The Waldo Moment

Although i was expecting something of what i've seen in this episode, i didn't expect it could so well describe what is happening in Italy just now. I invite some of the readers to inform about the way a party led by a comedian gained 25% of votes. And it's style is not different, IMHO, from Waldo's. Such things can happen, it's not only Sci-Fi.

Apart from this i give only 9/10 because i feel that something is not working perfectly in the script and in the missed potential of the characters. Acting and direction is the same quality of other episodes and I keep on being surprised about the special effects of this show. In the end it's really cute. Too much i'd say.

One of the best episodes that most audience wont understand.It really shows where society is going, especially how a politics can be about popularity and how democracy can become just mob mentality(especially in this age with so many stupid people), because even though Waldo didn't win initially, he gained in popularity and we can assume eventually people took Waldo seriously despite him being just a popular blue bear. This episode foreshadowed Trump?...

So the producers did great job for whole 35minutes with interesting plot of this episode and they've decided they're doing too well and make the ending miserable disappointment, really sad.

Released in 2013 (at a brief point when this concept initially felt utterly preposterous), I can fondly remember (a happier, much simpler time in our nation's history) all those years ago when "The Waldo Moment" received a fairly tepid response from critics & fans alike across the globe (myself included, I'll admit) - labelled as "the worst" the series had to offer, brazenly disregarded & forgotten about by the majority who paid the foreboding warning no mind etc.

How wrong we were.

It aged like fine wine.

Ironically (in an ominous collision between fiction & reality), that's because nobody took this cautionary satire seriously (chronicling our population doing precisely that, complacently sleepwalking in to the inevitable chaos guaranteed to ensue by dignifying dangerous ideologies / lack of them, over simplifying complex issues - requiring nuance, diplomacy - & galvanising support for a contemptuous façade under the guise of meaningful protest votes, actually rendering all votes meaningless as a consequence); collectively, we naively laughed at the farcical absurdity with incredulity & derision (under the false pretence that such a circumstance would never arise in truth - challenging our suspension of disbelief since our imaginations were unable to stretch further than was needed - in hindsight, what would await us only 3 years later), yet in the grisly prophetically accurate style of "Black Mirror", just like the people within the episode learned their lesson to complete dismay, underestimating the power of nihilistic, far right populism (giving voice to the disenfranchised within society - angry at the injustices of the world, yet channelling the frustration in completely the wrong direction; cynically wishing to tear down the old whilst offering nothing new in its place) is dangerously unwise & lacking in self-awareness. Hence, we're not laughing now & the joke's irrefutably on us.

Brexit. Trump. Boris Johnson. Bolsanaro. The list goes on.

Personality has triumphed over politics (as it predicted) & soberingly, we're now living in the age, obliviously never thought possible only a decade ago.

"Black Mirror" is a British series that consisted of two episodes...until Netflix got involved and commissioned more episodes. This episode is one of the original ones.

Waldo is an animated television character who is done LIVE using modern motion-capture technology. He is voiced by an out of work comedian, so you know the character is quick-witted. But he's also crude, offensive and annoying...yet the public seems to love Waldo and his offensive antics...so much that they decide to unleash him on a local election for Parliament. He pretty much makes a mockery of the election and despite how offensive and awful Waldo is the public love him. At this point...Waldo's voice starts to worry where all this is headed.

This is a very prescient episode of "Black Mirror". I think it gauges the public and their sheep mentality quite accurately...especially in light of some of our recent elections. I don't want to make this a political rant...just see this clever and very insightful show.