“Black Mirror,” the sci-fi anthology series, makes its return to Netflix this week for its seventh season, offering six more twisted tales that reflect the world around us and our increasingly uncomfortable relationship with technology.
Debuting back in 2011, the show currently spans 33 episodes (and one feature-length movie) and has been a critical darling for pretty much its entire run. With plenty of memorable moments, unforgettable characters and dozens of twists that will leave your jaw gaping, we’re picking out the very best of “Black Mirror” to celebrate its return to the streaming service.
And because you can’t take the good without the bad, we’ve also picked out a couple of installments that missed the mark. These are our picks for the best and worst episodes of “Black Mirror.”
Best “Black Mirror” episodes
‘White Bear’ (season 2, episode 2)
There have been very few “Black Mirror” episodes that have genuinely shocked me. Like, shocked me enough to stand up after it ended, pace around the room and furiously text my friends asking if they’d seen it yet because I was shook.
“White Bear” is one of those episodes, and honestly, it’s one of my favorites. It follows Victoria Skillane, a woman who wakes up with no memory of who she is. The world around her is complete chaos: People silently filming her on their phones, refusing to speak or help, while masked strangers hunt her down. It’s dystopian nightmare fuel.
But it’s the wild plot twist at the end that grabbed me by the throat. For once, it was a twist I genuinely didn’t see coming. The episode is so cleverly put together that it’s still engraved in my brain — Alix Blackburn
‘Shut Up and Dance’ (season 3, episode 3)
Picking my single favorite episode of “Black Mirror” is a tough task. I could have easily opted for “The Entire History of You,” “Be Right Back” or “Fifteen Million Merits,” and yet when I think about the show, there’s pretty much always one episode that springs to mind: “Shut Up and Dance.”
It’s the third episode of season 3, which premiered in 2016 and marked the show’s debut on Netflix after moving from the British network Channel 4. It stars the brilliant Alex Lawther, best known for “The End of the F**king World,” which ranks as one of my favorite shows of all time.
Its premise is simple: A young teenager is blackmailed into committing increasingly strange and eventually criminal acts after hackers obtain footage of him masturbating. Throughout the episode, I kept pondering, “Why is lead character Kenny this desperate to keep the footage hidden?” Then, the final twist comes into play, and everything clicks into place.
Yes, it’s arguably an episode that only works once; after you know the twist, it’s a lot less impactful. But that first viewing is truly haunting, and Lawther’s performance adds a desperate vulnerability to the proceedings that really hits home.
Whenever I’m looking to rewatch previous episodes, I can’t say that “Shut up and Dance” is the installment I select, but the impression it left on me the first time has never waned, even after all these years. It’s an encapsulation of the show at its very best. — Rory Mellon
‘San Junipero’ (season 3, episode 4)
I’ve seen “San Junipero” three or four times and ugly cried every single time. It’s one of the most emotional episodes of “Black Mirror.” The story of Yorkie and Kelly, two women who find each other in a digital afterlife, completely wrecks me.
What starts as a nostalgic, almost lighthearted exploration of a tech-driven paradise soon turns into a raw, deeply moving reflection on love, loss and memory. The connection between Yorkie and Kelly is so real and so tender. Watching them navigate their pasts while trying to figure out what’s truly worth holding onto — it’s just heartbreaking.
The twist destroys me every time, but it also gives me a weird sense of hope. When Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven Is a Place on Earth” starts playing, there aren’t enough tissues in the world to dry my tears. In a show known for its cold, dystopian outlook, “San Junipero” hits you in the heart. — Kelly Woo
‘USS Callister’ (season 4, episode 1)
“USS Callister” kind of does everything in the regular “Black Mirror” wheelhouse, all in one episode; it’s like a cocktail of the series’ usual themes.
Yes, it’s a colorful and kinda silly send-up of “Star Trek,” but it also balances that dark comedic tone with some sinister tech misuse and hideous behavior courtesy of a genuinely terrifying “Commander” Daly (Jesse Plemons).
The episode’s campy sci-fi pocket universe is impressively realized, and the near feature-length episode features some truly uncomfortable moments that have stuck in my memory ever since.
I was freaked out in “The Matrix” when Neo’s mouth was sealed up, and Daly’s threats to keep a featureless Nanette Cole (Cristin Milioti) constantly on the verge of suffocation? That’s nightmare fuel right there. Daly’s depravity only makes the crew’s escape into virtual space all the more cathartic. — Martin Shore
‘USS Callister: Into Infinity’ (season 7, episode 6)
It might seem like the obvious pick to go with the USS Callister sequel in “Black Mirror” season 7, but “Into Infinity” genuinely a really fun time and the perfect way to wrap up this new season.
Not only do we get thrown back into the universe reminiscent of “Star Trek,” but we’re also reunited with the original cast, including Cristin Milioti as Nanette.
In the sequel, Captain Nanette Cole and her crew are still trapped in a never-ending virtual universe, facing off against a staggering 30 million players. From the moment it starts, the episode is non-stop chaos, and it ends up being a wild, super entertaining ride.
As you’d hope from a sci-fi thriller, there are plenty of epic spaceship battles, explosions, and rising tension — especially as the real-world Nanette starts to discover that the digital clones are still stuck inside. It definitely left an impression, and I can see myself going back to rewatch it. — Alix Blackburn
Worst “Black Mirror” episodes
‘Mazey Day’ (season 6, episode 4)
For a series that’s meant to be provocative or prophetic, a story where the moral essentially is “the paparazzi sure are invasive and predatory, right?” isn’t exactly breaking new ground.
Enter “Mazey Day,” which sees a conflicted celebrity photographer hunting the titular teen starlet to a rehab facility after she’s involved in a hit-and-run incident.
What follows is pretty boring, really There’s a lot of build-up and heavy-handed moralizing, with scenes of just the most crass folks spouting horrific stuff in a cheap and kind of amateurish way (just so you really get that they’re the problem), and then you get the episode’s “big reveal” and wild pivot to a bloody supernatural thriller as their target turns on them.
The big reveal being such a left-field take really pulled me right out of the moment. And then, just in case you haven’t gotten the point already, it ends with that final “shot.” Pass. — Martin Shore
‘Bandersnatch’
“Bandersnatch” is one of “Black Mirror’s” most interesting experiments. Not only is it a feature-length installment instead of an hour-long episode (so it technically exists outside the seven seasons), but it’s also interactive, asking viewers to make decisions that impact how the story plays out.
On paper, it’s a novel idea and seems the perfect way to make viewers feel like an active participant in the warped world of “Black Mirror.” In practice, it proves to be little more than a gimmick, and it doesn’t help that “Bandersnatch” is among the worst narratives the series has ever spun.
The story centers on a programmer (Fionn Whitehead) who is attempting to turn a dark fantasy novel into a video game. Yet it spins its wheels all too often and eventually descends into a maze of surrealism that feels completely insubstantial and more than a little bit silly.
It doesn’t help that the vast majority of choices you’re forced to make have little to even zero impact on what happens next. It presents you with the illusion of choice, and while I suspect that was intentional, it doesn’t make for a satisfying viewing experience.
I actually recall watching it for the first time with my partner, and them being so bored and increasingly frustrated with the circulator nature of “Bandersnatch” that they requested we switch it off and watch something else instead. I had to return later on my own to see the thing through to the bitter end, and frankly, I probably shouldn’t have bothered. — Rory Mellon
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