When Netflix released the first interactive show on Netflix last year, Puss in Book: Trapped in Epic Tale, I was very curious about the concept. But when I played this short film, I did not get any interactive options. I did not investigate it any further, but the concept (which incidentally has also been used for some movies in the cinema) of leaving making choices about what happens to the viewer, is fascinating. Is it still a movie? Or is it more a game? Last Friday, Netflix released the first Black Mirror film, Bandersnatch, which also uses this concept. Again I did not get it working. Since Black Mirror is one of my favorite series and I had to see it, I decided to find out how you can watch it. My phone did not work (probably because it does not have a standard Android version), a Samsung tablet did not offer the option either. Apple TV, Chromecast and a Samsung smart TV were all the same story and the Netflix site does not offer an extensive list of supported devices. Eventually it worked on another smart TV from Samsung and after a lot of frustration I finally managed to enter the world of real interactive TV.
Bandersnatch is about Stefan, who wants to convert a “choose your own adventure” book into a game for the ZX Spectrum. He decides to talk at a big game publisher to see if they are interested and want to spread the game (when it is finished). What else happens in the story, depends on the choices you make as a viewer.
So the experience you have differs per person. The way Bandersnatch works is that as a viewer you are presented with a choice from time to time and have a few seconds to go for one of the options. What this Black Mirror film does well is to make that choice fluent, without showing a moment where everything freezes before it continues (as the interactive children’s shows do). The choices are initially simple (eg what do you want for breakfast?), but are getting bigger, just like the consequences. This film has five possible endings, which for some will be reason enough to take another look and make different choices. It is true that not every choice results in the continuation of the story, there are a number of points that you are sent back, so you do not have complete influence, but that fits well with the concept of Black Mirror. Personally, I found this a very unique experience that I enjoyed looking at and will certainly will experience again in the future. If you are a fan of Black Mirror you’ll watch this anyway, but even if you are not, it is something that you have to experience once, if you at least have one device that supports the technique.
[score8]
If you’re looking for something else to watch after Bandersnatch, you could choose Bird Box or Roma. If you still can’t find anything you want to watch, you can use a virtual private network to access Netflix titles only available in other countries, as I recently learned.
It sounds like you had a real battle to be able to watch it in the first place! Glad it was worth the work though. My parents had to borrow my brother’s Xbox as they were just getting an error message saying their smart TV wasn’t compatible.
Yeah, it really was a challenge to finally find something to watch it on (although it might have worked on a PC, which I didn’t try). Luckily there were compatible devices available 🙂 It’s annoying to get working, but I thought in the end it was worth it.