Category Archives: Other

Black Mirror – S2E1 Review

I decided to watch an episode of Black Mirror this week as the tech noir film, as I was interested in the more contemporary approach that this show could take. I closed my eyes and chose an episode randomly, landing on the first episode of season two entitled “Be Right Back.” The short description on the episode reads, “after learning about a new service that lets people stay in touch with the deceased, a lonley, greiving Martha reconnects with her late lover.” Without watching the episode, I’m interested to see if this has any parallels to the AI chatbots that have begun to pop up in common social media apps like Facebook and Instagram.

One of the first lines in the episode mentions the “Narwhal Virus” that collapsed Russia’s economy, and while I know that viruses are a frequent troupe in futuristic media, I still got a kick out of this post-Covid. Ashe, the “late lover” the description mentions, is certainly hooked to his phone and his death is implied to be due to distracted driving. I was also spot on about the AI chatbot prediction, as all of Ashe’s internet activity was funneled into a program that allowed Martha to text him. As the episode went on, not-Ashe became more realistic, transitioning from text into phone calls and finally into a real body. Martha experiences frustration as not-Ashe is indeed not Ashe, and she feels like he is so close to being the person she remembered but also so different.

I would be remiss if I didn’t mention that it took less than twelve hours for Martha to initiate sex with not-Ashe, which I found interesting. I feel like I would be so uncomfortable if I were in her situation, and the absolute last thing on my mind would be having sex with the thing that looks like my dead partner. However, I know that the idea of intimacy with future tech is something that many are interested in, and I think that acknowledging that in this episode made it stronger.

Goals for this Class

While it was the eighth task on the to-do list, I opted to consider what I wanted to get out of this class before reading/watching this week’s assignments. I work in theatre, primarily in lighting design, which provides an interesting method for storytelling. While lighting isn’t something that most audiences conciously notice, it is something that carries a huge amount of the narrative and helps to create the wold on stage. As such, I’m always working to try and find new ways to tell stories and interact with the world around me, especially in ways that may be unexpectected or unnoticed by most. I’m excited to learn more about different ways to tell stories, but also to engage with the “tech noir” theme and consider how technology has helped or hindered the development of complex narratives.