Seven Point Six Billion Merits

Seven Point Six Billion Merits

**SOME SPOILERS**


The second episode of the science fiction anthology series Black Mirror is called “Fifteen Million Merits”. The central character in the episode, Bing, is a machine. He wakes at the same time each day in a room full of screens, and walks to a room full of screens where he and countless other people pedal bikes to accumulate “merits” while they watch various different and odd programs that are advertised in random pop-up ads. Bing has presumably been in his routine for a very long time. Later he hears a woman, Abi, singing and bonds with her over a short time. To Bing, it is the first real thing he has experienced in his time pedaling in the compound where the episode takes place. He uses fifteen million of his merits to purchase a ticket for her to show off her singing on one of the programs called “Hot Shot.” Things take a turn for Bing and Abi when she is given an interesting proposition. To be blunt, one of the judges offers Abi a position as a performer on a pornographic program called “Wraith Babes.” Bing is forced to watch the one thing he viewed as important transition to something perverse. He breaks down, and becomes a shadow of the shadow he already was. He becomes a workhorse, focused on regaining his merits to perform on “Hot Shot” himself.


This episode rewards the observant, as the message of this episode can be hidden in the complicated world of this episode. The obsession with the power of spectacle continues from the first episode, with much of the observable philosophical influence seeming to come from Guy Debord. In the 60's, he wrote The Society of Spectacle where he proposed that understanding spectacle is critical to understanding society. To Debord, images and appearance has begun to govern social interaction since the Industrial Revolution. This spectacle is born when our social lives become governed by the economy. In “Fifteen Million Merits” entertainment is heavily integrated in every aspect of personal and interpersonal interaction. Bing rides a bike pointlessly for hours to accumulate these “merits” which he can spend on necessities, entertainment, or customizing his virtual doppelganger. All of the characters live in rooms full of screens where ads are played constantly. Anything outside of this economy are confiscated. Abi folds a penguin with paper from her lunch, and it is taken because it does not exist within the bounds of the cycle of labor.


Bing finds something real in Abi, and buys her the ticket as an act of economically unsound personal sacrifice. But there is no room for authenticity in this world. Everything is a commodity to the powers-that-be in this episode. Innocence, effort, rage, and everything wholly human are bought and sold.


Debord points out a very critical point where this commodification takes place, and we can observe this point in our own lives. When “being” becomes “having” the spectacle has taken over. Wearing a Nirvana shirt makes you rebellious, drinking Pepsi makes you an activist, and having a bumper sticker or sticker on your laptop makes you just about anything you could want to become. This is exemplified by the virtual “me” that each person customizes to be “them.” Also the “merits” each person had obtained is displayed on leader boards, and if your “merits” are exhausted you are dressed up in a yellow jumpsuit, relegated to clean-up after the bikers. Black Mirror takes it several steps further in “Fifteen Million Merits,” but the argument is observable. Sometimes that is what science fiction does. It takes the future and the amazing technology that may someday be possible, and uses that premise to point a mirror toward the present.


The message of this resonates effectively with me. It is interesting, deep, and not immensely heavy handed. The obvious highlight of this episode is Daniel Kaluuya. His acting is truly immersive and impressive. This second entry improves on the first and has continued to rope me in happily.