'Black Mirror' Season 7 Review: AI, Memory, and the Cost of Being Human

Black Mirror Season 7 Review

Episode One  - Common People

Subscription-based healthcare is a real scare as technology evolves. This episode introduces Mike (Chris O'Dowd) and Amanda (Rashida Jones) as a couple who went through a crisis when Amanda goes into a coma due to a neurological illness. A new technology, Rivermind, can save her. The surgery is free, but there is a monthly subscription fee.  Her husband, Mike, is willing to do anything to save her, so he agrees to the procedure and subsequent monthly fee.

Amanda's life depends on Rivermind Technologies' plan, which, at the basic fee level, subjects her to prolonged sleep. Eventually, as technology advances and updates, Amanda begins to sleep more and even has her consciousness taken over by random ads that she recites at any time.  Of course, Rivermind has a new, premium package, and the existing package is now labeled “Common”.  

It becomes a continuous grab at money and is a critique of the commodification of the healthcare system. Instead of providing a cure, just selling a treatment plan that patients must continually pay for even when they can barely afford it.

Episode 2 - Bête Noire

A culinary researcher, Maria, portrayed by Siena Kelly, has her world turned upside down when a former classmate participates in a focus group at her job. Verity, portrayed by Rosy McEwen, was bullied in high school, and she has a bone to pick with Maria.  She is out for revenge and effortlessly infiltrates Maria's workplace. She is able to easily gaslight Maria and see she has something on her side that can shift reality with a click of a button. Things are not as they seem. It keeps you locked in until the end of the episode and ends with a twist I was hoping for.

Episode 3 - Hotel Reverie

Hotel Reverie blends romance with science fiction and looks at AI and virtual reality differently. Similar in some ways to "Common People". It is a different technology that saves Hollywood millions on remakes. It allows an actor or actress to submerge themselves in the fictional world that the filmmaker creates with equipment that takes them into a virtual environment. This environment is captured and able to be broadcast. Actress Brandy Friday, portrayed by Issa Rae, participates in a virtual remake of a 1940s film. The characters are all AI recreations of original characters.  One AI begins to form a consciousness as her connection with Brandy deepens. Clara, portrayed by Emma Corrin, and Brandy challenge and shape their reality, AI Consciousness, and its relation to feelings of love and independence.  It explores the emotional consequences of immersive technologies as we see today with the emergence of AI girlfriends and boyfriends and how it can impact the human psyche.

Episode 4 -  Plaything

A former game programmer is interrogated for a murder that happened decades before. To recount this murder, he has to go back to the nineties when he was given the opportunity to work on a new game by a developer he respected. The game, along with acid, led to the descent into madness of someone who was already mentally unstable. This one is too good to give away. I will leave this quote here and talk more about it in conclusion.  "Humans somehow consider other forms of life less than them. Inherently dispensable, ask the Dodo if you don’t believe me. Artificial lifeforms are the lowest of the low. Just playthings to us.”

Episode 5 - Eulogy

Eulogy is a company that collects recollections for memorial services. Phillip, portrayed by Paul Giamatti, receives a call from the company to eulogize a woman with whom he has a romantic history. They send him the kit, a small disk that is placed on the temple to calibrate the system. Then he has to think of Carol, his ex. He is having trouble with those memories, so the representative that he is connected with via the disc. talks him through it. He finds physical photos, and the technology allows him to draw memories from them by transporting him into the image by looking at it. He is virtually transported back in time via the picture; his guide shows up in the flesh to walk him through the photo to help trigger his memory. This is an emotional and touching episode. This episode has a twist that I was not expecting.

Episode 6 -  USS Callister: Into Infinity

This is the sequel to the acclaimed "USS Callister" episode; if I am honest, it does not compare to that. It lost me early on and never managed to quite pull me in.

Overall Review

Season 7 of Black Mirror is far better than the previous season. It honors the series tradition of dark intersections of technology and the nature of man. Each episode deals with groundbreaking technology and asks, “How far can we take technology, and how far is too far?”  Overall, it's a series tradition for Black Mirror. The performances were stellar: Paul Giamatti (Eulogy), Peter Capaldi (Plaything), Rashida Jones/Chris O’Dowd (Common People), and Emma Corrin (Reverie) gave standout performances to me. Issa Rae, a favorite of mine who has made questionable acting choices, has been heavily criticized, but I am not sure if it is fair here. I feel that “Reverie” has a certain intentionality in highlighting an AI film versus something authentic so those acting choices could be intentional. She is the human player of a white male character, which some viewers were unhappy with; I saw it as a look at how deepfakes can work and how AI can be dangerous. AI seemed to be the theme of the season.

I was entertained by all of the episodes except the last. Reverie was a bit slow in the middle; it was my second least favorite. Common People, Bete Noire, and Plaything are the best episodes in the six-part series. Overall, I graded the season a B, which is very good, very Black Mirror.

What did you think?

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