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E3: Black Mirror 2, Floating Under The Radar At E3
Many of you have probably not heard of Black Mirror, let alone Black Mirror 2. In Black Mirror (1) – “Black Mirror is the name of the ancestral manor of the Gordon family located in England. Samuel Gordon is forced to return there after 12 years absence following the death of his grandfather, William Gordon. Despite occurring under mysterious circumstances, William’s death is considered a suicide by everyone except for Samuel. Plagued by sudden nightmares and excruciating headaches, Samuel is determined to find the true causes of his grandfather’s death. Soon, strange and unexpected deaths occur.”
Black Mirror 2 takes place in the 1990’s, twelve years after the first episode. Solitary Darren, hero of Black Mirror 2, meets cute Angelina while he is working at the local photo shop of Biddeford, a small town in New England. Angelina immediately understands to catch the eye of Darren´s despotic, unpopular boss. To add the mystery, there seems to be a third person interested in Angelina – Darren sees someone chasing her. He decides to investigate these incidents. His researches will soon lead him to several locations – such as the small English village of Willow Creek, that adventure game players know from part #1 “We found the ideal constellation for realizing Black Mirror 2 the way gamers want it”, Markus Windelen, dtp’s COO, explains. “We own the rights of the Black Mirror brand, and we know that it’s our duty to produce a Black Mirror sequel in the right spirit. The first Black Mirror adventure game was a blockbuster and still has a lot of fans awaiting a sequel. So we felt it was right to invest much time and efforts for finding and committing experienced partners, that intensively take care for realizing Black Mirror 2”, Markus Windelen adds.
“Cranberry Productions is responsible for developing and technically realizing Black Mirror 2 since the beginning of 2008. Additionally, the team of Bremen/Germany based developer King Art takes care for story and gameplay design. Professional story authors have also been involved in creating the game’s storyboard, so players can look forward to playing a thrilling, scary adventure game that features dramaturgy and tension”, reports Achim Heidelauf, Senior Producer at dtp entertainment and responsible for concept and production of Black Mirror 2.
“We decided to make Black Mirror 2 a 2.5D game after last year’s Leipzig Games Convention. Originally, Black Mirror 2 was planned to be a 3D adventure game, but then we felt that Black Mirror’s unique look didn’t work out in 3D. Additionally, we received a lot of response from the adventure gamers community, asking for keeping the unique Black Mirror style when doing a sequel to the game”, Achim Heidelauf continues.
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Let’s start with the good news. Lockbox looks far better than its misleading marketing materials suggest, a supernatural horror movie so darkly lit and color graded that you’ll have to squint your way through jump scares. It’s also anchored by reliable genre performers. That’s also about where the good news ends with this rote adaptation of Knifepoint Horror Podcast story “Winthrop.”
The empathetic Carla Gugino gives her all as Ellen, a saint of a woman with boundless patience who takes on life’s hard luck with a kind smile. After giving up her career as a fashion designer to become caretaker for a dying mother, she’s then forced to reinvent herself once more when her caretaker role ends. That catches us up to the events of Lockbox, where Ellen is asked to take in a cousin she hasn’t seen in quite some time who’s dealing with severe PTSD.
Just as Ellen finally establishes a real connection with Winthrop (Lou Taylor Pucci), it’s interrupted by the arrival of peculiar neighbor Vahna (Katharine Isabelle), who spells clear trouble. When Vahna shows up dead, it sets in motion a supernatural battle of possession.
Image Credit: Aura entertainment
Director Daniel Stamm (The Last Exorcism, Prey for the Devil) and screenwriter Justin Yoffe approach Lockbox in the broadest of brushstrokes, dooming it from the start with clunky storytelling and woefully underdeveloped themes of heady topics like PTSD. Winthrop is a character that comes loaded with emotional baggage and trauma that’s piled on throughout his tragic life, but much like its title, his interiority and history are treated like a tightly guarded secret meant to prolong the supernatural mystery.
The problem here, though, is that Lockbox is too sparse to sustain mystery at all, and it instead robs Winthrop of characterization. It winds up trapping the talented Pucci without anywhere to go, toggling between wounded animal and mentally disoriented.
From there, Lockbox bounds through plot developments without any sense of stakes or purpose, peppered by a smattering of haphazard paint-by-numbers jump scares. The only unwavering constant is Ellen’s resolute faith, and Stamm seems to leave it entirely to Gugino to guide confused audiences through this inconsequential story right up until its supernatural climax.
Image Credit: Aura entertainment
To give more credit, Lockbox at least injects an unconventional exorcism here; just don’t expect much in the way of explanation. When the film finally reveals the meaning behind its title, it dangles a fascinating carrot it has zero interest in delivering. More than a severe lack of fleshing out its characters beyond plot drivers or devices, this faith-based flick also seems terrified to offer any worldbuilding whatsoever.
Yoffe’s script stretches the short story beyond its means instead of fleshing it out, and Stamm fills out the gaps with cheap CGI scares and overwrought performances; Isabelle’s Vahna is beyond cartoonish in her villainy. It’s also pretty nonsensical, treating only Ellen’s faith with the utmost sincerity and largely squandering its typically reliable talent. So much so that the final imagery, pure sunkissed saccharine sentimentality, leaves you with the feeling that this horror movie might be better suited as an entry in Chicken Soup for the Soul.
Lockbox releases in select theaters on July 3, 2026.
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