Sophia Michaels
“Black Mirror” is getting meta in season six. On May 31, Netflix released the full trailer for the new season, which is five episodes long, and it’s given us our best look yet at the new, disorienting films. In “Joan is Afraid,” “Schitt’s Creek” star Annie Murphy stars a Joan, who opens a streaming service (that looks a lot like Netflix) only to see that Salma Hayek stars in a prestige drama about her life. In “Loch Henry,” a nature documentary turns into a twisted crime drama. And in “Mazey Day,” a paparazzi goes to the limits to get a photo of a starlet. Watch the trailer ahead to see moments from these episodes — plus “Beyond the Sea” and “Demon 79.”
Season six are the first “Black Mirror” episodes after a nearly four-year hiatus. The mind-bending sci-fi anthology series premiered season five in June 2019 with only three one-hour-plus-long installments. The new cast includes Aaron Paul, Josh Hartnett, Paapa Essiedu, Kate Mara, and Zazie Beetz
In the trailer, Netflix calls the episodes “films,” so it seems each installment will be cinematic in scope. Fans hope “Black Mirror” will follow the same pattern as its last season, which showcased some of its most explosive episodes to date — including the infamous “Striking Vipers” chapter, starring Anthony Mackie, Nicole Beharie, and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, and Miley Cyrus’s “Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too.”
The future of “Black Mirror” was shaky for a while after cocreator Charlie Brooker told Radio Times Magazine in 2020 that he wasn’t sure viewers would have an appetite for the show’s dark content in the middle of the pandemic. “At the moment, I don’t know what stomach there would be for stories about societies falling apart, so I’m not working away on one of those,” he said. “I’m sort of keen to revisit my comic skill set, so I’ve been writing scripts aimed at making myself laugh.”
“Black Mirror” originally debuted on UK broadcaster Channel 4 before Netflix picked up the series after season two. Since then, the show has become a landmark on the streamer, so its return was inevitable — especially after Netflix invested in Broke and Bones, the new production company from the creators of “Black Mirror,” Deadline reported.
Ahead, here’s everything we know about “Black Mirror” season six so far, from the new cast and teaser trailer to the release date.
