DIRECT HIT
Jodie Foster’s ‘Black Mirror’ episode the surreal deal
FIRST-time Emmy winners (be they actors or TV shows) aren’t necessarily guaranteed a long shelf life.
I note this in regard to “Black Mirror,” the (just slightly) futuristic “Twilight Zone”- ian series returning Dec. 29 for its six-episode fourth season on Netflix. The series, and its creator/showrunner Charlie Brooker, won two Emmys in September for last season’s episode, “San Junipero,” so expectations are high.
But if the upcoming episode “Arkangel” is any indication, “Black Mirror” won’t soon be suffering any post-awards lethargy (either in real time or via its altreality milieu).
“Arkangel” is notable for its behind-the-scenes pedigree, not only for being written by Brooker, but for its director: two-time Oscar winner Jodie Foster, who’s no stranger to Netflix, having directed episodes of “House of Cards” and “Orange Is the New Black” (in addition to an episode of the syndicated series “Tales from the Darkside” back in the late-’80s).
The episode hews closely to what’s set “Black Mirror” apart from other futuristic TV fare: a surreal, otherworldly story arc that, however fantastic it might seem, enters the realm of believ- ability by playing on our anxieties and fears — enhanced, in this case, by Foster’s surehanded direction.
A parable of helicopterparenting gone awry, “Arkangel” tells the tale of a worried, workingclass single mom (Rosemarie Dewitt), who enlists her 3-year-old daughter, Sara (Aniya Hodge), in a free, experimental program after the young girl vanishes from a playground (she’s found, unharmed, hours later).
The program, dubbed Arkangel, involves painlessly implanting a computer chip into Sara’s brain, giving her mother access (via an iPad-type device) to Sara’s whereabouts, her vital statistics (heart rate, etc.) and an “optic feed” that allows mom to see what Sara is seeing — and to visually pixillate anything she deems fearful to her child (she can also garble what Sara hears into an indecipherable rumble). As the years go by, we fast-forward to Sara’s ’tween years, which eventually morph into her life as a 15-year-old high school student (she’s played in these scenes by Sarah Abbott and Brenna Harding, respectively). Mom, who’s now dating and more fulfilled in her personal life, finally lands her helicopter and shuts Arkangel off — just as Sarah starts dating bad-boy Trick (Owen Teague, who played Danny Rayburn’s sketchy son in “Bloodline”). You’ll have to watch the episode to see what happens next.
The hour-long episode is briskly paced, and Foster does a nice job balancing the futuristic Arkangel gadgetry (aided by the show’s usual glitzy special effects) with Brooker’s taut script, which tracks the growing antagonism between Sara and her mother, who fears that letting her daughter (i.e. silencing Arkangel) can only lead down a bad road.
Fans of “Black Mirror” won’t be disappointed — and for those who haven’t ever seen an episode, maybe now’s the time to get hooked on a binge-worthy series.