Black Mirror Season 1 Episode 3 Recap – The Entire History of You

Three people welcome Liam Foxwell inside a meeting room. They tell him they will not be doing a witch hunt for the deadwood, but it‘s more like a treasure hunting for gold. One of them tells Liam‘s office can focus on litigation in retrospective parenting cases. Another mentions Bobby suing his parents due to a lack of confidence, leading to damages against earnings, as an example.

Liam asks them if the firm is okay with their suggestions, ethically and morally. They hesitate a bit, but they all say yes. They say they will invite Liam to work in their firm and ask him to do an exhaustive redo with personnel. Liam tells them he is ready to do a big redo at the moment, but the guy insists next week is fine. The guy asks if there will be a major deletion in their firm once the big redo starts. Liam assures them there will be none. Everything is set.

Liam leaves the building and runs toward the taxi. “Airport, please,” Liam says. He uses Willow Grain, a technology that records memories ingrained into the neck at the back of the ear, to pay for the taxi. The female voiceover mentions an upgrade will get Liam three decades of memory backup for free. He then uses Willow Grain to return to his conversation with the three lawyers. He zooms into one of the lawyers who told him they look forward to seeing him again.

Liam runs to the docking gate. The security guard asks him to rewind what happened to him in the last 24 hours and the past week at different rewind speeds, times four and times 64. Liam rewinds everything that happened to him while the security watches. He‘s cleared to enjoy his flight.

Jeff, Jonas, and Fi are in the living room. Jeff is complaining about the frayed carpet he paid top money for. Liam arrives at his destination. He knocks and plays a bit of footage where Paul, Lucy‘s husband, reintroduces Lucy to him. Lucy opens the door for him. He introduces himself and says they met at the Dublin wedding. Lucy gets Liam a beer. He goes to the living room where he sees his wife talking to Jonas. He gets startled, but he keeps it down. Fi approaches him and tells him he’s early. She thought he won’t make it. Jonas also approaches them and introduces himself. Fi turns his back and dons an awkward face. She also introduces Liam to Jeff.

Lucy introduces Liam to Colleen. He says he’s a soon-to-be unemployed slash unemployable lawyer. Fi, sitting down, doesn‘t understand what his husband just said. Lucy asks about Liam‘s appraisal. Liam can‘t answer straight, so Jeff suggests appraising Liam‘s appraisal, so Lucy calls everyone to watch. Jonas comes in and tells everyone that the idea is not good because Liam looks uncomfortable. Paul calls everyone to eat. Liam is bothered by Jonas, so he asks his wife, Fi, if he has met him before. Fi tells him Jonas is one of the old crowd. She has mentioned him before. Fi tells him that if he’s not in the mood, then they can go home. Liam says it‘s fine, and they kiss. Liam returns to his memory of Fi talking to Jonas, looking for some detail.

Everyone is at the dining table, ready to eat. Jonas talks about his latest breakup. He says they were in the middle of planning their wedding when suddenly he realizes that the less the relationship means, the more you spend on the wedding. They started to notice the tiniest details about their wedding, like the thickness of the wedding invitation paper. They needed something to talk about. Lucy introduces Hallam to everyone.

Jonas continues his explanation and compares a relationship to going to a theater. You pay a lot, but you’re just wasting your time. And the more you spend, and the longer it goes on, you just tell everyone how much you enjoy being with that person. Colleen suddenly asks, “Would you say you loved her, though?” Jonas says he thinks they just fancied each other, and that’s just that. Jonas continues about finding himself watching redoes of hot times with other hot girls. Everyone is enjoying Jonas’ story except Liam, quietly eating his food and observing Fi‘s body language. When Jonas mentions pulling himself while watching redoes of his hot encounters with random girls, everyone gets silent.

Hallam tells everyone she was gouged 12 months ago. Everyone asks her if it hurts. She says it‘s total agony. It left a scar on her neck. But she also tells everyone she liked it after day one. Hallam says she is boring because she prefers one man at a time. Fi says, “serial monogamist.” Jonas says he‘s a serial monogamist, staying faithful to his cornflakes. Fi laughs at Jonas‘ joke. Liam sees her laugh but stays quiet. Lucy tells her it‘s an exciting choice, going grainless. Colleen disagrees. Paul then says he will redo some things from the Fraser Road days. Everyone cheers.

Liam and Fi are in the car, redoing some memories about Liam‘s appraisal. They dissect what happened, Fi tells Liam that one of the lawyers ticked Liam‘s paper, but he says it could be some other things. Liam once again asks about Jonas. He asks Fi if she talks that much with him. Fi tells him not really. Liam tells Fi that he thinks Jonas is a bit of a knob, a dick, like pulling himself off from his relationship theories. Fi snaps at Liam and asks him why they even invited Jonas. Liam tells her he likes him. Then he tells Fi it‘s obvious he didn‘t want to invite Jonas. Fi redoes the evening when Liam invited Jonas to prove her point. But Liam says he was being polite.

Outside Liam and Fi‘s house, Liam makes an alibi for Jonas not to come in anymore. Fi gives Gina, the babysitter, an option to wait for a cab or sleep in her office. Fi redoes what happened when she was away from their baby‘s grain. Liam keeps on bugging Fi about Jonas. Fi admits she and Jonas had a thing, even before she met Liam. Liam doesn‘t stop, so they argue. Liam apologizes to Fi. They reconcile.

Liam keeps on rewinding everything that happened during the dinner. He can’t stop watching until the next day and asks Gina if what Jonas said was funny in her opinion. Gina tells him it’s not funny. Fi enters the living room and asks Liam what he is doing. Liam rewinds the video from last night and asks her what’s funny with Jonas‘ joke because Gina didn’t find it funny. Gina leaves their house. Fi assists her through their door.

When Fi returns, she tells Liam what he did was embarrassing. They argue again because Liam shows her the tiny details that means nothing to her. But Liam finds it odd. Liam also shows Fi how she looks at Jonas compared to how she looks at him. Their argument continues until Fi walks out of the living room. Liam keeps on rewinding the video of Jonas last night.

After a while, Liam goes out, but the car doesn‘t start. The grain assistant warns he is not in the best condition to drive the car. Liam overrides the grain and drives to Jonas’ house. He tells him he just wants to talk to him. Liam barges inside Jonas‘ house. Jonas gets annoyed at Liam and wants Liam to leave his house. Liam refuses to do so. He keeps on babbling things about his wife. Jonas gets impatient, so he gets near Liam to assist him outside. Liam hits him in the head with the bottle he is holding.

Liam gets into an accident. He rewinds everything that happened after hitting Jonas in the head with the bottle he is holding. Jonas tried to hit him back, but Liam was one step ahead of him. He told Jonas to delete everything about Fi in his head, or he would gouge him with the broken bottle he was holding. Jonas deleted all items with Fi. Liam told him to stay away from his house and goes home. Fi is sleeping when Liam gets home. She wakes up and sees Liam. She asks him what happened and where he went. Liam asks her if he is the father of Jody. Fi tells him he is. Liam sits on a chair and shows Fi what he saw with Jonas‘ items.

Then, she asks Fi more about it. Fi admits it and tells him she’s sorry. Liam asks her if she made Jonas wear protection. He asks Fi to show him. Fi hesitates, so she lies at first, but she eventually shows him the video. Liam goes insane. He keeps rewinding his memories with Fi in their house. Liam removes his grain to remove all memory he has.

Our Thoughts

A person‘s memory of the past is important. But a device that repeatedly allows someone to go back to a certain memory has its disadvantages. It may be good and useful for some things, like reminiscing good memories, but it can also be a starting point for arguments, especially once we get obsessed with things.