Black Mirror (Season 5, Episode 1) "Striking Vipers"

• Synopsis: 

Danny lives in an apartment with his girlfriend Theo and his best friend Karl. Danny is madly in love with Theo and finds her beautiful and magnetic, and he loves the playful and light friendship he has with Karl. For Danny, life couldn't get any better-fast forward a few years and Danny and Theo are living in a large house with their son Tyler. Danny and Theo are aiming for baby #2 but their relationship isn't what it used to be. Karl comes back into Danny's life and introduces him to a virtual reality fighting game called Striking Vipers X. Danny accepts remembering all those times when him and Danny would play the original Striking Vipers game, but Striking Vipers X is nothing its original predecessor. The players and the characters are connected and anything their chosen characters feel, Danny and Karl will feel as well. After living a mundane suburban life for so long, Danny welcomes a new and exciting distraction...but at what cost to his family?

• Discussion

I know a lot of people have mixed feelings about this episode but I absolutely loved it. This episode, I feel, is the most relatable of the season-there really is something for everyone in this episode.

I want to start off discussing our trio-Danny, Theo, and Karl. The opening scene at the club showcases them at the supposed "peak" of their lives-they are young, attractive and have no worries in the world other than to enjoy their youth. Theo and Danny even partake in some sexual role playing, and end up having passion sex in the bathroom. They are both so engross in one another both physically and emotionally that it is almost palpable.

Danny's friendship with Karl is also great-he gets to have the best of both worlds: an amazing girlfriend and a down to earth best friend. Danny and Karl bond over their love for video games, and in a sense are "escaping reality"  for a few hours. Danny and Karl's respective Striking Vipers characters are Lance and Roxette. I used to play a lot of RPGs when I was younger with my brother and cousins, and I will say that no one chooses their characters at random. Sure some people switch around and try out different characters, but in the end they will choose one that they feel they connect to the most. It is obvious in the first scene when we see Danny and Karl playing Striking Vipers, that this isn't the first time that they have played with their respective players. I did find it interesting that Karl chose a female character, and it was something that I would normally gloss over if it was any other show but especially in Black Mirror, I know that no detail, no matter how small, should go unnoticed. 

To me, it seems as if Danny's life is pretty damn great so it is painfully obvious that everything is only going to go downhill from here. 

Fast forward eleven years later, and we are introduced to an entirely different setting. Danny and Theo are married and have a beautiful baby boy, Tyler. The three of them live in a beautiful and spacious house in a suburban neighborhood, and they are trying for a second child. For being only 38, Danny seems to have the dream life: he's wealthy, he has a beautiful home, and a loving family. Yet despite it being his birthday, Danny seems to be anything but happy. He seems almost in a daze, like a part of him can't believe that this is his life and I don't mean this in an appreciative way. His wife is still as beautiful as ever, but Danny's eyes are wandering, looking at the other moms. When I watched this episode for the first time, I never got the impression that Danny was the unfaithful type because he "craved" other women. I saw it more as him being bored with his life, and wanting to break out of his normal routine. 

When we are young we crave spontaneity but as we get older we crave stability but one thing is true, human beings are hardly ever satisfied even when we get exactly what we have been asking for. 

I could relate to Danny in that sense. I read a quote once that said "the days are long but the years are short" and I couldn't agree more. Danny's life, despite being most people's dream life, is predictable and uneventful. Even though 38 isn't what most would consider "young," he still has a long life left to live and to live everyday wishing there was more to your life is saddening. 

So when Karl enters, I knew he would be the catalyst...well him at the gift he got for Danny. Actually, let me backtrack a bit and talk about their reunion. The contrast between Danny and Karl is almost drastic-from their attire to their lifestyle to their love lives-these two best friends split in two different directions. On one corner we have the typical family man Danny, who wears his polo shirts and is in bed before 10 pm and on the other corner we have Karl the ultimate bachelor who is probably bedding a different girl every weekend. 

In contrast to Danny's contained life, Karl's carefree lifestyle is very tempting, reminding him of his youth. Karl even shows Danny photos of the girl he is seeing, and it is obvious that she is much younger than Karl. Karl coming back brings Danny the excitement that he had been missing. Karl is the first physical manifestation of the past coming back to life for Danny, the second being the newest edition of their beloved game. 

Striking Vipers isn't just a video game to Danny, it is a representation of a much happier time in his life. It was when he was still going out, enjoying life, and having spontaneous sex with Theo. It's him smoking weed with his best friend and not worrying about much in life-it encapsulates a much simpler time. I also feel as if there is a sort of parallel between Danny's life and the reboot or remastered version of Striking Vipers X-it is as if both Danny and the game have been given a "second chance" again. Danny, by getting re-introduced to Karl, and the game by being revamped with better graphics and designs.

There are two games that we see Danny playing in this episode-one is Tetris and the other being Striking Vipers, and it does not take a genius to see how drastically different these two games are. Tetris is a classic game, it's a game we have played and our parents before us have played. It's a simple game with a simple goal-fit all the pieces into their appropriate places. Easy right? Although it does take skill and fast thinking to excel in the game, there really isn't much to it. The same can be said for Danny's life-it wasn't easy to get where he is now, after all a house that size in that neighborhood probably costed him a pretty penny. He has a successful career and he takes care of his family, and in a way he is living this traditional lifestyle that many couples fall into when they reach their mid to late 30s. Growing older means preferring stability over spontaneity-even his and Theo's sex life is planned out. Gone are the days of having a quickie in the bathroom because their desires for each other are so strong, and in are the days of having sex at a certain time of the month because that is when Theo is the most fertile. Like Tetris, Danny's life has been planned out for him and when everything is planned out for you, the excitement that was once there slowly begins to dissipate. 

And honestly...Tetris isn't a game that most people could get "lost" in or get super excited about. So try to imagine comparing your life to a game like Tetris...it's hard not to feel bad for Danny if we were to break it down like this.

Compared to Tetris, Striking Vipers X-which honestly, even the original game looked pretty exciting so I can only imagine how much funner the newest version would be with the added virtual reality aspect-is anything but placid and predictable. 

In this game, you are able to be any character you want-you are not defined by a face or a body. In fact if you do not want to be human at all, they even have animal avatars to choose from. Aside from the numerous avatar choices, there are a plethora of levels and settings to choose from-you can choose to duke it out in a beautiful island or on top of a run down city. There are so many choices, and the beauty of it all is that you do not have to commit to anything. If you chose the beach level and decided it wasn't for you, no problem, you can change the level right away. There really aren't any consequences, and that in itself is the ultimate freedom. It is no wonder games are so popular, they provide this alternative world for people to escape into, and more often than not these worlds are generated and designed so well that it is easy to forget that they are not real.

Speaking of what's real and what's not real...during their first fight, Danny asks Karl...or more accurately Lance asks Roxette "is this going to hurt?" in which she replies "the game emulates all physical sensations." Okay I definitely appreciate a good RPG with realistic graphics, but why would any sane person want to actually feel the pain of being beat up? Okay, I could be wrong here and there are a lot of sadists out there but this was the one aspect of the game I couldn't fully grasp. I am going to go out on a limb here and say that the creators of this game did not think their audience would use this game to have VR sex, so they literally created a game where the pains of their characters could be felt by their players...interesting. I mean I guess that would make the actual game more intense-players would take the game more seriously because they don't want to feel the injury in real life as well.

I did not watch the trailer for Black Mirror Season 5 because I didn't want to be spoiled, and I wanted my first time watching each episode to be as unbiased as possible. Yet when Roxette and Lance (I'll refer to them by their avatar names when they are in the game and as Karl and Danny when they are outside of the game) started to "wind down" after their first brawl, I could definitely feel the sexual tension rolling off the screen. It took my mind a quick second before it went "wait, is this show really going there?" and yes...it did. 

To be quiet honest, I am more than okay with a homosexual story line-after all we did have the amazing "San Junipero" episode in the earlier seasons that was just beautifully done-so if this was where this episode was going, I am on board to see how it would play out. 

Karl doesn't have much to lose but Danny is risking his entire life on the line just to be with Karl. I was trying to figure out the message behind this episode: Was it that Danny and Karl had always had these feelings for each other but they did their best to repress them? Is Danny secretly gay and that is why he has been feeling so isolated from Theo? Is Karl gay or is he bisexual? Yet the more I thought about these questions, the more they didn't quite make sense. If Danny was indeed gay or bisexual, why did the beginning shots of the episode focus on him checking out women? Was this because he wanted to see if he was just losing attraction for Theo or was it something more severe and he had stopped finding all women attractive? 

If Karl and Danny had always had feelings for each other, then what was that passion sex scene we saw at the beginning of the episode between Theo and Danny for? Karl had been dating a beautiful young woman and had no problem performing for her as well, so it can't be that he had always been attracted to men right? And also there is the elephant in the room-the avatars that they had both chosen: Roxette is a female and Lance is a male. If the show really wanted to push this forbidden love between two men plot line, the foreshadowing would have been there right? It doesn't quite make sense because on one hand we know that behind the avatars are Karl and Danny, but when we are watching these intimate moments in the game, it is really Roxette and Danny. There was even a point in which Karl tells Danny that having sex as a female is different than having sex as a male, and it almost seemed as if he prefers to be in the female's position rather than the male's-that's also an interesting route to go down...

Yet there is no denying that even if there isn't a strong love there, there is definitely something between these two friends. I honestly hate using the word "something" to describe a feeling or a relationship, the word "thing" is the ultimate placeholder-my high school English teacher, Mrs. Stover would cringe if she knew I still use this word. Mrs. Stover, just hear me out-I'm using the word "something" because I cannot put my finger on exactly what it is. When Danny and Karl meet up in real life to see if they have any chemistry, they realize that after they had kissed that they in fact do not feel anything for each other. Yet when we go back to the previous scene at Danny's birthday dinner, Karl tells him that he has tried to intimate what the two of them had with other players playing Lance and it just isn't the same. Why is that? If he was only attracted to the avatar then anyone playing Lance would do, but that isn't the case here. So if Karl isn't just attracted to Lance and he isn't attracted to Danny in real life, what is it that he really wants?

Now I know I could have missed the mark by a land slide here, but this is my two cents on Karl: 

1. He can find someone he has a strong physical attraction to but he has a hard time finding someone he can have a mental and emotional bond with. Karl is actually a really complex character, much more so than our leading man, Danny. Karl is very attractive, successful, and wealthy-he is a triple threat ladies (and gentlemen), am I right? He knows that, and he can score any beauty he wants and he knows this. Yet despite dating a very young and beautiful woman, it is obvious that the relationship lacks substance. Case in point: his girlfriend, Mariella, didn't even know who Dennis Rodman is...insert the "she's too young for you bro" meme here. All jokes aside, having such a vapid relationship can make anyone feel unfulfilled and this is a fact-don't bank all your money on physical appearance. In contrast to his relationship with Mariella, Karl's relationship with Danny is much deeper because of their shared history and their strong friendship. Karl and Danny are able to open up to one another and talk about topics that are often difficult to discuss, and they are able to be vulnerable with one another while also keeping their friendship carefree. I'll bet that Danny would have known who Dennis Rodman is, that's for sure. 
2. Despite his emotional and mental bond with Danny, he isn't physically attracted to Danny... yet. I know this can be argued both ways, but I honestly don't see him being attracted to Danny physically. Could he eventually be since the emotional and mental bonds are so strong? Absolutely. I've seen it happen with friends who didn't find their significant other all that great to look at or they have dated people who weren't "their type" and ended up falling for that person anyways because they made them feel understood and loved. Do not sleep on how powerful a mental and emotional connection could be...
3. I have to bring this discussion back to Karl's avatar of choice, Roxette. Since I literally emphasized the word "choice," I want to remind everyone how peculiar it is that he chose a female avatar. Karl is very much proud of his masculinity and never showed any signs of wanting to be anyone other than himself, so this still strikes me as interesting. Since we don't know why he choice her as his avatar, I'm just going to assume that this could be a sort of subconscious choice to be someone completely different from his actual self. Maybe Karl, just like Danny, just wants an alter ego to escape into when real life begins to feel heavy. Or maybe when they first got the game, Danny made an offhanded remark that Roxette was attractive or something and Karl thought it was funny to choose her as his avatar and the rest is history. He could have done this as a joke, or maybe he subliminally made this choice because of his attraction to his best friend. Your guess is honestly as good as mine, but to gloss over this detail I feel, would be a shame.   

As for Danny, I feel his situation is a little less complicated. Let's explore two routes here (although there are many more to explore):

1. Danny is bisexual or is now homosexual: The idea that Danny could have a preference to men is quite likely. As a viewer, we can take the scenes of him checking out other women as 1. he is bored with his relationship with Theo and craves other women or 2. he is looking at other women and wondering why he isn't feeling anything. It is quite normal (although saddening to think about) for couples to lose feelings for each other, especially physically and sexually, especially if they have been together for quite some time. I do believe though that the "honeymoon stage" always comes back, so it's nothing to worry about too much. However, losing feelings for your spouse because you've gotten comfortable or bored is vastly different from losing feelings because you are attracted to a different gender entirely. When the two finally duke it out at the very end (in the rain I might add because why not right? Rain does indeed make everything more intense), Karl is very set in stone after he makes out with Danny that he does not feel "a damn thing." However when the camera zooms in on Danny, his face says something else. It seems to me that maybe Danny does feel something for his best friend, and if he does, then he once again has the most to lose out of the two. 
2. Danny is bored with his relationship and his life: Now this would be the easier problem to fix because it is common and therefore, less complicated. Like I've mentioned earlier, it is normal for couples to go through these in and out periods within their relationship. We do not get much information on Danny, but the only times I've seen Danny truly happy is in the opening scene when he was back in college and whenever he is playing Striking Vipers with Karl. Other than that, Danny seems, to put it bluntly...miserable. Even when he is at work, with his wife, or with his son-he seems as if he'd rather be anywhere else and in a way, that makes me feel sort of sympathetic for him. Danny is a good man and he wants to do the noble thing by his wife and his family, but that loyalty comes at the cost of his own happiness. 

Now I know this episode really focuses on Danny and Karl, but I do want to briefly talk about Theo. I think she is amazing. As a woman myself, I felt like I could relate to her so well. The scene in the bathroom where she has her shirt off and is examining herself in the mirror, wondering if there is something "wrong" with her is so raw. It is said that men grow more attractive as they get older, while women we "peak" in our 30s. For Theo, who remembers how things used to be between her and Danny, feels as if he no longer finds her attractive and wonders if there is someone else. The crazy bit is Theo is absolutely stunning, and she is an amazing mother and wife. Case in point: when she turns down the attractive stranger at the bar. She even tells Danny that marriage is a commitment, and he can't just do whatever he wants because he has to think of her. I really love that conversation that they had because it is so intimate and vulnerable, and it wasn't easy for her to open up to him like that especially since he has been so dismissive of her lately. 

Unlike Danny who craves into temptation, Theo is constantly fighting it: she fights her own needs as a woman to feel desired and she also fights away the attention of suitors because she is married. It is really hard not to admire her strength, and her forthrightness. 

All of that aside, what do you guys think of the ending of this episode? A lot of people think it is bittersweet and honestly, I just think it is quite depressing. Theo's entire speech on marriage being a strong commitment kind of goes out the door if she is allowed one day of the year to be unfaithful, and she is also allowing Danny the same leeway. That to me just sends a message that marriage cannot work and that even partners as wholesome and committed as Theo will soon give into temptation. I know this is Black Mirror and it is not the kind of show to sugar coat anything, but still...unless the takeaway is that this episode focuses less on commitment and more on communication? Danny and Karl have been avoiding the elephant in the room for quite some time now, and when they decide to finally meet up in person, they are able to have an open and honest communication about what truly is going on. For Theo and Danny, they also had their heart to heart in the car when she backs him into a corner and demands the honesty that she deserves.

All in all, I felt this episode was done so well because even after finishing it, I still think about it a lot. There have also even trending jokes about boys playing Striking Vipers X when they say they are playing games with their friends which is hilarious. 

★ ★ ★★/5