Black Mirror is well-known as a sci-fi TV series that sometimes has unrealistic plots. Unlike the other episodes of Black Mirror, this episode has relatable and common topic to our daily life, which is a love-relationship. Martha, as the protagonist character, has been in a relationship for 10 years with Ash. They are not suitable each other, however, their relationship still works until they decided to move in Ash’s childhood house. This episode has four parts that are interconnected.
The opening of this episode takes place in a gas station. On a rainy night, Martha and Ash drive through miles and stop in a gas station to buy coffee. Ash is playing on his gadget (considered as a smartphone, but in a future style), while Martha is asking for Ash’s help. Ash is a gadget-addict. He really cannot stay away from his gadget. Instead, Martha hates gadget. Martha wants to spend her quality time with Ash, but Ash does not seem to care about her. This scene satires on our current generation’s relationship style. We choose to spend more time on our gadget and this slowly kills our quality time with our beloved one. From this scene, we already knew that their main problem is on their communication.
After they arrived, the surrounding of their house is dark, and their house also in a mess because they have just arrived. This shows that the house where they live is on sequestered place. There is no neighborhood or any building near their house. They speak in a British accent and once Ash told that there is a great spot of Victorian era, so their house is in the future England. Later, Ash finds out his childhood photograph is still on the fireplace, so he recalls back his childhood memories. He sits in front of the fireplace, which sets the warm mood eventhough the house is still messy.
They had sex on their bedroom on the next scene. The room is set to dimly lit, which makes they look more intimate, under the white blanket. The bedroom is still unfurnished, but the bed looks comfortable. In the end, Martha is not satisfied with their intercourse because Ash got tired, yet he did not do anything helpful since beginning.
On the next day, Martha realized that their house’s surrounding is the best scenery. This two-stored old-style house was made with authentic bricks, with wooden fence and some faded roof on top of the house. It was a quite big house for them. Although their house may probably aged 100 years or more, but it still looks good and surrounded with green scenery. This scenery also emphasizes that they live in a remote area, far from the city or nearest building. However, Ash’s office is at the town, so he should drive miles to work. The house have no pathwalk or any road to get into the main road. On his first day of work, Ash asks Martha to accompany him, but Martha refuses it. Then, Martha stays alone in the house. The house is still awful, but they have no time to tidy up their house. The kitchen looks untidy with lot of kitchen utensils.
Martha also says that she needs to do her job as an art worker. She has her own workspace that looks more organized than the other room. She works overtime on her first day staying on the house instead of cleaning the house. This reveals their economical situation. Probably they are penniless, so they decided to live in a rural area. They both should work hard to get some money for their new life together. This also shows that capitalism, in the future, is still dominating people. Martha chooses her workspace with a good scenery from the window that could reduce her stress. Her workspace also has a future-based sophisticated canvas for designing her work. Technology is made for ease people to do something, so do this canvas and all of their sophisticated gadget.
Later, Martha worries on Ash. Ash’s number is not active, so Martha gets panic then calls her sister. Her sister’s house is similar with houses in the present time, with piano, TVs, sofa, and other furnitures. Her sister once mentioned that their houses’ distance is three miles. Probably, her sister live in a rural area too, but in a better economical condition. While Martha is on the phone, the police’s siren lights the house. Ash died on a car accident, and the police comes to Martha’s house just to give her the bad news. We could conclude, probably, Ash died because of he is texting while driving. He could not keep his eyes on his phone whenever and wherever he will be. This satires that our generation nowadays often plays our gadget while driving. It is dangerous and one of the cause of death that occurs on the young generation, like us. This scene is the beginning of all the conflicts later.
The next scene is on Ash’s death ceremony. The mood is set to be gloomy, just like Martha’s feeling. All guests wear black as sign of misery. Lot of people mourn the death of Ash, so do Sarah. Sarah, a friend of Martha, gives an information about resurrecting the deceased people. Martha, who is still mourning, yelled at her. This changes the mood from sad into an indignant mood. We could feel Martha’s loss of her beloved one, also her depression. This is the most sensitive scene after all. We could not imagine our feeling when the one we love died. In this scene, we could ‘feel’ and pretend to be Martha. Martha’s love for Ash is big, and just like the Bee Gees song that they sang, “If I can’t have you, I don’t want nobody baby”. This scene ends the Part One of the episode.
When Martha comes home, she feels the emptiness of being alone. She used to live with Ash for 10 years, so it is hard for her to adjust herself to a new condition. She then decided to renovate and tidy up the house, one thing that have not done yet since they moved in. The moment she does the renovation alone effects our mood. We could really feel her emptiness and feels lonely. The house, at first, is plain white. Then, Martha paints it with a calm color. This represents her feeling, she wants to be calm so she changes the house’s arrangement. She puts Ash’s photos in the attic. This remind us of a scene in the first part, where Ash told that when his late brother and late father died, his mother put their photos in the attic just to make Ash forget about them. The abandoned attic looks a little bit creepy and messy.
After all those housework done, Martha is relaxing on her bedroom. The bedroom looks more comfortable after the renovation with warm tone. The whole house becomes a lovely place to stay. Then, she feels the emptiness attack on her, so she opens her laptop. She gets upset when she reads Sarah’s email saying that Sarah already signed Martha for the resurrection technology. It was on midnight when Sarah receives call from Martha who gets angry on her. Sarah’s room is quite dark, and she definitely sleeps beside someone. Sarah explicity told Martha on the cemetery that she uses the resurrection technology for her deceased partner. We could assume that it was her partner’s replica, but there is no further explanation of Sarah’s life after using that technology.
On the next lovely morning, Martha throws up then she takes a pregnancy test. Knowing she is pregnant, she gets confused evenmore because she is widowed and she should raise her baby alone. The bathroom is set in a gloomy white tone. This also represents Martha’s mood of getting pregnant without her partner. Feels depressed, later Martha calls her older sister, but no one answer it. Then Martha remembers about the email she has received yesterday. She comes back to her bedroom to try the program, finally. The conversation on her laptop shows that RoboAsh is activated after she click a button. The laptop’s display looks so futuristic and Martha operates it simply without touching anything. This signs that in the future, everything becomes simple and practicable.
The setting signs that Martha’s sister’s house is more sophisticated. There are more cooking utensils with stylish kitchen set behind her rather in Martha’s kitchen. This shows the difference in their economical’s condition. Probably, Martha’s sister live in a better condition. Martha finally closes herself to people after denies her sister to look after her. She uploads videos of Ash to the program which could allow her to talk with RoboAsh. This event also takes place in her room in the midnight. Based on my analysis, Martha seems to be lonely in the midnight after Ash’s gone. Knowing no one sleeps beside her could be the worst thing could happens to her. So she stays awake and chooses to ‘replace’ Ash with this program which could ‘resurrect’ the late Ash.
Martha, on the next day, spends her time hiking and wandering off near her house. She finds out that there is a peaceful place by the sea. She finally can talk with Ash via phone. Martha really wanted to visit this place before Ash died. Martha wants to calm her mind from any pressure that she experienced these days. This also signs that she finally finds her inner peace by replacing the late Ash with RoboAsh.
The next day, Martha decides to see doctor. The doctor’s equipments in the setting are very sophisticated. This also tells us that in the future, any medical activity will be simple and easier. Martha accidentally drops the phone after sending the baby’s heartbeat to RoboAsh. She becomes more attached with phone rather than the late Ash now, and she becomes more sensitive of anything happens to her gadget. She becomes Ash, but in a different way. She realizes it sooner than Ash, then she decides to buy a human version of RoboAsh, to prevents her craziness of gadget. This scene is also the end of Part Two.
A huge packages of RoboAsh arrived in the beginning of Part Three. It is a huge box that contains an embrio-like RoboAsh. After it is be put in the living room, Martha starts to explore the box. She shocks when she sees how realistic the RoboAsh is. She cries and we could feel her feeling of happiness. It is fact that she is happier after she ignores her sister and starts using the program. She is now becomes happier because she thinks that this could replace the existence of the late Ash.
She carries Ash into a bathtub, then pours a powder that could wake him up. The bathroom stays dark because the robot needs to be marinated until couple hours. This gives us a creepy mood at first, because who could trust a robot? However, after seeing RoboAsh awakes, she thinks it was unreal, but seeing Ash standing in front of her now, she feels extremely charmed. She gives Ash clothes to wear, and tries to express her feeling in front of Ash. She touches Ash and tries to makes RoboAsh having an erection. It was unreal that a robot could feel sexual reaction, but Martha really misses Ash that she forgets about the reality. The living room is set to dimly lit, which sexualizes them. At last, Martha is satisfied with RoboAsh’s sex rather than the late Ash. The room is set jas the previous scene where the late Ash and Martha had sex. However, in this scene, the bedroom looks messier because they both have great sex. This also ends the Part Three.
After being visited by her sister and being told that Martha should move on, she starts arguing with RoboAsh. She accidentally nudges a glass in the kitchen which hurts RoboAsh. Then Martha realizes that RoboAsh has no emotion over anything. He is just a program after all. Martha becomes disappointed and blames it to the innocent RoboAsh. It was evening after her sister’s visit so it was quite dark in the kitchen. The mood quickly changes into frustated mood, that we all could relate. This scene also shows the ego of Martha has just touched the boilling point; the complication of her problems. She then casts out RoboAsh.
However, in the morning, RoboAsh just stands in front of the house. This sets the creepy mood, because the tone is quite mysterious and RoboAsh being fishy. Scared that RoboAsh will do something bad, then Martha brings him to the cliff, and asks him to jump off. The cliff is near the peaceful place in Part Two, but this place is more scary. Probably it was at noon, because we could still see the sun in the frame. The sea in the scene is limitless, and breathe-taking. Honestly, this place is also beautiful to seclude, but Martha wants to slay her own ego here by killing RoboAsh.
Years later, the baby inside Martha’s tummy is getting bigger and is having her birthday. The living room is more furnished than before, signs that she becomes more successful now. The light tone shows that they are happier now. When Martha’s daughter wants to go the attic, Martha slightly shows her sad face. In the end, she allows her daugher to give a cake for RoboAsh that be put on the attic (this also the repetition of what Ash’s mother did to the late Ash’s brother and father). The attic looks more creepy with RoboAsh who has not grown after years. The attic still looks dark with some light which makes the attic looks warmer than before.
As usual, in each Black Mirror’s episode, we are the one who guess the ending of the story. What was happened to them? Why did RoboAsh finally stay in the attic—not jump off the cliff? There are lot of things we did not know, but in my opinion, this episode fiddles with my feeling more than the other episode in Black Mirror.
Conclusion
Martha and Ash’s love is pure, just like the other couple’s love. They live in future, that is the difference. Ash may probably the representation of us in a relationship, whom clumsy and addicted to gadgets. Ash’s and Martha’s selfishness slowly kill their relationship. So when Ash is dead, Martha had just realized that Ash meant the world for her. The mood of each parts of this episode changes from sad to happy. The settings of this episode, unfortunately, sometimes do not represent the future time. Probably we are expecting tall buildings and flying cars, but this also shows that sometimes future means simple, not only sophisticated. This also signs that their love is simple and pure eventhough in the end, Martha loses against her ego and lock her ‘ego’s representation’ forever in the attic.