I’ve been a fan of Charlie Brooker’s Black Mirror since it first debuted on Channel 4 in 2011 with The National Anthem and its infamous Prime Minister and pig storyline.
The entire first season feels soaked in British culture, from accidentally prophetic Prime Ministers caught in compromising positions with pork to a dystopian riff on reality television.
The stories were underpinned by a bleakly cynical humour that runs throughout modern British comedy from Brass Eye to Psychoville.
But with Season six, we have Hollywood A-listers like Salma Hayek and Aaron Paul poking fun at Netflix-style streaming services or playing an American astronaut in the 1960s.
When it was announced between seasons two and three that Netflix would be picking up the show, I was initially excited – this no doubt meant bigger episodes with bolder creative swings.
However, what I forgot is that whenever US-based broadcasters, and more importantly US-based money, are involved, there’s always a knock-on effect – and I feel Black Mirror has fallen victim to Americanisation.
This concept is defined exactly as it sounds – the influence of American culture onto an entity that alters it in various ways.
Black Mirror felt radically different when it arrived, almost dangerously so – it told remarkably transgressive stories – and those roots are what Black Mirror needs to rediscover if it wants to stay relevant.
Brooker’s deal with Netflix has undeniably led to the attraction of a better-known cast, greater scope through enhanced budgets and even interactive experimentation with the ‘choose-your-own-adventure’ special Bandersnatch.
But whether consciously or not, the cultural dynamics of the series have shifted to favour a stateside perspective, not least in terms of episode location.
Out of the 16 episodes commissioned since the Netflix deal, nine of them have been either set in America or feature a significantly American cast – even episodes like Smithereens see the local police quickly giving way to the FBI.
There’s nothing wrong with expanding Black Mirror to include an American perspective – but as a fan I’ve felt like it is going too far.
Even more so, a thrill for me was seeing emerging British talent, something that is unlikely to happen while big US names continue to take centre stage.
While the initial America-centric episodes like Nosedive, San Junipero and USS Callister debuted to critical acclaim, episodes since have seen diminishing returns, with Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (starring Miley Cyrus) becoming the show’s second-worst rated episode according to critics, and certainly one that I struggled to even finish, growing increasingly bored of the explicit robot. Very American humour, I might add.
In that episode, when a popstar is placed into a coma, her consciousness is uploaded to a computer – and after that is put into a doll, two children unlock the limiter allowing the original Ashley to gain full consciousness inside the doll. If that was hard to grasp reading it – try watching it!
These days, it feels we’re less likely to see character actors like Michael Smiley or Lenora Crichlow wrapped within the nefariously knotty story of White Bear, but instead will be given the eye-catching casting of an A-List Cyrus, which felt to me like something of a stunt.
It felt as though the entire premise was built around a starring role for the popstar and the rest came after – as a result, the episode doesn’t feel like much of anything aside from a weirdly dark Hannah Montana rerun.
The problem of having Hollywood stars like Anthony Mackie is that they can easily overshadow the story they’re attempting to tell – having Jon Hamm in the Christmas Special felt, well, special – now, it feels like having a big Hollywood cast is more important than telling than the storyline.
Frankly, Black Mirror has become a little toothless.
Hollywood stars care a great deal about their image – I’m not sure some of these big US names would have signed up to play the pig-bothering prime minister from the first episode.
Black Mirror’s cultural identity was initially shaped by its Channel 4 origins – the bad boy, provocative broadcaster that took the risks that the more established channels didn’t.
The first two seasons felt like a response to the British cultural zeitgeist at the time, while always maintaining its sharp satirical edge and central theme of the dangers of technology.
I believe that sharpness has faded, as shown by Season 5’s relatively lacklustre reception.
I know that the power of Netflix means a return to those uniquely British roots is unlikely – so if the show wants to recapture that sharp edge, it needs to finally go global.
Imagine a series of Black Mirror where there’s an episode set in South Korea, another in the Philippines, one in Uganda – the technological dystopia Black Mirror warns us of will have a worldwide impact, so it deserves a worldwide scope.
Some may wonder if there’s an appetite for such an international, multilingual show, but I’d say you need only look at the global fanbases for shows like Squid Game, Narcos, Money Heist, and Dark to see the answer to that question.
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From what we’ve seen in the mysterious Season 6 trailer, the show will continue to favour a US-centric way of storytelling.
Perhaps part of the issue is Charlie Brooker’s centrality to the project – maybe it’s time for him to go global, invite writers and directors from around the world, set episodes in different regions, and truly reinvent the show.
Otherwise, the Americanisation will likely get worse, and so will the critical response.
I’ve always been a Charlie Brooker fan and always will be, so I’ll of course be tuning into this latest season of Black Mirror – but to me it’s clear that if the show cannot break out of this feedback loop of American favouritism, then Black Mirror’s ultimate twist may be that it makes itself obsolete to its own audience.
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