Germana Carillo It's not Black Mirror unless some high-tech gadget is implanted in someone's head or gut. Season 7 introduces the "Nubbin" and fans are already asking if the device can actually be purchased.
It shakes your conscience, bringing forgotten memories to the surface. It’s unclear whether Nubbin is exactly what we want for our future, but one thing is certain: many would buy it right now.
Thankfully, however, Nubbin—a super high-tech device that supposedly attaches to your temple and gives you powers in your mind—is merely a marketing stunt, supported by influencers around the world. It’s a clear example of just how far technology has come, with our lives almost entirely online and bizarre new inventions being sold to us on a daily basis. And the line between reality and fiction is becoming harder to distinguish.
Social media has been flooded with videos of influencers in a trance after placing the device on the side of their heads. Their eyes empty, staring into nothingness. So, the question arises: are we sure that a new “brain chip” for “memory enhancement” is really what we want? Would we even like it?
This is the dilemma posed by the latest season of Black Mirror and its promotional campaign. Yes, the “Nubbin” chip, created by TCKR Systems and promising to allow you to “enter virtual consciousness,” exists only in the fictional world of the seventh season of the most dystopian show of all time.
The perfect reality? It’s all in your head. Reality is boring. It’s time for something better, their website says.
Is nubbin technology real?
In a word: no. Nubbin and TCKR Systems are fictional creations born from the unsettling imagination of Black Mirror’s writers. But it would be naïve to stop there.
What leaves a bitter aftertaste—and perhaps a bit of fear—is that, season after season, Black Mirror doesn’t strike us with what’s entirely invented, but rather with what feels eerily familiar.
Even when we’re witnessing surreal, absurd scenarios, seemingly light-years away from our own reality… the world outside surprises us, shortening the distance, transforming. And we find ourselves living—albeit in different forms—the same anxieties and questions.
Because Black Mirror isn’t so much about the future, as it is about us. And the present, which silently, is transforming right before our eyes.
