Men Against Fire

"Men Against Fire" is the fifth episode of the third series of Black Mirror, starring Malachi Kirby, Madeline Brewer, Ariane Labed, Sarah Snook, and Michael Kelly. It was written by series creator Charlie Brooker and premiered on Netflix on 21 October 2016.^[1]

Plot

A military organization is battling a threat referred to as "roaches", mutated leftovers of a biological weapon from an unspecified war. Koinange, known as "Stripe" (Malachi Kirby), and Raiman, known as "Ray" or "Hunter" (Madeline Brewer), are part of a squad led by Medina (Sarah Snook), who use an implant called MASS to help with strategic operations. They answer the call of a village whose food supply was ransacked and tainted by roaches. Following a lead, they head to an aging manor and interrogate its owner (Francis Magee). Medina suspects that the owner is harboring these roaches, while the others search the house. They come across and subsequently fight three pale humanoids with sharp teeth and no apparent capacity for language, while the manor's owner attacks Medina. During the ensuing struggle the roaches are killed, except for one who flees into the woods. After killing one of them Stripe accidentally flashes himself in the eyes with a device with green LEDs at the tip. The owner is captured and the manor is torched.

En route to headquarters, Stripe appears to be daydreaming about a woman but she glitches out. That night he experiences the same dream but the experience is intercut with images of blood. A conversation with Raiman implies that the soldiers are fed these sexual fantasies as rewards for roach kills. Later, his interface glitches multiple times during training regimens. He brings this up with a doctor and a psychologist, Arquette (Michael Kelly), who enters commands into a computer for Stripe to receive "a good night" to thank him for reporting the glitches. When he sleeps, Stripe segues into a chaotic, frightening version of his sexual fantasy, with multiple copies of the same woman. More glitches occur, however, and Stripe abruptly awakens from the sleep.

The next day, the soldiers arrive at a compound on another hunt, and further glitches enable Stripe's sense of smell, which had previously been absent. They get ambushed by a roach sniper who kills Medina. They scour the sniper's building when Stripe encounters what Stripe sees as a human woman, who is shot by Raiman when she tries to flee. In a subsequent firefight, it is made clear that Stripe sees humans while Raiman sees roaches. Stripe knocks out Raiman but gets shot during the melee, and then escapes with the roaches—a woman (Ariane Labed) and child, who are from here on shown as humans and can be understood by Stripe.

After Stripe passes out behind the wheel of the Humvee during the escape, the roaches lead Stripe to their makeshift dwelling in the forest. The woman explains to Stripe that her name is Catarina and that his MASS implant has altered his vision, whereas the villagers' perception isn't altered and they simply hate the roaches due to propaganda and bigotry. Those seen by the soldiers as roaches are in fact human victims of a Holocaust-like ethnic cleansing campaign against those believed to be genetically inferior, following the outcome of a war ten years before. Meanwhile, Raiman tracks them down and ultimately slays the two roaches and knocks Stripe unconscious, returning him to headquarters to be confined.

Inside Koinange's cell, Arquette explains that the green light device was an optical transmitter which infects MASS implants with a virus. Arquette then discusses the history of warfare, reluctance to fire, and PTSD. He reveals that the implants are used to dehumanize the enemy, allowing soldiers to kill without remorse as well as improving efficiency in other ways, including obscuring or blocking out other sensory experiences such as the screams of the victims. He confirms that Stripe has been working for a global eugenics program to "protect the bloodline" of humanity, and shows him video evidence that Stripe, as a recruit, knowingly consented to the memory and sense-altering effects of the MASS procedure.

Stripe attempts to attack Arquette, who subsequently uses Stripe's MASS implant to temporarily blind him. Arquette begins playing the raw footage of his first mission, where Stripe brutally murders the pleading "roaches" -- revealed to have been human all along. The woman who escaped is revealed as Catarina. Arquette threatens to incarcerate Stripe and endlessly loop the footage in his mind, unless he agrees to have his memory of the past three days erased. Stripe agrees and is afterwards discharged with full honors, returning home to what appears to his eyes to be an an immaculate house and an awaiting dream girl. Meanwhile the viewer witnesses that in reality, he stands outside a graffiti tagged, dilapidated house, alone.

Production

The title is a reference to the book from Brigadier General S.L.A. Marshall, Men Against Fire: The Problem of Battle Command (1947), where Marshall states that during World War II, 75% of soldiers did not fire their rifles, even under immediate threat, and most of them, when they actually fired, rather aimed above the enemy's head.^[2] A similar statement is made during one of Michael Kelly's character dialogue in the episode. Dave Grossman's book On Killing about the psychology of the act of killing (which is based on SLA Marshall's studies) also inspired Brooker to write the episode.^[3]

Critical reception

Adam Chitwood of Collider criticised the fact that the episode "tips its hand way too early and is heavy-handed with its social commentary".^[4] Suchandrika Chakrabarti of Daily Mirror rated the episode 5 out of 5, noting how the episode "forces you to think about the philosophical consequences of high-tech warfare".^[5]

There is a reference to season 1 episode Fifteen Million Merits, in which Jessica Brown Findlay's character performs the song "Anyone Who Knows What Love Is (Will Understand)" by Irma Thomas. Raiman sings this song in Heidekker's house while holding him at gunpoint.

See also

• The 5th Wave – a 2016 film with a similar premise
• Uncanny Valley – a 2015 short film with a similar premise
• Haze – a 2008 video game with a similar premise
• Hearts and Minds – a 1998 episode of The Outer Limits with a similar premise

References

External links

• "Men Against Fire" at the Internet Movie Database