Black Mirror (TV series)/Fridge

2011 TV series

• The kidnapper in "The National Anthem" — an anonymous individual who with one action sows the seeds of chaos within an entire community and forces them to dance along to his tune through provocative, vulgar and inflammatory actions, derailing all discussion until it's about him and what he's done and making everyone else do all pretty much just to prove a point about how stupid everyone else is for getting caught up in what he's done. So, basically a glorified Troll, in other words.
  • The kidnapper was also revealed to be Turner Prize winner at the end, so it's also a send up of True Art Is Offensive
• Either Fridge Brilliance or Fridge Horror depending on your viewpoint, but in 15 Million Merits the omnipresent exercise bikes that apparently provide power to society don't appear to be connected to anything. This would make the constant peddling totally pointless. Given the other omnipresent aspect of this society, constant entertainment on screens everywhere, the bikes could be just another way to occupy a populace that actually has nothing to do.
  • It's shown that you obtain the "merits" through the cycling, but exactly what the cycling is meant to achieve is never clarified, although as a bit of Fridge Brilliance this is the point - the bikes are useless busy work which everyone has to do to get by, even if it's totally pointless, as a metaphor for the work everyone has to do to get by in the real world today. Ever feel like your job is totally useless and produces nothing worthwhile? That's what the bikes are meant to be.
  • Isn't it suggested that cycling provides electricity to power all the screens? So people are kept compliant by watching trash to distract them from their meaningless jobs... which exist only to produce the trash that keeps everyone compliant... Consumer capitalism in a nutshell.
    • Yes that's what the populace is lead to believe but the humans generally only provide ~250 Watts while cycling, ~400-500 Watts if they really push themselves. Now currently a 52" TV will use about ~285 watts (varies depending on manufacturer of course) even taking into account future improvements in energy saving technology it's very unlikely humans alone would be able to power the power city that includes lifts, vending machines, lights, touch-screen mirrors and of course the omnipresent floor to ceiling TVs complete with motion detectors. It's possible that they are simply there to augment the power consumption but personally I think it's just to keep the population busy and to make them think they're doing something worthwhile.
      • It's a metaphor, nothing more. It doesn't make objective sense but then it's not meant to.
• Either Fridge Brilliance or Fridge Horror depending on your viewpoint, but at the end of 15 Million Merits, the main character Bing is seen looking out of what might be a huge Fake vista of woodland or is alternatively looking out of a real floor to ceiling set of windows showing lush green forest as far as the eye can see. This means that he has either swapped his tiny cell for a larger Gilded Cage or The endless drudgery of cycling that the majority of the populace does, has enabled most of the planet to resort back to natural forest. Either ending can be seen as ultra depressing, but YMMV.
• Fridge Brilliance for The Entire History Of You. The memory grains that store everything you're doing at every point in your life are a clear metaphor for social networking, and the habit of recording everything one is up to as a status update. Do you really want to keep all that around forever? Rendered somewhat scarier by Facebook's introduction of a "timeline" feature, which quite literally lets you zip around to see your exact thoughts, location and activities at any point in your life where Facebook has data to display, from your birth onwards. Virtually everything depicted in the programme is now at least vaguely possible. Sweet dreams.
• In 15 Million Merits, the citizens all sleep in their own single cells and are bombarded with pornography every few minutes. One method of population control, I suppose...
• In The Entire History of You, Liam's suspicious and paranoid behaviour - when you think that spouses in regular circumstances who believe their partner is cheating on them are usually 'right', then his behaviour is totally justified, and magnified, by being able to replay all the memories to pick up on all the things that triggered those thoughts over and over again over the years.
• In 15 Million Merits, people who are fat are discriminated, as they do no exercise and do not power up the screens that everyone uses. Because of this, they are given either menial jobs such as cleaning, or are made to appear on TV where they are abused for the entertainment of those watching. Oh, and you can shoot them in computer games. So to sum up, the people who are considered to be a waste to society are abused on TV as entertainment and given menial jobs where they suffer everyday. Sound familiar?
• Fridge Brilliance in 15 Million Merits: it's implied, when Abi goes for her Hot Shot audition, that the Cuppliance is responsible for her going into pornography more than anything else. But then, Bing goes on as well, avoids drinking it... and then goes along with the panel's offer and gets swallowed up by the machine anyway. Maybe the drink didn't really do that much, they just thought it did?
• 15 Million Merits ? Why not 12 million? 20 million? Because in the future, everybody will be famous for fifteen minutes.