Westworld Discussion Thread
 

We should start a thread for Westworld after what was arguably one of the greatest season finales of the Peak TV era.

Yes, people were carping on a few of the "mysteries" not being all that, but I was never one for the geekboy cluesolver jamboree anyway. More important was Dolores' transformation and where this takes the show in season 2.

Hopefully folks stuck around to the end of the credits to see the bonus scene with Armistice, certified fucking bad ass (C.F.B.A.).

Holy shit what a show.

I haven't seen the finale yet....

I'm pretty confused, though... Maybe this thread can clear some things up for me before I watch it.....

Um... you should probably watch it first. Because I'm sure this thread is going to talk about last 30 mins of the finale pretty quickly.

Mind is blown, such an amazing finale. Best show of the year imo.

This show just didn't do it for me. Excellent acting, very cool visuals, interesting premise but it was just a slog from a plot and pacing perspective IMO. A six episode miniseries and/or a 60 minute finale would have worked better for me.

I'm usually in line with the consensus on these types of shows so all the gushing surprised me. Glad others liked it more...

Terrific show all together, although I wasn't as wowed by the finale. Maybe I figured it out too easy (which is unusual, I am much more of a WSYIWYG spectator of shows like these).

I am definitely interested to see where they will take it. Although I would have been twice as interested if a certain someone had stayed on a certain conveyance.

Fianle didn't really do much for me either, as the main reveal had already been spoiled many times over, and I read a couple pre-finale headlines that were touting it as some kind of super-violent masterpiece, which just led me to be slightly underwhelmed.

Really enjoyed the show, liked the finale, but I did feel like the show faded in the last few episodes. Still really good, though, and am looking forward to seeing where they go with it.

Best show on TV today. Loved every single second of the Finale!

I really enjoyed the show. Sort of wonder if it'd be better as just a one season type thing. They did foreshadow the twists way too much which kind of ruined it. Plus some of the writing was pretentious and meant nothing (basically every speech Hopkins makes). That'd be my only two gripes.

Also this is from episode 6.

I thought it would have worked much better as a 6 episode miniseries but that's without knowing the S2 plans.

As for your spoiler...

I don't think the William/Man in Black was meant to be much of a plot twist for the audience. It was pretty easy to figure out and the payoff was really in Dolores' reaction.

The big twist for me was that Hopkins had been planning that final scene for 30 years.

I'm with you. Watched it because of the original movie but thought it was pretty boring.

Yep. That was the big twist for me. The rest of the theories had already been puzzled out by the internet - William = MIB, Dolores = Wyatt (which I thought was a ludicrous theory, but guess not), BernArnold, etc. However, the idea that Ford's new narrative plan was reversing his mistake from 30 years ago and giving the hosts consciousness was quite a shock. Just a jaw dropping final 20-30 mins.

A more than worthy successor to Game of Thrones. I enjoyed every second (though it was right up my alley, I love sci-fi that asks about sentience).

Oh, and Anthony Hopkins may not be done yet... remember he was making a host in his lab under the house. The two competing theories revolve around the notion that he was making a host of himself either to a) have the host Ford be killed by Dolores or b) release his consciousness into a host as he considers it a higher type of creature.

Finally we get the show back.

Happy with the direction. Obviously a lot of mixed timelines in ep1, but plenty of plot to work with going forward.

Feels like forever since we've gotten to see it.

This is something that is going to happen more and more often. New shows with big productions having to wait two years between the 1st and 2nd seasons because they weren't sure it'd be renewed. American Gods has the same thing going on for the same reason.

Game of Thrones just decided to take a year off because... well I don't actually know why... they are furiously writing?

GRRM sucks.

Patrick Rothfuss is getting there with me also.

Brandon Sanderson is the man.

This has become much more of a conventional, plot driven, action series. It's fine, but nowhere near as interesting as season 1.

I'm kinda disappointed in the new season so far.

RajWorld was great! And a glimpse of ShogunWorld! Next episode references the Sphinx. Wonder if there is an Ancient Egypt World out there?

It's really cool to see all of the different worlds and how they are affected by the robot uprising (as the hosts try to figure out who they are).

But the different worlds are also confusing. Was Ford in charge of all of them? Are all of them experiencing Wyatt like consciousness? Why only try to get Abernathy when other parks would offer the same options? Is there a Bernard for each park? Does Bernard even know of the other parks? Are they all run from the same facility or are there multiple control buildings? Why does the man in black never reference the other parks? Are they owned by him or different corporations? How would that even work assuming the hosts are all from the same source?

The questions have always made the show.

It seemed like Grace had some in depth knowledge of the company's motivations, even remarking to her colleague that hosts not watching them was not how all this worked. There is even some online speculation that she may be William's daughter, using a different (middle?) name.

And it did seem that RajWorld at least was experiencing an awakening. The host who attacked the guests talked about violent delights.

My wife is feeling the same way. She knows I want to watch it so she does but is ready to check out. The 1st season was fantastic but something seems different about this season, or maybe that the show was only going to have 1 season.

Anyway, 1st episode was strong and enjoyed some of the backstory told in episode 2 trying to get backers for the park, but started to turn from there.

I wonder if people forgot how confusing (and slow) Westworld was early in Season 1.

These seem like questions only to ask questions. You can ask questions like this about every show every made it seems, but the answers don't really seem like they would add anything to the plot we have seen.

I mean, lets assume some common sense things until told differently. You seem like you are looking for answer for question's that aren't that relevant.

example. Does Bernanrd even know of the other parks? Who cares, the story so far seems to take place in the one main park, and is now getting branched out. If this somehow becomes relevant to the story, i'm sure they will tell us!!

If you enjoy it, good for you. For me, though, I see a show that was very carefully crafted in season one look thrown together in season two. I'm sure a lot of the problem is that season one told a complete story and it's hard to follow up on that.

In season one everything revolved around Westworld, the creating, populating, operating, planning, etc. All of the questions revolved around Westworld, Arnold/Bernard, Wyatt, man in black, android consciousness, and most of all, Ford. If this is just one of six parks, it all matters a lot less. If Ford was operating them all, the Wyatt story is less interesting. The corporation story is less interesting if Westworld is only a piece of a larger company. They certainly made it sound like it was the sole money maker. Why wouldn't the corporation mention the profits/losses of the other five parks?

Yes, I could go on and on. For me, it appears they broke a lot of logical lines just to add tigers and samurai. Cool, but ultimately less satisfying than a really good and thought provoking season one.

Why? We know that ~30 years ago, the Delos Corporation bought out all of Ford's share in the Park(s) while keeping him on. It is quite possible that Ford just wanted Westworld, while Delos wanted to make a whole lot more money and created the other parks using Ford's ideas. This would allow Ford to focus on Westworld, while also affecting the other parks (as we see in the opening and ending of the last episode).

It actually makes less logical sense for Delos to have only focused on one park designed to appeal to nostalgic Americans. We know that they are interested in DNA of the guests, whether it is to clone them for use in the real world (as in the plot of Futureworld, the movie sequel to the original Westworld) or for blackmail purposes or something else. It makes far more sense to try to get high ups from all over the world, which means parks designed for people from those areas (RajWorld for rich Brits, ShogunWorld for rich Japanese people, etc).

If that's the goal, why would you put all the parks next to each in some area of the United States?

If the awakening, for lack of a better term, is happening across all the parks, the role of Wyatt is less important. If the awakening is only happening in Westworld, how is there an uprising in other parks?

I feel like perhaps the issue is that you haven't been watching that closely. S2 EP1 confirms that that parks are in the South China sea somewhere.


Wyatt origination predates Delos's take over. And it seems that, Wyatt's resurrection spreads like a virus (the code phrase is easily spread). We'll probably get more into it as the season rolls on - as this host uprising seems like it may have been Ford's last narrative (S2 EP1's title was Journey into the Night, which was the title of what Ford said he was working on when Dolores killed him).

The issues remain regardless of where the parks are. How did all of season one happen with no mention of the other parks? I still think they've added all these parks mostly because tigers and samurai are cool.

So you didn't notice that Maeve wandered into the ShogunWorld host repair / behavior modification facility at the end of Season 1? In the same episode (Bicameral Mind), Westworld is referred to as "Park 1" by Felix. I reiterate: I feel like perhaps the issue is that you haven't been watching that closely.

Yeah, but that was right at the end, and even then it wasn't really incorporated into the story. Why didn't any of the creative or corporate types mention the other parks? In all of the discussion of the history and progression of Westworld how was there no mention of the other parks?

Season one was a theme based discussion of identity and consciousness. That appealed to me greatly. Season two, so far, has been a conventional, plot driven, action story. That's a lot less appealing to me.

But if you like it, that's cool.

Why wasn't it mentioned that the Man in Black and William were the same person 30 years apart? Because it was part of the gradual reveal. Same as the additional parks. The fact that they were introduced in Bicameral Mind means they weren't just thrown in there, but were part of the story all along.


I'm not sure how one sees the almost opposite reactions of Dolores and Maeve to sentience and think that questions of man or machine isn't a core part of the show anymore. In addition to the questions of whether this is all a part of Ford's programming or is it actual decision making on the part of the artificial beings. The main characters of the show have mostly become hosts who are struggling to deal with their reality (& the Man in Black).

Well William wouldn't have any way to discuss future him and the MIB didn't have a reason to mention his first few trips to the park other than in the way he did. Ford, Bernard, Elsie, Ashley, Theresa, Charlotte, etc. all had reason to mention the 5/6s of the corporation, land and hosts.

Sure the theme stuff is still there in some degree, but it went from primary to secondary. We're now in a plot driven story ala Game of Thrones, which wasn't the structure of season one.

Well that turned out to be true.

Really cool episode with Bernard dealing with his memories and a reveal at what Delos was attempting to do. Though, who knows, Ford may have figured out what William could not. That last consciousness that Bernard takes from the lab. That has to be Ford, right? So Ford can resurrect himself in a new body?

And it really did seem the view of the new code in Abernathy (the globe one) was very similar to the view of the code in Jim Delos. And Abernathy reacts a similar way when confronted with reality - wonder if that's the "other way" William describes when he meets 149th Delos.

Just caught up with Episode 4.

That might have been the best episode of the series yet.

Whoa! Ford is in the machine!

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The samurai sword fight was great. I wish they stayed around, there could be so much more done in Shogun World.

TBH, I feel this thing has been dragging on. They want to keep audiences guessing (which is fine) but I'm getting bored with TMIB thread.

While I really liked Season 1, I just couldn't get into Season 2. Thought the finale was a complete disaster.

Tons of plot holes, abandoned storylines, and others that just didn't go anywhere. By the end there wasn't a character I actually cared about.

Show was great when it was about Westworld. The hosts slowly figuring things out, the guests abusing them, etc. Would have loved to have seen more of the parks like Shogun World.

Not sure where they go now but it feels like a poorly written sci-fi fanfic with a big budget.

I mean that literally defines the first season - they even adapted it from a poorly written sci-fi film ;).

I like that Season 2 explored the concept of free will (and of course, different concepts of free will, Dolores v. Akecheta) as Season 1 explored the concept of sentience. I am excited to see the battle of Dolores and Bernard and am curious as to where future host William comes into the picture (I'm guessing Bernard created him to deal with the Dolores threat).

lol at shout out to Game of Thrones in episode 2 of season 3.

And shade thrown as well in that cameo.

Westworld Ep 3 (of S3) may have been on the better episodes of the series. It is an entirely different show now - almost like a cleaner Blade Runner involving corporate espionage.

I can't say I'm really enjoying the reboot/ending season to this point. It's so far removed from Crichton's origin story and the concepts that were explored in season 1. It's still quite convoluted, but less than previous seasons. It doesn't appear to be dealing with multiple timelines this year, but it's still confusing. I appreciate that they are trying to wrap everything up and I think that's for the best. It's too bad that they just couldn't come up with a better written plan looking back at where they started from.

I'm actually really enjoying this season. I like the Blade Runner vibes and the whole concept of a rich billionaire who had his hometown nuked wanting to order and control humanity to prevent mass extinction.

And trying to tie that control to the control of the hosts in the park - at least that's Dolores's point of view - while not realizing she is exercising her own control over other beings.

I'd point out that Crichton's original story did not involve any sympathy for the hosts - but rather they became terminator like horrific villains. Though the host doppelganger thing they are doing in S3 seems to harken back to Futureworld (Westworld's sequel)

So WW is back, and it's more the direction that season 3 should have gone. We were watching a recap on YT prior to diving in on this season and I was reminded just how insane and convoluted the entire narrative is. Season 3 was such a mess, imo, such a departure from the feel of 1 and 2 that it took a great deal effort to see bring it all together.

Now at the start of 4, the plot feels both more manageable, a return to the ideas and concepts of the early seasons, and a possible off ramp to join the original series with the plot, but to do that takes so much deep memory of what happened to keep it all straight that you'll need a reference card each week.

Tonight's episode was fantastic. Great reveal.

Tessa Thompson's Charlotte Hale is such a badass villain. She kills it.

Oh man, idk if I trust we won't switch timelines or dreamstates again but that was some serious carnage in the few minutes!

OK, nvm we're just going to resurrect "Charlotte" with no explanation of how her pearl wasn't destroyed?

Idk, season had a lot of promise and seemed to be building a ton of momentum until episode 7 but that wasn't the way I would have taken the plot. The entire Christina plot was just a set up for next season, we're not really connecting the only outlier we care about to the main plot, and they're killing off pretty much every other character and actor we like before the final season? Interesting.