Do you like reality TV but wish it involved more psychological torture? Did you watch The Truman Show and think, Man, I'd love to see this in real life? Are you eagerly anticipating a gritty reboot of Candid Camera? Well, great! Netflix has the perfect, fucked-up hidden camera show for you.On Tuesday, the streaming service released the first trailer for its upcoming special, The Push, where a British illusionist named Derren Brown tries to coerce an unsuspecting victim into committing murder—since it's apparently no longer entertaining to watch prank shows that just involve hiding Frankie Muniz's car or whatever.In the special, Brown puts together a "meticulously planned and rehearsed scenario" starring 70 actors to push the victim, Chris, to his breaking point. "Chris is enmeshed in a web of lies, and that’s important," Brown says in the trailer. "I need him to feel like there’s only one way out." That way out? Pushing another actor to what Chris believes is his death."The question we're considering is simple," Brown says. "Can we be manipulated through social pressure to commit murder?"According to Entertainment Weekly, The Push is the first of three Netflix specials from Brown, a guy who has built his career off torturing everyday people by convincing them that the world has ended or their plane is crashing. This new special looks like a standard recreation of the Milgram experiment you learned about in high school psych, except with more moving parts and filmed with hidden cameras for your viewing pleasure.It's unclear from the trailer whether Chris succumbs to the social pressure and winds up committing the fake murder, or how much therapy it will take for him to deal with his inevitable psychological damage. For that, we'll have to watch the whole special when it debuts on February 27 on Netflix.Sign up for our newsletter to get the best of VICE delivered to your inbox daily.
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