What The Heck Is Black Mirror Season 6's 'Red Mirror'?

The trailer for the sixth season of "Black Mirror" includes a curious new addition to the show's familiar format. After presenting snippets of the first four of five episodes — including a retro space story, a Scottish murder mystery, a paparazzi-centric tale, and a meta-narrative about Netflix itself — the screen suddenly flickers out like a finicky film reel, complete with the sound of a projector powering on. "And Red Mirror presents," the title card says, in a blocky, textured red font that looks like something out of a horror movie trailer.

The teaser that follows is for an episode called "Demon 79," which seems to be a comedy-tinged '70s horror story about a murderous woman played by Anjana Vasan ("We Are Lady Parts"). We see her choke out a man at the shoe department counter where she works, run a vehicle off the road, and debate whether or not she's crazy with a white fur-clad character played by "I May Destroy You" breakout Paapa Essiedu. What we don't see, though, is any explanation for what the hell Red Mirror actually is.

Series creator Charlie Brooker has remained tight-lipped about the details of what seems to be a special episode of the season, but that hasn't stopped the internet from speculating about what the Red Mirror label might mean. The simplest explanation is that it's a fake film production or distribution company meant to indicate that the episode takes place in the past, which makes sense since it takes place in a time before streaming platforms were a thing. Others guessed that the title card could indicate viewers will be witnessing an alternate universe take on "Black Mirror."

Either bit of speculation could be right, but the trouble with both is that "Black Mirror" has envisioned alternate worlds and traveled back in time before, and has never announced a temporary re-titling when it did so. In fact, one of this season's episodes, "Beyond The Sea," takes place both in the past and in an alternate timeline, as its official synopsis describes a dangerous mission two men take on "in an alternative 1969." Since we didn't get a special, '60s-style title card intro for that episode's teaser 30 seconds earlier, it doesn't seem likely that the story's setting has much to do with the Red Mirror introduction.

So what could Red Mirror be? It seems like there's a more-than-negligible chance that it could be a new "Black Mirror" banner meant to indicate that an episode we're about to watch isn't confined to the sci-fi label. The series has long since incorporated horror elements, but unlike "The Twilight Zone," the anthology classic it's often compared to, "Black Mirror" has never crossed fully into horror or fantasy territory. With a Red Mirror banner distinguishing an episode like "Demon 79" from the rest of the season, it's possible Charlie Brooker could free himself up from the constraints of the titular screens referred to in the series title. If the black mirror the show is named after is a darkened phone or computer screen, as Brooker has said before, what kind of mirror is red? Based on the title of "Demon 79," probably a hellish one.

This is, of course, pure speculation at this point as "Black Mirror" hasn't yet been released on Netflix. Yet Brooker himself has given statements that seem to support the idea that "Black Mirror" will push beyond the limits of its dystopic sci-fi label this year. In an interview with Netflix's site Tudum, Brooker said, "I've always felt that 'Black Mirror' should feature stories that are entirely distinct from one another, and keep surprising people — and myself — or else what's the point?" He explained that the show "should be a series that can't be easily defined, and can keep reinventing itself." If that reinvention involves a successful shift toward new genres, it could be a return to form for a once-esteemed series that has lost its consistency in recent seasons.

To that end, the description for "Demon 79" doesn't include references to technology at all, but instead notes that "a meek sales assistant is told she must commit terrible acts to prevent disaster" in 1979 Northern England. It's a plot that sounds a bit like the plot of the 2001 Bill Paxton movie "Frailty," if the angel in question was (maybe) Essiedu in a fab, furry getup. Further evidence: episode director Toby Haynes is known for his work in fantasy and genre storytelling — he's directed episodes of "Being Human," "Doctor Who," and "Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell" — as he is for his work on sci-fi shows like "Andor." All of this could mean nothing, but the convergence of the blood-red slasher film titling and Charlie Brooker's insistence that the new season will shake things up in a big way seems promising.

Brooker told Tudum, "I began this season by deliberately upending some of my own core assumptions about what to expect." He noted that, along with more traditional "Black Mirror" fare, the new season also includes "a few new elements, including some I've previously sworn blind the show would never do, to stretch the parameters of what 'a Black Mirror episode' even is." 

New elements like a foray into pure horror or fantasy, maybe? We'll find out when "Black Mirror" season 6 premieres on June 15, 2023 on Netflix.