The dystopian thriller Black Mirror will return to Netflix for a sixth season. The series first premiered in 2011 and has gone on to achieve critical acclaim. The Twilight Zone-like series has earned 9 Emmy Awards, including one international Emmy. Its episodes "San Junipero" and "USS Callister" are the most nominated. These episodes included performances from Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Mackenzie Davis, Michaela Coel, and Jesse Plemons.
The five previous seasons of Black Mirror have included performances from Jodie Whittaker, Daniel Kaluuya, Hayley Atwell, Chloe Pirrie, Jon Hamm, Bryce Dallas Howard, Wyatt Russell, Sarah Snook, Benedict Wong, Rosemarie DeWitt, Joe Cole, Letitia Wright, and several others. Creator Charlie Brooker has written many of these Black Mirror episodes, including "San Junipero" and "USS Callister." He will continue this work with Black Mirror's newest season.
Per Variety, Brooker will pen new episodes of Black Mirror in a sixth season for Netflix. He will be joined by Annabel Jones, an original collaborator on the series. The announcement of these new Black Mirror episodes comes after Brooker and Jones left their production company, House of Tomorrow, which produced Black Mirror beginning in 2014. Brooker and Jones have continued to work under the banner of Broke and Bones, which produced the Netflix mockumentary Death to 2020. House of Tomorrow was backed by Endemol Shine Group, which Banijay Group acquired in 2020. This prevented Brooker and Jones from creating a new Black Mirror season for Netflix. With the news that another Black Mirror season is on the way, it appears Brooker, Jones, and Banijay Group have reached an agreement.
According to Variety, the newest season of Black Mirror is expected to follow the path of the series' later seasons and increase its production value. Black Mirror's sixth season is also believed to have more episodes than its fifth, containing episodes that span over 60 minutes. In the past, Black Mirror has had several episodes that exceeded 60 minutes, telling its twisted stories in a near-film-like format. In 2018, Black Mirror ran with this and created Black Mirror: Bandersnatch, an interactive film that ran for roughly 90 minutes, depending on the path selected by its viewers. Bandersnatch starred Fionn Whitehead and Will Poulter.
Bandersnatch was followed by the fifth season of Black Mirror, which premiered in 2019. The fifth season of the series only featured three episodes: "Striking Vipers," "Smithereens," and "Rachel, Jack and Ashely Too." These Black Mirror episodes featured performances from Anthony Mackie, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Nicole Beharie, Andrew Scott, Miley Cyrus, Angourie Rice, and Madison Davenport.
In the three-year absence of Black Mirror, Brooker has kept busy. Aside from writing Death to 2020, Brooker also produced Attack of the Hollywood Clichés! for Netflix, which had Rob Lowe as its host. In the time Black Mirror has been absent, the world has undergone many shifts that its fans have noticed coincide with the sci-fi series. Known for its grim dystopian presentation of reality and the future, this upcoming season of Black Mirror will be no different. In the evolving climate these new Black Mirror episodes will arrive in, they may just be the thing its fans have needed.
Black Mirror is now streaming on Netflix.
Source: Variety