What all seasons of the Channel Four/ Netflix series Black Mirror have in common is a terrifying picture of what the world can look like if AI and technology take over the world. If AI is getting more advanced with age, could that mean that television creators are going to be replaced by these smart programs? Black Mirror creator Charlie Brooker explains why he’s not worried about AI replacement for his job.
It’s scary what AI programs like ChatGPT can do. In an instant, this program can write anything for you like the book ending for Game of Thrones. As the 2023 Writers Strike brought out awareness of the frequency of AI-produced scripts, The Guardian reported that Black Mirror creator Charlie Brooker spoke at an International Convention Centre SXSW event in Sydney about facing anxiety when asking ChatGPT to write something for him. Brooker said:
I said to ChatGPT, ‘Go give me an outline for a Black Mirror story. And as it’s coming through in the first couple of sentences you feel a cold spike of fear, like animal terror. Like I’m being fucking replaced. I’m not even gonna see what it does. I’m gonna jump out the fucking window.
ChatGPT seems almost flawless in how it can think of the most complex answers to your questions in the course of a few seconds. It's understandable where studios were coming from at the time of the writers strike. AI, after all, has the ability to come up with an entire screenplay instantly compared to waiting for humans to think one up.
It’s also easy to understand where the fear of AI comes from in Brooker, when some of the best Black Mirror episodes had to do with AI playing a significant role in everyday life. Examples include “Striking Vipers” about an AI role-playing video game and “Joan is Awful” about AI-generated entertainment. Being the driving force behind so many episodes is bound to make you scared about art imitating life.
Thankfully, by the end of Charlie Brooker’s ChatGPT interaction, he realized that he had nothing to worry about his career:
Then as it carries on you go, ‘Oh this is boring. I was frightened a sec ago, now I’m bored because this is so derivative.’ It’s just emulating something. It’s Hoovered up every description of every Black Mirror episode, presumably from Wikipedia and other things that people have written, and it’s just sort of vomiting that back at me. It’s pretending to be something it isn’t capable of being. But I can’t quite see it replacing messy people.
Imagine what a relief it must have been for the creator of one of the best Netflix series to know that ChatGPT isn't perfect. This AI tool may come up with answers easily, but it doesn’t mean they’re always intelligent or accurate ones. Artificial intelligence can be just as “messy” as people can be. If there’s any benefit to humans having to think hard when it comes to mastering creativity, it's that we can come up with well-thought-out ideas compared to rushing through them.
While the writers strike may have come to an end despite the growing threat of AI, the SAG-AFTRA actors strike is still ongoing. Studios have been trying to get actors to give away their AI likenesses for “eternity.” That’s an incredibly scary concept that ironically was covered in the episode “Joan is Awful” where a businesswoman's life is told onscreen by an AI version of Salma Hayek. Actors are having their likeness scanned to be used for future projects, not being told what those projects will be or being compensated for them. Hopefully in the future, something can be settled that will benefit both studios and actors.
While it’s hard to know how much interference AI will have towards the entertainment industry in the coming years, at least Charlie Brooker can rest assured that his job is safe. With his high level of ingenuity, at least he’s smart enough to think of something more clever for season seven of Black Mirror compared to what ChatGPT came up with. You can watch all episodes of this sci-fi anthology series right now on your Netflix subscription.
