With last week’s premiere of season seven of “Black Mirror,” audiences were treated to the most terrifying episode to date, “Common People.” 

The story follows Amanda (Rashida Jones) and her husband Mike (Chris O’Dowd) as their lives are turned upside down when Amanda suffers a medical emergency and is placed into a coma. 

With seemingly no options available to save her life, Mike is recommended a meeting with Gaynor, (Tracee Ellis Ross) a spokeswoman and sales rep for a new start-up called Rivermind. 

Gaynor tells Mike that Rivermind can save Amanda’s life by replacing the parts of her brain that they remove in surgery with artificial tissue that is connected to their servers. Think of it like cell service but for consciousness. 

Rivermind has towers that provide ‘coverage’ for their customers and as long as you stay within your coverage area, you are fully conscious and aware of things, but if you leave your coverage area, you black out. 

The company operates on a monthly subscription of $300 that Mike and Amanda definitely can not afford. 

But how could you turn down the chance to save your wife’s life? 

Mike agrees, the surgery is a success and Amanda is seemingly as good as new. 

Mike starts taking extra shifts at work and working overtime to cover the subscription costs and it is a burden but one he is happy to endure to have Amanda back home. 

Amanda is a teacher and soon able to return to work but things become difficult when Rivermind rolls out ads on the common tier coverage plan. Ads hijack the user’s brain and causes them to temporarily black out and recite some slogan or sales pitch for a variety of products that relate to whatever topic of conversation the user is currently having. 

Not to worry though, by upgrading to Rivermind premium, Amanda can enjoy a wider coverage area and the removal of ads, all for the low price of $800 dollars a month. 

It is a truly dystopian scene, both horrifying and oh so American, an eerily realistic possibility that would not look out of place on your local evening news. 

The aforementioned Gaynor is so upbeat and excruciatingly positive as she explains these horrors to Mike and Amanda that she seems almost robotic. Like she was programmed to be as joyful as possible, no matter the context of the situation.  

To avoid the ads and allow Amanda to return to work, Mike starts performing stunts on the internet for strangers in order to make extra money. Degrading things like drinking his own urine and putting mouse traps on his tongue, all for the luxury of keeping his wife’s brain functioning! 

It’s the type of feel-good story akin to an 8-year old child raising money to buy his friend a new wheel-chair that fills you with immense dread that a kid would have to do such a thing at all. 

Rivermind does not stop there though, there are more upgrades in store! Premium mode is now standard and the ultra premium plan is Rivermind Lux. This option is $1,800 a month and comes with an app that lets the users regulate their mood and senses. 

So they never have to experience real emotions again! 

If you don’t have the money to subscribe to Rivermind Lux full time though, you can buy booster packs for shorter periods of time. 

Mike is able to do more embarrassing things on the internet to buy 12 hours of Rivermind Lux for Amanda to celebrate their anniversary but the aftermath of such an experience leaves her reality feeling quite empty by comparison. 

Oh, Mike and Amanda have also been trying for a kid for a while now but if she gets pregnant, it will costs $90 extra per month because of course it does! 

Without spoiling the ending as this is an episode that deserves to be seen, the takeaway from this episode was a real sense of dread. Mainly because this episode, albeit sci-fi in nature, does not seem impossible or even improbable in our current world. 

To think that a company could have the capabilities of bringing people back from otherwise fatal traumatic brain injuries and instead of prioritizing its ease of access and sharing it around the world, they seek to monetize it as much as possible is exactly how I think an American company would react in real life. 

When a system prioritizes profit over people, you create the incentive for situations like this. A healthcare system that exists mainly to turn a profit rather than to help people creates the opportunity for a company like Rivermind to actually exist. 

With each passing season, it gets harder and harder to enjoy “Black Mirror” because each release feels closer and closer to seeing our current reality laid bare. 

But this show is still exceptional and season seven is one of the best yet, despite the real horror that it inspires. 

Categories: Arts & Entertainment