USS Callister - first episode of new season out on Netflix.
That was great episode, it is bit like Galaxy Quest but very creepy!
>:(
'Creepy'? It's been out 8 hours and 'spoiled' already! ;)
Episode 2 Arkangel has a very similar concept to a recent Dredd story about parental controls.
Episode 1: good
Episode 2: very good
Episode 3: VERY good [spoiler]I've got 12 guinea pigs. Piggies RULE!!!![/spoiler]
Continuing the 2000AD theme I would say that the punchline for episode 3 Crocodile was very Future Shocks.
I wonder if Charlie Brooker is a fan of Dredd. I mean "Black museum" was literally taken right out of Mega city one.
USS CALLSITER
Brillaint. Great riff on Kirk's 'Thataway'
Made me laugh out loud.
Much as I like Black Mirror, I always get the impression that the tale could be told in half the time.
Callister was ok just a bit drawn out and, once the "twist of who the real baddie was, didn't seem to have anywhere to go other than the actual resolution. Did I miss something?
Quote from: Tiplodocus on 02 January, 2018, 11:22:25 AM
Much as I like Black Mirror, I always get the impression that the tale could be told in half the time.
Callister was ok just a bit drawn out and, once the "twist of who the real baddie was, didn't seem to have anywhere to go other than the actual resolution. Did I miss something?
Yeah, absolutely agree. I did start checking my watch during that first episode. There was no need for it to be longer than the standard hour. Sort of preffered it on Channel 4 for that very reason.
Quote from: Tiplodocus on 02 January, 2018, 11:22:25 AM
Much as I like Black Mirror, I always get the impression that the tale could be told in half the time.
Callister was ok just a bit drawn out and, once the "twist of who the real baddie was, didn't seem to have anywhere to go other than the actual resolution. Did I miss something?
Agree 100%. This episode seems to be getting a lot of love but the longer running time was unnecessary & having it at the standard 50mins would have made for a much better episode.
Agree to a degree. The middle part did drag a touch but overall I found this episode to be a delight.
Episode 3 is just about one of the darkest things I've ever seen left me feeling so down[spoiler]probably because I became a dad last year I just couldn't handle the the infanticide [/spoiler]
Great series but like I said number three just a little bit too dark for me
Co's Radbacker
Yawn. That was the worst series of Black Mirror so far!
There was rather an over reliance on Ai as the basis of stories, maybe it was supposed to be a recurring theme, and I agree USS Callister was overlong and laboured the point somewhat.
Metalhead and Arkangel were both excellent though!
I rather enjoyed it, but a lot of it felt a little familiar and unsurprising to me, which is a first for a series of Black Mirror. My favourite episode was Hang The DJ! I usually prefer the darker episodes but that one grabbed me most despite its recurring theme.
Quote from: marko10174 on 01 January, 2018, 09:00:52 PM
I wonder if Charlie Brooker is a fan of Dredd. I mean "Black museum" was literally taken right out of Mega city one.
2000ad got it from Scotland Yard I think
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Museum
edit: [spoiler]oh and memories through DNA??[/spoiler]
ARKANGEL also falls flat for me despite being pretty well executed Again, it just seemed the only place the tale had to go. Maybe I shouldn't be expecting clever twists in these.
And Again, too long. They could have cut the first 15 minutes quite easily.
I've just binge watched these over the last two days. I enjoyed them all! My favourite, by some margin, was Crocodile. It reminded me of 'Shut up and dance with me' with the unfortunate lead character being forced to make progressively bad choices. Very grim indeed.
I really enjoyed USS Callister too. I can't help thinking that most of us would do exactly the same as Robert if we could! (I remember Mrs Pete watching the first episode of Westworld with me and asking, in all seriousness, why anyone would want to go there? Is she kidding me!?!)
Arkangel was a great premise but went on a little long I thought, as was Hang the DJ (though the payoff in that one was wonderful.)
I very much enjoyed Metalhead as a bit of a romp, albeit a very stylish and tense one. I thought Maxine Peake carried the episode brilliantly.
The Black Museum was a great ending, totally giving an anthology horror vibe, much like our very own 'Tales from the Black Museum.'
Telly's great at the moment isn't it?
Not sure about 'USS Callister'...
What I've really liked about Black Mirror so far is the feeling that - maybe at a stretch - this could actually happen. That's almost its defining characteristic, making an episode like 'Nosedive' genuinely unsettling. But [spoiler]creating a digital copy of somebody which has that person's memories and personality, from their DNA,[/spoiler] is straight-up bad-science fiction. You could get away with it in Dr Who (in fact, they have: but still a bit silly) but in Black Mirror it just didn't feel right. Like a robot Buffy.
Enjoyable enough, but I preferred the one where they duplicated Riker in a transporter accident...
The DNA replicator was an odd mistake in a show that has done lots of consciousness transfers or copies just with the old electrode earbud thingy on the temple. But it did drive the plot point of having to get the samples back.
Overall series 4 has been splendid, packed full of interesting ideas, fabulous filming, and great performances. I really enjoyed the black and white survival horror of Metalhead; and the grisly, EC comics anthology style of the Black Museum.
For listeners of my other podcast we'll be covering the first two Channel 4 series on British Invaders next month.
I wouldn't exactly call it a mistake as such, just a necessary plot device.
Possibly a more believable thing would have been the personalities being extracted from the staff members who release what they think is personality data for NPCs in the game, but are unaware how much is taken.
It still leaves the problem of a physical thing to be obtained by the person in the real world - sure it could just be data on his server, but unlikely that a tech nerd like that wouldn't have a backup of the personalities.
I definitely think the DNA --> memories thing wasn't Charlie's finest hour, Black Mirror is usually really good at keeping it believable, that's why they're so unsettling. To me at least. Maybe if they'd introduced and explained the concept upfront? 'Remember Assassin's Creed? Well Ubisoft - RIP - were fucking right!'.
I've watched most of the series now, apart from Arkangel, because it looked boring.
They're quite variable in quality, but I'm not sure how they compare to the previous lower-budget series before the Netflix cash and "Hollywood Talent" rolled in, because I haven't watched much of Series 1-3.
I think one of the reasons I have given previous seasons a swerve is that it does seem to be the sort of thing that not-very-clever people on Twitter seem to think is the epitome of very clever science-fiction television.
With a very salient and serious message about society THAT REALLY MAKES YOU THINK DOESNT IT?
And therein lies the biggest issue. It seems to appeal to people who aren't naturally inclined to thinking, and so therefore require being *forced* to think.
And what makes that more palatable is the (genuinely clever) way Brooker does that.
Every single episode takes something obviously recognisable from childhood, so in his case 70s and 80s culture, casting actors you recognise from somewhere, and then a slightly futuristic tech device that shows how society is not always being improved or helped by technological advances, AND IT REALLY MAKES YOU THINK DOESNT IT?
So there'll be, I dunno, what looks like a children's drama like Grange Hill, and we are watching a pastiche of that, but at the end of every episode of Not Really Grange Hill, the viewers are allowed to interact with the stroryline and make the characters do something awful, but actually these digital actors have feelings and stuff!
Should we be allowed to manipulate these not-quite-human avatars? Wow, deep. And then the Not Really Grange Hill digital avatars turn the tables on the viewers using reverse polarity or some bollocks, and we learn to feel their pain, or despair or whatever, and a gleaming, yet dreadful, BLACK MIRROR is held up to show us how awful we are, and how vacuous, cruel and mean society is, especially politicians and white men.
IT REALLY MAKES YOU THINK DOESNT IT?
It's just TV.
I watch it, enjoy it, forget it pretty much.
Rarely makes me think.
Does that make me shallow? I'm not sure. But I certainly don't learn my life lessons from the television.
Quote from: Mattofthespurs on 12 January, 2018, 04:15:16 PM
Does that make me shallow? I'm not sure. But I certainly don't learn my life lessons from the television.
I've learned a few from TV, to be honest - that Shut Up and Dance episode definitely made me think long and hard about the nature of privacy in the internet age, and the recent one about the mother implanting nanny software in her daughter's head raised to some serious and difficult questions too.
Loved this season of Black Mirror (if not quite as much as the last two) - the twist at the end of the dating one was utterly beautiful, and the robodog one was truly terrifying. Yeah, the DNA thing was a bit silly in a series that is usually disturbingly true-to-life, but it was still a great episode. Wasn't crazy about the last one; the eccentric guide in a museum of stories seems a bit too old-fashioned and derivative for such a tech-savvy and zetgeisty show (though I do enjoy the Megazine's
Black Museum).
In any case, I can't wait for the next series - it's like having the very best Future Shocks stretched out and put on the telly.
Quote from: Andy B on 05 January, 2018, 05:11:56 AMBut [spoiler]creating a digital copy of somebody which has that person's memories and personality, from their DNA,[/spoiler] is straight-up bad-science fiction. You could get away with it in Dr Who (in fact, they have: but still a bit silly) but in Black Mirror it just didn't feel right.
That's the thing about Black Mirror, it's really more of a horror show than science fiction. It's central premise of people and technology can result in bad things - emphasis on bad - is the one note it constantly hits but it's very well made so the leaps it takes don't really matter that much as long as it moves the story and the characters along to the next thrill, tense moment or revelation.
Just caught up with CROCODILE. Really didn't like it. It looks like Charlie watched Fargo the night before writing it. The technology aspect only exists to make the final twist work - again the story could work without it.
Only takeaway I thought was good was questioning whether the opening instigating incident actually played out as represented on screen. Her subsequent actions and the investigator talking repeatedly about subjective nature of memory would suggest not.
Oh yeah... every protagonist was female. I think. Makes a nice change.
Best: Hang the DJ. Very well handled twist that I didn't see coming.
Favourite: USS Callister. Just good fun throughout.
Least favourite: Arkangel. Good premise, unbelievable characters.
Is it easier to write a twist that leads to an unhappy ending than it is to write one for a happy ending? I certainly think so.
Quote from: Tiplodocus on 21 January, 2018, 11:24:17 AM
Oh yeah... every protagonist was female. I think. Makes a nice change.
Did that make you enjoy it more?
Just noting it as a refreshing change.
A good story is a good story regardless of the gender of the lead.
Though I do tend to think you get a bit more variety with female leads; writers can be less inclined to have them punch their way out of trouble. By now we've seen that lots of times.
Loved 'Hang The DJ'.
I have 2 left to watch. Metal Head and Black Museum.
Watched Metalhead tonight.
Simple, but very effective.
Probably the least of the series so far but still very good.
In order for me:
Hang the Dj》》》》》》Metalhead 》》Callister》Black Museum》》》Arkangel》》》》》》》》》》》》Crocodile.
I actually still quite enjoyed the ones I didn't enjoy if that makes sense. Nice to see smartly written and very well acted and produced genre stuff.
Just finished Black Museum.
Excellent stuff.
the whole series was more Monkey Loves you.
After a bit of time to digest the whole series, the episode I look back on in the season as my favourite is definitely Hang The DJ. Lovely story and didn't go in the direction I expected it to ([spoiler]possibly conditioned by the downbeat nature of Black Mirror endings I actually thought that the dating app would turn out to be a scam cover for a prostitution ring - at one point it made such a point of him being tied up in long stays while she was pretty much just being assigned one night stands constantly. I figured the guys were rich paying customers in on the scam who just wanting to 'rent' a willing woman. I think I just expected it to be unpleasant, and that was the most unpleasant twist I could think of! I'm glad that didn't turn out to be the case, and it was a rare instance of a really feel-good episode instead)[/spoiler].
I enjoyed them all though, and thought Callister was a great romp and a really fun episode. I sometimes think Brooker's humor comes through a lot less in the last couple of series, with the exception of the occasional episode and Callister was one of those.
Just watched Callister. Worth thing about it: what happened to all the people stranded on planets? What happened to the Khan analogue?
Smithereens.
Wow.
Just wow.
This was incredible.
Andrew Scott. Take a bow. Looking forward to the next two.
Quote from: Mattofthespurs on 05 June, 2019, 09:39:42 PM
Smithereens.
Wow.
Just wow.
This was incredible.
Andrew Scott. Take a bow. Looking forward to the next two.
Is that one of the season 5 episodes? I'm getting the impression Netflix have done the same thing as Love, Death & Robots and shuffled the episode order for different accounts, we watched the first one last night and got a different episode (Fighting Vipers)!
I'm not sure why they do that, and it does make it more complicated when you turn up at work and the pre-spoiler chat question is 'has everyone watched the first one?'!
Yes Smithereens just f$@ken wow, that's some quality TV right there. Number 2 in my order with Steel Vipers as playing first, just Hannah Montana grown up to go but it will have to be good to beat that. Pitty there's only 3 EPA this Sean but it's worth it just for Smithereens I think, suppose you could add Bandersnatch in for this season to make it 4 EPISODES.
CU Radbacker
Quote from: Keef Monkey on 06 June, 2019, 10:17:17 AM
Quote from: Mattofthespurs on 05 June, 2019, 09:39:42 PM
Smithereens.
Wow.
Just wow.
This was incredible.
Andrew Scott. Take a bow. Looking forward to the next two.
Is that one of the season 5 episodes?
I just picked that one to watch first as I like Andrew Scott.
Ah ok, I had heard people mention the episodes popping up in a different order so thought that was happening!
We similarly skipped one to watch the Miley Cyrus episode because we'd seen folk posting about the Nine Inch Nails connection and wanted to see what that was all about. Was very good! Smithereens next.
Watched the Miley Cyrus one last night. Enjoyed it. She was excellent.
Smithereens was good. As someone who works in a vague vicinity of the surveillance superculture made possible by digital identity, I thought it did a great job of showing the limits of traditional legal routes of investigation vs the insights available to the digital overlords. Though that said most of it is literally publicly available if you look rather than just in the hands of those with admin powers.
Nine Inch Nails have released a collaborative shirt for the episode that Trent's music is used, for those interested! I love this XD
(https://imgur.com/D9jIEKE.jpg)
https://store.nin.com/collections/clothing/products/head-like-a-hole-x-black-mirror-tee
Did not like Striking Vipers at all.
It was well acted but it was, imo, a ham fisted (please excuse the anology) rally against online porn.
Everything it said was true but, man, it forced it home (again, apologies)
I thought they should have called it Mortal Cumbat.
Quote from: JamesC on 09 June, 2019, 08:55:12 PM
I thought they should have called it Mortal Cumbat.
:lol:
Wasn't expecting much from the Miley Cyrus one after seeing some sniffy reviews. But I watched it and I liked it - I was wondering if Miley could act but then remembered that she started off her career as an actress. Also nice to see the toxic Breakfast Club trope subverted - [spoiler] Maverick, interesting punk / goth type is 'fixed' and made into a nice, normal girl by all-American conforming heroes.[/spoiler]
I really enjoyed this series. The Miley Cyrus one was the weakest but SMITHEREENS and STRIKING VIPERS are up there with the best of them for me. So much going on in VIPERS... even the name of the episode is blackly humourous; duelling snakes. Fnar, fnar!
All episodes were twenty minutes too long, mind.
I am sure it has already been mentioned but[spoiler]for the computer dudes to have the ability to have it off, a programmer must have included the code to make it possible?!
[/spoiler]. Maybe I'm nit-picking?
Quote from: JamesC on 09 June, 2019, 08:55:12 PM
I thought they should have called it Mortal Cumbat.
Street Fister?
Tekkake?
Injuices?
Sexy Smush Bros?
Guilty Grind?
Quote from: zombemybabynow on 10 July, 2019, 06:52:10 AM
I am sure it has already been mentioned but[spoiler]for the computer dudes to have the ability to have it off, a programmer must have included the code to make it possible?!
[/spoiler]. Maybe I'm nit-picking?
Hot Coffee all over again.
1. maybe mortal crumpit?
2. hot coffee?
Quote from: shaolin_monkey on 10 July, 2019, 02:09:17 PM
Quote from: JamesC on 09 June, 2019, 08:55:12 PM
I thought they should have called it Mortal Cumbat.
Street Fister?
I think there's a bit of Street Fister in all our hearts.
Quote from: zombemybabynow on 10 July, 2019, 03:35:40 PM
2. hot coffee?
It was a bit of experimental code left in a Grand Theft Auto game where you could take a girl for coffee then home to have quite explicit sex. The code wasn't accessible in the release version, but modders hacked the game, found the code and a playable version hit the illegal download market.
Then the media got wind of it, and shit hit the fan for Rockstar games.
Cheers for that fact shaolin_monkey