Summary: Mia and her boyfriend Rob accidentally kill a man and cover it up together. 15 years later, Rob tries to reveal what they did so he can have a clear conscience but Mia doesn't agree and kill him. A woman named Shazia is investigating a car accident with a device which allows her to see memories. The investigation takes her to Mia and she learns of what Mia did. Mia kills her and proceeds to kill her family to avoid leaving witnesses. However she leaves the guinea pig alive and its memories expose Mia's crimes.
The Good: First and foremost, I have to stress how beautiful this episode was. The cinematography was wonderful in this episode and it's easily the prettiest Black Mirror episode so far with a lot of creative shots which improve on the scenes a lot. I really liked the first scene. Mia and Rob' kill was pretty brutal and genuinely chilling, and I think it set the tone nicely for the episode which only got darker from there. Better yet though was Mia and Rob's conversation 15 years later. Mia looks completely different and is obviously changed, but Rob looks exactly the same and the only accomplishment he seems to have made is quitting alcohol. It's an excellent way to emphasize why Mia wouldn't be bothered by their past killing because she has moved on with her life and done bigger things. Rob hasn't and as such he is haunted by his past which is quite similar to his present. Their conversation is very good and is probably my favourite part of the episode honestly. Mia killing Rob was sudden, but I understood why she did it and that's the most important part for sure and is key in making me buy into Mia's mindset for the rest of the episode. That brings me to the next point. Mia is the antagonist in this episode and I think it's really enjoyable to watch her do whatever she can to cover her tracks. Though not all of her kills have a massive impact, they are still brutal and difficult to watch, and it makes Mia's ultimate conviction at the end feel very deserved as she wipes out an entire family. Shazia's short story was effective too and I thought the concept of the memory device is pretty neat, as the concepts on this show always are. It was nice to get introduced to it before she confronts Mia because it allowed us to really understand the situation as Mia and Shazia talked. We want Shazia to survive but we also don't want Mia's secret to come out, so it ends up becoming really tense television as they start talking and Shazia eventually discovers the truth. The Bad: This episode had a cool concept and some good moments but it's also the most flawed episode this season. The biggest flaw for me is the fact that this episode really had no purpose. Ask yourself this: what was the point of this episode? I asked myself this for all other Black Mirror episodes and I could come up with an answer immediately, but with this episode I just couldn't come up with anything. The episode didn't have any kind of point it wanted to explore. It was just a dark episode with people getting murdered just for the sake of it. This show has been depressing before and it has worked, but that is only because those depressing episodes had a larger purpose. Since this episode has no purpose, it feels like pointless misery and that's never something you want in television. If you are making your audience feel like crap, you have to have a reason in doing so. The main reason why the episode seems to have no point is because of the weak exploration of technology. The technology wasn't really explored at all and very little about this episode actually focused on the affects that technology has on our humanity. That's okay though if the episode had a powerful story to tell with memorable characters. But it didn't. The characters were basic, not that likeable and their character arcs weren't that memorable. "USS Callister" did a much better job with its characters. The plot had a lot of issues as well. For one, the middle of the episode really drags and doesn't amount to much. We are given tons of time to learn about how the technology works, but it has literally no payoff and there are even plot holes created by it (more on that in a second). Furthermore, it's very obvious that Mia and Shazia are on course to run into each other, so it feels like a huge waste of time until they finally do meet. But now about the technology. This becomes a problem because the ending of this episode features what I think is the show's worst twist. First we are treated to the unpleasant killing of a baby but we learn that the baby is actually blind as the shock reveal that she didn't need to kill the baby. But there are so many flaws here. For one, we have established that to see somebody's memories they have to think about them. But babies have bad memories and how would you possibly communicate with a baby to think about what they have seen beforehand? There shouldn't be any conceivable way to access the baby's memories anyways, so that makes the murder feel even more unnecessary. But worse than that is the second twist that the guinea pig witnessed the whole thing. If you thought the communicating with a baby thing was bad, this is even worse! For one, guinea pigs have terrible memories which is a biological fact, and of course how on Earth could we communicate to a guinea pig? It's terrible writing and feels tacked on just for a shocking ending. I was disappointed in the use of the "car won't start" cliché. I mean, how often is it that cars just happen to not start when you need it to? It's a stupid coincidence which is just there for more drama. The Unknown: Sadly there isn't much to discuss here because the episode is pretty shallow. I only have one question, and that is why is the episode called "Crocodile"? Is it because the main character is similar to a crocodile or am I missing something here? Best Moment: Probably Mia and Rob talking after 15 years and showing how far they have come as characters. It was very well written. Character of the Episode: Mia. Conclusion: This episode had potential but there was shallow exploration and a weak ending leaving this as one of the weaker episodes. Season 4 has been rather disappointing so far, so here's to hoping that the next few episodes can be of a higher quality. Score: 60
0 Comments
Your comment will be posted after it is approved.
Leave a Reply. |
Aaron DhillonJust a university student who loves to watch TV. And analyze it way too much. Archives
March 2024
Categories
All
|