You’re Never Gonna Guess the Real-Life Scandal That Inspired ‘Black Mirror’s’ “Joan Is Awful” Episode

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After a four-year hiatus, Black Mirror is officially back on our screens for season six, after Netflix took over the anthology series from Channel 4. But did you know that one of the episodes, Joan Is Awful starring Salma Hayek, was inspired by a real-life scandal?

The episode, which is the first in the new series, follows 'average woman' Joan, aka Annie Murphy, who realizes her life is actually playing out as an adaptation starring Salma Hayek as her.

Viewers watch as Joan attempts to stop her secrets being revealed by the production house and streaming service (side note: this feels very meta, doesn't it?), only for a final twist to make her question all of her actions.

Now, creator Charlie Brooker has revealed that the episode was inspired by the true events of Elizabeth Holmes—the disgraced former CEO of Theranos (a blood testing start-up based in Silicon Valley)—, who was convicted on four out of 11 counts of wire fraud and conspiracy and later sentenced to more than 11 years in prison.

Speaking to Metro, Brooker said, "I was watching The Dropout, which is the dramatization of Elizabeth Holmes and the Theranos story, with my wife and we were sort of commenting on like, 'This feels like it happened yesterday, and here it is already a drama on TV.'"

He combined the concept of a real-life event being adapted for TV very quickly with another idea he'd had—" a story about an average woman who finds herself on the front page of the newspaper"—and came up with Joan Is Awful. "I was like, I don’t know what the story is, but it’s a funny situation."

He does have a point; Elizabeth Holmes was first indicted on nine counts of wire fraud and two counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud in June 2018. The Dropout was first announced in May 2019.

She was then found guilty of four counts of wire fraud and conspiracy in January 2022—three months before the Hulu adaptation dropped in March 2022.

Shop Now The Dropout is available to stream on Disney+

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