Shut Up and Dance (Black Mirror)

"Shut Up and Dance"
Black Mirror episode
File:Black Mirror - Shut Up and Dance.png The mysterious hacker blackmailing Kenny tells him to wait until he is "activated".
Episode no.	Series 3 Episode 3
Directed by	James Watkins
Written by	Charlie Brooker William Bridges
Original air date	21 October 2016 (2016-10-21)
Running time	52 minutes
Guest appearances
Alex Lawther – Kenny Jerome Flynn – Hector Susannah Doyle – Blackmailed Woman Frankie Wilson – Tom Jimmy Roye-Dunne – Red Hannah Steele – Melissa Sarah Beck Mather – Restaurant Mother Beatrice Robertson-Jones – Restaurant Daughter Maya Gerber – Lindsay Camilla Power – Sandra Ivanno Jeremiah – Moped Man Mariam Haque – Petrol Station Attendant Natasha Little – Karen Nicola Sloane – Bank Clerk Paul Bazely – The Man in the Woods Leanne Best – Penny

"Shut Up and Dance" is the third episode of the third series of British science fiction anthology series Black Mirror. It was written by series creator and showrunner Charlie Brooker and William Bridges, and premiered on Netflix on 21 October 2016, together with the rest of series three.

The episode tells the story of Kenny (Alex Lawther), a teenage boy who is blackmailed by a hacker possessing a video of him masturbating. As the hacker forces Kenny to commit mysterious and criminal acts, Kenny realizes that various other people, including a man named Hector (Jerome Flynn), are also blackmailed into similar actions.

The episode received very positive reviews.

Plot

Teenager Kenny (Alex Lawther) returns home from his busboy job to find that his sister has infected his laptop with malware; Kenny downloads a purported anti-malware tool which actually allows an unseen hacker to use the laptop's camera to record him masturbating. The hacker emails Kenny, threatening that the video will be sent to everyone in his contacts list unless he follows a series of instructions.

The next day at work, Kenny receives a text directing him to a location 15 miles away, with only 45 minutes to get there; he frantically cycles to the coordinates. There he is met by a man on a scooter, also acting on instructions from the hacker, who gives Kenny a box with a cake inside. Kenny is instructed to deliver the cake to a hotel room, where he finds Hector (Jerome Flynn). Hector then receives blackmail messages of his own: he was about to cheat on his wife with a prostitute, and follows the instructions out of fear he will lose custody of his children.

Kenny and Hector are instructed to drive to a location outside the city. However, when they stop for petrol, Hector's wife's friend Karen (Natasha Little) asks Hector for a lift home, for which they must drive recklessly without explanation, before continuing to their destination. There they are told to use a gun concealed in the cake to rob a bank. Hector insists on being the driver, leaving Kenny to perform the robbery. Though Kenny urinates out of nervousness during the robbery, he manages to get a bag full of cash and flee the scene with Hector.

Hector is told to destroy the car, while Kenny carries the money to a drop-off point in a nearby wood. There he meets another blackmail victim (Paul Bazely), who explains they are to fight to the death while the blackmailer observes through a camera-equipped drone; the money goes to the winner. Kenny tearfully protests that he merely looked at some pictures, but the man guesses that – like him – it was child pornography. Kenny brandishes the gun, then attempts suicide, but finds the gun isn't loaded. They fight hand to hand, as the drone transmits.

Meanwhile, Hector returns home to his family, but finds the hackers have already sent his wife the evidence of his infidelity. The other blackmail victims seen have also had their information released, despite complying with instructions; they each receive a trollface image from the blackmailer.

Bloody from the fight, Kenny staggers from the woodland with the money. He receives a hysterical call from his mother; the video of him masturbating to pictures of children is now public. He ends the call as the police arrive, offering feeble resistance as they apprehend him.

Production

In an interview, Brooker revealed that the story went through many different iterations, and some did not include the final twist. He revealed that in one version of the story, there was no reason why the events were happening, and in another the roles were reversed, with Jerome Flynn's character having the extremely dark secret.

Critical reception

Tim Goodman of The Hollywood Reporter praised Alex Lawther's performance in the episode, calling it: "one of the best things of 2016". Robbie Collin of The Daily Telegraph rated the episode 5 out of 5, describing it as "soul-scorching [and] relentlessly riveting". Matt Fowler of IGN similarly praised the episode, saying that it leaves the viewer "utterly shaken", and that it was a "remarkably heart-pounding episode". In the Daily Mirror, Suchandrika Chakrabarti gave the episode 5 out of 5 stars, summarising that the episode is "very simple, but incredibly effective" and "the least-technical episode of Black Mirror on Netflix, but among the very scariest".

Sophie Gilbert of The Atlantic compared the episode to "White Bear", another episode in the series wherein a seemingly innocent person turned out to be a criminal.

Zack Handlen of The A.V. Club gave the episode a B+ rating, complimenting Black Mirror's "willingness to force moral questions that make everyone feel awful", and saying that the episode was "never boring, but [...] not all that engaging, either". Adam Chitwood of Collider stated that although it wasn't a "bad episode", it was a "frustratingly tense one [...] [and] a bit too long and has one of the darkest throughlines of the season".

See also

• Blue Whale (game)

External links

• "Shut Up and Dance" at IMDb