If Loadsamoney had a penchant for pastel...
That's the shallow saccharin future we are presented with in episode one of Black Mirror, Nosedive.
I'm not sure how spoilery my reviews of each episode will be. I am planning on talking more about the feel and ideas of each episode rather than the plot. I am going to give you a spoiler warning anyway. Just in case. So here you go...
*SPOILER WARNING*
You can't say I didn't warn you.
I think this was a great choice for an opening episode. I found the technology and concepts very accessible. Whereas other episodes are more soaring Nosedive is just a sarcastic version of 2016. We have Uber. China has an app that uses a rating system. There's a rich kids' Instagram that only rich kids have the privileged God given right to post on, because images of us pleblians living our plebeian life in plebland are far too harrowing. Nosedive is these elements of today gone mainstream.
We are always making judgements, even on the social media sites that the proletariat can use. By consequence we are always performing. We portray a reality of our lives that isn't reality at all. It's theatre. And even though we are aware of this, the primitive emotional part of our brain is still effected. Even people like myself who like to think they are too wise to fuss over such banalities are sucked in. I don't think there's many who've never felt a flurry of excitement when they get a scattering of likes on their post. It reminds you that your important, that you matter (even though you don't). It is a reassurance that our existence is not inconsequential but rather we are leaving a mark on the world. Most of us have seen someone else's photo and felt a twinge of jealousy about their life whilst we're sat on a bus on our way to work struggling to write a blog. In that moment reality slips, we misplace our knowledge that the photo is staged and the person who's in it is probably right now looking at someone else's photo and feeling just as rubbish. NONE OF IT IS REAL. Away from the virtual sphere we always worry about how we appear. We cringe at what we said to that person that made us sound a fool. So much of our life is consumed by how we think we appear to others. Social media isn't the cause, merely the reinforcer of this habit.
That's the shallow saccharin future we are presented with in episode one of Black Mirror, Nosedive.
I'm not sure how spoilery my reviews of each episode will be. I am planning on talking more about the feel and ideas of each episode rather than the plot. I am going to give you a spoiler warning anyway. Just in case. So here you go...
*SPOILER WARNING*
You can't say I didn't warn you.
I think this was a great choice for an opening episode. I found the technology and concepts very accessible. Whereas other episodes are more soaring Nosedive is just a sarcastic version of 2016. We have Uber. China has an app that uses a rating system. There's a rich kids' Instagram that only rich kids have the privileged God given right to post on, because images of us pleblians living our plebeian life in plebland are far too harrowing. Nosedive is these elements of today gone mainstream.
We are always making judgements, even on the social media sites that the proletariat can use. By consequence we are always performing. We portray a reality of our lives that isn't reality at all. It's theatre. And even though we are aware of this, the primitive emotional part of our brain is still effected. Even people like myself who like to think they are too wise to fuss over such banalities are sucked in. I don't think there's many who've never felt a flurry of excitement when they get a scattering of likes on their post. It reminds you that your important, that you matter (even though you don't). It is a reassurance that our existence is not inconsequential but rather we are leaving a mark on the world. Most of us have seen someone else's photo and felt a twinge of jealousy about their life whilst we're sat on a bus on our way to work struggling to write a blog. In that moment reality slips, we misplace our knowledge that the photo is staged and the person who's in it is probably right now looking at someone else's photo and feeling just as rubbish. NONE OF IT IS REAL. Away from the virtual sphere we always worry about how we appear. We cringe at what we said to that person that made us sound a fool. So much of our life is consumed by how we think we appear to others. Social media isn't the cause, merely the reinforcer of this habit.
The protagonist Lacey is an archetypal Aristotelean tragic hero. She is incredibly well written and acted. She is likeable but her flaws are evident. The story of her downfall in a single day is tragic and funny. That makes me sound slightly sociopathic. I'm really not (or am I?) In literature and philosophy there's always been a fascination with the rise and fall of the individual. The extremes of which are absurd and thus create a disquieting juxtaposition of humour and foreboding. The story picks up on the macabre in this way. You want to simultaneously look and look away as Lacey rampages through the life she built up for herself and tears it apart. So instead you just sit there in pain, scared about how easily you could end up doing the same thing- which I think might be the point. At this point in the show I have an existential crisis and have to check I'm still sitting down and not standing on a seat shouting obscenities at everyone on the bus. However, unlike the traditional tragedy I did not find the ending a total nihilistic pit of despair. Lacey may have lost everything, but what she had was never real to begin with. Her pursuit of perfection and subsequent fall from grace pulled head first out of the Matrix. As ever Black Mirror marvels at technology and worries about what us humans might do with it.
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