Black Mirror – Hang the DJ ending explained: What happened to Frank and Amy?
Everything you need to know!
Season 7 of Black Mirror has arrived, so it feels timely to revisit one the best episodes of the long-running anthology series, Hang the DJ.
In season 4 episode 4, Charlie Brooker offers a futuristic take on dating apps like Tinder, as Amy (Georgina Campbell) and Frank (Peaky Blinders' Joe Cole) are matched together by a dating device.
Coach, their AI cupid, pairs each individual with someone for a fixed period of time, which helps to inform their 'ultimate match'.
Amy and Frank are assigned together for 12 hours and quickly form a close bond, but Coach still pairs them to other people when their time comes to an end.
Yet the duo keep gravitating towards each other and none of their subsequent matches feel as fulfilling.
Later, Frank and Amy are paired together again, and in a small attempt to defy the system, they promise each other to never check the expiry on their relationship to try and live in the moment.
Hang the DJ ending explained: What does Frank do?
One night Frank succumbs to the temptation and checks the clock to discover that they have five years together.
Slightly relieved by what he sees, Frank is then horrified as he watches Coach recalibrate their expiry date down to 20 hours, as it repeats: "Everything happens for a reason."
By breaking Amy’s trust, Frank has influenced their relationship timeline, leaving him distracted the next day when he skims stones with Amy.
Unaware of their changed fate, Amy notices that the stone only ever skips the water four times. Never any more.
After holding in the secret in an attempt not to ruin their final day, Frank reveals that he checked their expiry date and they only have an hour remaining.
Furious, Amy blames him for the little amount of time they now have together, while Frank desperately tells her they should breach the wall and "f*** the system".
She storms off and they're both assigned to new partners. Once again, they still can’t stop thinking about each other and Frank is open about his heart being elsewhere with his new match.
What happens to Frank and Amy?
Coach then tells Amy that tomorrow will be her 'pairing day', the day she meets her 'ultimate match' and 'leave[s] this place'.
To her disappointment, the algorithm confirms that it will be with someone she’s never met before.
On her final night, Amy is allowed to meet with one person and she requests to see Frank, before she skims Coach across the swimming pool four times.
At the restaurant, Frank and Amy embrace, desperate to be back with each other, as Frank reveals tomorrow is also his pairing day.
Amy encourages Frank to try and remember where he was before he was in this system, as they both begin to question why they have no memory of life before this game.
Amy is adamant that the rules don’t make sense and believes that this world is a test and, in order to win, they have to breach the wall and escape. Frank agrees, as he believes she is his perfect match.
Everyone becomes suspicious, as it seems they know what Frank and Amy are about to do, which is confirmed when a man with a tazer approaches them.
Yet, Amy doesn’t back down, and instead she reaches out and puts her hand over the tazer and it cuts out - it wasn’t real.
This act of rebellion causes everyone in the restaurant to stop, frozen in time, as the couple run through the motionless city and scale the wall using a ladder.
Do Frank and Amy make it out of the game?
As they approach the top, the city behind them powers down and pixelates out of existence. Amy and Frank then see countless versions of themselves and discover that there have been over 1,000 simulated realities of their relationship.
In 998 of these worlds, Frank and Amy rebelled against the rules to be together, so the system has decided they are a 99.8 per cent match.
In a final twist, the couple are sent back into the real world, where a dating app pairs Frank and Amy together and tells them they are an almost perfect match, 99.8 per cent.
Through their consistent dedication to each other in every reality, the couple are allowed to be together.
Their eyes meet across a bar, now strangers to each other, and the lyrics "hang the DJ" echo out around them from The Smiths' song Panic.
Amy and Frank are free from the twisted game to start dating each other (again), this time without the looming threat of a fast-approaching expiry date.
Black Mirror seasons 1-7 are available to stream on Netflix now. Sign up for Netflix from £5.99 a month. Netflix is also available on Sky Glass and Virgin Media Stream.
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