Rating ⅗
ATTENTION: SPOILERS of Black Mirror S. 3 Ep. 2 “Playtest”
The episode follows an American traveler named Cooper, who volunteers to test out an experimental virtual reality video game. Unbeknownst to the audience, Cooper is in the virtual reality from the beginning of the episode, but we see him volunteer for the video game about a third of the way into the story. At this point, the episode turns into a nightmare.
Black Mirror is known for speculating about advanced futuristic technology and its societal or individual effects. The video game technology can read your mind, giving Cooper his worst nightmare based on his fears. However, during the first part of the episode, the game gave him the best sensations he has ever experienced. Every scene is beautiful; he has sex with a gorgeous girl–it is his dream world. Then, things turn dark.
I gave the episode a ⅗ because it is worth a casual watch. If you can guess the ending, and if you read this review, now that you know the ending, it is not as exciting of an episode. It is a slow burn because the first 20 minutes of the 57-minute episode appear to have nothing to do with the interesting video game test–we do not find out until the end that the entire episode was the test. But, if you can get through the first third, following Cooper as he explores the mansion is entertaining. As the video game turns into a nightmare, Cooper slowly becomes scared and wants out. He gets physically injured, and shit gets real.
Another positive element of the episode has to do with the cinematography. The first third of the episode had shots with lots of light, and the shots increasingly became darker– literally and figuratively. Additionally, as the stakes get higher–Cooper wanting out, the video game infecting his mind and establishing roots, the experimenter unable to shut off the game–the language becomes more explicit and intense.
I have watched every Black Mirror episode because most of them are worth a watch insofar as they relate to contemporary ideas and problems. In the case of this episode, it gets us thinking about how far augmented reality can go. At the beginning of the episode, we see some of the highs that virtual reality can offer, but the episode focuses on the dark side of technology–as that’s what viewers care about. It scares us that we do not know how our everyday technology works. The world the writers built reflects this fear and shows that even a seemingly innocuous “Playtest” can become deadly when advanced technology is involved.