Black Mirror season 6 recap guide: All 5 episodes explained

From the mind of Charlie Brooker comes the return of Netflix’s most visionary show to date, Black Mirror. The anthology sci-fi series made its debut in 2011 and has since become a cult favorite, leaving viewers scratching their heads, asking existential questions, and wanting more. Each episode of the series is a standalone story, exploring the dark side of technology, which has included social media, VR, AI, and more.

It’s been four years since we last got new episodes of the critically acclaimed show, which is why fans are so excited to start binging Black Mirror season 6. And now finally it’s here! The new season features big names such as Aaron Paul, Salma Hayek Pinault, Ben Barnes, Michael Cera, Kate Mara, and others. Based on the episode descriptions we got ahead of the release, we already knew we were in for another twisty, thought-provoking ride.

Let’s break down every episode of Black Mirror season 6, starting with the premiere, “Joan is Awful.”

Black Mirror season 6 episode 1 recap: “Joan is Awful”

The first episode of Black Mirror season 6 is bound to get people talking. We get to know a character named Joan in “Joan is Awful,” a woman who feels like she’s not in control of her own life. As she tells her therapist, she feels like she’s on “autopilot” and isn’t the main character in her life story. Well, things spiral out of control even further when she realizes a streaming service called Streamberry is using her life as a drama series.

The episode starts off by showing us what Joan’s life is like. She’s engaged to a man named Krish but doesn’t seem happy. At her job, she feels like the middleman between the board and her staff, and in one scene we see her fire a young woman named Sandy. She tells her therapist that Krish is a little too vanilla, even though he’s nice, and compares him to her ex, Mac. Speaking of her ex, Mac continues to blow up her phone with texts letting her know he’s in town and he wants to see her.

After Joan talks about her relationship with Krish to her therapist, she decides to meet up with Mac for drinks. Mac says he wants to get back together, which frustrates Joan because he broke her heart and she was finally starting to move on with her life. They share a kiss, but Joan realizes what she’s doing is wrong and leaves abruptly. Mac tells her where she can find him if she chooses, noting that he’ll be in town for a few more days.

When Joan gets home, she gets settled in with dinner and a glass of wine with Krish. As they flip through Streamberry to try and find something to watch, they stumble upon a new show titled Joan is Awful. The main character, Joan, is played by Salma Hayek, but she’s wearing Joan’s clothing and has the same hairstyle as her.

Curious, Joan and Krish begin watching. And as it turns out, the show follows Joan’s real life, and the episode plays out the day she’s just had. Joan begins panicking before realizing that Krish will see what she told her therapist and what happens with Mac, so she tries to turn the TV off. But Krish ends up seeing her session with her therapist and storms out.

Joan tries to tell Krish that the show is just a show, not actually what happened, but he feels differently. He asks to see her phone to see if she’s been in contact with Mac, but she refuses, leading him to drive off and leave her.

The next morning, Joan goes to work and learns that the board is getting rid of her because she broke her NDA while firing Sandy, which was then shown for everyone to see in the episode of Joan is Awful. She realizes that there’s a new episode out of the show which, again, follows her current day with Salma playing her. Joan decides to seek advice from her lawyer, who tells her that she actually signed her life story away when signing up for Streamberry, as it’s in their terms and conditions that she didn’t read.

Desperate to take down the show, Joan decides to take matters into her own hands and stages a revolting scene, trying to get Salma’s attention. She believes if she does something disgusting, the Joan played by Salma in Joan is Awful will do it too, which will make the real Salma angry.

Joan eats a handful of fast-food hamburgers and washes them down with a liquid laxative before heading over to a church where a wedding is happening. She bursts through the doors wearing a cheerleader outfit and begins uncontrollably defecating all over the floor. The guests are horrified and Joan gets arrested.

Salma sees the episode and is furious, demanding her lawyer do something. But as her lawyer explains, she agreed to scenes like this when she signed her contract with Streamberry, so there’s nothing they can do. She fires her lawyer and heads over to Joan’s to yell at her. While talking about the whole thing, Joan and Salma realize they shouldn’t be angry with each other; they have a common enemy in the CEO of Streamberry, Mona Javadi.

The ladies form a plan to go to the Streamberry headquarters and pull the plug on the show. Salma, being a famous celebrity, is able to get into the building pretty easily and then sneaks Joan in. They make it upstairs and see the “quamputer,” a quantum computer that holds billions of simulated souls from alternate universes. Here’s where things get trippy.

When Salma and Joan get up there, a worker (played by the amazing Michael Cera) tries to stop them as he sits in front of a monitor displaying footage of Joan. Joan is confused, asking how he has that. He explains to them that Joan isn’t “the Source Joan,” she’s actually a version of the Source Joan played by the actress Annie Murphy. Joan is even more confused, and the worker shows footage of Annie Murphy on the red carpet, telling her she’s the star of the show Schitt’s Creek.

Joan punches the worker in the face, knocking him out, and takes his keycard to open the room holding the quamputer. But before Joan can destroy it, Mona storms in and begs her to stop. She explains that if she destroys the quamputer, she’ll also be destroying the simulated souls who believe they’re real people. That includes Joan, who finally realizes she’s not the real Joan after all. She’s simply playing the character. As she discovers this, she also realizes that all of this has happened before to the Source Joan. It’s not her decision, she’s simply an actress playing out a scene that’s already taken place.

Joan then destroys the quamputer, changing her back into the real Joan, while Salma turns into the real Annie.

Black Mirror season 6 episode 1, “Joan is Awful,” ending explained

Now that Joan is back to being the real Joan, we get a scene of her in therapy talking about her life post-Joan is Awful. She says she’s dating again and reveals she has a new job where she feels proud of herself. As it turns out, she opened up her own coffee shop, something she mentioned she had always dreamed of. She tells her therapist that she finally feels like the main character in her life.

While working at the coffee shop, Joan gets a visit from Annie. They’re both under house arrest for what they did, but they seem happy. Now that they can be themselves, and without any simulated versions or CGI likeness, they’re at peace.

Black Mirror season 6 episode 1, “Joan is Awful,” post-credits scene explained

The credits start to roll, but that’s not exactly the ending of the episode. In a post-credits scene, we get to watch the real Joan’s church incident. Remember, because Annie was playing a version of Joan, acting out events in her life, that means the defecating church scene really did happen to the Source Joan. The quick scene gives us a peek at the actual incident. Gross!

The first episode of Black Mirror season 6 is definitely a fun one, but the second episode gets a lot darker. Flip the page to read all about “Loch Henry.”