It's been a few years since Black Mirror released any new episodes. The last 2 seasons, and the interactive special, Bandersnatch were all let-downs, and it was starting to feel like the show had run out of creative juices. I kept hearing that the reason for the hiatus was a combination of the creators having run out of ideas, and also that some of the ideas that had come up with were getting too close to being real, and they didn't want to give real-life companies any ideas. (But I can't find a primary source for any of these claims, so take them with a grain of salt).

Well, Black Mirror is back with a seventh season, and I think it's a return to form for the series!

If you were disappointed with Bandersnatch and seasons 5 and 6, then you will be in for a pleasant surprise, as season 7 comes out of the gates swinging with an episode that I believe to be one of the series' best. It follows that up with 2 underwhelming episodes. I feel like these are more a problem of a failure to stick the landing, than of being fundamentally bad ideas, as they both start out with interesting premises. But then it goes on a real tear with 3 good-to-great episodes to close out the season. The penultimate episode is also fantastic and ranks among my favorite of the entire series.

Image ©: Netflix.

Image ©: Netflix.

Season 7 includes 2 of the best episodes of the entire series.

I am really struggling to see how the National Football League thinks that it's NFL+ subscription service is worth $30 - $80 a year. I tried a free trial of the app during the first week of the NFL regular season and was thoroughly disappointed by the service in almost every conceivable way.

First of all, just signing up for it is a pain in the ass because their payment provider, Cleeng takes forever to load. I had to refresh it several times and wait several minutes before I was finally able to actually activate the trial.

The NFL wants $30-$80 for its streaming service. Is it worth it? Spoiler: NO.

The real kicker is that I can only watch live games that are televised anyway, as well as in-market games. So I can watch the Raiders (because I live in Las Vegas), even though I hate the Raiders; but I can't watch the Bears unless they're on TV anyway. I don't have cable, but I do have a broadcast TV antennae, and an Amazon Prime subscription (which carries Thursday night games). I can already watch every game that NFL+ offers at no extra charge, with the sole exception of Monday night games on ESPN, because even though we have a Disney+ subscription that supposedly includes ESPN+, we can't actually watch any live sports on ESPN+ because the Disney subscription only covers the basic ESPN+ content, and live sports requires the premium ESPN+ subscription. So, without needing to write another review, ESPN+ is also a complete waste of money.

If I really want to watch a Monday night game, I can go to my parents' house and watch it. They have cable, and they live less than 2 miles away.

The only thing that NFL+ offers that has any value to me is the ability to watch replays of games. But that's a feature of the premium ($80) subscription, and isn't offered by the basic ($30) subscription, and it's not something that is likely to be particularly valuable to most casual NFL viewers. It's only potentially valuable to me because I make YouTube content about Madden and other football video games, and I often use NFL footage (under Fair Use) to demonstrate how those games get football right or (more often) wrong. Most people don't bother to watch replays of live sports. The appeal of sports is to watch it in the moment. Once the moment has passes, so has the appeal. People watch highlights after the fact, but not entire games. The only time I've ever watched re-broadcasts of NFL games was when I would watch replays of Bears preseason games on NFL Network in order to see how the backups play. I have no interest in watching re-broadcasts of regular season or playoff games, except in the context of using it in a YouTube video. And that also has limited value because I'm usually able to find the clips or highlights that I need for free on YouTube or from NFL or ESPN highlight and analysis shows.