Striking Vipers

Two men struggle to deal with the consequences after playing an immersive video game.

Yet another humb dinger of a scenerio, that with a few tweaks could've been fabulous.

Slight spoilers below!!!

The problem is we don't see enough friendship development in the early stages to truly feel how powerful their connection is in the later scenes. We only see a snippet of college like behaviour.

Because of this we don't know if it's the game or their bond that makes the simulation so powerful.

The ending however adds an excellent spin on how to manage complicated relationships in modern times.

I've read the reviews complaining about it not being black mirror or the episode being boring. What were you watching? Black mirror is all about technology affecting our lives in the near future and showing us paths that may be trodden. This is about the perils and highs of immersive gaming, this is about better than life (thank you Red Dwarf), this is about boundaries being blurred, relationships being blurred, life being blurred. Nothing in this episode couldn't happen and very likely will happen. The cast was strong, the writing and direction both strong, ending strong. This had it all. Writing this review I changed my score to a 10 from a 9 as I couldn't see what was dropping the point whilst I wrote. I've intentionally not put any spoilers and the hints I have given were in the trailer. It's a great episode. I have no idea what the negative reviewers were watching to be honest.

Dimnishing the boundaries between VR and reality to a point where it becomes disturbing. Abnormal is the new normal of life.

There are good ideas within Striking Vipers, and there is a bravery to it too in terms of its content and its bigger budget. Those ideas suggest the idea of online relationships providing something real life does not, of breaking down barriers (even gender), or just of them being an escape from the real life as those relationships are totally untethered from it. The starry cast and high production values added to the feeling that this could be good - but it was only okay.

The energy of the delivery helped it, but fundamentally it didn't feel like the characters made a real connection, and the episode felt very event driven rather than character so. The performances were decent, but too much was telegraphed and/or presented without nuance or detail. The writing is surprisingly lacking though; the whole thing concludes in quite a small way, there doesn't feel like a warning here, or some sort of chill that this will be coming - instead it feels like a decent compromise. All told, while there are ideas in here, nothing really seemed to take off in it.

A little bit strange.. yea it's strange.. but really not that bad. Good acting.. but strange story haha