Black Mirror, a British science fiction series created by Charlie Brooker, is a show that evaluates today’s society and our interaction with developing technologies, most particularly how these developments can often end up in consequences. Episode themes can often have a dark theme and handle very controversial topics. Each episode tells it own story in its own universe or even in the near future of our own society.
It has been just over one year since I first streamed the show that everyone who happened to own a social media account had been talking about. For myself, it was slightly confrontational watching the first few seasons, facing a possible future reality where people can ‘relieve’ their memories through recorded devices or even live in a completely VR (Virtual Reality) universe.
Whilst confronting, it allowed the audiences of the show to consider the reality of such developments that we could face. It engaging to watch an episode and then further explore the possibilities with other members of the shows audience on social media platforms such as Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook and Instagram. A group of people who have a co-interest of watching a TV show and discussing how possible it may be, Easter eggs and other points that the show may make that relate to today’s society eg. assisted dying (Episode. San Junipero)
The show also allowed room for the dark theme of the show to be given extensive thought. Recently released (December 2018) was an interactive episode for Black Mirror on Netflix called ‘Bandersnatch’, one of the first to a new step in online streaming. This episode followed a choose your own adventure game, that gave many choices where individuals were requested to make decisions for the protagonist that could lead to his own death. I found this interesting because it was the first time I saw an audience actively discussing the possibilities of a show and their own adventures with the show.
Black Mirror was an example for me how an audience can engage with one another and communicate about the episodes deeper meaning. It helped me understand that audiences don’t just have to sit and watch a show to be actually considered as an audience, but the interactions with one another and the deep interest in the show explained to me that a key part of the show was actually the audience. Hence the name ‘Black Mirror’ is a symbol of the screens that individuals watch the show on, we were the one’s looking into a ‘black mirror’ and the reflections we saw were ourselves – the audience. Is this something to reflect on as a member of the audience – does this say something about us and how we can impact the future? Let me know your thoughts.
https://www.cnet.com/news/black-mirror-netflix-season-4-every-episode-ranked/
Till next time.
Alex
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References –
Featured Image – https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2085059/ Featured Press Image, series advertising
https://www.cnet.com/news/black-mirror-netflix-season-4-every-episode-ranked/
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As someone who has not seen this series you sure have convinced me to give it a watch! I loved reading this, it shows how much attention you’ve paid to the episodes and social media is so relevant to what we will learn so you’ve really captured that aspect. I love how you’ve incorporated photos from the episodes!
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I love the Black Mirror series and you discuss it immaculately. I love the layout of your blog and the images that assist in the understanding of the storyline. This was really well written and definitely made me feel like re-watching the whole series!
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I’ve watched the first couple of seasons but I’m yet to watch Bandersnatch! Your blog really got me in the mood for it though. I think it’s really interesting to think that if this show came out 10 years ago, the audience wouldn’t have had as great of a reaction as they do now. With how fast technology has advanced, back then this would’ve seemed unrealistic but now its increasingly becoming more and more real. I love your 8bit background too!
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Thank you for reading my post! I do really find it interesting how the times change also impacts how the audience reacts with the television shows we watch! Some of these technology ideas can seem scarily close too!
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Black Mirror is amazing! This is such a great example to use for the blog topic. They definitely take their audience into consideration… not making the episodes too long, each ep is a different story so a new viewer can jump into any season without being lost, content that relates to our current behaviours, Bandersnatch being interactive, the show gets important discussions going, etc. I like how you added the meaning behind the name Black Mirror as well! I never really thought about it but it makes perfect sense. I think we’re definitely addicted to screen time and it’s just going to increase from here on out. You see kids with iPads and then that weird Momo thing? Things are definitely changing pretty quickly.
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