I’ve ranked the Black Mirror episodes and plotted them on a timeline. Now here’s a video playlist of the best episodes, about half of them, if you don’t want to invest in the whole series. You should watch them in the order listed. I arranged them roughly by chronology (on which see the timeline), though it’s not exact. Primarily, I arranged them in this order for maximal dramatic effect, choosing a strong lead and epic ending, and being sure to balance misery with the rare optimism when possible. Unlike my rankings, the blurbs here are spoiler-free so you can read them in advance and see the kind of story you’re getting into.
Black Mirror Playlist
1. Be Right Back (S2, E1)
2. Playtest (S3, E2)
3. Crocodile (S4, E3)
4. Hang the DJ (S4, E4)
5. White Bear (S2, E2) or Shut Up and Dance (S3, E3)
6. USS Callister (S4, E1)
7. White Christmas (Special, between seasons 2 and 3)
8. San Junipero (S3, E4)
9. Loch Henry (S6, E2)
10. Joan is Awful (S6, E1)
11. Black Museum (S4, E6)
12. Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too (S5, E3)
13. Fifteen Million Merits (S1, E2)
14. Beyond the Sea (S6, E3)
1. Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1). It’s the perfect Black Mirror episode to start with. Not too hard-hitting, so it eases you into the miseries of techno-dystopia instead of smashing you on the anvil. It’s also one of the most emotional stories (the only rivals being “San Junipero” at #8, and “Beyond the Sea” at #14), which is another sure hook. And it’s from an early point in the chronology of the Black Mirror universe — involving AI replicas of deceased loved ones, but imperfect ones unlike the exact clones and clones consciousnesses in other episodes — and so it fits as a starter. For almost every reason, “Be Right Back” should take the lead in your playlist.
2. Playtest (Season 3, Episode 2). Also from an early point in the Black Mirror timeline, “Playtest” is about a guy volunteering to be the test subject of a game which inverts the premise of virtual reality. Rather than being immersed in a virtual reality of the game’s world, the game brings elements into the real world of the player, making him experience hallucinations. Life threatening ones. And the nightmare won’t let him go. What happens isn’t pretty, so you’ve been duly warned. But if you’re a horror fan you’ll love this episode.
3. Crocodile (Season 4, Episode 3). Famous for being one of the very darkest episodes of Black Mirror, “Crocodile” involves the recallers, one of my favorite tech inventions. They’re tiny nobs placed on someone’s head in order to transmit the subject’s surface thoughts and memories to a computer, which then plays back the person’s thoughts and memories like a movie. Recallers are used by police officials to get inside suspects’ heads, or by insurance agents get at the truth of clients making a claim — in other words, they’re the most outrageous violation of privacy. The story shows an ordinary woman we would consider decent who is driven to commit murder after murder to keep her dark secrets from coming out.
4. Hang the DJ (Season 4, Episode 4). Now for some optimism and a rare happy ending (you’ll need it after the above two episodes). The plot centers around a dating app that pre-selects your partner and the length of your romantic relationship — which could be for a day, a few days, months, or years. The expiration date is mandatory, and the rules of dating are enforced by government agents wielding tasers. It’s a frightening vision of the future (or is it?), but the way in which a particular couple fall in love and refuse to let go of each other is a very moving story. It will help you recover from the two episodes above, and give you breathing space before plunging into either of the two below…
5a. White Bear (Season 2, Episode 2). The next two are so nasty that I suggest watching just one or the other (thus labeling them 5a and 5b). Or if you’re like me, and you get off on this shit, then watch both of them as a sick double-feature. They stick a knife in you and keep twisting. “White Bear” is pure adrenaline rush, filmed as a single long-action set piece, with a nameless woman on the run being terrorized and chased by people in strange masks. Neighborhood people watch gleefully and record the spectacle with their smartphones, ignoring her pleas for help. And the stuff they do to her… and when you find out why… enough said.
5b. Shut Up and Dance (Season 3, Episode 3). I felt for this kid to the awful end (which is very awful, be warned). Thanks to malware, he’s been videotaped jacking off to porn and then blackmailed via anonymous text messages. He must hurry up and ride his bike to this location; he must hook up with another guy who’s also being blackmailed. They must do this and that. Drive here; rob this bank. Meet another guy. Fight him to the death. The pacing never lets up, and the reason this kid is being tormented remains a mystery until — as in “White Bear” — the final few minutes. This is probably the most nihilistic Black Mirror episode to date, so buckle in fast.
6. USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1). You need a gift after being put through “White Bear” and/or “Shut Up and Dance” and this is it. There’s as much as suffering and torture on display as in the above two, but at least there’s a triumphal ending, and by God this episode is fun. And who better than Jesse Plemons to play the corporate asshole, who uses a virtual reality game to dominate and abuse the cloned consciousnesses of his employees who can do nothing to escape the nightmare? In the game he’s a spaceship captain who forces them to play out “Star Trek” dramas while submitting them to torments and degradations. By now on this playlist the timeline has progressed to advanced technology: the cloning of a person’s consciousness, where the clone is a captive with no rights.
7. White Christmas (Special). Judged by many to be the best Black Mirror episode (I say third best), it contains some of the most horrifying ideas in the series. The worst being a “cookie” (what looks like an egg in the above pic), which holds a copy of a person’s consciousness — basically a clone without a physical form — and is enslaved to do what it is told. (The rogue technology of “USS Callister”.) That’s bad enough; what makes it worse is that the consciousness is an exact clone, so it believes it’s the real person, utterly confused and trapped in an existence that it never agreed to. (Again like “USS Callister”, except the technology is now legalized and mainstreamed into society.) The story is two men sitting in a cabin on a snowy Christmas Day, confessing their ugly pasts. What’s really going on is far uglier.
8. San Junipero (Season 3, Episode 4). After the misanthropy of “White Christmas”, this one will restore your faith in humanity. It’s set in a techno-afterlife, where those who have died, or who will soon die, are able to enjoy a virtual beach resort in the bodies of twenty-year olds. The beach resort has been constructed as if from the ’80s, with arcades, music, dress attire, bars, and cars straight out of that time period, with one crucial difference: there are no homophobic hangups, so you can live (or relive) the 1980s and fuck whoever you want, whatever your orientation. Is that heaven on earth? “San Junipero” suggests that it is, and whether or not you agree, I guarantee you’ll be crying when the credits roll, but in happiness for a change. For once in Black Mirror, the technology isn’t poison, and the characters get the peace and liberation they deserve.
9. Loch Henry (Season 6, Episode 2). Many assume this episode is set in an early point in the Black Mirror timeline, but they miss the roll call of documentaries in the epilogue: (1) Suffer the Children: The Tipely Pedophile Ring, (2) Loch Henry: Truth Will Out, (3) Euthansia: Inside Project Junipero. Which obviously puts this after “San Junipero”. It only seems that “Loch Henry” is primitive because it’s set in a rural village where high-tech is absent. The rustic setting is put to good use though — beautiful Scottish highlands once terrorized by a local serial killer. It’s a horror piece, and if it doesn’t have the tech-centric tone of Black Mirror, it certainly fits in the series as an indictment of how streaming platforms turn audiences into voyeuristic consumers of real-life tragedies. In particular, the crass but well-meaning Stuart is probably my favorite supporting character in the entire series.
10. Joan is Awful (Season 6, Episode 1). It’s the premiere of season 6 but actually comes after “Loch Henry” (episode 2) chronologically. Like “Loch Henry”, “Joan is Awful” indicts the streaming industry and the way companies like Netflix treat their actors and writers. It’s funny and fun — a rarity in Black Mirror — and uses Salma Hayek wonderfully, as she plays herself; enraged beyond endurance. The streaming industry has taken her AI form, exploited her body image, and forced it to act in films and TV in ways that she finds outrageous. (At one point Hayek’s AI form is made to take a shit on the floor of a church at a wedding.) This prompts her to wage war on the streaming company with the help of another victim (the titular character Joan), and the way these two team up is priceless.
11. Black Museum (Season 4, Episode 6). Like “White Christmas” (#7 on this playlist), this episode contains exceedingly horrifying scenarios even by Black Mirror standards. There’s tech that gives you incredible pleasure from the pain of others, or even from your own pain, which can become so addicting that you mutilate and ruin yourself for the sake of those orgasmic highs. There are cloned consciousnesses being subjected to isolation, or torturous imprisonment, one of them being a former death-row inmate, who is now executed again and again in an electric chair by customers who come to the museum and pay for the privilege of repeatedly killing this guy. That there is some justice at the end doesn’t mitigate the horrific experience of watching this episode, but damn if it isn’t Black Mirror doing what it does best.
12. Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3). Miley Cyrus doesn’t do much right, but give her credit here, she does a fabulous job playing a pop star like herself (the character of Ashley), and the episode is a gratifying “fuck you” to pop music in favor of edgy and industrial rock. The Ashley Too doll steals the show as a foul-mouthed scourge (the doll contains the cloned consciousness of Ashley) who leads two teenagers on a break-in to rescue Ashley who has been abducted by her music manager. It’s as fun and hilarious as “Joan is Awful” (at #10 on this list) and a rather underrated episode. Chronologically it follows “Black Museum”; you can tell by the news ticker that says “Museum owner’s body found in smoking ruins”, a reference to the fire at the end of that episode.
13. Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2). Now we’re in the far future of pure dystopia. People live in tiny boxed rooms where every wall is a screen and if you want to shut out the noise or annoying ads you need the credits (merits) to do so. Everything is paid for in these merits — toothpaste, food, and choosing what to watch. You earn the merits by riding an exercise bike all day long, which powers the energy for this oppressive world. If you’re lucky enough to acquire 15 million, you can petition for a career of on-screen fame away from the bikes. Maybe you can be a singer, or a dancer, or a comedian. But when you become a celebrity in this dystopia, you trade one life of misery for another. The episode is a critique of power and social class in world where 98% live below the poverty line. It’s a love story too, and a damn heartbreaking one.
14. Beyond the Sea (Season, 6, Episode 3). It probably says something about me that my favorite Black Mirror episode is the most depressing one. And damn, “Beyond the Sea” is sad enough to make me slit my wrists. But it’s a beautifully told story, and the most skillfully directed of any Black Mirror episode. Chronologically it’s actually the earliest story, but you have to save the best for last; you simply cannot watch this first in your playlist. It will spoil you, and it’s feature-film length to boot (clocking in at 80 minutes). Watch it last as a masterpiece prequel. The setting is an alternate 1969 with a very advanced space race. Two astronauts live alone on a shuttle in outer space on a long six-year mission, but they have the technology to beam their consciousnesses back to earth when the day’s work is done so they can regularly be at home with their families. That is, until things go horribly wrong. And then even more wrong. So wrong it seems almost a crime to watch something like this. But you must.
The Busybody 