(Spoiler alert: You may not want to read until you’ve watched the “Black Mirror” season 4 episode “Black Museum” — and perhaps other episodes from this and past seasons.)
The Black Museum was a fun place to visit at the end of season 4 of “Black Mirror,” perhaps because it was basically a house of references to previous episodes from the season. Meta-jokes? Evidence of a shared universe? Whatever the case it, let’s take a look.
This is one of the mechanical bees from the season 3 episode “Hated in the Nation” — which murdered a whole lot of people.
This distinctive uniform was worn by the hunters on the weird “justice”-focused reality show in the season 2 episode “White Bear.”
In the background here, you can see what looks an awful lot like the virtual-reality headset from the season 3 episode “Playtest,” in which a man (Wyatt Russell) died while playing a game that was constructed to prey on his greatest fears.
This notorious box we saw earlier in season 4 — it was used by Robert Daly (Jesse Plemons) to upload people’s DNA into his computer so he could create AIs based on them inside a video game. The lollipop was used to create a digital version of a character’s (Jimmi Simpson) young son — which Daly immediately tossed out an airlock in order to get the Simpson AI to behave.
This tablet comes from the season 4 episode “Arkangel,” used as a way for helicopter parents to spy on their children. This particular tablet was used by the child (Brenna Harding) to beat her mother (Rosemary DeWitt) nearly to death.
This bathtub is from “Crocodile.” A man was murdered in it. There’s not really anything techy about it. It’s just a bathtub.
Aside from the items in the museum itself, “Black Museum” contained a couple verbal references to past episodes as well. The two episodes referenced are “San Junipero” (“like when they upload old people to the cloud?”) and the “White Christmas” holiday special (copying consciousness using “cookies”).
Bonus: while not in the actual Black Museum, one of the stories Rolo Haynes (Douglas Hodge) tells Nish (Letitia Wright) involves this shot of a character (Aldis Hodge) reading a graphic novel based on the season 1 episode “15 Million Merits.”
