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I didn’t really get the point of Striking Vipers at first, I thought them getting together in the game would lead to something else, but then that was basically the entire plot and there was no real twist to smack you in the face like I kept waiting for. It seems like they could have told the story in half the time as well, it really dragged after a while and was soooo slow, but then I don’t think that any of the episodes from series 5 needed to be over an hour long personally. Part of me wondered if they were deliberately making the episodes really bloated just so that they would feel more like mini movies, and thus could compete more in certain categories in the Emmys and other award shows, otherwise it seems that they could easily all have been tightened to 30-40 minutes to help with the pacing?
Still Striking Vipers is an episode that improves on rewatch once you actually know where it’s going, and that it’s more of an exploration of sexuality than it is an episode with the usual Black Mirror twist. My interpretation was that Karl was just in it for the sex between their avatars, but it came across to me from how the actor played it that Danny really did feel feeling something after they kissed? But it seemed like the idea was meant to be that they were in love, but they couldn’t physically be together as themselves because they just weren’t attracted to one another outside of the game? I’m assuming that’s what the episode was going for at least, that they were emotionally intimate, but not physically compatible in the real world? It wouldn’t make sense for them to be willing to kiss and test it out if they were that repressed about possibly being gay, so it seemed like the idea was meant to be that the attraction honestly wasn’t there in RL, but I don’t know if the actor playing Danny got the memo :P
It was interesting how it seems like a happy ending at first, but then actually when you think about it, it’s pretty depressing that Danny and Karl only get one day a year together that they can really look forward too with Danny getting to escape the monotony of his marriage, while Karl is just desperate to really connect with another person. It didn’t have the usual shocking Black Mirror twist at the end, but I did find the whole episode quite bittersweet and depressing if you think about it as them using the game to escape from the mundane reality that is their adult lives :(
And Smithereens was mixed for me. The acting was good, but it was basically just a standard hostage drama, it didn’t really feel like a Black Mirror episode. It felt like there was too much emphasis on the police POV, even though clearly they really wanted to make their point be about social media and how much information those companies can store on us, but it didn’t fully come across when most of the episode just felt like your standard detective show. And then the ending felt a bit too on the nose and preachy imo when we found out that the entire scenario was because of his phone distracting him while driving. The episode just felt like Charlie Brooker lecturing the younger generation and their obsession with never looking up from their smartphones, and I guess that is Black Mirror’s thing to be fair lol, but I just found it to be really heavy handed when it’s played completely straight and without the usual slightly distorted and futuristic version of our world that you get. Something like Nosedive made far more of an impact with its look at how far we might eventually take our chasing of social media likes.
Idk though, maybe I find it hard to fully buy into episodes that are all about how social media has desensitised us and everyone is more disengaged from the real world, because really humans have historically *always* brushed most tragedies aside and got on with their day unless it immediately affects them. I don’t see how having a brief reaction to a breaking news twitter notification is so drastically different from how someone might have responded to a newspaper story or a television news story 30 years ago that involves people that they don’t know. Might sound harsh, but you can’t sit there crying and having ~deep thoughts~ every time there’s a loss of life, you’d basically be spending every day depressed and over emphasising in that case, so I don’t agree that social media has made humans worse in that respect.
And certainly going online to talk to people has enriched the lives of many people who are socially awkward and don’t have any rl friends. Introverted and shy people would not have any more friends if the internet had never existed, they would just be a lot lonelier if they didn’t have that option to meet likeminded people online to share their common interests, so to my mind the internet was really a blessing for them :shrug: I know that today’s older generation aren’t as tech savvy, but I imagine also that a lot of older people in future years will feel far less isolated when they have the internet to connect with people from all over the world, although obviously physical human contact is important as well
And I’m not 100% sure how I feel about Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too. I know that some people *really* hated it, it seems like it was too Americanised for a lot of viewers, but I didn’t think it was horrible or anything. At first I was pretty into the idea of an episode focused on music industry exploitation, I would have liked a darker ending actually of her remaining in a coma and still aware of what was going on, while her hologram keeps her career going, instead things did get a bit cheesy towards the end. But at the same time a lot of really dark things did happen to Ashley, I thought it was horrifying that her aunt basically brought her up, and yet only cared about her as a product and the best way to market her. It felt like a very effective commentary on how the music industry markets singers, it’s already been pointed out that there were a lot of parallels to Britney Spears if you believe the stories that are currently going round on her father holding her under a conservatorship against her will
I saw a suggestion on reddit for an alternative ending that I really liked, where Rachel is confronted with the real edgier and darker Ashley coming out of the coma, and ultimately decides to plug her back in so that she can keep Ashley Eternity instead, and apologises, ‘sorry, I’m just such a big fan’. That would have been a more typically Black Mirror ending and way of commenting on how fans love the product over the person, instead of having it end on the slightly cheesy moment of Ashley rocking out, and her two former fans running out saying that they hated it. I’m going to assume that the second half of the episode was a deliberate satire of Disney movies, but it still felt a bit 🙄 at times lol. I think the episode would of worked better with more focus on Ashley and her management team maybe, and less on the two sisters going to rescue her
Overall I felt like Bandersnatch kind of overshadowed series 5, I suspect it was more work than they had anticipated, and they spend so much time and money on it that they ended up rushing these three episodes. I liked Bandersnatch, but none of series 5 produced any standout episodes for me, and that was disappointing when quite honestly you’d have expected all three of them to be classics considering that well there were only three episodes
And on another note, it seems like Netflix has really been lacking in the U.K. recently, I’ve noticed that they hardly add any new shows these days that aren’t Netflix originals. It seems like their deal with the CW must have come to an end for starters as they haven’t added any of their newer shows like Legacies and Roswell New Mexico (and I really wanted to see that one!), it’s just been the new seasons of shows that they already had an existing arrangement with. Traditionally they’ve always included tons of shows from the other US networks, they were one of the easiest ways to find shows like Breaking Bad, The Good Place, Suits, Hannibal etc etc. And they’re all still there thankfully, but they’ve hardly picking up any new shows. Hopefully not a sign of things to come, but I suspect that it is :(
Still Striking Vipers is an episode that improves on rewatch once you actually know where it’s going, and that it’s more of an exploration of sexuality than it is an episode with the usual Black Mirror twist. My interpretation was that Karl was just in it for the sex between their avatars, but it came across to me from how the actor played it that Danny really did feel feeling something after they kissed? But it seemed like the idea was meant to be that they were in love, but they couldn’t physically be together as themselves because they just weren’t attracted to one another outside of the game? I’m assuming that’s what the episode was going for at least, that they were emotionally intimate, but not physically compatible in the real world? It wouldn’t make sense for them to be willing to kiss and test it out if they were that repressed about possibly being gay, so it seemed like the idea was meant to be that the attraction honestly wasn’t there in RL, but I don’t know if the actor playing Danny got the memo :P
It was interesting how it seems like a happy ending at first, but then actually when you think about it, it’s pretty depressing that Danny and Karl only get one day a year together that they can really look forward too with Danny getting to escape the monotony of his marriage, while Karl is just desperate to really connect with another person. It didn’t have the usual shocking Black Mirror twist at the end, but I did find the whole episode quite bittersweet and depressing if you think about it as them using the game to escape from the mundane reality that is their adult lives :(
And Smithereens was mixed for me. The acting was good, but it was basically just a standard hostage drama, it didn’t really feel like a Black Mirror episode. It felt like there was too much emphasis on the police POV, even though clearly they really wanted to make their point be about social media and how much information those companies can store on us, but it didn’t fully come across when most of the episode just felt like your standard detective show. And then the ending felt a bit too on the nose and preachy imo when we found out that the entire scenario was because of his phone distracting him while driving. The episode just felt like Charlie Brooker lecturing the younger generation and their obsession with never looking up from their smartphones, and I guess that is Black Mirror’s thing to be fair lol, but I just found it to be really heavy handed when it’s played completely straight and without the usual slightly distorted and futuristic version of our world that you get. Something like Nosedive made far more of an impact with its look at how far we might eventually take our chasing of social media likes.
Idk though, maybe I find it hard to fully buy into episodes that are all about how social media has desensitised us and everyone is more disengaged from the real world, because really humans have historically *always* brushed most tragedies aside and got on with their day unless it immediately affects them. I don’t see how having a brief reaction to a breaking news twitter notification is so drastically different from how someone might have responded to a newspaper story or a television news story 30 years ago that involves people that they don’t know. Might sound harsh, but you can’t sit there crying and having ~deep thoughts~ every time there’s a loss of life, you’d basically be spending every day depressed and over emphasising in that case, so I don’t agree that social media has made humans worse in that respect.
And certainly going online to talk to people has enriched the lives of many people who are socially awkward and don’t have any rl friends. Introverted and shy people would not have any more friends if the internet had never existed, they would just be a lot lonelier if they didn’t have that option to meet likeminded people online to share their common interests, so to my mind the internet was really a blessing for them :shrug: I know that today’s older generation aren’t as tech savvy, but I imagine also that a lot of older people in future years will feel far less isolated when they have the internet to connect with people from all over the world, although obviously physical human contact is important as well
And I’m not 100% sure how I feel about Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too. I know that some people *really* hated it, it seems like it was too Americanised for a lot of viewers, but I didn’t think it was horrible or anything. At first I was pretty into the idea of an episode focused on music industry exploitation, I would have liked a darker ending actually of her remaining in a coma and still aware of what was going on, while her hologram keeps her career going, instead things did get a bit cheesy towards the end. But at the same time a lot of really dark things did happen to Ashley, I thought it was horrifying that her aunt basically brought her up, and yet only cared about her as a product and the best way to market her. It felt like a very effective commentary on how the music industry markets singers, it’s already been pointed out that there were a lot of parallels to Britney Spears if you believe the stories that are currently going round on her father holding her under a conservatorship against her will
I saw a suggestion on reddit for an alternative ending that I really liked, where Rachel is confronted with the real edgier and darker Ashley coming out of the coma, and ultimately decides to plug her back in so that she can keep Ashley Eternity instead, and apologises, ‘sorry, I’m just such a big fan’. That would have been a more typically Black Mirror ending and way of commenting on how fans love the product over the person, instead of having it end on the slightly cheesy moment of Ashley rocking out, and her two former fans running out saying that they hated it. I’m going to assume that the second half of the episode was a deliberate satire of Disney movies, but it still felt a bit 🙄 at times lol. I think the episode would of worked better with more focus on Ashley and her management team maybe, and less on the two sisters going to rescue her
Overall I felt like Bandersnatch kind of overshadowed series 5, I suspect it was more work than they had anticipated, and they spend so much time and money on it that they ended up rushing these three episodes. I liked Bandersnatch, but none of series 5 produced any standout episodes for me, and that was disappointing when quite honestly you’d have expected all three of them to be classics considering that well there were only three episodes
And on another note, it seems like Netflix has really been lacking in the U.K. recently, I’ve noticed that they hardly add any new shows these days that aren’t Netflix originals. It seems like their deal with the CW must have come to an end for starters as they haven’t added any of their newer shows like Legacies and Roswell New Mexico (and I really wanted to see that one!), it’s just been the new seasons of shows that they already had an existing arrangement with. Traditionally they’ve always included tons of shows from the other US networks, they were one of the easiest ways to find shows like Breaking Bad, The Good Place, Suits, Hannibal etc etc. And they’re all still there thankfully, but they’ve hardly picking up any new shows. Hopefully not a sign of things to come, but I suspect that it is :(
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(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-12 06:09 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-12 08:08 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-12 06:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-12 08:03 pm (UTC)It’s a little bit frustrating because Netflix always used to add most of the CW shows like Riverdale, iZombie, The Originals, Gossip Girl etc right after their US airing, all of which are still on there, it just doesn’t seem to be something that they’re going to carry on with their new shows. They haven’t even added the new Pretty Little Liars spin-off, even though that’s another show where the original PLL always used to air over here weekly on Netflix. And nor do they air Young Sheldon for example, even though The Big Bang Theory is on there, so it just seems like they’re keeping up the deals with older shows, but not adding anything new
Netflix originals are interesting to check out, but that’s not all I want to watch Netflix for, and their trailers for what’s new in May and June hardly appealed to me at all to be totally honest as it was nearly all just really old films, or a few original shows of theirs, and I’d been interested in hearing about the usual addition of more established hits from other networks
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-12 08:16 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-12 08:37 pm (UTC)Netflix are obviously focusing more on original content as a way of surviving, but meh I wonder how far it will take them. They can’t produce that many new shows every single month that people are going to keep regularly subscribing for, especially when they dump six-ten episodes at a time and then that’s usually it for a year or more, that can’t really compete with the regular networks releasing new episodes all year round to keep people talking on a weekly basis. Whereas you can easily finish the new series of Black Mirror in a day tbh, it’s only three episodes 🤷♀️
At the moment they do still do the weekly airings on Netflix for shows like Riverdale, Suits, and The Good Place, but it doesn’t seem like something that’s going to continue with newer shows as I can’t think of any new network shows that have been added for this year? So, once those shows have all finished airing, I can see people no longer subscribing for every month, but just tuning in every few months to binge watch and catch up on what they’ve missed. Likely there will just be spikes when their bigger hit shows like Stranger Things and The Crown add a new season, but then those shows can take a year and a half or more to be updated, so that’s not going to be a regular occurrence either
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 12:38 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 05:03 am (UTC)Considering that everything is getting their own streaming service now it's unfortunately going to be a thing now that Netflix will no longer be hosting newer shows, or at least it'll be an incredibly smaller selection than in the past. I did read something a while back that Netflix just wants to host their own original content altogether and not have anything else of any other property. This is sadly a result of what this ridiculous streaming wars nonsense has done. It's just fucking everyone over, at this point. What made Netflix stand out initially was that it was a good place to host a variety of things and it was a good way of viewing so many things, but now with other streaming services being put out and wanting "their" property on there only, it's going to get even more restrictive. But overall, it's just stupid because there's so many services now that nobody is going to want to pay for multiple different ones just to view one or two shows that are shown exclusively on that service.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 10:45 am (UTC)If enough new streaming services start up then I can see people just choosing to subscribe to Netflix occasionally to binge watch everything that’s caught their eye, especially as most of their shows are easy enough to catch up on in a weekend or less. They seem to be cutting their seasons down even more lately as well, you hear that ten episodes are what they’re generally aiming for now, certainly people can catch up with shows like Russian Doll (ten half hour episodes) and Sex Education (6 episodes) in a single night if they have the time. And that’s supposedly what Netflix are encouraging anyway judging by the stories of them considering how fast people are watching new content after it’s released. I just don’t see how their new content going to be enough to see people through a month when Netflix are urging viewers to get through a new show that they spend months on and millions of dollars on in a weekend, and then on to the next?
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 01:25 pm (UTC)I feel like they both felt something after the kiss in real life. It was pretty obvious but the father cared too much for the wife, kid and the future with her that he didn't want to risk anything.
The Miley episode was good in my opinion. Both episodes didin't have the typical Black Mirror-feel to them. Well only the aunt and her team anyways, I thought that was pretty dark..But I totally agree on the music industry today. It's all about money, just look at all these sick artists today. That didn't come from nothing.
They either..don't come out alive or have serious issues from being in the industry.
Not going to comment on the second episode as I haven't watched it yet. I hope it's better than the first one.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 03:27 pm (UTC)I also thought that Danny felt something after the kiss, but it just seems weird for them to be willing to actually kiss and test it out, only to then still be in denial, so I assume that the episode meant to say that they were genuinely only attracted when they were in the video game, but who knows
I liked the Miley episode in the first half, but at the same time I do get the backlash as it did seem like it went really childish and over the top when the sisters went on their rescue mission, it was kind of a weird feel for the show. I would have been more into it if they had made it a typically dark episode, and not gone for the Hollywood happy ending. It had its moments though, and I thought that Miley’s voice acting was very funny
And I’d be interested in what you think of the second episode when you do watch it :) I thought that it was probably the most interesting of the three when I was watching, but the ending didn’t really land for me. Maybe that’s part of what feels lacking with these episodes, they all kind of leave me feeling ‘was that it’, instead of sitting there stunned the way that you did with episodes like White Christmas and Shut Up And Dance ETA And even the happy endings with Hang The DJ and San Junipero had more impact as well, so I don’t expect every episode to be a sad one, but all three episodes from this season just really fizzled out for me towards the end
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 09:29 pm (UTC)I was expecting more too. I hope we get some better episodes in the next season. I think the episode is what you make out of it. They had something for sure but I also felt like the father was being pressured by the friend as it was always him that sent him requests to join the game, it was never the father that did that.
And also the fact that they were never two men in the game...might have something to say, with why they maybe wouldn't have worked in real life?. Wasn't one of them a woman in the game anyways? I feel like they definitely got their sexuality tested and got them confused. It might have been different if they actually played men, both of them..in the game.
Like I said, maybe it was just a episode that has many theories and people will just agree with what makes most sense to them.
White Christmas was CRAZY! The little egg thingy and the person inside of that, totally reminded me of Sims. And the ending....when the guy had his whole life ruined by being blocked from seeing other people's faces was seriously so fucked up and reminded me of being blocked by people on social media, like for example facebook. I thought of facebook right away lol.
Nose dive was a interesting episode too. People will go so far for likes today.
I think the craziest episode of Black Mirror for me, has to be White bear. That one has stuck in my head since I saw the episode. I will always remember it. I love how dark it was and how they changed the normal rules of punishing people that have done something wrong. I get goosebumps just thinking about this episode. It was a great mystery as it started and kept me interested until the end.
Think about all the trouble, the huge team...all the actors have to play along. Damn..if this ever happened in the future..imagine the time and energy there would go to punishing one single person haha. That writing was brilliant.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-13 10:28 pm (UTC)Yep, Danny played the man, Karl was the women. I was actually expecting Danny to experiment with being the woman after he asked Karl what it was like, and he seemed really curious, but then they did nothing else with that. It really did feel like the episode just introduced the idea of two hetro (?) friends having virtual sex and trying to figure out if they were also attracted in real life, and then..... that was the entire plot. I can’t believe that they needed 1 hour and 1 minute to tell that story, whereas White Christmas managed to pack in sooo much more with just an extra ten minutes running time
White Christmas really was a great one, it’s one of my all-time favourites, alongside White Bear, Shut Up And Dance, and USS Callister, so I guess it’s mostly the really bleak episodes that make the biggest impression on me! I really loved how both White Bear and Shut Up And Dance turned the tables at the end, making you question if these protagonists that you had previously been rooting for really deserve that kind of punishment and suffering, if anyone does. White Christmas too really confronts you with that when it gives you the most extreme number of days possible for him to have to keep on living through again and again in his own version in Hell
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-14 01:03 am (UTC)I agree there isn't much out there on Netflix to watch. I also have HULU and there isn't much out there either. I am thinking about digging into Supernatural. That should take me like a year to get thru all those seasons.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-14 01:11 pm (UTC)The third episode is probably the only one of the three that feels like it has a developing story actually and things happening
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-20 11:41 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-21 12:07 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-14 08:20 pm (UTC)I think Striking Vipers was probably my favourite of the three, but I wasn't impressed with it at first - it just seemed better after I had watched the other two! White Bear is still my favourite ep I think, followed by San Junipero.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-15 12:03 am (UTC)And I’m not sure if that was the reason for the bloated feeling or not lol, but it did sort of feel like there almost had to be a determined effort to get over an hours worth of content from an episode with such a simple story as Striking Vipers, so I wondered if that could be a factor. Certainly they did have a ton of success in the past with awards for USS Callister and San Junipero in television movie categories.
The length of the Miley episode I get more, but Striking Vipers and Smithereens are so clearly ~should be 40 minute tv episodes~ stretched out for no other reason that I can see
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-16 07:25 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-16 07:39 pm (UTC)And hmm I know that they hired a Mexican actress for Liz (as she was also Mexican in the original book series) after the original show cast Shiri in the role, so possibly they wanted to lean into that early on, especially as immigration between the US and Mexico is a very topical issue right now? Certainly the writing for CW shows isn’t always as subtle as it could be though!
(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-18 11:21 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-06-19 10:24 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2019-07-18 06:54 pm (UTC)Smithereens was sad like so many of these eps tend to be, without really saying anything new about social media.
Striking Vipers seemed to be a metaphor for gayness and the guys being unable to admit their love expect in the game. Like Karl saying he liked sex better as Roxette, and that somehow being his true self maybe. A very sad ending anyways.
(no subject)
Date: 2019-07-18 08:44 pm (UTC)And I found Striking Vipers to be the saddest ending of the three as well. I’m not sure whether we were supposed to think it was actually a good compromise that they get a single night a year together, but it just seemed like a very lonely and dissatisfying way of dealing with their feelings to me idk
(no subject)
Date: 2019-07-20 04:57 pm (UTC)Striking Vipers had a sad ending for all three, Theo didn't seem happy in her marriage and being allowed to cheat/flirt won't help it once the novelty wears off.
The guys should have tried it in RL. I think maybe they were going for a bittersweet ending. Maybe.