There’s a major plot hole in Black Mirror’s Common People and it makes the ending pointless

I love Black Mirror as much as the next criminally online person, and part of that is undoubtedly poking holes in the plot. Already, we’ve had claims about Bête Noire’s almond milk thief being disproven, questions about Hotel Reverie’s technological prowess, and now another one in the very first episode.

Season seven of Black Mirror kicked off with a bang with Common People, a starkly bleak tale about married couple Amanda and Mike just trying to get by. It stars Rashida Jones and Chris O’Dowd as the couple who, after a devastating accident, are forced to sign Amanda up for a subscription-based healthcare service. Soon enough, they’re forced to pay extra to ditch the adverts, try for a baby, and even leave their county, and poor Mike is left desperately seeking financial aid through an OnlyFans-like cam site.

The episode ends with Mike seemingly killing Amanda through suffocation before heading off with a scalpel in hand to end his own life – but it didn’t have to end that way. In fact, Mike and Amanda could have easily flipped the script.

Everyone loved Black Mirror’s Common People, but this plot hole is annoying af

Most Black Mirror episodes contain some piece of advanced technology that serves as a sinister reminder of our reliance on tech and our tendency to take things to the extreme. In Black Mirror’s Common People, that’s Rivermind, a synthetic portion of the brain that can give people a new lease on life.

Fronted by the eerily creepy medical rep Gaynor, played by the uber-talented Tracee Ellis Ross, Rivermind offers a number of subscriptions models with the lowest being common, hence the episode’s name.

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After finding out about the impromptu adverts in her brain and how her mind is used for application memory for most of the night, resulting in constant fatigue, Amanda is shown the new and improved Rivermind Lux by Gaynor. Through this new tier, which comes at an EXTRA $1,000 a month, Amanda would be able to alter her emotions and even download new skills. In the handy infomercial, the model is able to download skills such as parkour, tennis, and skating.

Common People felt like good old fashioned Black Mirror…

The juxtaposition between the determination of humanity and love in the face of capitalism mixed with technology+ a lack of empathy leading to brutal dark consequences w/ no performative heroism…

we are so fucking back! pic.twitter.com/ByeOahKyHa

— R I L E Y (@_lifeofriley92) April 13, 2025

So, if you’re able to download the skills and attributes of other Rivermind users, then why the hell aren’t Amanda and Mike using it to their advantage? Struggling with money? Not anymore, because you just downloaded the financial skills of a hedge fund manager.

The possibilities are literally endless. Amanda could download hacking skills and change Rivermind to suit her needs, she could download the skills of a neuro surgeon to fix her brain, Damn, she could even download the skills of a soldier and go all GI Jane on Gaynor and her Rivermind cronies.

With all that considered, Mike didn’t have to smother his beloved wife with a pillow and then kill himself for cash on the internet. If only they had downloaded some common sense.

Black Mirror season seven is available on Netflix now. For all the latest Netflix news, drops and memes like The Holy Church of Netflix on Facebook. 

Featured image credit: Netflix