Culture

We're Just Gonna Go Ahead and Rank All the Existing Episodes of Black Mirror

Before the show returns, let's take a long hard look in the Mirror.

Quick: where were you in January 2015? If you can somehow summon the wherewithal to think back through the ichorous fog of an unprecedentedly hateful political season, you may remember a simpler time. A more innocent time. A time when---at least if you were in the US---you probably spent a few blissful hours watching Black Mirror, the creepy British sci-fi anthology that had just landed on Netflix. In the span of a mere six epsiodes and a later Christmas special, series creator Charlie Brooker managed to extrapolate from our always-connected, smartphone-obsessed society all kinds of dark near-future tales. Would memories one day be recordable---only to be used as leverage? Would the gamification of fitness curdle into servitude? And what about pigs, man? With *Black Mirror'*s imminent return upon us (as a Netflix exclusive, we couldn't help but notice with a tiny shudder of foreboding), please accept this not-at-all-humble ranking of the first two seasons. And yes, we're giving bonus points for prescience.

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