Was the protagonist viewing child porn when he was recorded? I don't think it was ever stated clearly... But it had to be something worse than everyday legal porn, yes?
sharehe wuz watching CBeebies.
share[deleted]
It was stated very clearly by his mother's call saying "they said you were looking at children.. children!!!"
So.. wat?
Kenny wasn't watching kids. They trolled him extra hard in the end and pinned the child porn on him as well.
Nice twist in that nobody at all got away with *beep*
I still don't know what the black guy did wrong, though.
No, he was a pedo. They set it up subtly and they had him looking young an innocent so you wouldn't believe it. The hints were at the beginning. Before the fight, which you weren't quite sure why he did answer the guy, but his mother confirmed it.
http://www.auplod.com/u/dalpuo430da.png
(\ v /)
(='.'=)
He clearly was watching child porn coz the other guy said " how young were they" and he tried to lie but the other guy knew coz he did the same
shareIsn't he also a kid himself? Like, he couldn't have been anymore than 15. That one was *beep* up though, but he could say he was framed, he has the text message to prove it.
shareDiscussed elsewhere - I thought he only looked 15, the script says he's learning to drive which means he's at least 17 (which would mean he would not be tried as an adult if so, and would not go to adult prison). However the synopsis says he is 19. I'd argue it is irrelevant what the synopsis says (imagine watching this in 20 years, will the synopsis still be around?), so we can only guess at his age.
Also, the UK law now means it is unlikely he would've left school unless he was 18, but it is possible under some circumstances
https://www.gov.uk/know-when-you-can-leave-school
England
You can leave school on the last Friday in June if you’ll be 16 by the end of the summer holidays.
You must then do one of the following until you’re 18:
stay in full-time education, for example at a college
start an apprenticeship or traineeship
spend 20 hours or more a week working or volunteering, while in part-time education or training
How is a 19 year old meant to act? Is there a particular rule that by thar age they need to act a certain way?
Quite a few posters have said they thought he was a minor/was about 15. Why did they think that?
Because he's deliberately meant to look young to make you feel more empathy for him.
The actors 20 and they used no makeup etc to make him look any younger. Doesn't mean he's only 15 either.
If you have a lot of the audience thinking he looks under 18, which means he won't go to prison like you might think from the end with all the police cars, and his crimes of bank robbery and killing/murder won't result in adult sentencing either, you have people thinking 'well he won't face much punishment. Yet the synopsis tells us he is 19, so will face adult punishment. Perhaps the script should have made it clear somewhere how old he was, rather than us disagreeing about how old he is likely to be depending on whether he is serving alcohol as part of his job, etc.
I might think it was left vague on purpose, except they seem keen to clarify it in that synopsis.
It's pretty obvious from the script he's no longer a minor. He is learning to drive meaning he's over 17 (it can take ages to learn to drive if you can only afford one lesson a week) . He looks like he's working full time meaning he's 18 as there's no school involved. His sister looks about 15 and there's no mention of them being twins making him older. There's so many pointers to him being an adult.
One could say his mother looks at him in a far more grown up way than a mother would a child.
All the clues are there
How have you judged he was working full-time not part-time?
shareThey showed his home life and his work life. If he was also at school they've shown that. In fact they'd be more likely to show that as it would show how much of an outsider he was.
Despite all of this they've said how old he is so it's moot really.
The fact he gets to and bails on work at 12pm tells me he doesn't go to school.
shareI was not thinking about his age being a factor at all for him not going to Jail, that is where those text messages would come into play. He can show that to the police and explain that he was being coerced into doing the things he did. He can lead them to the body of the man he presumably killed, since he walked away and that guys phone will help lay out more of the story for the authorities.
Something like this happened back in the '03 where a man, Brian Wells, was kidnapped and had a bomb attached around his neck. He was then instructed to rob a bank.
I know the show was not set/made in the USA, but kids here learn to drive at 15 and get their licence at 16, so....easy assumption to make. However, kids here would not work a server job until age 16. Not knowing the "rules," in England, I assumed he was just slow at getting his driver's licences
shareI can tell you that kids don't drive at 16 in the UK.
In average in London, people get their licence at 25 or so. Around 20 in the rest of the country.
I think he is 19. Dropped out college or maybe it's summer.
Not said clearly?
One of the first things his mom yells on the phone is "KIDS!"
They also foreshadow it near the beginning when he's giving a toy to a little girl and observing a child's menu that has been colored in.
---
When you were pouring the Bisquick, were you trying to make pancakes?
He got turned on by an adult themed music video and felt like having a wank, I don't think he had anything to do with child porn, they just pinned that on him. They could paste in anything they wanted once they had the video of him. Also, you don't just google child porn. Looked like he wrote porn hub or something similar.
"You'll be taking a soul train straight to a disco inferno where you never can say goodbye!"
That is what also makes me wonder about it being child porn: you don't just google (or any regular search enghine) that. Also, he clearly has no much idea of computers. I'm not saying people that watch child-porn necessary master computers, but if they want to avoid legal consecuences they won't google child porn, they won't just download the first malware tool they find... they have to know more than that.
Of course, that can be not intentional, but I think being that careless would probably lead police to him sooner than some troll aiming to random targets (it was not her sister the one accessing child-porn but probably random sites), yet they were recording a random guy just in case he would masturbate to child-porn?
Also, they had a recording of him jerking off... how could they really have proof it was child-porn he was watching (he was looking at the screen and it was a laptop camera) so any sound could be easily added and they could say "this was what he was looking at", but should need trust in the hackers not modifying it.
I think the intention was "surprise, they were all pedophiles" (Mindy probably was underage prostitution) but it was poorly executed more than intentionaly ambigous.
I imagine they already knew he was watching child porn before targeting him and then got the actual evidence after loading their virus.
I think it's pretty obvious due to a number of things:
1) The foreshadowing of his interactions with the child at the beginning.
2) The fact he was willing to rob a bank, if it was purely just him masturbating he would have run away - same applies with the fight to the death.
3) He described the porn as "just a few pictures", pretty sure most teenage boys would watch videos.
4) He didn't argue his mum asking about him watching kids.
5) All the other people were morally reprehensible so it would make sense he was too, also the fact that only him and the paedo fought to the death.
We also know the woman at the beginning wasn't caught up in child porn as she was tangled up in the whole thing for being racist.
As I said in another thread,a problem with the trolls plan was plausible deniability. It would be natural for any of their victims to lie and say the accusations weren't true. And all the evidence against them comes from tech-savvy internet trolls. However convincing that evidence is, a victim could argue it was all faked, Kenny could say he was just watching regular porn and they've faked whatever they have shared with everyone. Maybe all of the victims have been blackmailed into committing other offences as Kenny has, then they are in trouble, but whatever the secret is that the trolls have revealed is tarnished because people don't trust anonymous internet trolls.
What if it was the police.....big brother and all that.
But...There are pedophile crusaders on the Internet and because of their actions have put many pedophiles away so I don't think it's quite as easy as saying they faked it all.
We never found out what the black guy delivering the cake did either.
I was under the impression that he (the main kid) was slight feeble minded through the episode. Aspergers or autism or something. The way he acted around others and the way he announced that he was going to drink a coke to his sister.
Great episode nonetheless.
No, he told his sister to stop stealing his cokes as he went to drink one (and noticed, I assume, that there were some missing).
shareAhh! I must have misheard.
I also wonder about the significance of the drawing he looked at. It was a house on fire.
I Def. Don't think the organisation targets just pedos, they go around tapering everyone they feel has done injustice. If he just had a walk with regular port I don't think they would have made him do those things. It also highlights that sort of vigilante justice and how dangerous it can become. Where does it end and who are they to decided who's done bad things? Great episode,
It wasn't it was just a picture a child had coloured in. Just makes him even creepier
shareThat's right, I forgot the woman was for racism. So the other one was just for cheater and paying for sex?
The other one we only know it was something "pervert", that's why I thought they were all child abuse, I forgot the racist one and suppossed the pervert was also child related and the married guy was saying "twenty-something" just as a way to recognize she was young but not making it such a big deal.
They already knew and her sister happily went to the site they also put the trojan/virus?
About your points (though I agree the intention was to state clearly he was watching child-porn):
1) Yeah, after ending the episode it gets a new meaning, but he was just giving a toy and looking at a drawing.
2) People commit suicide for sex-shame (people who got pictures stolen for example), so rob a bank (something he also did because he was afraid of the cheater) or fighting to death / shooting himself (as he tried because he prefer that before killing) don't really force me to believe the masturbating video is not enough (of course not for everyone, but is not unheard either). Of course, not having the option to kill yourself or run didn't let it many options and you probably fight even if that's not what you want (we really aren't sure if he killed him or maybe he just let him unconcious).
3) I'm quite sure there's plenty of child-porn videos (for anyone that knows where they can get pictures) and also lots of regular pornography nowadays keep using pictures (probably more for consumers that want to watch many different acts/actresses in one wank, while videos usually are more one-jerk consumed, so it depends more in taste than anything).
4) I agree, though I also was surprised she (and his sister) were so convinced -you know, family usually are less likely to believe it-. I really don't understand how it could be perfectly clear what he was watching to even convince the mother so easily.
5) Well, who knows what the just "pervert" guy did to be so morally reprehensible and then the cheater well... not the end of the world really. The trolls themselves were morally reprehensible sending people from place to place with very short time (a big risk for other drivers and peasants) and making them rob a bank (stealing just to make a fake game with an "prize" they don't need -not releasing the info was good enough for both of them-, so I assume the money finally arrived to the hands of the trolls (maybe stealing is not reprehensible but paying for sex is, who know how they think).
I think the episode works ok if you don't think too much in those details, but then more than a Black Mirror is just a regular action story.
While I do agree to things being said, I feel like people are forgetting a few things in this episode.
Before I get there, I'll say that I thought that the whole time, it was pics of that redhead from the diner, but once it got to the pedo fight, I connected the dots with the kid (which I did find a little creepy, but I just passed that on as him being awkward around people). Remember, they only made this kid and a pedo fight, not hookercaller, not blackguyonamoped, just these 2, and there we found out that the trolls wanted a pedodeathmatch.
1) I agree with that they meant for him to be jerking it to lil kiddos.
2) So jerking off doesn't seem like such a big deal, so that's why I assumed it was to something specific like the redhead (he doesn't want to be creepshamed at his job or whatnot), but the kid also gives just as much reason to not want that vid released.
ALSO: the main thing I see people here forgetting is that if they recorded his facecam, I'd say they were probably also recording what was on the screen that was on. Also, even with the defense he could say that he was jerking off to lesbo porn, he's already been branded as a pedo by everyone in the community. His defense doesn't matter, because people don't care about the truth that much when something like that comes out. His reputation is ruined already.
3) It was pictures, and I don't even think it was porn, I think odds are is that he was probably just jerking it to some picture of kiddos on facebook/some site, and not nude kiddies. He didn't even argue with his mom about the validity, he knew it got leaked, so imo, his silence spoke more than words could.
4) That's where the paragraph I typed earlier comes up: IF it was just pictures, it may be from facebook/whateversitetheyuseonblackmirrorforsocialnetworkinthisparticularepisodebecauseitsdifferenteverytime. So when they leaked the video, it's an overlay of what was on his monitor and what was on his webcam, that makes it believable imo. And if it is from blackmirrorfacebookequivalentthingy, then perhaps they know the child/whatever or something along those lines, you feel me?
5) Who knows what mopedblackguy did, but it was something bad. And I don't think the trolls care about their morality, I think they just want to punish others for some sick game. I also don't think the trolls care about the money, they just wanted to see how far they could push these people, up until the 2 pedos fought to the death. Giving an extra incentive was probably their attempt at making it more legit in the 2s eyes, but who knows. (Can I say the trolls were super dicks for making the pedokiddo rob the store with a gun with no bullets)
All in all, I feel like they explained enough (not the guymopedblack, though)for viewers to understand for the most part.
I don't forget that, I think that's probably what they had, but the thing is that is just two different videos and it would be impossible to connect them. Maybe even those trolls were doing it on purpose and he was watching regular porn and they told him they would say it was kids and would show "proof". I guess that's probably not the intention but actually the thing is maybe even someone not-guilty would then do all that to protect himself, and all you need is a video jerking off and swearing that some video capture you show was actually what they are watching.
Maybe they explained enough, is just I think there were many things poorly done and I have to suspend my disbelief a lot. For example you say maybe it was just random kids on facebook, while some people point the fact he didn't want his sister using his computer and the lock in the door as a proof that he was hidding child porn from her. He wouldn't hide that much just pictures of kids... but then, if they weren't regular kids pictures then googling for child porn and the huge lack of knowledge he seemed to have about computers is susprising for a pedophile that consumes child porn.
Bronn said that he just wanted to *beep* a 20 something for old times sake, Mindy wasnt underaged
shareYou don't really know that. You also don't know mindy's story. SHe could be underage, she could be pimped or traffiked etc.
shareYeah, I know, but there's something people do sometimes: it's called lying.
Also the main character says he was just jerking off watching some porn, he tries to make it lighter than it is.
I thought he was lying about the age because I thought they were all related to pedophilia, I forgot the woman was racist so of course now I realize if they were not all pedophiles then Mindy could be or not underaged and he could be saying the truth. Anyway, just a character saying something wouldn't be proof, we see that even in this episode and other characters.