Ranking Every Episode of Black Mirror Season 7

Black Mirror season 7 came out this week and after binging (and then re-watching again because I’m a sicko), I’m ready to rank these episodes from least to best.

Before we get into this, I want to make it clear I think all 6 episodes were fuego so if something is ranked at the bottom, that doesn’t mean I think the episode sucked.

Black Mirror season 7 was their best season in a long time—creating 6 interesting stories, all beautifully shot and directed and acted.

5 stars to everyone involved.

Okay, so yea, let’s rank every episode of Black Mirror season 7:

6. “Hotel Reverie” (Season 7, Episode 3)

A-List movie star, Brandy Friday (Issa Rae), longs to star in a classic, old-school, golden age Hollywood classic like her favorite film, Hotel Reverie—starring Dorothy Chambers (Emma Corrin).

Thankfully, this is Black Mirror, so any random, specific technology you need to make any random, specific story exists.

Awkwafina runs a tech company that can reanimate old movies in real time—transporting modern actors into the place of existing old ones—remaking films in real-time. And would you look at that, Awkwafina’s team happens to be remaking Hotel Reverie. [Awkwafina voice] “what is you talmbout”

Despite being derivative, Hotel Reverie is one of the best stories Black Mirror has told—but the episode is long and Issa Rae, bless her heart, cannot act as well as her screen partner, Emma Corrin. So Issa can’t act and she’s given one of the longest episodes to prove juuust how bad she is.

But I’m a sucker for forbidden love where one person plays the most beaufitul song you’ve ever heard on the piano and the other person quietly stands behind them, placing their hands on their shoulder to indicate “we are lesbian lovers”.

Great TV. Great effort by Issa Rae. I’m sure it was exciting receiving the opportunity to expand her acting range but it turns out, she ain’t got it. And that’s okay!

5. “Eulogy” (Episode 5)

Paul Giamatti stars as ~~Paul Giamatti~~ Philip—a lonely grouch who receives a phone call informing him that an old flame passed away and asking if he’d like to share anything for her eulogy.

He is then sent a technology that—through the help of an AI (played by Patsy Ferran)—guides him through his buried memories of Carol, a lost love.

Eulogy is a fearless story—presenting our protagonist as an immature, drunk asshole who slowly realizes he, and only he, is the reason Carol left him. I love the way Paul and Patsy travel through still images as he desperately attempts to remember the love of his life’s face after he dramatically cut her head out of all his photos.

Personally, I could not stay frozen like these background actors without, like, looking directly into the camera lens or sneaking a vape hit in but I reckon that’s why I write about acting and don’t practice it myself.

4. “USS Callister: Into Infinity” (Episode 6)

The video game/ Star Trek vibes aren’t my thing. However, this is an incredibly well-made sequel to a story I wasn’t originally in love with—expanding the world of USS Callister into the greater world of corporate greed and worker exploitation.

Personally, this episode didn’t heat up for me until someone was hit by a car. I sat up in my chair like the doctor hit me in the knee with that little rubber, I don’t know what it’s called, knee hammer(?)

This USS Callister sequel was an amazing exploration into how power and loneliness can activate the worst versions of ourselves, as Jesse Plemons returns, not as evil Captain Kirk but as a lonesome video game programmer used and enslaved by corporate interests.

Also, I’ll watch anything with hot blue ladies. I have a type, apparently. Blue. Ok.

3. “Bête Noire” (Episode 2)

This episode could be ranked no. 1 on this Black Mirror Season 7 list based solely on my respect for unhinged pettiness.

Sienna Kelly stars as Maria, a candy exec whose new recipe disgusts a room of focus group tasters, when she recognizes a former classmate, Verity Greene (Rose McEwen), persuading, changing the minds of the focus group until they suddenly fall in love with Maria’s shitty product.

Maria remembers Verity as the nerdy girl in school no one liked except one male teacher, whom she believes Verity may or may not have milked.

The technology in this story is the silliest of the series, as I’m unsure an alternate reality exists in which those two women were meeting in the office hallway at night with Maria speaking “fluent Chinese.”

This story is broken down into 5 chapters, each corresponding with the day of the week, starting on Monday and ending on Friday. Verity even quips about how fast she was able to break Maria, taking just 5 days to bring her to rock bottom.

All hail our empress of the universe!

2. “Plaything” (Episode 4)

Peter Capaldi is our long, gray-haired maniac who gets captured shoplifting a 40oz beer in a 2034 London convenience store—activating their futuristic crime-stopping doors that lock criminals inside until the police arrive.

Once in custody, our protagonist, Cameron Walker, begs for a pen and paper while telling the detective and social worker the story about The Thronglets—a game introduced to Walker in the 90s when he was a video game reviewer for PC Zone magazine.

This episode is sort of a sequel to that choose-your-own-adventure Bandersnatch bullshit episode with Will Poulter reprising his role as video game designer, Colin Ritman—except this time, he’s created Thronglets—which is less so a “game” and more so the creation of sentiant life that Cameron Walker dedicates his existence to growing, understanding and eventually going as far as drilling a cable into his own brain so he could connect directly with the Throng.

Perhaps I’m a sucker for 90s nostalgia and growing up with those PC MS-DOS games or perhaps it’s the grimey, late 90s/early 2000s cinematography but I am ready to serve our Throng overlords.

1. “Common People” (Episode 1)

We are all one medical emergency away from total ruin.

Common People is the most easily digestible Black Mirror season 7 story and easily the most effective in its message.

Rashida Jones and Chris O’Down star as Amanda and Mike—a married couple whose lives are forever altered by Amanda’s brain injury—leading to a new, “experimental” technology that allows her to extend her life juuuuust as long as the couple pays their monthly subscription fee.

A smart, heartwarming tale about a modern healthcare institution that has been privatized and profit-driven—only truly serving the wealthy who can afford it—while regular, everyday people must sacrifice everything to keep their sick loved ones from the grave.

There’s also an interesting exploration of live-streaming culture, as Mike must sign up to stream on DumDummies—a platform in which the wretched must do reckless or harmful acts to themselves in hopes of getting little tips and gifts from their bloodthirsty viewers.

Brutal episode 1 but certainly set the tone for the best season this show has made top to bottom. Not a single dud in sight. Look at Black Mirror being good again. Go, Charlie Brooker. Do your thing, king.

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