Showrunner: Charlie Brooker
Directed by: David Slade
Runtime: Variable
It’s that time of year again where Black Mirror returns to our screens, making us want to throw out all of our tech and run in fear into the wilderness, only to inevitably die to a drone with an AK-47 mounted to its body. This time, however, it’s a bit different. Black Mirror does not present us with a full season of misery, but just one episode—Black Mirror: Bandersnatch.
Bandersnatch is a standalone episode of Black Mirror that is not like any other. This is a choose-your-own-adventure episode. During the episode, prompts appear at the bottom of the screen and you, the viewer, have to choose between two options. The choices you make have an impact on what happens in the story, and potentially what ending you see.
The story in question follows a young man living in the eighties named Stefan. Stefan is a software developer who has been working on a video game adaptation of his favourite book ‘Bandersnatch’, a choose-your-own-adventure novel. How convenient. At the same time, Stefan is going through severe mental health issues stemming from a traumatic experience he had as a young boy. Stefan has to deal with his issues of paranoia, delusions and disassociation while coping with the immense stress that comes with game development. It’s a good setup that compliments the interactive storytelling well. The choose-your-own-adventure mechanics start to fuel Stefan’s mental health issues and reinforce the agency given to the viewers.
Making choices as to what Stefan does becomes a powerful way to present his inner demons. He slowly becomes more paranoid and obsessed with the notion of having no free will. He further disassociates from his world and considers the possibility of many worlds and timelines with differing outcomes that he can’t control.
In practice however, this system didn’t end up being as deep as I wanted it to be. From my viewings I found only one “main” ending to the episode (meaning I only saw one ending that led to the credits rolling), which is pretty disappointing for something that keeps telling you there are many outcomes available. Really, there’s only one. I was lucky enough to get through to this main ending on my first watch (weird flex, but okay). After this, I started again and chose all of the opposite options to see how many different outcomes I could get. Not many, as it turns out. My choices in the second run would either lead to a new scene that would eventually railroad me back onto the main plot. Or abruptly end with an early and usually unsatisfying ending.
Bandersnatch definitely has issues regarding its illusion of choice. It’s hard for the whole experience to not to feel shallow due to the lack of depth that comes with this structure when you don’t provide enough branching narratives. But I also can’t fault it too much. Plenty of video games have tried this story structure as well, only to hit the same pitfalls that Bandersnatch falls into. If people find out that their decisions don’t matter, your illusion is broken and whole experience is lost.
That being said, it does give the show some interesting tools to play with regarding storytelling. As an example, when replaying scenes I found that characters would gain a sense of déjà vu, mentioning the fact that they’ve been in this same scenario multiple times. At other points, I got prompts to make a choice when only one was available. Stefan will even outright refuse some choices given to him, breaking the very rules that were set up for you. These moments caught me off guard and were easily the highlight of my time with Bandersnatch. It can feel very meta at times, but it defies your expectations enough to give you a shock and keep you watching for whatever tricks are coming next.
Eventually, the story (well the the “main” story I should say) follows through some fairly predictable beats, and you can probably guess the ending pretty early on. The eighties motif didn’t do much for me, and I couldn’t help but think cynically about it considering the eighties are very popular right now. It just feels like an appeal to popularity that didn’t add much to the plot. Maybe I’m just sick of the eighties by this point. Regardless, I can’t deny that having the agency to select what actions Stefan takes, be it illusion or not, did have a big impact on me. Seeing the final results of what you’ve made him do does make it feel like it was your doing. You’re responsible for what happens on screen. Implemented better, I can see this being a fantastic narrative tool to be used in other shows—perhaps even films one day.
Bandersnatch is an interesting experiment that overall can feel half-baked and a bit shallow. However, I feel like being interesting is enough of a reason to give this a watch. But that’s your choice in the end. Or perhaps I’ve already made that choice for you.
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