Black Mirror: Ranking Every Episode From Worst To Best

18. Black Museum

Black Mirror Black Museum
Netflix

Black Museum had lofty ambitions. After four full seasons telling unconnected stories, this finale was built on the promise of joining all of them together, with those previous tales all being attractions located within the titular museum. Home to "authentic criminological artefacts", the episode follows main character Nish's visit to the isolated attraction, as she's shown around and given the full story on three of the items held there.

The wraparound narrative and anthology structure is evocative of White Christmas, but unfortunately Black Museum doesn't boast the same connective throughline which made that episode such a standout. There was no real show-stopping short story either, and the references to other episodes - which came in the form of key items that fans would instantly recognise - are mostly just there as background iconography, with the thrill of seeing them again overshadowing the fact that the filmmakers weren't really doing anything interesting with their inclusion.

Some of the stories are still enjoyable, and it is cool to see the entire history of Black Mirror brought together for the first time, but there's the constant feeling that the episode didn't quite live up to its true potential, and might have only subtracted some of the mystique from this universe, rather than added to it.

[JB]

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NCTJ-qualified journalist. Most definitely not a racing driver. Drink too much tea; eat too much peanut butter; watch too much TV. Sadly only the latter paying off so far. A mix of wise-old man in a young man's body with a child-like wonder about him and a great otherworldly sensibility.

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Josh has over 11 years of experience as a published writer, having worked nine of those years as a full-time content producer at WhatCulture. In that period he has created hundreds of articles, videos and podcast episodes for multiple WhatCulture channels, specialising in gaming, horror and film & TV. He now primarily works as a senior content producer and presenter on WhatCulture Gaming where he co-hosts the WhatCulture Gaming Podcast, a top 3 UK most listened to gaming podcast that he co-created in 2018. Over the years he has reviewed several high-profile gaming releases, covered industry events with on-site reporting, opined on breaking news, and even kicked off his interviewing career by chatting to childhood hero, Tommy Wiseau.