This review is only for those who watched the show!
Firstly, not as deep as it used to be, like in the first couple of seasons. It's enjoyable but how much of it comes from the famous cast and how much comes from the script? I think Black Mirror was better with the less known actors, then the characters were like us, ordinary people caught in the web of confusing evil tech. The celebrities playing celebrities trick is just distracting.
But never mind that. My real problem is this, and it's very specific to this episode, ATTENTION, SPOILER: Am I missing something here? Because I can't understand why on earth the "avatar Joans" would smash the quantum computer because the real Joan, AKA the source, already did that. Yes she probably smashed it but because she wanted it to end simply. There wasn't any big revelation about how her life is an adaptation and her whole existence was deep fake cgi because it was not. It was real. And the computer generates a similar version of what's happening in real life, so the first version must be more or less the same scenario and the second one, and third one, and so on... there's no reason for the avatars to realize that they are avatars. The real life events wouldn't have a guy in the control room watching the real Joan rapping in the car because that recording did not exist and without it there wouldn't be a realization of the truth moment. That's not the truth of Joan so can't be scripted in the lifes of digital Joans. They wouldn't say that they should destroy the computer because that's already happened, determinism etc etc, because they would still be thinking that they were original. You see my problem?
Also, instead of doing that thing in the church, if I were Joan, my first solution to this problem would be getting rid of all digital devices for a month, not giving the algorithm content. Why would a character choose the crap route instead of the first, much less humiliating thing that comes to mind? Oh for cheap sensational scenes, ok.
I think whole thing was a bit lazy. If I had written that script, I would have ended the show with digital Joan destroying the machine without realizing that she was a version of Joan, therefore each Joan destroys CGI versions that come after them, (not themselves like stated in the show, that is just silly, computer is creating the next version, not the current version) leaving only real Joan left at the end, all happy at first, then starting a new season against her will, this time the story of her serving a prison sentence due to destroying that computer, because unfortunately there was a backup computer.
But I understand, it was not meant to be serious, it was a satire about AI threatening to take creative jobs in the industry and we got it and laughed about it but I still think it needed that bit of perfection in detail, a bad ass ending and a little pinch of dreadful pessimism to make it real Black Mirror material. The episode paradoxically resembles to be written by AI. I think Brooker could do better. No need to give ammunition to computers in the argument of humans vs machines, right?
Firstly, not as deep as it used to be, like in the first couple of seasons. It's enjoyable but how much of it comes from the famous cast and how much comes from the script? I think Black Mirror was better with the less known actors, then the characters were like us, ordinary people caught in the web of confusing evil tech. The celebrities playing celebrities trick is just distracting.
But never mind that. My real problem is this, and it's very specific to this episode, ATTENTION, SPOILER: Am I missing something here? Because I can't understand why on earth the "avatar Joans" would smash the quantum computer because the real Joan, AKA the source, already did that. Yes she probably smashed it but because she wanted it to end simply. There wasn't any big revelation about how her life is an adaptation and her whole existence was deep fake cgi because it was not. It was real. And the computer generates a similar version of what's happening in real life, so the first version must be more or less the same scenario and the second one, and third one, and so on... there's no reason for the avatars to realize that they are avatars. The real life events wouldn't have a guy in the control room watching the real Joan rapping in the car because that recording did not exist and without it there wouldn't be a realization of the truth moment. That's not the truth of Joan so can't be scripted in the lifes of digital Joans. They wouldn't say that they should destroy the computer because that's already happened, determinism etc etc, because they would still be thinking that they were original. You see my problem?
Also, instead of doing that thing in the church, if I were Joan, my first solution to this problem would be getting rid of all digital devices for a month, not giving the algorithm content. Why would a character choose the crap route instead of the first, much less humiliating thing that comes to mind? Oh for cheap sensational scenes, ok.
I think whole thing was a bit lazy. If I had written that script, I would have ended the show with digital Joan destroying the machine without realizing that she was a version of Joan, therefore each Joan destroys CGI versions that come after them, (not themselves like stated in the show, that is just silly, computer is creating the next version, not the current version) leaving only real Joan left at the end, all happy at first, then starting a new season against her will, this time the story of her serving a prison sentence due to destroying that computer, because unfortunately there was a backup computer.
But I understand, it was not meant to be serious, it was a satire about AI threatening to take creative jobs in the industry and we got it and laughed about it but I still think it needed that bit of perfection in detail, a bad ass ending and a little pinch of dreadful pessimism to make it real Black Mirror material. The episode paradoxically resembles to be written by AI. I think Brooker could do better. No need to give ammunition to computers in the argument of humans vs machines, right?