![]() ![]() Is "Beyond the Sea" connected to "USS Callister"? It's one of the grimmest Black Mirror endings to date, and a strong reminder of one of sci-fi's most valiant life lessons: don't go in anyone else's body, and don't let anyone into your own. These two are stuck in space, with only their mission and the Sartre-esque hellscape of each other, with quite literally nowhere else to go and nothing else to do. His time on earth, presumably, is screwed. Not to mention the fact that Lana and Henry were killed by someone in Cliff's body. ![]() There's nothing, at all, that Cliff can do-he said before that this is a two-man mission that needs two men. And now they've both got four years to go, together. A devastated Cliff returns to the ship, panting deeply, as David pushes a chair out for him. Lana and their son, Henry, were both slaughtered by David, in Cliff’s body. And that something is something not good.Ĭliff goes back into his on-earth body and is instantly crushed to see blood all over his home. ![]() David is a second late to grab Cliff and let him in. What really happened with the twist at the end of Black Mirror's "Beyond the Sea"?īut that's not what happens. And that's when things get hairy in a real Black Mirror way. But he eventually finds David's drawings-which he draws from memory-of an increasingly-naked Lana. Eventually, David (in Cliff's body), hits Cliff's son, Henry, for messing with his art, and Lana tells him to go home.Ĭliff, in space, largely suspects nothing. When he eventually puts on "La Mer," the moment we all saw coming comes: he attempts to seduce Lana, something she initially declines. Once this starts happening, though, it becomes pretty evident where things are headed David, the intellectual greiving, connects on a deep level with Lana, and it's clear that a love triangle is coming. David, still deeply grieving, accepts the offer, and eventually begins to paint their home as a thank you to Cliff and Lana. This all changes, though, when a cult-led by a Charles Manson-esque figure played by Rory Culkin-breaks into David's home, calling what he and Cliff are doing "unnatural." Despite David's best efforts, the cult murder his family and destroy his avatar, leaving him stuck in space.Ĭliff is almost as crushed by David at this happening, and, being a good person (and as someone who isn't sure if he alone could survive their two-man, six-year mission in space should something happen to David), decides with Lana to let David start using his on-earth avatar for a little bit at a time. Most of their time is spent in their on-Earth avatars, and when they need to go up to their actual bodies in space, they can get there with a simple tag that pings in their pockets. They also aren't quite in the same place personally-David connects on a deep level with his wife and we even see them get intimate as David plays "La Mer" by Charles Trenet, while Cliff and his wife Lana (Mara)'s relationship has seemingly grown cold.ĭespite these differences, both men seem content with how things are going-their system works. Both, as we see through an interaction David has with a local moviegoer, are somewhat celebrities for their outer-space and on-earth feats. We see that these two astronauts live different lives both have families, but while David lives in a modern home in an urban city, Cliff lives far away in a farm house with a big lot. They are quite literally in two places at once. The initial twist, though, is that this alternative 1969 has made a technological advance that our timeline never did-Cliff and David can go to sleep in a special capsule in their spaceship, and basically use extremely-advanced robots that look identical to themselves as their on-earth avatars. The episode in a nutshell: David (Hartnett) and Cliff (Paul) are a pair of astronauts in outer space, in year two of a six-year mission. A couple episodes of Black Mirror's sixth go-around seemed to be missing that technological hook that makes the show what it's always been, but that's not the case with "Beyond the Sea," which mixes a bit of speculative sci-fi technology with what may be the best cast of the season (Aaron Paul, Josh Hartnett, and Kate Mara) to make an episode that's just about as good as the show has ever been. PERHAPS THE best episode of Black MirrorSeason 6 is "Beyond the Sea," an 80-ish minute affair that takes a bunch of ideas previously attempted elsewhere-including Being John Malkovich, Don't Worry Darling, Bad Times at the El Royale, and Westworld-and drops them into a '60s alternative history setting that at times feels straight out of Mad Men (but with that signature sci-fi twist). The following story contains spoilers for Black Mirror Season 6 Episode 3, "Beyond the Sea." ![]()
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