In Black Mirror's episode "White Bear," we meet Victoria, a woman who has committed an atrocious crime and been sentenced to repeated humiliation in an echo of those original events. Victoria is suffering for both herself and her fiancé, who committed suicide before being brought to justice. However, I want to study the possibility that entertainment and profit were placed above punishment, and that the woman we see is possibly not the first Victoria, and probably not the last.
When the woman wakes up, she has no memory of who she is, and only finds one picture of herself—a picture taken with low quality in a dark room. Both photo manipulation and cosmetology have come far enough to imitate another person.
Victoria's memory is wiped every night. However, small pieces do come through every once in a while, such as her image of Jemima Sykes upon finding a picture of her. These may seem to be evidence of her identity, but these kinds of images could be planted in someone's head through repeated and/or subliminal messages. Further, if this case was as viral as to create a justice park where civilians visit to witness the torture, then certain images and memories of it would exist in the public conscience, much like the crimes of Ted Bundy and Jack the Ripper in our world.
Furthermore, the actress playing Jem was manipulating Victoria's malleable mind into submitting to certain ideas and memories. First off, she is the one who supplies the idea of suicide when Victoria points out her bandage cuffs. Then she is the one who speaks of the transmitter in White Bear and brushes off Victoria's weak attempts to make them stop. Even the name of "Jem" is a recollection of Jemima, making a connection between the girl Victoria and Iain killed and this woman now leading her to White Bear. Another actress, playing the knife woman, looks very similar to the victim's mother as well.
Why would the justice park want to replace Victoria after her body and mind give out? Those running the park would want to do so to protect the profits of the park and the job security it provides them. From the treatment of Victoria it is clear that she could only last so long from doing this. The calendar depicted early on in the episode clues the audience in to just how long this could have been going on. Eventually, when the original Victoria is or was unable to go on as expected, another criminal seen as deserving of this punishment could be slipped into place, have their mind wiped, and be shown the home videos and videos of Iain and Victoria's crime.
The justice park is a perfect place for someone to constantly replace Victoria. She is visually ambiguous; her skin is a mid-tone olive, her hair short but liable to continue growing in the park so length is not an issue. Her eyes are dark, not a striking blue or green or anything of the sort. The pictures of her they do have are either underexposed, such as the one on her mantle; overexposed, as her mugshot is, or they are drawings, court depictions which are not accurate in the first place. The audience probably doesn't care about the authenticity either, as they just want to be entertained and feel a thrill.
2 comments:
I think it's interesting that you bring up the possibility of Victoria being replaced because I just wrote about how her body cannot possibly survive the type of trauma she goes through for long, even though she forgets. It seems completely plausible that the sick and twisted capitalists running the White Bear Justice Park would keep punishing criminals that look similar to Victoria to keep the park running. I do think the whole thing is highly immoral and messed up though. Victoria did do an egregious crime; however, I think it's unfair that she's taking the punishment meant for her disgusting fiancé as well as herself. I feel like something exactly equal to the crime she committed would be to die the same way Jemima did, but no one seems to be interested in that during the episode. They seem to be trying to satisfy their own sadistic desires. Yuck!
Erin, you bring up an interesting point about Victoria. She is rather visually ambiguous and thus easily replaceable. None of her features are bold, like stated in your example about eye color. Plastic surgery could fix up almost anyone to be a Victoria.
I do wonder how many iterations of Victoria there have been. Unfortunately the episode does not seem to offer any hints. We can make guesses based on health, but they are just that, guesses. There has to have been more than one Victoria though as the facility's apparent age and popularity don't seem to match up with how long Victoria can live in these conditions. I really wish the episode had included more of a hint or teaser on this topic!
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