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Black Mirror S2E02 "White Bear" discussion thread
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Black Mirror Season 2 Episode 2 - White Bear
Victoria wakes up and cannot remember anything about her life. Everyone she encounters refuses to communicate with her.
Warning: this thread contains spoilers about this episode! If you haven't seen it yet, please watch it and come back to this thread later.
You can talk about past episodes, but please don't discuss future episodes in this thread!
If you don't know what to say, here are some questions to get the discussion started:
- How does the title relate to the episode itself?
- Are there any similarities between real life events and the episode?
- Are there any references or easter eggs in the episode, such as references to past episodes?
I like the episode, and I'll write my thoughts on it in another comment, but I want to create a separate comment so I can share my disbelief with some of the online reaction to the episode.
On r/blackmirror and in threads that mention this episode in other places I have repeatedly seen people bring up the idea that this episode is morally gray. These posts seem to say that they are unsure if the punishment given out to the woman is appropriate and some even argue that the punishment is fitting and fair.
I really dislike these comments because it's so obvious that the punishment isn't justified at all. It's an incredibly cruel form of torture and no crime should ever deserve a punishment anything like it. I believe that no punishment should involve pain or torture of any kind and nobody deserves cruelty no matter what they have done, but even somebody with a less "extreme" view should see that how awful the punishment is. The idea that people even consider her punishment justified is reprehensible.
Even worse to me is that the episode seems to very clearly make this statement. The way the citizens participating in the punishment are so gleeful and nonchalant about it should be a scary thought to anybody and I would have said that part of the episode was too far-fetched if not for the comments online defending the punishment. There's also the implication that our main character was forced or coerced to participate in the murder that seems to be completely missed.
The way criminals are treated is directly hypocritical to the laws citizens must follow. In many places it's never acceptable to kill a human, including euthanasia and abortion. That is, unless you kill someone. Now it's okay for the state to kill you.
There was a time when all human tribes viewed all other human tribes as sub-human animals. That went on for hundreds of thousands of years, even in recorded history, until just very recently.
This conversation existing is affirming our progress even as we lament that it's not good enough.
I've only seen this episode once. I remember thinking that even though her memory is getting wiped the stress of doing this every day would kill her. Forgetting what happened wouldn't stop her body from producing adrenaline and other chemicals.
They'll just do it until she glitches out then stick her into an institution, if she survives. It's a pretty cool form of capital punishment if you are of the punishment-fits-the-crime mindset, not so fun if you consider the cruel and unusual. Reality TV would be on this in a hot second to sell the macabre.
I find I like Babylon 5's solution better. ;)
Absolutely agreed. Before the reveal, it was an average at best episode. But that reveal was an incredible twist - and the shock from it carried on though the rest of the episode. It could’ve ended there - but the kept going, and like you said, the planning scenes (while appealing to the nerdy “how would they actually do this” side :P) add an extra layer of discomfort, showing how they’ve turned torture into a tourist attraction (especially sickening how kids participate and are completely desensitized).
It seems like they took a (random?) criminal and selected them to be the “star” of a reality TV show, to appeal to or reinforce the spectator culture of their society.
The thing that stuck with me the most is....she doesnt actually know she is being punished because her memory is erased each time.
The murderer who goes to the electric chair or chemical death KNOWS what he did wrong.
That girl never did since they wiped her memory.
I get that there need to be repercussions for actions (although nothing this extreme) but from a simple glance this isnt justice.
Its just torture.
A+ episode though. Showed the true dark side of humanity.
Very true - they’ve basically turned her into a human “thing” that exists solely to suffer endlessly until death. At that point, I think the whole punishment aspect becomes an excuse to have a subject for a cruel reality TV show.
This was the episode that finally sold me on the series. I watched the first season and episode 1 of season 2 and its was only 1 of 4 of the episodes that I liked even remotely, 15 million merits. I stopped watching during 'Be Right Back' because I decided I wasn't feeling the series at all, I didn't watch for probably a year or two.
Some more reddit post about episodes and mentions to cool sounding stuff finally convinced me to try it again. I finished Be Right Back and was meh. Going into White Bear I had non-existent expectations and for most of the episode I felt like I'd give up on Black Mirror once again, but holy shit was I drawn in from then on with the big reveal of the episode. White Bear finally showed a true dark part of the Black Mirror universe and I got absolutely hooked, watched the rest of the series in the next day or two and finally got what all the fuss was about. This episode saved the series for me. 5/5
Sorry, a little bit later than usual posting this thread!
This is definitely one of the more intense episodes of the series, and also one of the best IMO.
The repeated & voyeuristic public spectacle aspect is where the meat of the critique is, for my taste. If it were not for that, it'd be a simpler examination of the eye for an eye view on capital punishment (punishing the perpetrator by inflicting the same thing they put their victim through). The writer deliberately makes it more difficult to sympathize with the protagonist than some here are making it sound by making her crime so heinous. Maybe it'd be too convenient of a dystopia if this sentence were being inflicted on, say, political protestors or someone else who clearly didn't do something wrong?
But I feel like this series has failed in its goal when it has to resort to hackey narrative devices like having a character wake up with amnesia to make its point. I was actually more disturbed by the concept of futuristic torture as presented in Altered Carbon, which is not a very thoughtful show.