From bestiality to AI Miley Cyrus: The best, worst and weirdest episodes of Black Mirror

Not many shows jump from futuristic love story to workplace drama, or police procedural to folk horror, over a few episodes. Black Mirror can and does. Charlie Brooker’s sci-fi anthology series has been hopping genres for seven seasons, each episode warning us of the dangers of advancing technologies – to varying degrees of success.

So, with the new season recently landing on Netflix, we’re looking back at some of the best, weirdest and worst Black Mirror episodes to date.

Best

USS Callister (season 4, episode 1): If you’re a fan of Star Trek, Jesse Plemons and workplace dramas, then buckle up – this episode is the holy trinity. The co-founder of a video game company tires of his employees’ bullying, so he traps them in an offline, modified version of his Star Trek-style game, torturing them as he sees fit.

Its pop-cultural allusions, all-star cast and seriously dark twists won this episode four Primetime Emmys in 2018, including outstanding television movie. It was so popular that Netflix has delivered a sequel in the new season. However, the second sadly lacks the uncertainty and high stakes of the original.

San Junipero (season 3, episode 4)

Following three seasons of bleak speculative fiction, this episode is like an uplifting breath of fresh air. It introduces San Junipero, a digital reality in which the elderly can reconnect with loved ones who have chosen to spend their afterlife in a simulation of their younger bodies. It’s where two young women meet and fall in love despite complications in the real world.

Instead of technology driving people apart – which is essentially the ongoing theme throughout Black Mirror – San Junipero depicts a future in which it fosters genuine connection. Think of it as The Notebook, but for the digital age.

Finally, a Black Mirror episode that isn’t all doom and gloom!Credit: Netflix

Eulogy (season 7, episode 5): Loss and memory are also well-worn themes in the Black Mirror universe – take fan-favourites Be Right Back and The Entire History of You, for instance. But the newest season arguably offers the most thoughtful treatment to date.

A man learns his former lover has died. He’s asked to contribute to her eulogy, which is created by having loved ones literally step into photographs using AI tech to relive their memories – good or bad – with the deceased. For this man, played impeccably by Paul Giamatti, it’s an opportunity to reckon with the breakdown of a relationship he had long repressed.

Like San Junipero, it’s a rare episode that shows technology resolving emotional turmoil rather than aggravating it, in a sensitive and cinematic way.

Paul Giamatti will make you sob in this Black Mirror episode.Credit: Netflix

Weirdest

The National Anthem (season 1, episode 1): Beginning the whole series with an episode centred on bestiality is a pretty major swing. In The National Anthem, a beloved royal is kidnapped. The fictional British prime minister is ordered by the kidnappers to have sexual intercourse with a pig on national television in exchange for the princess’ release. He reluctantly agrees, only to discover the princess had been released 30 minutes before the broadcast.

This episode is like one giant trigger warning: Black Mirror is not a comfort show. Granted, it nods towards declining moral standards and government ineptitude, but it largely leaves you feeling queasy, enough to turn you off pork for at least a couple of weeks.

Joan Is Awful (season 6, episode 1): The crux of this episode is “read the terms & conditions”. It just takes a few major twists and turns to get there. Joan Tait (Annie Murphy) is living a rather unremarkable life until she comes across a show that mimics every detail of her daily life. It turns out a Netflix-esque streaming platform retained the right to turn Joan’s life into content when she signed up, and uses a quantum computer and AI-generated virtual actors to do so.

By the time Salma Hayek shows up, three separate reality timelines have appeared, and multiple people have defecated in a church, making the episode more surreal than thought-provoking. But Black Mirror makes surreal look good.

Salma Hayek leans into the weird in this Black Mirror episode.Credit: Netflix

Plaything (season 7, episode 4): What would happen if the world were taken over by a mass of tiny digital lifeforms created by an eccentric genius played by Will Poulter? That’s the gist of Plaything, and yes, it’s as weird as it sounds.

A timid video game journalist is invited to trial a state-of-the-art game, which is like a combination of Tamagotchis, Zoo Tycoon and The Sims. After stealing a copy, the journalist becomes obsessed with the game’s evolving creatures, eventually developing a way to communicate with them, and then agreeing to facilitate their plans for world domination.

It’s uncertain what this episode is really warning us against – too much gameplay? But it’s just strange enough to keep you engaged.

Worst

Smithereens (season 5, episode 2): Andrew Scott is an incredible actor (see Ripley), but even he couldn’t breathe life into this PSA-style episode. He plays a ride-share driver who lost his wife in a car accident because he was checking a notification from social media platform Smithereen. Blaming the company for her death, he kidnaps a Smithereen intern and ultimately ends up in a hostage stand-off.

It’s the age-old “don’t check your phone while driving” moral, but with absolutely zero stakes, even when Scott is wielding a gun.

Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (season 5, episode 3): Sorry, Miley Cyrus, this episode misses the mark. The real-life pop star plays a fictional singer whose identity has been controlled and downloaded onto AI dolls for fans. When she expresses desire for an edgier style, she’s forced into a coma.

Its reference to Britney Spears’ conservatorship and the “Free Britney” movement could have been entertainingly zeitgeist-y if it weren’t so on-the-nose. Add its strange aversion to pop music and it’s a dud episode.

What’s your favourite – or least favourite – episode of Black Mirror? Let us know in the comments below.

The seventh season of Black Mirror is on Netflix now.

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