Black Mirror is a British television series that examines a variety of issues that face contemporary society, usually involving the implications of new technologies. Created by Charlie Brooker, this celebrated fiction series illuminates the darker, often chaotic side of evolving media and human knowledge. Using an assortment of satirical themes and motifs, this show fascinates audiences by conveying a sense of anxiousness that is felt by the fluctuating nature of modern society and its increasing advancement. Each episode of this series has a different cast and scenery, allowing the show’s creators to explore a diverse range of concepts that tend to critique certain societal ideals; although each episode is different in cast, all of the episodes
…show more content…
The advent of modern platforms such as the expansive Internet, that includes social networking and news consumption, along with television viewership and even the use of an app, allows the meme of Waldo to spread rapidly; Waldo evolves into an international phenomenon by the end of the episode. At the close of the show, Waldo is seen across billboards in a Orwellian police state, proving that he has become one of the most powerful memes ever created. According to a passage in our text by Richard Brodie, “A meme is a unit of information in a mind whose existence influences events such that more copies of itself get created in other minds” (23). Waldo was able to effectively spread his countercultural ideals through a series of media networks that connect individuals with information at an accelerated rate. Memes attach themselves to their hosts through infection, acting nearly identical to viruses that are found in our natural environment. Media viruses attach to our neurons and use us as their vessel; its success is directly dependent on the strength of the host is has acquired (Vacker ppt. 1). People, who often spread memes unwillingly, are attracted to memes for a variety of reasons; sometimes these memes are imposed on us through advertising, careful articulation by broadcasting networks and are seen as important due to its popularity. Memes vary immensely in form, but share similar intentions. A meme is typically spread in order to carry out a particular message; in Black Mirror, the network controlling the rights to Waldo is able to efficiently spread the image of Waldo to audiences, without them directly knowing the true intentions of the media
The advent of modern platforms such as the expansive Internet, that includes social networking and news consumption, along with television viewership and even the use of an app, allows the meme of Waldo to spread rapidly; Waldo evolves into an international phenomenon by the end of the episode. At the close of the show, Waldo is seen across billboards in a Orwellian police state, proving that he has become one of the most powerful memes ever created. According to a passage in our text by Richard Brodie, “A meme is a unit of information in a mind whose existence influences events such that more copies of itself get created in other minds” (23). Waldo was able to effectively spread his countercultural ideals through a series of media networks that connect individuals with information at an accelerated rate. Memes attach themselves to their hosts through infection, acting nearly identical to viruses that are found in our natural environment. Media viruses attach to our neurons and use us as their vessel; its success is directly dependent on the strength of the host is has acquired (Vacker ppt. 1). People, who often spread memes unwillingly, are attracted to memes for a variety of reasons; sometimes these memes are imposed on us through advertising, careful articulation by broadcasting networks and are seen as important due to its popularity. Memes vary immensely in form, but share similar intentions. A meme is typically spread in order to carry out a particular message; in Black Mirror, the network controlling the rights to Waldo is able to efficiently spread the image of Waldo to audiences, without them directly knowing the true intentions of the media