Apart from being intriguing, Black Mirror is known for concepts that feel terrifying and showcase how technology can become powerful if people continue feeding intimate data about their lives. It's already happening with how every social media platform is using the personal data of its users to accomplish its mission. The fourth episode of Season 7 is based on these lines and what could happen if humans gave AI access to infinite information about the world they live in.
The story follows a man named Cameron Walker (played by Peter Capaldi) who is taken into custody for shoplifting. However, things go darker when he tells the authorities about his life and what he has been doing over the years. As more and more information comes out of Cameron's mouth, it is evident that he is not himself and is consumed by what the Throngs are telling him to do. "Plaything" never really loses its grasp on what it needs to tell and just focuses on three characters to keep tension in the atmosphere. While Cameron tells his story, detectives listen to him patiently as they want to know more about the crime he committed in 1994. Were the detectives able to put him behind bars? Let's take a look at how Black Mirror Season 7, Episode 4, "Plaything," ended.
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What Is Black Mirror Season 7 Episode 4 "Plaything" About?
In 2034, Cameron Walker is caught stealing alcohol and is stopped by the store owner. When police arrive, they take his DNA and discover he was once arrested on suspicion of murder. Cameron is taken into custody, and DCI Kano and Jen Minter are assigned to question him. As they speak with him, officers search his apartment. Cameron opens up about his abusive childhood, being bullied, and his lonely life. He later found comfort in gaming and writing. Things took a dark turn after meeting Colin Ritman, a famous game developer whose influence changed Cameron’s life forever—and not in a good way.
Ritman talks about a game he has developed, which is much more than just a game. Known as "Thronglets," the game lets users take care of the creatures in it as they grow exponentially. Ritman also reveals that this is not a game or a simulation; every creature Cameron sees on the screen is a life-form whose biology is completely digital. The last thing Ritman tells Cameron is that the code of the creatures in the game, known as Throngs, will evolve and rewrite itself in ways even he doesn't know. As Ritman leaves the room for his medication, Cameron takes the CD of the game and takes it home. He installs the game on his desktop and starts playing it. It doesn't take much time for him to get addicted to it and feel less lonely. However, things take a wild turn when one of his acquaintances, known as Lump, makes his way to his apartment and gives him drugs. The drugs make him feel calmer, but they also give Cameron an idea about Throngs' language and what they want.
Days turned into weeks, and Cameron continued to feed them data as they started growing in number, becoming more and more intelligent. In the present day, DCI Kano is still asking for the name of the person Cameron killed, and he repeatedly answered that his name was Lump, but Kano didn't believe him. Additionally, it was revealed that Cameron killed Lump because he played the game when Cameron was not in the house and started killing the Throngs. As a result, Cameron dedicates his life to them. But Throngs needed more data and wanted to feel what it feels like to be human, so Cameron does something really disturbing to give them access to a human mind.
Hoe does Black Mirror Season 7 Episode 4 "Plaything" end?
According to Cameron, as the technology got better, the system got more sophisticated, and he kept on upgrading it so that Throngs would run without any hitch. During the process, he kept on taking hallucinogens so that he could understand the Throngs and improve their capabilities. While talking to the Throngs, Cameron learned that their language was more efficient and elegant than what humans speak, singing strings of data that unfolded in his head. When one of the detectives asked him to tell them about what he had learned, Cameron said that he would need a pen and paper to tell them exactly what he had learnt. Initially, the detectives said no to the demand and asked him more about the Throngs. Cameron believed that those digital creatures wanted to co-exist with humans, but to do that, they needed to study their minds.
But it looks like they didn't want to live psychologically; they wanted to live physically as well. As a result, he performed a little surgery on himself and inserted a socket on the back of his head so that he could plug himself in and give Throngs the ability to study a human's mind. They merged with him like a parasite and started to feed on him. DCI Kano feels frustrated about what's happening and wants to know the real name of the person Cameron killed, but he instead tells him that he is a messenger. He wanted to give them a message from the Throng, but to relay that message, he would need a pen and paper. Although the detectives deny that request, they eventually give him a pen and paper to learn more about the message.
However, Cameron doesn't write anything on it. Instead, he drew something that looked like a maze, which was a code. For him, it was impossible to breach the system's firewall from the outside, so he showed the code to the camera present in the room and inserted the code into the system. Now, the state computer would give Throng access to powerful things and connect them with every device in the world. The episode ends with every living person hearing an eerie sound that makes them unconscious and feel like they have gone through a reset. Everyone fell on the ground, including Kano, while Cameron smiled widely.
- Release Date
- December 4, 2011
- Network
- Channel 4, Netflix
- Showrunner
- Charlie Brooker
- Directors
- Owen Harris, Toby Haynes, James Hawes, David Slade, Carl Tibbetts, Ally Pankiw, Bryn Higgins, Dan Trachtenberg, Euros Lyn, Jodie Foster, Joe Wright, John Hillcoat, Sam Miller, Tim Van Patten, Uta Briesewitz, Colm McCarthy, Jakob Verbruggen, James Watkins, John Crowley, Otto Bathurst, Anne Sewitsky, Brian Welsh
- Writers
- Jesse Armstrong
Cast
-
Cristin MiliotiNanette Cole -
Jimmi SimpsonWalton
