‘Black Mirror’ Season 6 Casts Aaron Paul, Josh Hartnett, Zazie Beetz, Kate Mara and Paapa Essiedu

The return of Black Mirror is starting to take shape.

The upcoming sixth season, which has yet to set a premiere date, is rounding out its cast. The Hollywood Reporter has learned that Zazie Beetz, Paapa Essiedu, Josh Hartnett, Aaron Paul, Kate Mara, Danny Ramirez, Clara Rugaard, Auden Thornton and Anjana Vasan are set to appear in the new episodes.

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Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones’ acclaimed dystopian anthology, as THR has reported, is expected to have more episodes than the previous season, which had three installments, and will continue the show’s trend of producing longer and more cinematic stories. While the total episode count for season six hasn’t been announced, this batch of castmembers will star in the first three episodes, per sources.

Netflix declined to comment on the castings.

The previous season of Black Mirror aired back in 2019 and before the COVID-19 pandemic struck. At the time, Brooker expressed disinterest in making more episodes of the tech-horror series amid the global tragedy. Instead, he and partner Jones produced two pandemic-themed, end-of-year mockumentary specials for Netflix, Death of 2020 and Death of 2021.

Black Mirror was produced by Brooker and Jones via their production company House of Tomorrow under Endemol Shine Group. The duo left the shingle in 2020 to launch new banner Broke and Bones, with Netflix as a key investor. The rights to Black Mirror, however, stayed with Endemol, which was, in turn, bought by Banijay Group. Netflix ultimately came in and licensed Black Mirror from Banijay, returning access to the title to Brooker and Jones.

Now, with prescient writer-creator Brooker back to plotting new episodes, fans of the hit Emmy-winning series will have to wait to see what he has in store, and how the new season will follow up on critical and audience hits like “San Junipero,” “USS Callister,” “Be Right Back” and “Entire History of You.” Per tradition, expect the plot details to remain under lock and key until the episodes drop.

Beetz stars in Donald Glover’s FX series Atlanta and on the big screen in Joker, The Harder They Fall and in the upcoming Bullet Train;  Essiedu starred in Michaela Coel’s HBO series I May Destroy You, as well as in series The Gangs of London and The Lazarus Project; Hartnett last starred in Sky’s The Fear Index and next up will be in Oppenheimer; Paul stars in HBO’s Westworld, and recently revived his Breaking Bad role for Netflix in El Camino and is set to appear in the final season of AMC’s Better Call Saul; Mara recently starred in the Amazon series A Teacher and on FX’s Pose and will appear in the upcoming abortion movie Call Jane, which premiered at Sundance; Ramirez recently starred in Top Gun: Maverick and in the Disney+/Marvel drama The Falcon and the Winter Soldier; Rugaard starred in Sky series The Rising; Thornton recently appeared on the final season of NBC’s This Is Us; and Vasan starred in Peacock’s We Are Lady Parts and on the final season of AMC’s Killing Eve.

Variety first reported the casting news.

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