Black Mirror Series 2 (2013) - Review

Starring: Hayley Atwell, Domhnall Gleeson, Lenora Critchlow & Daniel Rigby

Written By: Charlie Brooker

Directed By: Owen Harris, Carl Tibbetts & Bryn Higgins

Certificate: 15

 

Following the success of Black Mirror's first series, the show was recommissioned for another three episodes to be broadcast in early 2013. The second series saw the start of growing interest in the show, as it continued to examine and deconstruct our relationship with technology, the implications it's already having on our society, and what it may hold for the future. As with my previous review of the first series, I'll be looking at each episode individually and examining their content, what they have to say about their themes, and how effectively they manage this.

 

The first episode of the series, Be Right Back, takes place in what appears to be an alternate present day setting. Young couple Martha and Ash move to a remote house in the countryside, but a day after moving in, Ash is killed in a car crash. As a devastated Martha mourns the loss of her boyfriend, a friend introduces her to a new online service that allows people to stay in touch with the deceased by creating a virtual copy based off their social media profiles. Although she is initially reluctant, after discovering she is pregnant, Martha starts communicating with a virtual Ash, and gradually becomes more and more dependent on this re-creation. One of the first themes to pick up on in Be Right Back is that of social media addiction and the negative consequences that it can bring. As social media becomes the dominant form of communication for many of us, it can gradually draw each of us in to the point that we can't imagine life without it. I speak from experience when I say that it's scary how quickly and unconsciously we can develop this addiction. The more the addiction grows, the more we start to lose sight of the world outside of social media, which is best seen through Ash. We don't spend much time with the original Ash in this episode, but from what we do see, his social media addiction becomes apparent, spending much of his time on his phone. It wouldn't even be too much to assume that Ash's inability to properly separate himself from his phone is what caused his off-screen car crash. With Ash gone, this addiction appears to pass itself into Martha, especially once she starts to rely on the virtual Ash. When she drops her phone and panics, she is distraught and even tells the virtual Ash “I dropped you!” - unable to separate him from the phone. However, an even meatier theme of this episode concerns the information that can be gathered through social media. It's scary when we stop and think how much of our lives we upload and keep catalogued forever on social media, and it's only because of how much Ash shared his life online that a reconstruction can be made. Social media companies learn and collect so much data from us, that they could feasibly recreate any of us in the event of our death. In the near future, the technology this episode presents could become a conceivable reality.

 

Many of these ideas have been explored and discussed before this episode came about, so despite how effective it is in presenting them, on their own, they wouldn't be enough to make this episode particularly original. But what makes Be Right Back an even smarter bit of television is that it presents two sides of the argument. Yes, it's unnerving how much of our lives we share and commit online, BUT it rarely becomes enough that it would make an entirely accurate reconstruction of someone. I again speak from experience when I say that when we share something about our lives on social media, it rarely paints a 100% accurate picture of our lives. We all more or less tend to condense it to the things we enjoy, and are willing to share. Be Right Back walks a thin line between commenting on how much we share, and commenting on how it doesn't create an accurate picture anyway. The latter half of this is best seen when the Ash doppelgänger is introduced to the story. The scene of him and Martha having sex is eerie in how unsettling it feels, and brings back memories of a similar scene from The Entire History Of You. This Ash's passivity and inability to fight back once Martha grows hostile towards him has such an unnatural feel about it, and shows how there's nothing human anymore beyond the pre-programmed quirks of the original Ash. In the end, this technology does more harm than good as it prevents Martha from letting go of someone she loved, and instead she rather poetically ends up with her mistake literally living right above her, as Ash is confined to the attic. As with practically every episode of Black Mirror, the thing that neatly wraps all this episode's thematic content together is the production values and the strength of the performances. Hayley Atwell does a tremendous job portraying the grief and hurt of losing a loved one, and Domhnall Gleeson still manages to be creepy as the Ash replacement, despite his passive, almost innocent demeanour. With a haunting soundtrack, impressive direction and plenty of symbolism in the isolated house setting, Be Right Back is a fantastic opener to the series.

 

Our next entry to the series is White Bear, which takes place in another alternate present day reality. In the episode, a woman wakes up with no recollection of who or where she is. When she goes outside, she is met with people filming her on their phones, and “hunters” armed and in pursuit of her. In her attempts to escape, she meets Jem who explains that a signal being broadcast by a nearby transmitter has turned people into voyeurs, and together they must stop the signal to free everyone. Compared to the previous episode, the technology in White Bear has a much more minimal presence, to the point where it's little more than a plot device that allows for debate on quite a different topic. (Skip ahead to the next paragraph now to avoid spoilers!) To discuss this episode properly, we have to talk about the major twist that comes roughly half an hour into the episode, with the reveal of who Victoria really is. The reveal that Victoria was the accomplice to a serious crime, where her fiancée abducted and killed a young girl, raises a huge amount of ethical issues surrounding criminal justice and punishment. As a society, we often become desensitized and see people saying how they want to make criminals suffer. While in some cases, especially for people who've been victims to a crime, this is an understandable reaction, we have to stop and ask if someone like Victoria deserves this punishment. No matter the seriousness of the crime, if we deliberately condition someone so they can no longer remember what they did, making them suffer over and over again, how can we still be punishing the same person? If we do the same thing to criminals that they've done to others, with Victoria's suffering being constantly filmed by the visitors, then how are we better than them and how is that justice?

 

While White Bear gives us this kind of content to chew on, the brutal and unforgiving tone of this episode shouldn't be overlooked either. White Bear is still one of my favourite Black Mirror episodes to date (and probably my favourite of this series) for how visceral it feels in its presentation. Even without its social commentary, this episode works as a compelling and dangerous thriller that feels incredibly dark, even by Black Mirror's standards. Being chased by a man in a balaclava with a shotgun, having masked hunters in pursuit waving carving knives around, and even seeing Victoria restrained and about to have a power drill put through her back – so much of this episode is messed up to watch. It also works as an engaging mystery plot too, keeping us guessing about the significance of things such as the symbols on the TV screens or the titular white bear. And like any good mystery, the pay-off is horrifying yet satisfying, and the episode teases us and gradually reveals bits of information along the way as we see Victoria experience brief memory flashbacks. The only real criticism I could make about White Bear becomes apparent once you've watched it and it starts to linger in your mind. Once you start to think about the huge cost and impracticalities that must come with running somewhere like the White Bear Justice Park, it's when the episode starts to slightly falter. Given that Victoria endures this punishment again and again for filming a crime, we can assume that a similar setup is used for punishing other criminals, but the space you'd need and the cost of maintaining it for that number of criminals would be far too much. It's nowhere near enough to discredit this episode, but it's something that starts to play on your mind when you're not watching in the moment

 

For the final episode of the series, we return to a contemporary political thriller – The Waldo Moment. We are introduced to Jamie, a failed comedian, and the voice actor behind a vulgar blue cartoon bear, Waldo. Waldo, already popular with viewers, gains more popularity after an interview with Conservative politician, Liam Monroe. Following the interview, the producers behind Waldo enter the character into a local by-election, standing against other serious politicians. Waldo's crude interactions with his opposing candidates sees his popularity continue to grow and grow, to the point where he stands a serious chance of being elected. The Waldo Moment often ends up being regarded as the 'dud' episode of Black Mirror, and while I would personally agree that this is one of the show's weaker entries, it isn't fair to simply dismiss it as it's still far from bad. If anything, The Waldo Moment is proof that Charlie Brooker is a writer ahead of his time, because as many people have pointed out, this episode bares some scary parallels with the 2016 U.S. Election. The Waldo Moment has aged incredibly well, and looking at the developments that have occurred in the world of politics since it was first broadcast in 2013, it's much more appropriate to be reviewing it more than three years later. In fact, I'd argue the reason this episode was met with such a lukewarm response when it was first released is because there's no real reason why Waldo's campaign should last more than fifteen minutes, rather like a certain individual's campaign in the 2016 U.S. Election, yet it does. In the episode, we see Waldo using outrageous behaviour to attract public and media attention, whilst speaking in a tone familiar and popular with many voters to attack and deconstruct the political system they have become more and more disenfranchised with, yet he has nothing of positivity to offer in its place. Now doesn't this sound familiar? Despite the differences in context, the similarities between Waldo's and Donald Trump's election campaign are uncanny. Both exhibit disgusting behaviour, both are unsuitable for any position of responsibility, and both offer nothing of any merit to replace the existing system. So what can we take from this? The message I always take from The Waldo Moment is recognition of the fact that something in the current political system needs to change, but that doesn't mean that just anything is a good replacement. “Anything would be better than this” doesn't apply, even to the tired, unequal and ineffective system we currently tolerate.

 

So if this episode has aged so well, why doesn't it stand tall head and shoulders with some of the others around it? Although The Waldo Moment is far from bad, it lacks the compelling story that the best episodes of Black Mirror can provide. Episodes like The National Anthem, Fifteen Million Merits, White Bear and more have both engaging stories and a lot of content to unpack and discuss. While the substance in The Waldo Moment has definitely come along, especially as it's aged, the story sadly doesn't impress as much. Our main protagonist, Jamie, ends up feeling like one of the least interesting aspects of the episode, and other characters such as Gwendolyn don't fare any better, despite decent performances. The two just don't stand out to me, and certain plot developments surrounding their relationship don't feel entirely convincing, especially the moment where the two end up having sex. Once you look past the political content within The Waldo Moment, the story itself has little to offer. 

However when it comes to this series as a whole, the result is very different, and Black Mirror's second series is once again a triumph. The show carries over everything that made the first series such a success, implementing a variety of genres, tones and stories to explore plenty of wildly interesting content. Still justified in its cynicism, and still with the same ability to capture your thoughts long after watching, this second series of Black Mirror deserves just as much love and praise as its first.

Be Right Back



9/10

White Bear



9/10

The Waldo Moment



7/10