Black Mirror has always thrived on the eerie overlap between fiction and reality — but with Season 7’s “Bête Noire,” it may have officially crossed the line. What was supposed to be a mind-bending episode about gaslighting has now spilled into viewers’ actual lives, sparking widespread confusion online — and even, reportedly, disrupting one couple’s wedding plans.

In a now-viral post, a fan named Jason shared how the episode, directed by Black Mirror creator Charlie Brooker, messed with him and his fiancée. Watching the episode simultaneously from two different countries, the couple found themselves arguing over a detail as small as a fast food hat. The catch? They weren’t wrong — they were watching two different versions of the same episode.

Yes, Netflix deliberately released two versions of “Bête Noire,” each featuring a different restaurant name on a red cap — “Bernies” in one, “Barnies” in the other. The name isn’t just a throwaway gag; it becomes a pivotal plot point as the lead character, Maria (Siena Kelly), begins to feel reality shift around her. Her colleagues insist one version is correct, the internet backs them up, and Maria — much like the viewer — starts to question her own memory.

 

Fans are now calling the move a “live gaslighting experiment.” Memes are flying. Reddit threads are on fire. “They planned drama, we lived it,” one user wrote. Jason, meanwhile, said his fiancée accused him of making things up — until they compared notes and realised they weren’t watching the same episode.

Showrunner Brooker even trolled fans, posting a smug video holding the infamous cap and teasing, “It’s a Barnie’s cap. Or is it a Bernie’s cap?”

 

What makes this episode particularly unsettling is not just the narrative, but how it enacts the experience of gaslighting on the audience. It blurs perception, hijacks trust, and questions digital reality — all classic Black Mirror territory, now executed with unsettling precision.

As the debate continues, one thing is clear: Black Mirror didn’t just break the fourth wall — it set it on fire, then asked you if it was ever there in the first place.