List of Black Mirror episodes

Black Mirror is a British television drama series created by Charlie Brooker. The series is produced by Zeppotron for Endemol. Regarding the programme's content and structure, Brooker noted, "each episode has a different cast, a different setting, even a different reality. But they're all about the way we live now – and the way we might be living in 10 minutes' time if we're clumsy."

Series overview

Series		Episodes	Originally aired
			Series premiere	Series finale
	1	3	4 December 2011	18 December 2011
	2	3	11 February 2013	25 February 2013

Episode list

Series 1

#	Title	Cast	Writer	Director	Broadcast Date	Viewers (millions)
	The National Anthem	Rory Kinnear and Lindsay Duncan, with Donald Sumpter, Tom Goodman-Hill, Anna Wilson-Jones & Lydia Wilson	Charlie Brooker	Otto Bathurst	4 December 2011	2.07
The opening programme to the series is a 44 minute long political thriller in which fictional Prime Minister Michael Callow (Rory Kinnear) faces a huge and shocking dilemma when (fictional) Princess Susannah, Duchess of Beaumont (Lydia Wilson), a much-loved member of the Royal Family, is kidnapped. For her safe return, the Prime Minister must have sexual intercourse with a pig on national television. Callow adamantly opposes the demand and does all possible to catch the kidnapper before the deadline. Callow also demands that the news not reach the public, but the ransom video was posted on YouTube and, despite having only been up for nine minutes, has already been viewed and downloaded by many members of the British public. Although the UK's media initially agrees not to report the story it soon reaches foreign news networks, which immediately begin reporting. After this, the UK media follow suit. When the video was first received by the British government, one of the PM's aides, Alex Cairns (Lindsay Duncan) began faking footage to broadcast. The kidnapper discovers the ploy and sends Princess Susannah's finger to a UK news station as a response. The story is outed and public opinion turns sharply against Callow. This drives Callow to order an immediate rescue operation on the building where they believe Susannah is being held, forgoing the recommended observation period. The building is revealed to be a decoy and a reporter is injured during the operation. Callow loses even more support. After being informed that neither he nor his family will have protection from repercussions if he refuses, Callow is forced to perform the indecent act in front of a live global audience who are quickly disgusted by the sight but still don't turn off their screens. The princess is discovered unharmed in the streets, the finger having belonged to the kidnapper. It is revealed that she was released before the deadline, but went unnoticed as everyone was distracted by the broadcast. It emerges that the events were planned by Turner Prize winner Carlton Bloom, who intended to make an artistic point by showing that events of significance had slipped under the noses of the public and the government as they were "elsewhere, watching screens" and not paying attention to the real world. Bloom commits suicide as the broadcast airs, and it is decided that the early release will not be revealed to anyone including Callow. A year after the broadcast, Callow's political image has remained intact and he has gained greater public approval due to his willingness to sacrifice his dignity. Princess Susannah has recovered from the kidnapping and is expecting a child, while the public at large knows of Bloom's organising of the affair. While Callow's reputation has been raised in the eyes of the public, it is implied that his marriage and relationship with his wife (Anna Wilson-Jones) has not survived the ordeal.
	15 Million Merits	Daniel Kaluuya, Jessica Brown Findlay and Rupert Everett, with Julia Davis & Ashley Thomas	Charlie Brooker & Kanak Huq	Euros Lyn	11 December 2011	1.52
A satire on entertainment shows and our insatiable thirst for distraction set in a sarcastic version of a future reality. In this world, everyone must cycle on exercise bikes, arranged in cells, in order to power their surroundings and generate currency for themselves called Merits. Everyone is dressed in a grey tracksuit and has a "doppel", a virtual avatar that people can customise with clothes, for a fee of merits. Everyday activities are constantly interrupted by advertisements that cannot be skipped or ignored without financial penalty. Obese people are considered to be second-class citizens, and work either as cleaners around the machines (where they receive verbal abuse) or are humiliated on game shows. Bingham "Bing" Madsen (Daniel Kaluuya) is a citizen of the facility who has inherited over 15,000,000 merits and has the luxury of skipping advertisements. In the toilet he overhears Abi (Jessica Brown Findlay), a woman whose voice he finds beautiful, singing a song from before the facility. He encourages her to enter into the X-Factor style game show Hot Shots, which offers a chance for people to get out of the slave-like world around them. Abi however does not wish to do this as she hasn't enough merits and feels she would be unable to perform under the pressure. Bing persuades her and, feeling there is nothing "real" worth buying, purchases the ticket for her, which had been raised from 12 to 15 million merits. When she enters the competition, the judges (played by Rupert Everett, Julia Davis and Ashley Thomas) and the crowd enjoy her singing, but they state there is no room for an 'Above Average Singer' and instead give her the chance to become an adult actress on the pornographic TV Show 'Wraith Babes', or else return to the bike machines. After goading from the judges and the crowd, and drugged on a substance called "Cuppliance" (compliance in a cup), Abi reluctantly agrees and Bing is heartbroken. Bing returns to his cell without Abi and without any merits. When a showing for Wraith Babes appears on the screen, he is unable to skip it as he doesn't have enough merits and is forced to watch Abi perform a sexual act, even unable to close his eyes due to the cell emitting a piercing tone until he watches again. He desperately tries to escape his cell, ramming the door until the glass breaks. He hides a shard of glass under his bed and starts to earn another 15,000,000 merits to enter the competition. He stops buying food (eating the leftovers the other citizens leave behind), watches all advertisements and pedals for months until he has enough to buy another ticket. He stands in the Hot Shots waiting room every day without any expression until he's eventually called to compete. As he approaches the stage he is required to take a dosage of Cuppliance, as Abi did, but he then presents the empty carton he preserved from Abi's performance, avoiding taking the drug. When he is put on the stage he begins to dance but interrupts his performance, draws the shard of glass and threatens to kill himself live on the show. He tearfully rants about how unfair the system is and expresses his anger for how the judges took away the only thing he found in the facility that felt real. The judges, instead of taking his words into consideration, are impressed by his 'performance' and offer him his own show, where he can rant about the system all he likes. Under a similar pressure as the one placed on Abi earlier, he accepts, and he is shown finishing one of his streams in his penthouse, putting his shard away in a silk box. Bing stands staring out of the penthouse windows over a vast green forest stretching to the horizon.
3	The Entire History of You	Toby Kebbell and Jodie Whittaker, with Tom Cullen and Jimi Mistry	Jesse Armstrong	Brian Welsh	18 December 2011	0.87
Set in an alternative reality where most people have a 'grain' implanted behind their ear which records everything they do, see or hear. This allows memories to be played back either in front of the person's eyes or on a screen, a process known as a 're-do'. Liam Foxwell (Toby Kebbell), a young lawyer, attends a work appraisal which he feels did not go well. After leaving the meeting he replays his memory of it and dwells on a seemingly insincere phrase used by his employer. He arrives at a dinner party hosted by some of his wife's friends, and sees his wife Ffion (Jodie Whittaker) talking to a man he doesn't recognise, whom she introduces as Jonas (Tom Cullen). Some of Ffion's friends ask how the appraisal went and suggest replaying it as a 're-do' so they can all give their opinions on it, but Jonas steps in to save Liam from the embarrassment. At dinner, Jonas speaks increasingly frankly about his personal life, and talks about masturbating to re-dos of sex from his earlier relationships. Throughout the meal, Liam becomes suspicious of how fondly Ffion seems to be looking at Jonas, and he is especially suspicious when she laughs at Jonas's bad joke. When Liam and Ffion return home, it transpires that Ffion had had a previous relationship with Jonas many years ago which she had mentioned to Liam but downplayed. She initially said it lasted a week, then says a month, and then admits it was six months. These initial lies make Liam even more paranoid and he insists on replaying footage from the evening and demanding explanations for why Ffion said and did the things she did. Ffion becomes increasingly uncomfortable with his relentless questioning and the conversation turns into a row. Liam apologises and they have sex, but they are both watching re-dos of more passionate sex from earlier in their relationship. After they finish, Liam goes back downstairs and watches re-dos of Jonas' frank confessions from the dinner party, whilst drinking excessively. He continues this all night, and the next morning argues with Ffion about her laughing at Jonas' joke. She goes back to bed and he drunkenly drives to Jonas' house, where he confronts him about his relationship with Ffion, and threatens to cut Jonas' grain out of his neck if he doesn't delete all the footage of her stored on it. Jonas complies, and Liam drives away, crashes his car into a tree and passes out. When he wakes up, he replays his latest memories with increasing horror, and walks home to confront Ffion - as Jonas projected his footage of Ffion onto the wall screen before deleting it, Liam noticed that there was a file proving Jonas and Ffion last had sex eighteen months ago, around the time their daughter Jodie was conceived. Ffion admits to cheating on Liam, saying that it was when Liam had temporarily walked out after a row, but insists that she and Jonas did use a condom and that Liam is the baby's father. Liam refuses to take her word for this and demands that she replay the re-do of it to prove it. She tries to erase the memory but he stops her, and she plays the footage whilst sobbing and unable to look at the screen. It is unclear whether the video proves or disproves Liam's suspicions, although it is heavily hinted that they were correct. In the closing scenes, Liam is shown wandering through the house, which is now untidy and half-empty, and Ffion and Jodie are gone. Happy memories of his wife and daughter appear as he walks through each room, until, tormented by these re-dos, he messily cuts his grain out of his neck with a razor.

Series 2

#	Title	Cast	Writer	Director	Broadcast Date	Viewers (millions)
1	Be Right Back	Hayley Atwell and Domhnall Gleeson, with Claire Keelan, Sinead Matthews, Flora Nicholson, Glenn Hanning, Tim Delap & Indira Ainger	Charlie Brooker	Owen Harris	11 February 2013	2.01
Martha (Hayley Atwell) and Ash (Domhnall Gleeson) are a young couple who move to a remote house in the countryside. Ash is a social media addict and compulsively checks his phone for updates on his social network pages. The day after moving into the house, Ash is killed returning the hire van. At the funeral, Martha's friend Sarah (Sinead Matthews) tells her about a new online service that lets people stay in touch with the deceased. By using all of his past online communications and social media profiles, a new "Ash" can be created virtually. Martha rejects the idea outright, but Sarah signs Martha up to the service anyway, without telling her. When Martha is sent an e-mail supposedly from Ash, she furiously confronts Sarah, who urges her to at least give the service a try before dismissing it. Over the following days, Martha is overwhelmed by grief, and soon discovers that she is pregnant. Becoming emotionally unstable, she responds to the artificial Ash's e-mail. She starts to communicate with him through instant messaging, and informs him of the pregnancy. She then uploads videos and photos of Ash to the service's database, and the service duplicates Ash's voice to talk to Martha over the phone. Martha allows herself to believe that she is talking to her dead partner, and over the following weeks she talks to the artificial Ash almost non-stop, keeping him updated regarding the pregnancy. After Martha accidentally damages her phone and has a panic attack when she temporarily loses contact with the service, the artificial Ash tells her about the service's next stage, which is still in its experimental phase: a body made of synthetic flesh that the program can be uploaded onto. Martha buys a blank, synthetic body from the service, and following the artificial Ash's instructions she allows the body to take on Ash's physical characteristics. The end result is a clone that looks almost exactly like Ash, only missing minor characteristics such as his facial hair and a mole on his neck. From the moment the clone is activated, Martha is uncomfortable and struggles to accept its existence. Despite the clone satisfying her sexually, she quickly becomes frustrated by it constantly doing what she says without question, its lack of emotion (only expressing emotions when she tells it to do so), and the absence of certain habits and personality traits which the real Ash had but the service did not have information on. After an argument, Martha decides she can no longer tolerate the Ash clone, taking it to the edge of a tall cliff and ordering it to jump off. The clone agrees to do so, but Martha grows even angrier, saying that the real Ash would not have willingly jumped. The clone responds by begging for its own life, causing Martha to realise that she can't bring herself to get rid of it. The scene cuts to several years later, and Martha is shown to have raised her daughter (Indira Ainger) in the country house, keeping the Ash clone locked in the attic. She allows her daughter (who is never named) to see the clone on weekends, but the daughter convinces Martha to allow her into the attic on her birthday to give it a piece of birthday cake. While her daughter is in the attic with the clone, Martha waits at the bottom of the attic steps, close to tears.
2	White Bear	Lenora Crichlow and Michael Smiley, with Tuppence Middleton, Ian Bonar, Nick Ofield, Russell Barnett & Imani Jackman	Charlie Brooker	Carl Tibbetts	18 February 2013	1.69
In a bedroom, a woman named Victoria Skillane (Lenora Crichlow) wakes up in a chair to find she can't recall anything about her life. Apparently the result of a failed suicide attempt, Victoria is surrounded by images of a small girl (Imani Jackman) (whom she assumes to be her daughter) as well as photos of her and an unknown man (Nick Ofield). Victoria sees an unusual symbol on the TV screens in the house and a calendar on the month of October, with all the dates being crossed off up until the 18th. Leaving the house, Victoria sees people constantly recording her on their phones. When asking for help and shouting at the people to stop recording her, a man wearing a balaclava with the symbol on it pulls up in a car, takes out a shotgun, and fires at Victoria. After being chased by the masked man, she soon meets Jem (Tuppence Middleton) and Damien (Ian Bonar), two people getting supplies. Damien is killed by the masked man when attempting to save Victoria and Jem, forcing them to go on the run. Jem explains that the symbol denotes a transmitter called 'White Bear', whose signal has turned most of the population into dumb voyeurs who do nothing but record everything around them. Victoria and Jem are unaffected, but are also a target for the 'hunters', including the masked man. Jem plans to reach the signal's transmitter to destroy it. As they travel, Victoria and Jem are picked up by a man named Baxter (Michael Smiley) who is also unaffected, but drives them to a forest and holds them at gunpoint. Although Jem manages to escape, Victoria is tied to a tree and about to be tortured until Jem returns and kills Baxter. They continue travelling to the transmitter, while Victoria starts to have visions of past and future events. When they reach the White Bear transmitter to destroy it, Victoria and Jem are attacked by two hunters. Victoria is able to wrestle a shotgun away from a hunter and fires at her attacker - only for it to spray confetti. The walls open to reveal an audience applauding after observing the escapade; Jem, Damien and the hunters are revealed to have been part of a charade all along. Victoria is strapped into a chair, while Baxter appears and explains everything; the girl that Victoria assumed to be her daughter was actually a six-year-old schoolgirl named Jemima Sykes, whom Victoria and her fiancée, Iain Rannoch (the man from the photographs) had abducted a few miles from her home. After taking her to a nearby forest, Iain proceeded to torture and kill Jemima while Victoria recorded his actions on her mobile phone. The 'White Bear', originally the victim's teddy, was a symbol of the nationwide search and murder investigation, while the symbol on the screens and on the hunter's mask was identical to the tattoo that identified Victoria's fiancée (who had committed suicide in his cell before the trial). Having tearfully pleaded guilty and insisting that she had been 'under Iain's spell', Victoria was given a sentence that the judge described as 'proportionate and considered' - to undergo this mob-recorded, poetic justice every day. Victoria, who still has no clear memory of these events, is driven back to the compound past a crowd baying for her blood (under encouragement from the staff) and returned to the room where she woke up. She is placed back in the bedroom chair by Baxter and as she watches footage of Jemima, Baxter places electrodes on her head, wiping Victoria's memory of the day's events as she screams in agony. As Baxter leaves the compound to the sound of Victoria's screams, he takes out a black pen and crosses off the 18th of October from the calendar; ready for Victoria to relive the same events the next day. Over the end credits, we see the staff (including Baxter, Jem and Damien) of the 'White Bear Justice Park' prepare for another day as they set up the scenario, and how it plays out. The voyeurs are members of the public who are there to see Victoria suffer while using their phones to record the show. The episode ends as it began, with Victoria waking up in the bedroom chair with no memory.
3	The Waldo Moment	Daniel Rigby, Chloe Pirrie and Jason Flemyng, with Tobias Menzies, Christina Chong, James Lance & Michael Shaeffer	Charlie Brooker	Bryn Higgins	25 February 2013	1.28
Jamie Salter (Daniel Rigby) is a failed comedian who performs the voice and movements (via performance capture) of a blue cartoon bear named Waldo, who interviews politicians and other authority figures. The interviewees are fooled into thinking the Waldo interviews are for a children's TV programme, when they're actually for a late-night, topical comedy show. Waldo the bear is extremely popular with the British public, and a pilot for his own series is commissioned, but despite the character's success Jamie is depressed and unsatisfied with his life. During a brain-storming session for the Waldo pilot, producer Jack Napier (Jason Flemyng), who owns the rights to Waldo, jokingly suggests that Waldo should compete against real politicians in an upcoming by-election in the (fictional) town of Stentonford, so he can stand against one of his past interviewees, Conservative candidate Liam Monroe (Tobias Menzies). Jamie at first opposes the idea, worried about entering the world of politics, but he soon reluctantly agrees to go ahead with the plan. The production company head off on a campaign trail, projecting Waldo onto a screen on the side of a van and driving to wherever Monroe is campaigning, so Waldo can publicly humiliate him in front of the public. During the campaign, Jamie meets Gwendolyn Harris (Chloe Pirrie), the by-election's Labour candidate who is only entering the by-election to further her own political career. Jamie and Gwendolyn grow close, and they have a one-night-stand, but afterwards Gwendolyn is warned by her campaign manager to keep away from Jamie during the campaign. Jamie can't understand why she is avoiding him, and develops a disdain for career politicians. On a TV panel show with every party candidate as a guest, Monroe mocks both Waldo and Jamie, taunting him by saying Waldo is nothing more than a joke and Jamie himself hasn't achieved anything in his comedy career. This aggravation causes Jamie to angrily rant at every candidate on the panel, accusing them of being more artificial than Waldo is, exposing Gwendolyn as a career politician and stating that the public has lost faith in politicians. Jamie is later embarrassed by his outburst, but the rant becomes a hit on YouTube and Waldo gains more public support. Both Jamie and Napier meet with a man (who introduces himself as a member of "the agency") who claims that Waldo's independent stance has the potential to become a global authority figure much to the disdain of Jamie and, after a heated argument with Napier, Jamie opts to leave the campaign. He tries to apologise to Gwendolyn for his actions, but she turns him away, enraged that he has potentially damaged her career. On the final day of the campaign trail, Jamie rejoins but is overwhelmed by guilt and breaks down at a rally, begging the public not to vote for Waldo, leaving the van and trying to smash the screen. Napier takes over Waldo's controls and orders the public to attack Jamie. On the day of the election, Jamie watches the results from a hospital bed; Monroe wins, with Waldo (now voiced by Napier) coming second and Gwendolyn coming third. Napier prompts the audience to riot. During the end credits, Jamie is shown to have become homeless, and is living on the street. He sees Waldo on a nearby monitor displaying what is assumed to be political adverts on a global scale and angrily throws a bottle at the screen, which leads to him being assaulted by two police officers. The episode originated in an idea for Nathan Barley, an earlier TV project co-written by Charlie Brooker and Chris Morris.