But the technology our two leading gentlemen utilize is a virtual reality video game where you can actually “feel everything,” and that’s something our current society is nowhere near capable of.įifteen Million Merits (2011) /bd7Xmu9lxQ I think people fall in love like this all the time, through whatever their preferred platform is. I don’t think “Striking Vipers” is all that wild from a distanced perspective. And, of course, whether any experienced “love” itself is even tangible. If virtual applications can make someone’s gender identity and sexuality fluid. The affect it has on actual interpersonal relationships - in this scenario, one of the characters’ wives. The question of whether the love is still there when it’s not virtual. “Striking Vipers” is Black Mirror’s “Can you fall in love with someone you primarily spend time online with?” story, and it nails every chord. Premise: Two heterosexual best friends unearth romantic feelings for each other within the confines of a fighting video game. To say the least: I don’t doubt the near-future possibility, and I don’t think there’s much of a “society” left if it occurs. However, we remain one final massive jump away: Turning a killer’s plight into live entertainment everyone can participate in, so to speak. I think, and terrifyingly so, we’re already on the verge of this kind of world with a limited concept of forgiveness as we ostracize people in our vicinity. It’s even a biting critique of vigilantism against criminals.įrom this perspective, I don’t think “White Bear” is impossible. It asks how exposure to violence desensitizes us through technology and even snatches away our collective empathy for others. It is a commentary on how we view people who “must” be punished for breaking the social contract at all costs. “White Bear” is a quintessential Black Mirror story. She later learns this is a punishment for a heinous crime she no longer remembers. Premise: A woman desperately flees killers as bystanders do nothing to intervene. But this is a level of technological advancement and a complete lack of a rule of law in digital media that I don’t think we’ll ever reach. I feel for Annie Murphy and Salma Hayek’s plight here, er, their characters, I mean. Flip it into coherent programming within one typical white-collar work shift (at most), thanks to A.I., is patently ridiculous. Take your life wholly as its intellectual property, andĢ. However, the idea that any streaming giant would be able to:ġ. “Joan Is Awful” is a prime example as it walks us through the horrifying potential dangers of clicking through those terms and conditions contracts we mindlessly sign so we can play with our phones. There are seemingly few things Netflix loves doing more than “joking” about itself. Premise: A terms and conditions agreement that a woman signed entitles a fictional streaming organization to broadcast every detail of her life as entertainment and as it happens. Warning: Some of these “fictions” have kind of already come to pass off our screens, and coming to terms with that is NOT for the faint of heart. If it’s one or the other, it’s probably lower on the list. If both sentiments apply, the plausibility rises accordingly. Is the human destructiveness premise itself, technology or element or not, believable or transferable?.How believable/how far away are we from the central technology or element?.I want to stress that my criteria for plausibility evaluation are rooted in three factors: With the sixth season of Black Mirror now on Netflix, here’s For The Win’s ranking how believable the horror of every episode is. Even if most of these stories are enthralling, not every concept is believable for the time being. Rod Serling and his spiritual predecessor in The Twilight Zone must be so proud. It resonates expressly because you can absolutely envision the dark side of humanity rearing its ugly head in these stories. More often than not, Black Mirror admonishes us for tearing our world apart together because of our primal selfishness, egos and need to be unique. This isn’t to say it couldn’t come about in the future, but some episodes’ conceits feel like they’re decades away rather than years. Nor is every piece of technology plausible in our present reality. And as a result, the show reflects the flaws of advanced human technology and the worst impulses of our nature that it feeds and cultivates.īut not every Black Mirror episode is necessarily about the foibles of technology. It refers to the reflective (and empty) black screen when we’re not using our computer, phone or television. HEAVY SPOILERS AHEAD.Įven more than a decade since its inception, Black Mirror’s simple title always gets me. BETTER YET, DO NOT READ IF YOU HAVEN’T SEEN MOST OF BLACK MIRROR. WARNING: DO NOT READ FURTHER IF YOU HAVEN’T WATCHED SEASON 6 OF BLACK MIRROR.
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