How Netflix surprised Charlie Brooker when he wanted to parody streaming giant in 'Black Mirror' Season 6
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: The wait is finally over as Netflix returns with its most distorted and uncomfortable show. ‘Black Mirror’ has a slate of five new episodes with each diving into a territory that will fascinate you even as you squirm in your seat. The sixth installment of Charlie Brooker’s creation took four long years to come to fruition and the first four were released in a shorter period between them. But Brooker has promised to abandon all hope, for all those who enter into the realm of ‘Black Mirror.’
In a noble attempt to push boundaries with its latest season, the show’s creator decided to tame the dragon as well. The first episode of the show titled ‘Joan is Awful’ will feature a streaming service eerily similar to Netflix. Brooker made a conscious decision of parodying the streaming giant and was nervous at first as to how the executives of the world’s biggest streaming platform would react. Will they cancel the show? Will they throw this brilliantly evil proposition right back at his face? When Brooker announced his plans to these Netflix executives in the room, he expected a huge angry backlash. Instead, he received an indifferent “Okay.”
Netflix parodied as ‘Streamberry’
The streaming giant is shown a platform named ‘Streamberry’ in an episode where Joan (Annie Murphy), becomes aware that her life is the subject of a streaming series in which she’s played by Salma Hayek. She sees this on a streaming platform, ‘Streamberry' and decides to investigate. The iconic red color and the font is strikingly similar to the Netflix logo and the way it is presented, will give anyone a clear indication that the US streaming giant is being toyed with here.
Brooker sits down with Empire magazine to throw some light on his conversation with Netflix on the matter and revealed that the streaming giant responded way too quickly and without any hassle. Brooker revealed in the interview, "We’ve got this streaming platform called 'Streamberry' in this episode… can we make it look like Netflix?' They went away and came back quite quickly — weirdly quickly — and said, 'Yeah, okay.' There wasn’t any resistance to it, that I could tell. Which is a bit disappointing, because it would be good to be able to say 'I just did it anyway because I’m an anarchist!' But no.” Brooker was taken aback by Netflix’s indifference and further added, “That episode is quite meta and weird anyway. It’s one thing me watching it in the edit, but the thought that people are going to be watching it on the Netflix platform itself? That’s quite bonkers.”
Brooker stays true to the ‘Black Mirror’ philosophy
It is clear from Brooker’s statement that the man would have fought the streaming giant to get "Streamberry", his fictional version of Netflix on air. Though fans can tell he has retained his storytelling integrity despite being on Netflix's payroll. The show, renowned for parodying and satirizing social media, reality television, dystopia, gaming, and human emotions, has explored layers that none of the shows out there have dared to use. If any impediment arises to Brooker’s creative vision, the world now knows that he will not bow down before anyone, even Netflix. For all we know, Brooker should be deemed as ‘Banksy’ of the OTT world.
