A Netflix pickup of the hit show about the evils of technology keeps its dark spirit but injects a bigger budget, a raft of starry names and way more surprises

By the end of Black Mirror’s UK run, the show, while still impressive, was in danger of turning into self-parody. There was even a joke account tweeting out faux stories about how our nefarious iPads and sinister Facebook accounts were secretly plotting against us.



But after it proved a hit on Netflix in the US, the streaming platform (whose monopoly over our viewing habits could easily be the basis of a future episode) bought the rights and commissioned a splashy new series. With Charlie Brooker onboard but with a bigger budget and a starry new cast, it’s a minor victory that the show not only retains its dark spirit but adds yet more complexity.

In the first two episodes, showing as part of the small-screen strand of the Toronto film festival, Brooker (with help from a new team of big names) displayed his knack for exploring not only the evils of technology but the life-changing benefits it might bring. In San Junipero, we follow Yorkie (Mackenzie Davis), a gawky young woman in the 1980s, uncomfortably traversing her way through a club filled with others having more fun than her. One of these is Kelly (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), a sexually confident woman who tries to bring Yorkie out of her shell. But there are limitations, both with what Yorkie is comfortable doing and the strange focus on time that threatens to bring their fun to an end at midnight.

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To say much more about the plot would be a spoiler, but Brooker takes us to surprising and ultimately poignant places. Davis and Mbatha-Raw are both sorely underused actors and their journey provides them with a welcome opportunity to impress with their emotional range, pulling us into a story of forbidden and unusual same-sex love.

The second episode Nosedive is more traditionally Black Mirror in its tale of the sinister side of technological progress, but it’s pulled off with a freshness that prevents it from ever feeling heavy-handed. Lacie (Bryce Dallas Howard) is a woman keen to achieve self-improvement. In the world she lives in that means improving her public rating, which is done by impressing others with her social media presence and daily interactions. Everything is given a score, from her small talk in the elevator to the quality of her cutesy coffee shop pictures. When school friend Naomi (Alice Eve) asks her to be maid-of-honour at her glamorous wedding, Lacie sees a chance to make a major change to her life.

Co-written by Rashida Jones and directed by Joe Wright, Nosedive manages to create a believable and aesthetically impressive mini-universe without the need for tiresome exposition. As with most episodes, it’s an extension of our world with the excessive reliance on social media popularity and the dull preponderance of sweetly inane personalities winning out. Your rating increases with every nice thing you say and do, even if you’re lying through your teeth, which makes the tension slowly escalate throughout. Howard expertly nails a woman trying to be liked but masking a set of negative, or even just honest, reactions and emotions that threaten to bubble over.

Both episodes boast a cinematic sheen, allowing for more immersive world-creation and even more ambitious narratives. Brooker’s show retains its status as a marvel, hinting at darker and greater things to come.