Utterly consumed with your phone? Obsessed with your iWatch to an unhealthy degree? Anxious when you’re offline? If you’re looking for cultural skewering from a futuristic, dystopian angle, perhaps laying down a foundation for the dark side of our current technological fixation, Netflix‘s “Black Mirror,” is the show for you.
Created by Charlie Brooker, in case you’re living under a rock, “Black Mirror” is a British science fiction television anthology series where no two eps are the same. “Black Mirror” has always featured great directors (Joe Wright, Dan Trachtenberg), and cast members (Hayley Atwell, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Mackenzie Davis, Domhnall Gleeson), and in season four, the series pushes starry guest-stars even further.
Filmmakers helming episodes in season four include John Hillcoat, David Slade and Tim Van Patten (“Boardwalk Empire,” “Game Of Thrones,” “The Wire,”) to name just a few. Cast members of note this season include Andrea Riseborough, Rosemarie DeWitt, Georgina Campbell and Jesse Plemons. Somehow Brooker has the time and energy to write most of “Black Mirror” and that won’t change. In season for he pens every episode except for a share credit on “USS Callister.”
Season four also features director Jodie Foster and an episode called “Arkangel” which gets the spotlight here in the first official trailer. Starring Rosemarie Dewitt (“La La Land,” “Mad Men“), Brenna Harding (“A Place to Call Home“) and Owen Teague (“Bloodline“), “Arkangel” nearly preys on parental fear, playing with the idea of when kids were able to play all day without supervision before culture changed in the ’90s and beyond.
Other episodes include he aforementioned “USS Callister,” which looks like a comedic riff on “Star Trek,” and “Metalhead” looks like it features some kind of “RoboCop“-esque mech enforcer. As the title suggests, “Black Mirror” always looks to reflect back at the viewer, often in ways that are chilling and possibly hit to close to home. But piercing stabs at our culture
While no date has been given yet, “Black Mirror” premieres on Netflix in late December and an official date will arrive soon I’m sure.