Charlie Brooker - Black Mirror

[therockbox]

Only just heard about this, a series of three stand-alone episodes with the first one tomorrow night on Channel 4.

Charlie Brooker, the author of E4's BAFTA-nominated Dead Set, returns with a new three-part 60 minute mini-series. Charlie authors two of the three films while the third is written by Jesse Armstrong (Peep Show, The Thick of It, Fresh Meat).

Over the last ten years, technology has transformed almost every aspect of our lives before we've had time to stop and question it. In every home; on every desk; in every palm - a plasma screen; a monitor; a smartphone - a black mirror of our 21st Century existence.

Our grip on reality is shifting. We worship at the altars of Google and Apple. Facebook algorithms know us more intimately than our own parents. We have access to all the information in the world, but no brain space left to absorb anything longer than a 140-character tweet.

Black Mirror taps into the collective unease about our modern world. The three stand-alone dramas are sharp, suspenseful, satirical tales with a techno-paranoia bent.

The first episode is called The National Anthem;

A twisted parable for the Twitter age, 'The National Anthem' looks at how information is now disseminated so quickly and public opinion now so loud, powerful and quick to change, that life is very much harder for the rich and supposedly powerful. It's a political thriller in which the fictional Prime Minister Michael Callow (Rory Kinnear) faces a huge and shocking dilemma when Princess Susannah, a much-loved member of the Royal Family, is kidnapped.

I enjoyed Dead Set so I'll be watching this. The first two episodes are written by Brooker (Konnie Huq co-wrote the second episode), and the third by Jesse Armstrong, so I'm looking forward to that one as well.

[King Ellis]

"Unfunny, deeply unpleasant, and not clever"

[jack95]

"Unfunny, deeply unpleasant, and not clever"

That's a quote from the Daily Mail though, and a negative review from the Daily Mail usually means you're doing something right.

[Gazz]

Anyone watch?

[R.W.]

Yep, thought it was really good.

[King Ellis]

Waiting for (spoilers):

P.M's questions or a random journo.

"Mr Cameron, would you fuck a pig?"

"Well, look, that's just not..."

"For the sake of Kate Middleton, Mr Cameron?"

[METALMAN]

Waiting for (spoilers):

P.M's questions or a random journo.

"Mr Cameron, would you fuck a pig?"

"Well, look, that's just not..."

"For the sake of Kate Middleton, Mr Cameron?"

Why would he want to fuck a pig when he already fucks a horse?

[Dingle]

Ahh can't believe I missed this, I'm assuming it'll be up on 4OD soon so I'll have to watch it then.

[Skummy]

Curse my not watching anything but iPlayer, and having given up on Twitter! I had no idea this was even happening. Will definitely have to track this down, fucking love Brooker.

[Dynamite]

Yeah, anybody who hasn't watched it should track it down. I found it really enjoyable. Great writing to make such an unlikely scenario seem so possible.

[Cactus Drags]

Genuinely unsettling, but really well done, it could quite easily have gone the "HEY EVERYBODY LAUGH AT THIS RIDICULOUS SITUATION GUFFAW" but it handled it well. Facepalm moment looking at Twitter at the people who just didn't get it though.

[Vamp]

To be fair to the Daily Mail (fuck, I never thought I'd say that) it wasn't really clever. It was decent for what it was, dark twisted entertainment, but it really wasn't anything else. Worth a watch though, especially since there's bugger all else on Sundays, and especially since there's very little satire on, but I don't think it was as clever as it seemed it thought it was. Some of the acting was great though, mainly the PM's wife. I've been on a bit of a downer when it comes to Brooker lately. That's mainly from the slip in quality of his Guardian articles though.

[Walker]

It really wasn't trying to be clever though. It was Brooker saying this is what society is like now; if this unlikely event happened, this is how people would react. On that level, he did a fantastic job with it. There was clearly a lot of effort put into minor background details, like the YouTube comments and the tweets, and I loved that. As far as black comedy goes, it is as black as you are going to get - the main comedic aspect, the absurd notion of the PM fucking a pig on TV, is rendered entirely unfunny by the second half of the show and that is down to some excellent writing. I guess the message is a rather clichéd "It is funny until someone gets hurt", but I'm fine with that because it worked.

I can't wait till next weeks show, even if it does end up being all too similar to Dead Set in certain ways.

Edited December 5, 2011 by WalkerWGZ

[Vamp]

Not trying to be clever? I don't believe that for a second. Even ignoring that, it hasn't stopped people on twitter and so forth proclaiming it's genius, which is more what I was getting at. And that the Daily Mail were right when they said it wasn't clever. Not that I'm saying the rest of the review was. Even the idea that that's how people would react I'm dubious on. For a starter I don't believe that the Prime Minister wouldn't go in public before the event and try to resign for her life instead since at the stage they believe the culprit wants excercise power over the government. And while of course it was exaggerated for dramatic effect, I don't actually believe the streets woud completely empty for it. They wouldn't. Nor that a news show editor would be stupid enough to tell his journalist to run which got her shot. So it certainly wasn't very much about people and how they'd react. That's not me even being picky and pointing at plot holes, those are just basic human reactions that wouldn't have happened. If I was going to point out plotholes they couldn't tell a fucking princesses hand from a painters.

Yeah, people are really making this soujnd like it was better written than it was. I'm not saying it was bad, it was decent dark fluff, but it was still fluff. That's not to say some of it didn't have merit. A satire involving government where the government isn't completely inept (bar the fucking finger, but everyone seemed to miss that, that's what makes me weap more for humanity) is nice to have. Even if the plaudits of the show seem to think it was a political satire. I'm not really sure how. And secondly the fact that it was assumed to be a Muslim terroist plot when it came from the mind of a fucked up painter, and actually there was far more intrigue for me in that one subplot than there was in the rest of the show. Like I said, decent, if not great, satire is welcome on my box.

[Cactus Drags]

If a fucking military unit had just caught me somewhere I technically shouldn't even know is relevant to the story, with no visible credentials or proper film crew with me, yeah, I'd run. Quite how quick to shoot her was perhaps more questionable.

[King Ellis]

I would have thought they're supposed to take non lethal shots in situations such as that. This was their only lead and someone is fleeing the scene so they need to catch them somehow.

[R.W.]

She'd have been shot just as quick in real life - warned to stop several times, kept running. The only difference is they probably would have killed her in reality. Ask Jean Charles de Menezes

As for Vamp's point about the finger - you'd be surprised how many men have "girly" fingers and vice versa.

[GA!]

Just watched it. I thought it was brilliant, done really well, very realistic in what would happen if such a scenario came up. It was "unfunny... and not clever" but people easily forget that satire, at its core, is neither of those things (any of those elements added is just a bonus).

[Herr Matzat]

Great first episode.

Very nice trailer (that dos not seem to spoile anything, at least not after seeing the first episode)

Edited December 5, 2011 by Michael Matzat on a Plane

[Walker]

The only thing I really agree with Vamp is the streets being empty. I don't think they would have been too, especially not in London.

The finger I can sort of explain because when you have a hostage situation and a severed finger shows up, you kind of just jump to conclusions.