Black Mirror Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too Review

This week on Black Mirror Friday, Shannon and Fadra are discussing Black Mirror “Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too,” episode three of Season 5. Spoilers ahead!

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In the final episode of Black Mirror’s Season 5, a lonely teenager yearns to connect with her favorite pop star – whose charmed existence isn’t quite as rosy it appears.

This episode stars Miley Cyrus, Angourie Rice, Madison Davenport, Susan Pourfar, and Marc Mechaca (our beloved Russ from Ozark!).

Miley plays Ashley O, a pop star who is controlled by her agent/Aunt Catherine. Rachel is a young girl who loves Ashley O and received her AI doll, “Ashley Too,” as a birthday gift.

Ashley is drugged and placed in an induced coma while her Aunt goes on to create a hologram of Ashley that will tour the world. Rachel and her sister Jack discover that “Ashely Too” actually contains all of Ashley O’s consciousness. Together, they save Ashley O from her evil Aunt.

This episode is almost two different stories and we thought it could have been accomplished in about half the time, or with a less bloated story.

With quite a few plot holes and longer than it should have been, we didn’t love this episode – though Shannon liked it a bit more since she loves Miley!

A Look in the Mirror

In this segment, we discuss the technology and how close we are to seeing it in real life. We are actually already seeing some of the technology in this episode – the holographic performers!

Ronnie James Dio, who died in 2010, is actually on tour now as a hologram. The rest of the band Dio plays live while a big screen shows a hologram of Ronnie. Vocals are from previous live shows and it takes two months per song for production.

The Dio hologram – which isn’t technically a hologram – was created by a Los Angeles–based entertainment company called Eyellusion. They use a technique called “Pepper’s Ghost” which has been around for many years. It’s a reflective screen that bounces an image onto a see-through screen, giving the illusion of a hologram. The illusion is combined with some of the same motion-capture techniques James Cameron pioneered in the movie “Avatar.”

Our Reflection

We’re rating every episode to help you decide which are must-sees, good to watch, or could be skipped.

Shannon: Good to watch (but bordering “you could skip”)
Fadra: Could skip it (unless you really love Miley Cyrus, then it’s good to watch)

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