Fridge / Black Mirror: Bandersnatch

• Fridge Brilliance
  • In the TOY ending, present Stefan hides the toy under the bed, where child Stefan will search for it and find it so that he can join his mother on the doomed 0845 train. But why not just put it on the bed, where child Stefan will find it immediately and they can go on the (presumably non-doomed) 0830? However, we have to see this from present Stefan’s perspective. Stefan lost his mother at a very young age. He doesn’t remember much of her, and now she’s more of a symbol of his guilt and his loss. He can’t imagine what it would be like to actually live with her; all he wants is to have died with her as he feels he should have. More of a Fridge Tearjerker really.
    • Isn't it just so his dad doesn't see it and take it away, as he did before when the toy was on the bed...
    • Opening up the safe via TOY features a scene where his dad seemingly accepts him retrieving the toy. The rabbit is under the bed in all instances where we see the dad taking it; it's only the TOY ending where Stefan is able to find it and go with his mum.
• Fridge Horror:
  • Fans of the series get scared that something as small as their choice of cereal for Stefan’s breakfast could be the turning point for dystopia. And it’s all your fault.
  • There’s also the fact that no matter what choices you make, the film seems to guide you onto a set path. You’re trying to stop the dystopia but have no choice.
  • The lambda symbol in "White Bear" is used here to represent divergent realities, but eerily hearkens back to that episode’s twist of Victoria’s endless, unknowing torment being used for the entertainment of the masses...only this time, the unfeeling crowd is the audience, playing out Stefan’s torture over and over for entertainment.
  • The first major turning point occurs when Stefan is asked to work in Tuckersoft to develop the game. If the viewer accepts, Stefan gets crushed by the creation of a failed, neutered version of Bandersnatch. Therefore, the only way to help Stefan choose better is to get him to refuse Thakur's offer, and work on Bandersnatch alone. However, making him choose to work alone is what tips him off to feeling like he's being controlled by someone else, as he clearly wants to work in the team and looks surprised at his own desire to work alone. Stefan's torment and torture from that point on is a result of the viewer trying to help him achieve a better ending, and our desire to help him by making him choose against his own wishes ultimately creates the conditions for his own downfall anyway.
• The TV Show ending is basically the plot of The Truman Show, and is perhaps one of the most Paranoia Fuel-inducing endings. Imagine you've lived your life as it is now. All is normal and then... It changes without warning. The wall behind you is no longer there- replaced by people you have no memory of, filming you. You suddenly start to see everything in the room you were in as props, and note how you appear to be in a type of set. Everything you once knew has become a lie. But perhaps the most important part is... were your private moments filmed on TV?
• Fridge Logic:
  • If you end the story prematurely,(Work with Thakur's development team or take the upped dosage medication, and with either path Stefan ends up creating a completed but neutered Bandersnatch game.) Stefan will make a statement that implies he knows what's going on, or is the one controlling it. Not only this, if you prematurely ended by (Work with Thakur's development team, going back, Stefan will make comments that he'd only know if he knew what was going on. And then Colin would do the same. And yet if you don't take those paths, the story will go in a completely different direction that Stefan doesn't know what's going on.
    • IIRC, if you take the "wrong path, mate" first and then go back and refuse to work with Thakur's development team, Stefan and Colin will know about their previous meeting, but neither of them will know how they know. Even early on, Stefan knows something is up—he feels compelled to pick one cereal box over another, or bite his nails—but he doesn't start working it out until watching the VCR tape and delving deeper into Bandersnatch.

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