For those expecting the subtle tameness of last week’s Be Right Back, Charlie Brooker’s latest
instalment of Black Mirror might need
a ‘Warning’ sign or at least some sort of emotional preparation to get viewers
through unscathed.
Instead, we’re thrown straight into confusion as the main
character, Victoria (Lenora Crichlow) wakes up in a chair surrounded by pills,
wrists bandaged and no recollection of how she got there or who she is. The
bewilderment is dragged out slightly with Victoria slowly scanning herself and
the room but it adds to the audiences need for understanding. The only clue to
foul play is the strange symbol on the room’s TV, which, as the show
progresses, keeps reappearing.
As Victoria finally ventures outside we’re barely allowed a
few moments to take in the estate’s residents, creepily filming her every move
through their windows, before a masked man aims a shotgun at her head and
chases her through the streets. From here on out all hell breaks loose and the
show suddenly becomes an apocalyptic style survival story with camera wielding
‘zombies’ following Victoria as she tries to evade numerous crazed murderers.
Up until this point Brooker definitely goes with the ‘less
is more’ idea in terms of dialogue. Victoria is the only character to speak,
only sobbing and wailing, ‘who am I?’
and ‘Can you help me?’ over and over.
Crichlow plays the part extremely well, out-acting everyone else as her screams
become more desperate and terrorized, literally making you uncomfortable as a
voyeur.
It’s a rebel survivor (Tuppence Middleton) who helps to move
the story on in terms of dialogue and purpose as she plans to destroy a
transmitter at White Bear, which is supposedly causing the epidemic. However, Middleton’s
decisive and brave manner starts to create impatience with Victoria. I found
myself wanting to shake her into action, instead of allowing herself to be
dragged around as she blubbers.
At this point, the plot seems pretty straight forward and reminiscent
of Derren Brown’s Apocalypse. Until
the plot twist his you in the face like an atomic bomb.
Victoria is instantly
flipped from the character of pity to a Myra-Hindley style villain, serving out
a twisted sentence at a “Punishment Park” which is White Bear. Her ordeal is a
setup she is doomed to repeat after she filmed the murder of a young child,
carried out by her fiancé. The strange reoccurring symbol? One of her fiancé’s
tattoo’s. The Zombie like camera men?
Paying visitors symbolising her past crime. Each night her memory is
painfully removed via electric shock therapy, an ordeal we are forced to watch.
The rug-pull twist finds power in its relation to real-life
murders and the public’s thirst for punishment. It leaves you fearful of how
far the Justice System could go, leaving you to question: would we revel in the
punishment or see the cruelty? It even plants a nasty squirm in your stomach as
you contemplate Brooker’s attack on how often we all choose to see life through
a camera lens, hoping for a YouTube hit, than with empathy and morals.
Once again, Brooker shows strong writing, intelligent ideas
and an uncanny knack for creating a troubling reflection of society.
Score: 8.5/10
