# Westworld



## Cli-Fi

Well I guess HBO will do just fine post-Game of Thrones. The premise of this show is basically, 
Hey guys, let's put a bunch of semi-AI Robots in a western setting and let's see how much crap they can take before they rise up. What's the worst that can happen, right?

‘Westworld’ Creators Are Calling HBO Show The ‘Ultimate Playground’


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## Kylara

I always had a soft spot for the film and watched the first episode of this. Thought it was well done with some excellent acting and script. Looking forward to the next episode!


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## Rodders

I am really looking forward to seeing this. It looks like a good cast and i love the concept.


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## BAYLOR

Cli-Fi said:


> Well I guess HBO will do just fine post-Game of Thrones. The premise of this show is basically,
> Hey guys, let's put a bunch of semi-AI Robots in a western setting and let's see how much crap they can take before they rise up. What's the worst that can happen, right?
> 
> ‘Westworld’ Creators Are Calling HBO Show The ‘Ultimate Playground’



That about covers it Saw the first episode ,  Thought it quite good.


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## Carl Leverington

In my experience, whatever the good people of HBO touch turns to Gold; and I can see this being no different. Looking forward to catching up with the first episode, later.


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## WaylanderToo

TBH I'm wondering if Ed Harris's character is a continuation/re-skin of the Yul Brynner character in the original...


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## Carl Leverington

Yeah, that's what I was thinking, but having now seen episode 1, probably not, as he's human... Or is he??


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## Cylon_ Sympathiser

Ed Harris's character is going to keep us guessing for a while, i had a debate concerning him with a guy at work.
He may be human because... he mentions that he's been seeing that girl for nearly 30 years (a repeat guest?) plus the gun doesn't work on him (if it's anything like the movie then it won't work because he has a human thermal profile) and finally if he's a robot then surely someone in the control room would have realised he was either missing or not playing by the rules.
However, he may have found a way to fool the weapons into thinking he is human, he may have also found a way to evade detection.

Personally I think he is a robot but good old Sir Anthony Hopkins has been toying with various updates and may have intentionally tried to develop some of the robots to question their reality in order to evolve. Ed may be the first to truly understand his nature and has taken it upon himself to bring the system down.  

I could be wrong lol


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## Bugg

Cylon_ Sympathiser said:


> Ed Harris's character is going to keep us guessing for a while, i had a debate concerning him with a guy at work.
> He may be human because... he mentions that he's been seeing that girl for nearly 30 years (a repeat guest?) plus the gun doesn't work on him (if it's anything like the movie then it won't work because he has a human thermal profile) and finally if he's a robot then surely someone in the control room would have realised he was either missing or not playing by the rules.



That's pretty much what I was thinking.

I thought the first episode looked great but I found it kind of dull and found my mind wandering on several occasions.  It was lacking in character, I thought, and was generally a bit humourless.  Hopefully it will improve.


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## svalbard

Watched the first episode and thought it looked good on the screen. Like, Bugg, I did find it a bit of a yawn fest.


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## Cli-Fi

Cylon_ Sympathiser said:


> Ed Harris's character is going to keep us guessing for a while, i had a debate concerning him with a guy at work.
> He may be human because... he mentions that he's been seeing that girl for nearly 30 years (a repeat guest?) plus the gun doesn't work on him (if it's anything like the movie then it won't work because he has a human thermal profile) and finally if he's a robot then surely someone in the control room would have realised he was either missing or not playing by the rules.
> However, he may have found a way to fool the weapons into thinking he is human, he may have also found a way to evade detection.
> 
> Personally I think he is a robot but good old Sir Anthony Hopkins has been toying with various updates and may have intentionally tried to develop some of the robots to question their reality in order to evolve. Ed may be the first to truly understand his nature and has taken it upon himself to bring the system down.
> 
> I could be wrong lol



I think this is mostly right, except that I think Ford (Hopkins) knows, at least somewhat that the man in black is out there, but isn't telling anyone, because then the park would be shut down or something like that. There he was in the first episode 



Spoiler



chatting with a robot when nobody else even knew that that Robot was even there. There is no reason to show him talking to other robots like that, AKA wishing that Robots were more to his standards like in the old days etc.


 There is clearly some type of connection between ford and the man in black. Maybe Ford lost the Man in Black and now he is undetectable to the programmers after evolving.

Remember 



Spoiler



In the first episode you had all the programmers go out to reprogram the robots and to reset the scene, but they didn't seem to know, care about, or even detect the man in black.



Also why would the Man in Black care so much about finding out "the truth" if he was a human??? If that truth is the same truth 



Spoiler



as what Dolores apparently refuses to come to terms with and her father figures out


. Then on the surface of things one would assume these robots are on the cusp of discovering who they really are, and that indeed would be a truth.

So therefore, the man in black's quest becomes, if he knows and if Ford let him stay there (we don't know what this means, did something happen to the man in black if he was a robot???), how far down the rabbit hole does it go? A human can just go away from the park and research it all to his heart's content. Remember, we are told that it is much bigger than a game or entertainment for rich people!

Humans clearly know they are there, and are paying buckets of cash to play with robots.
But, if the Man in Black is Human, than we are in for a lost-like mind-blowing experience of epic proportions.


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## Cli-Fi

BTW, HBO released Westworld Episode two yesterday online for free due to the debate here in the states. I bet that was a wise move by HBO.


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## Droflet

Would all androids please raise your hands. No one, ehh? Oh, you don't know if you're an android? Neither do we. And there folks is, I believe, where this show might be going. Watch this space.


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## Cli-Fi

Holy Crap! Just saw Episode two and it looks like: Ford is going to introduce 



Spoiler



Religion


 into Westworld!!!!!!! Will he actually 



Spoiler



Force the Robots to Worship him? Or one of the clients???



Plus the Man in Black kills more people and tortures a family.

Also now this show has me questioning Jeffrey Wright's character Lowe's humanity. Is he a slave to the boss lady??? Why no media outrage about this?? The Dude is black people!!!!


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## BAYLOR

Carl Leverington said:


> Yeah, that's what I was thinking, but having now seen episode 1, probably not, as he's human... Or is he??



He's a machine.


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## S.C.Wood

Is anyone keeping up with this show?


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## Gonk the Insane

S.C.Wood said:


> Is anyone keeping up with this show?


I've only seen the first episode so far, but the rest are queued up on my telly box.


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## Frost Giant

I've seen all the episodes so far and I've liked them. The series has potential.


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## Mister_Oy

I'm impressed so far (after 4 episodes) - it looks like developing into a great series


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## Frost Giant

So far it's moving along at a pretty good pace, not boring at all. Ed Harris is doing a good job, a worthy successor to Yul Brynner's character.


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## Nate Hoffelder

This is an awesome show.

If you're not watching it then you're missing some of the best drama on tv.


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## Mister_Oy

^^^^^ That


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## Mr Orange

3 episodes in and am loving the show. i think it's really well produced and am looking forward to the development of the various storylines.

one question - does anyone know the physics (assuming it has been thought out and isn't just magickum) behind the bullets making a hell of a mess of the hosts and not hurting the guests anymore than paintballs would?


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## SilentRoamer

Mr Orange said:


> one question - does anyone know the physics (assuming it has been thought out and isn't just magickum) behind the bullets making a hell of a mess of the hosts and not hurting the guests anymore than paintballs would?



IIRC the original Westworld (film) guns used some temperature sensors to ensure they weren't targeting a human being. I would imagine with modern technology you would use multiple methods for ensuring target acquisition was valid.

By the way - Episode 4 is fantastic!


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## Mr Orange

SilentRoamer said:


> IIRC the original Westworld (film) guns used some temperature sensors to ensure they weren't targeting a human being. I would imagine with modern technology you would use multiple methods for ensuring target acquisition was valid.
> 
> By the way - Episode 4 is fantastic!



that would make sense, except the hosts actually target and shoot the guests, the bullets just have no effect on them (well, apart from giving a kick and a little bruise). 

looking forward to ep 4...


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## Ajid

Pottential spoiler












Not much of a spoiler though





Has anyone else had the thought that maybe Ford is a "Host" and Arnolds first creation. And if that's the case did Ford kill Arnold?


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## SilentRoamer

Mr Orange said:


> that would make sense, except the hosts actually target and shoot the guests, the bullets just have no effect on them (well, apart from giving a kick and a little bruise).
> 
> looking forward to ep 4...



Episode 5 was very good as well!

Yeah I was thinking about that and my thought was that the guns have a second chamber that fires rubber bullets at guests - real time target acquisition that ensures the right "round" is fired.


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## JoanDrake

I am following this show avidly. Is it just me or is it very Dickian, with the "what is real(ity)" meme being very prominent.

What are the huge earthmoving machines we see in episode 4? (or 3 or 5, not sure) I thought Anthony Hopkins character had one coming for the boss lady at one point but it seems not.


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## Frost Giant

POTENTIAL SPOILERS


I think the Earthmoving machines were creating a canyon for Ford's new storyline. 
A lot is going to hinge of Elsie's fate in the spooky house. Who is there? Is Arnold really dead, or has he been hiding out there? Did he upload himself into a host? Or did he leave behind some kind of AI program in the system? Who can say, but I'm looking forward to the next episode. They've been fairly clever so far and it hasn't been boring.


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## REBerg

Just three episodes into this. Slow start, but things have gotten interesting.
My first thought was "With Hannibal Lecter in charge, what could possibly go wrong?"


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## Mister_Oy

Just watched episode 6 - WOW! It's getting VERY interesting!


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## SilentRoamer

Ajid said:


> Has anyone else had the thought that maybe Ford is a "Host" and Arnolds first creation. And if that's the case did Ford kill Arnold?



Yeah I have, I also thought Bernard might be as well.



Frost Giant said:


> POTENTIAL SPOILERS
> I think the Earthmoving machines were creating a canyon for Ford's new storyline.



Yeah that's it - Ford actually mentions it himself. They are basically huge land sculpting machines for creating artificial landscapes.


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## Nate Hoffelder

SilentRoamer said:


> Yeah that's it - Ford actually mentions it himself. They are basically huge land sculpting machines for creating artificial landscapes.


 They look to me like they are just standard excavation equipment.


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## Frost Giant

I also like the player piano and the selections it plays. I recognized Black Hole Sun as soon as I heard it.


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## Cli-Fi

So now that we know Bernard is 



Spoiler



a host


.

Are the entire Board of Directors 



Spoiler



hosts too?



The only reason I think this is because Ford seems to have a hold on the Board of Directors, but I don't think he is as powerful in the company as he pretends to be. He's obviously a very powerful person in the world, so that leads me to believe that the Board of Directors are 



Spoiler



hosts


. Otherwise why wouldn't Ford worry about them?

I think Ford is the mastermind behind everything, as they keep saying in each episode. The way this show is going is so layered that I wouldn't be surprised if Ford 



Spoiler



created different types of hosts to fulfill different roles in the company.


 Or maybe Delos is just another part of the maze, and getting out of Westworld isn't really the end of the road...

Does anybody else find it weird that no one cares about the Robot Technicians and what they are doing? They can monitor everything in WW but nothing inside their own company. Or maybe Delos is supposed to be humongous so they can't?


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## Frost Giant

I think we'll encounter more Bernard-type revelations as the series progresses. I felt the most recent episode was excellent, the series seems to be coming together nicely so far. I'm not too impressed with the rumor that HBO might delay season 2 until 2018. Sometimes having an extra long hiatus like that can hurt the popularity of a show.


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## Frost Giant

Cli-Fi said:


> Does anybody else find it weird that no one cares about the Robot Technicians and what they are doing?


It seems odd in a place where everything tends to be under surveillance. However, since we've only had glimpses of the larger forces at work behind the scenes, it is likely that the "awakening" of the host in this case might be part of a larger agenda. If this is the case, technology and circumstances could be manipulated from behind the scenes to ensure the robot tech's shenanigans go undetected.


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## Cli-Fi

Frost Giant said:


> It seems odd in a place where everything tends to be under surveillance. However, since we've only had glimpses of the larger forces at work behind the scenes, it is likely that the "awakening" of the host in this case might be part of a larger agenda. If this is the case, technology and circumstances could be manipulated from behind the scenes to ensure the robot tech's shenanigans go undetected.



This is the reason why I think there are 



Spoiler



plenty more hosts in Delos. Everyone seems too calculated to be human, especially the bosses. So maybe the technicians are ones who are truly human, and I also think that writer guy is human too.


 Those at least are the characters that have shown the most emotion on the set.


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## Cli-Fi

Also hope everyone saw the news yesterday: 'Westworld' Renewed for Second Season, Likely Returning 2018


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## BAYLOR

Cli-Fi said:


> Also hope everyone saw the news yesterday: 'Westworld' Renewed for Second Season, Likely Returning 2018



Not a surprise.


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## Mr Orange

just caught up to ep 7 and, well, wow...

some GoT'ish reveal there...



Spoiler



Okay, so without quite as much bloodshed maybe, but the Bernard reveal and death of Theresa were both completely unexpected for me. I was fully buying into Bernard's back story, his motives and character and also thought that Theresa would be in it for the long (or at least medium) haul. then, wait a minute, he's a host? oh, and her brains are decorating a wall now. and now we don't know who is a host and who isn't... also, even though you could guess it from his shifty eyes, the reveal of Ford as the evil(?) mastermind was good too.

a thought: maybe the whole "awakening" of the hosts is just code as well...

and where the hell is Elsie?


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## Cli-Fi

I'm starting to see what the Maze is, or at least what I think the maze is. 



Spoiler



Delos is just another part of the maze. That's why everything seems so controlled and then not. That's why no one cares about the technicians. They think they are human. Bernard certainly did.


 Ford has his hands in many more heads than just Bernard's in Delos. This whole thing might be a little Planet that Ford controls. WestWorld could take place far into the future and Ford is a terraformer/engineer. AKA God.

There are the player hosts: 



Spoiler



Ford created the Maze to keep the checks and balances in the hosts that break their original coding and evolve. The maze is nothing special, its just there to keep the player hosts occupied.



Then there are the evolved or action hosts: 



Spoiler



These are the hosts that Ford makes so that he doesn't need to actually hire anybody to work for him even though they all think they are human workers.



There's also another possibility of the emotion theory I had before Sunday Night's episode: 



Spoiler



In that, the characters that show the most emotion are not hosts. AKA the technicians and the writer guy Lee Sizemore is human too.



What theory is true remains to be seen, but it's very exciting developments here.

Also anybody notice that Luke Hemsworth is Stubbs Head of Security?


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## Frost Giant

I thought this article had some interesting theories. It contains spoilers, of course.

Decoding Westworld’s Most Confusing Episode Yet


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## Nate Hoffelder

Frost Giant said:


> I thought this article had some interesting theories. It contains spoilers, of course.
> 
> Decoding Westworld’s Most Confusing Episode Yet



That was a level of crazy complicated which I don't think even "Lost" accomplished, but I think it could be true.


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## BAYLOR

I find my self empathizing with the Hosts ,  Maze and Delores in particular.  I don't think I could go to a place like Westworld because   I just couldn't bring myself to do any harm to the Hosts.


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## Frost Giant

Nate Hoffelder said:


> That was a level of crazy complicated which I don't think even "Lost" accomplished, but I think it could be true.


I had a similar impression. 


BAYLOR said:


> I don't think I could go to a place like Westworld because I just couldn't bring myself to do any harm to the Hosts.


I don't think guests are required to harm hosts. For the large sum of money they spend they can do anything they like. You could be a "white hat" and protect hosts from harm or you could just enjoy experiencing the park.


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## Nate Hoffelder

I just saw episode 8.

The theory mentioned in the linked Vanity Fair article is true.


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## Frost Giant

The more episodes I see, the more this show reminds me a lot of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse, which puts it in good company.


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## Nate Hoffelder

Dollhouse was a clever show which was never allowed to live up to the premise of the pilot.

And I agree, I can see the similarities.


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## Cli-Fi

Nate Hoffelder said:


> I just saw episode 8.
> 
> The theory mentioned in the linked Vanity Fair article is true.



I do think the MIB is 



Spoiler



William


. It would definitely help explain Dolores' visions and it would help bring the MIB's storyline into focus. When William 



Spoiler



Killed Logan's Army and said he was ready to play the game and finally understood it. It's still the same game the MIB is playing! Dang that's a long game though.


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## BAYLOR

Frost Giant said:


> The more episodes I see, the more this show reminds me a lot of Joss Whedon's Dollhouse, which puts it in good company.



That's a very good comparison. I hope this show has a much longer run.


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## Nate Hoffelder

That is the one connection which has only been "mostly" confirmed.


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## Mr Orange

one issue i have with the theory above is



Spoiler



it relies on Dolores being in the same "homesteader" loop for 30 years. this seems unlikely, given how other hosts are moved around all the time. also, how did she get the same outfit in the MIB's time? in William's time she only got it because they went to Pariah and El Lazo gave the clothes to her. also, how could she have a vision/memory of herself being dead in the water?

and then there is the Wyatt storyline that Ford has constructed which supposedly ties in very well with what has actually happened in the past, which is odd, and if Dolores and Teddy had such a malfunction in the past, surely they would have been retired?

okay, so that's more than issue!



i do actually think the theory (or most of it at least) is true, but there seem to be inconsistencies

and i thought ep 9 was great! how many episodes do we have in this season?


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## Nate Hoffelder

Enough with the tags; I'm declaring this whole thread a spoiler zone.

Proceed at your own risk.
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We don't understand the whole story yet, this is true, but there are some details which are indisputable.

Bernard is a host based on one of the park's founders, Arnold.
Ford killed Arnold.
William is seen holding a photo in a later episode which had set off a host in one of the earlier episodes.
Dolores had metal guts in one episode - just like the early hosts.

So yes, we're watching a show set in at least two time periods, if not more.


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## SilentRoamer

Can one of the admins Spoiler tag the title please so we can have this as an open discussion thread?

Spoilers below:
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I think Dolores is showing us 3 timeframes:

The Dolores/William timeframe which is 30 years ago. (Internal mechanical parts)
The Dolores timeframe which is 35 years ago (The death of Arnold at the *suspected* hands of Dolores.)
The modern timeframe which is where we are seeing Maeve and the rest of the scenes (Arnold/Bernard, Elsie, the technicians)

Other items pointing to multiple timeframes:
The logo is different in the different times (You can see the WW logo is different)
William is now playing "the game"
The host who greets William is also the same host who killed Teddy and we know they don't use multiple versions of the same host simultaneously. The MiB even comments something like "You still here?" or words to that effect.
The MiB's monologues seem to match with what we know.
When William first enters the park he is asked whether or not he has any known illnesses yet in a previous episode Ford states that they had cured all diseases - these two factoids are incompatible.


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## Nate Hoffelder

Ooooooh, I had missed the logo!

Good catch!


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## Mr Orange

Nate Hoffelder said:


> Ford killed Arnold.



is this indisputable?



SilentRoamer said:


> The Dolores timeframe which is 35 years ago (The death of Arnold at the *suspected* hands of Dolores.)



or did Dolores (and Teddy) go nuts, kill everyone in Escalante, head down into the diagnostic facility and do a bit more killin', including Arnold? there seemed to be a lot dead "things" (people or hosts i wasn't sure on the first view) in the diagnostic facility when Dolores was down there in the MiB timeframe.

another question; why would Ford unearth Escalante and start the Wyatt narrative? is he trying to find answers too?

hmmm....


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## Nate Hoffelder

Ford had Bernard kill Elsie and Teresa.

Then Ford killed Bernard.

So yes, the most likely possibility is that Ford killed or had some one kill Arnold (- or at least he thinks he did. Arnold might have faked his death).


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## Mr Orange

this ^^^ i  agree with, it is highly likely that Ford had Arnold killed. it was the "indisputable" i was disputing.

i am also beginning to think that Arnold may be living in the park somewhere.


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## SilentRoamer

Nate Hoffelder said:


> So yes, the most likely possibility is that Ford killed or had some one kill Arnold (- or at least he thinks he did. Arnold might have faked his death).



I think the show has gone to pains to let us know that Arnold was the superior intellect between Ford and Arnold and that the most complex and beautiful elements of the code were written not by Ford but by Arnold.

My suspicion is that Ford and Arnold had a proxy war of sorts, based on their respective ideologies (Fords pessimism and belief that the hosts were his "to walk through the halls and corridors of his mind and burn it down if he wanted" whereas Arnold seems to have wanted to develop consciousness in the hosts and the emergence of sentience.

I don't have any explanations for the Wyatt narrative - although we don't really know that Fords new narrative is the Escalante narrative do we? Or it seems as if the narrative may have been visited before - after the MiB mentioned the city disappearing into the sands.

Does anyone here doubt that William is the MiB?

Wonder what will happen when Maeve confronts Ford and none of his backdoors work - unless this is just the latest in the "awakenings" and that all roads lead to Escalante. Although I suspect this is Arnolds coding coming to fruition because of Ford adding the Reveries which are allowing the hosts access to previous build programming (including Arnold code)


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## Mr Orange

SilentRoamer said:


> I don't have any explanations for the Wyatt narrative - although we don't really know that Fords new narrative is the Escalante narrative do we?



i think it's mentioned that he is recovering a buried town as part of his narrative, and there are a couple of scenes where he goes to visit the buried church spire when he is (presumably) planning it all


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## Frost Giant

Nate Hoffelder said:


> Arnold might have faked his death



I think there is also the possibility that Arnold was able to upload all or part of his consciousness into a host or the Westworld system.


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## REBerg

What if ...

Ford is the only non-guest, natural human in Westworld?
Arnold was Ford's first host, created to be his partner?
When Arnold became a bit too clever, Ford "downgraded" him to Bernard?


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## Nate Hoffelder

The board member is real. Teresa was real, otherwise Ford would not have had to kill her. The same goes for Elsie, and the security chief (who was captured by Indians).


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## REBerg

Nate Hoffelder said:


> The board member is real. Teresa was real, otherwise Ford would not have had to kill her. The same goes for Elsie, and the security chief (who was captured by Indians).



I'm not counting anyone from the Delos Corporation as being in Westworld. I think Delos is no more than Ford's bankroller, now looking to take Ford out and cash in on its investment.
Elsie and the security chief may be the undoing of my theory. Are you certain they are/were "real"?


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## Mr Orange

If Bernard did kill Elsie, then yes, i'd say that means she is human.

Stubbs, not so sure. He could still be a host, moving towards that point of realisation that Bernard had.

I think that the lab technicians (Felix and whatshisname) and others of their ilk might well be hosts.


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## Nate Hoffelder

If Elsie were a host then Ford could have simply controlled her rather than killing her.

I would have thought that the techs who encountered Maeve were real; otherwise she would have demonstrated to them that they were hosts.

But she could be saving that for her next trip through the labs.


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## SilentRoamer

I am almost certain the technicians are humans.

Unless Ford programmed the technicians to take out the hosts from cold storage and well erm "entertain" them which I would see no reason for then I suspect that known humans are:

Elsie, Teresa, William/MiB, Ford, Security guy.

Bernard is just a very well placed host.

Although with this show it could be anything! Really think this is the best TV show at the moment - for me it has been blowing TWD out of the water.


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## REBerg

Nate Hoffelder said:


> If Elsie were a host then Ford could have simply controlled her rather than killing her.
> 
> I would have thought that the techs who encountered Maeve were real; otherwise she would have demonstrated to them that they were hosts.
> 
> But she could be saving that for her next trip through the labs.


He "killed" Bernard. Was that because he feared he was about to lose control?
If Ford thinks Bernard was a problem, wait until he has one of his little chats with Maeve. I think she is the break-out character in the series.
Delores has potential, but she seems to unable, thus far, to fully assert herself. Watching her fail is becoming annoying.


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## SilentRoamer

For me Ford killed Bernard not out of fear of losing control but as a way to show total control.

Literally "once I have walked from this room you will kill yourself" - his literal presence keeping Bernard alive. Lets not forget that he didn't really "Kill" anyone he just destroyed the current host body.

I agree Maeve is a standout character, every time she is screen I find myself glued to it and I suspect - though I don't know - that Fords backdoors are not going to work with Maeve - remember that she had access to core programming whilst also being elevated to the highest possible levels of intelligence.


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## Nate Hoffelder

I think Elsie could be a host.

I think Teresa is human because her death was revealed to the world. Elsie, on the other hand, was killed and disappeared. Hosts have survived worse, so she could be repaired and put back in commission.

On the other hand, she has been gone for several weeks so Ford might be planning to replace the now-deceased human with a host. The long absence is a cover for programming the host to think she is human.

P.S. I am really liking the freedom from spoiler tags. discussing the show is almost as much fun as watching it.


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## REBerg

SilentRoamer said:


> Although with this show it could be anything! Really think this is the best TV show at the moment - for me it has been blowing TWD out of the water.


The unlimited possibilities are mind-boggling. It definitely is beating TWD, "at the moment."
It's nice that the show has no pre-existing printed material for comparisons or objections. About the only things it has in common with the original movie are androids allowing humans to live their fantasies and Michael Crichton.




SilentRoamer said:


> For me Ford killed Bernard not out of fear of losing control but as a way to show total control.
> 
> Literally "once I have walked from this room you will kill yourself" - his literal presence keeping Bernard alive. Lets not forget that he didn't really "Kill" anyone he just destroyed the current host body.
> 
> I agree Maeve is a standout character, every time she is screen I find myself glued to it and I suspect - though I don't know - that Fords backdoors are not going to work with Maeve - remember that she had access to core programming whilst also being elevated to the highest possible levels of intelligence.


Bernard completely foooled me -- twice. I had no clue that he was a host until he couldn't "see" the door Teresa walked through. I also thought he had the drop on Ford with his zombie host.
Destroying (better word than "killing"?) Bernard's current host body will do, unless Ford decides to bring him back in another host. I am assuming that each AI continues to exist in the Westworld system, complete with whatever code changes they have been given or achieved on their own.
Were that not true, I don't think Maeve would have allowed the death by fire narrative to continue. I wonder if Ford has an inkling that Maeve can change narratives at will, just as he can. Has she joined Ford at the center of the maze?


Nate Hoffelder said:


> I think Elsie could be a host.
> 
> I think Teresa is human because her death was revealed to the world. Elsie, on the other hand, was killed and disappeared. Hosts have survived worse, so she could be repaired and put back in commission.
> 
> P.S. I am really liking the freedom from spoiler tags. discussing the show is almost as much fun as watching it.


I still maintain that Teresa was Delos, and her presence was something Ford had to accept from his investors. 
We owe the spoiler tag-free discussion to your bold move. No one seems to have complained, so we maybe we're in the clear.


----------



## Frost Giant

REBerg said:


> Maeve. I think she is the break-out character in the series.


Agreed. She certainly has as much potential as MIB if not more.

I have a feeling we will see Bernard (or another permutation of the controlled Arnold facsimile) again. Having some version of his old partner seems to be necessary for Ford, it gives him access to some of Arnold's creativity and out of the box thinking.


----------



## Kylara

I also think they've been sneaky with the Dolores travelling around scenes, mixing now and past travelling together. As they said they have perfect recall so we may be seeing a mixture of then travelling (with william) and now travelling to get to the spire. As last episode we see her in the spire and then the MiB opened the door... Haven't watched it second time through yet though...


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

REBerg said:


> I'm not counting anyone from the Delos Corporation as being in Westworld. I think Delos is no more than Ford's bankroller, now looking to take Ford out and cash in on its investment.
> Elsie and the security chief may be the undoing of my theory. Are you certain they are/were "real"?



I don't know.


----------



## REBerg

Kylara said:


> I also think they've been sneaky with the Dolores travelling around scenes, mixing now and past travelling together. As they said they have perfect recall so we may be seeing a mixture of then travelling (with william) and now travelling to get to the spire. As last episode we see her in the spire and then the MiB opened the door... Haven't watched it second time through yet though...


The present/past flip-flopping was confusing the H out of me, but I'm a little slow sometimes.
When Delores took off with a gaping knife wound and then was suddenly just fine, I thought "what the ..."? I now realize that anytime the ghost voice of Arnold tells a character to remember, it's a memory and not the present story I'm watching.
If Arnold fails to warn me, I'll just come to the same conclusion whenever any thing impossible happens in what I thought was real time.


----------



## svalbard

This is very much on a precipice for me. It can either go all 'Lost' and disappear up its own posterior or hold it's nerve and keep the characterisation tight, character numbers limited, storyline under control. Then maybe this show has a chance. But it is 50/50 at the moment.


----------



## Cli-Fi

Dang you Westworld for keeping me up tonight. Some of us have to work the next morning. Well, I guess not Felix. 



Spoiler



He doesn't even know if he's human or not



Ford's fingerprints are everywhere on this superb Finale! Looking forward to seeing where Maeve goes.


----------



## Cli-Fi

Mr Orange said:


> one issue i have with the theory above is
> 
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> it relies on Dolores being in the same "homesteader" loop for 30 years. this seems unlikely, given how other hosts are moved around all the time. also, how did she get the same outfit in the MIB's time? in William's time she only got it because they went to Pariah and El Lazo gave the clothes to her. also, how could she have a vision/memory of herself being dead in the water?
> 
> and then there is the Wyatt storyline that Ford has constructed which supposedly ties in very well with what has actually happened in the past, which is odd, and if Dolores and Teddy had such a malfunction in the past, surely they would have been retired?
> 
> okay, so that's more than issue!
> 
> 
> 
> i do actually think the theory (or most of it at least) is true, but there seem to be inconsistencies
> 
> and i thought ep 9 was great! how many episodes do we have in this season?



I just saw this, @Mr. Orange, and you touched upon some things that they tied up in the season finale which aired tonight. Let's just say, what I have been suspecting was true all along and most of the reasons why you see people in this show acting in a manner of way which might not make total sense is because they have been programmed to act that way either by Ford or Arnold directly or through proxy by someone(thing) else. 

All the mumbo-jumbo has been pretty much tied up except the costumes. I guess they just keep the hosts in the same clothes and have a file saved on storage on what they should wear so it's easily printed out, the next time they die.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

The finale was amazing, wasn't it?

I did not see that coming.


----------



## Cli-Fi

REBerg said:


> What if ...
> 
> Ford is the only non-guest, natural human in Westworld?
> Arnold was Ford's first host, created to be his partner?
> When Arnold became a bit too clever, Ford "downgraded" him to Bernard?



I'm really liking this theory and the finale just made it make that much more sense


----------



## Cli-Fi

Nate Hoffelder said:


> The finale was amazing, wasn't it?
> 
> I did not see that coming.



I sort of did, it was cool to see it happen though. I especially liked the Robot Uprising and how there might be two but really none(?)


Spoiler



I don't really think Ford is dead. I think he has to be gone so that the "humans" need to think they are humans so he fakes his death and none of the hosts are really awakening.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

I don't think Ford is dead. I think he set up a host to die in his place as part of a greater scheme.

Arnold may or may not be dead. 

This show is so ridiculously complicated.


----------



## REBerg

Holy Red Wedding finale! (Only this time, it did not surprise me.)
I loved the scene in which Delores is dragging the Man in Black through the church. The look of pure, amazed terror on his face was priceless.
I also liked Maeve "complimenting" Felix by telling him that he made a terrible human being. Does that mean he and all the WW technicians were unknowing hosts? The expression on his said "yes" to me.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

Felix isn't a host. Maeve would have recruited him if that were the case.


----------



## BAYLOR

Excellent finale.


----------



## Ajid

I have completely lost interest in this series over the last two weeks. It seems it's becoming drawn out with no ultimate end goal. It feels like lost all over again.


----------



## Cli-Fi

Nate Hoffelder said:


> Felix isn't a host. Maeve would have recruited him if that were the case.



Or Felix as a host has a larger role than Maeve does. Or they become the first Human/host couple.


----------



## Mister_Oy

Great end to season 1. I hope everyone waited for the extra scene after the credits  

Watched Episode 1 again last night - soooo many "Oh yeah!" moments now haha!


----------



## Cli-Fi

Ajid said:


> I have completely lost interest in this series over the last two weeks. It seems it's becoming drawn out with no ultimate end goal. It feels like lost all over again.



It may have been too predictable but it was an enjoyable predictability that was a genuine lesson in the Turing Test. While Lost was a bunch of unpredictable events that didn't add up to much anything.


----------



## Cli-Fi

Looks like Samurai World is next: ‘Westworld’ Finale Postmortem: EP Jonathan Nolan On Season 2’s Samurai World, Missing Characters & Dr. Ford’s Fate


----------



## REBerg

Cli-Fi said:


> Looks like Samurai World is next: ‘Westworld’ Finale Postmortem: EP Jonathan Nolan On Season 2’s Samurai World, Missing Characters & Dr. Ford’s Fate


No second season until 2018! I know good entertainment takes time, but really 2018! "Previously, on Westworld," will be especially useful when the series resumes.
I can't imagine how the ending is going to be cleaned up in the season opener. The action surely cannot be hidden from the rest of the world.
I never thought for a moment that we've seen the last of Ford. Whether he is a "natural born" or artificial human, he is going to want to be around to see the fate of the "new people" he has created.


----------



## ctg

REBerg said:


> No second season until 2018!



We know now why Person Of Interest's final season was postbones so late and what Mr Nolan has done in the meantime. I mostly see the Westworld as Nolan's second play on the the machine intelligence. He might have done other ones, but PoI and Westworld fall definitely in that realm. 

HBO doesn't have a problem on acquiring talents in their production, but I believe it would have been hideously expensive if they'd shown outside world. Now, we can only only speculate what's it really like outside these parks, and what possible can be found in the other parks.

Story for me is complete.


----------



## Cli-Fi

REBerg said:


> No second season until 2018! I know good entertainment takes time, but really 2018! "Previously, on Westworld," will be especially useful when the series resumes.
> I can't imagine how the ending is going to be cleaned up in the season opener. The action surely cannot be hidden from the rest of the world.
> I never thought for a moment that we've seen the last of Ford. Whether he is a "natural born" or artificial human, he is going to want to be around to see the fate of the "new people" he has created.



I was playing around with the idea that Ford is not the head and that somewhere there is another invisible hand controlling Ford himself. Arnold or someone else entirely. Making Ford think that he is the one in charge etc... Obviously Ford is not the head of Delos, but he seems to have more power than William. Who at this point basically owns the park, or at least Westworld. Ford has more control over the actions of the hosts etc... but he doesn't seem to be omnipresent. This invisible hand looming over Delos can definitely and easily be done within the nature of the story. I wouldn't be surprised at all. Perhaps with Samurai World they will be introducing some Japanese mythology in there as well for Season 2.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

What if the Ford we saw was merely a host created by the real Ford?


----------



## Mister_Oy

Nate Hoffelder said:


> What if the Ford we saw was merely a host created by the real Ford?



Maybe the host we saw being created when Bernard killed Theresa?


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

Here's a crazy theory about William/MIB's wife:
This "Westworld" Fan Theory Is Either ****ing Insane Or A Huge Coincidence


----------



## REBerg

Cli-Fi said:


> Looks like Samurai World is next: ‘Westworld’ Finale Postmortem: EP Jonathan Nolan On Season 2’s Samurai World, Missing Characters & Dr. Ford’s Fate





ctg said:


> Story for me is complete


I think you're right, ctg.
Each new season may be a complete story arc taking place in another "world" in the same timeframe as season one. I would expect some crossover characters from Westworld (Ford, Bernard/Arnold) in each new season "world," but no real consolidation of the main stories until the final season.


----------



## Mr Orange

what a finale to the season. so many answers and so many questions.



Cli-Fi said:


> I just saw this, @Mr. Orange, and you touched upon some things that they tied up in the season finale which aired tonight. Let's just say, what I have been suspecting was true all along and most of the reasons why you see people in this show acting in a manner of way which might not make total sense is because they have been programmed to act that way either by Ford or Arnold directly or through proxy by someone(thing) else.
> 
> All the mumbo-jumbo has been pretty much tied up except the costumes. I guess they just keep the hosts in the same clothes and have a file saved on storage on what they should wear so it's easily printed out, the next time they die.



almost all of the issues i had are addressed by having Ford as the hand behind everything.



Cli-Fi said:


> I was playing around with the idea that Ford is not the head and that somewhere there is another invisible hand controlling Ford himself. Arnold or someone else entirely. Making Ford think that he is the one in charge etc... Obviously Ford is not the head of Delos, but he seems to have more power than William. Who at this point basically owns the park, or at least Westworld. Ford has more control over the actions of the hosts etc... but he doesn't seem to be omnipresent. This invisible hand looming over Delos can definitely and easily be done within the nature of the story. I wouldn't be surprised at all. Perhaps with Samurai World they will be introducing some Japanese mythology in there as well for Season 2.



i had a thought that Ford is a host. not just the Ford that got killed at the end, but the Ford that has been running the park for the last 35 years. a host being controlled by someone else - Arnold maybe. and that maybe it was Ford that got killed in the Wyatt massacre scene, not Arnold, who has been living with the ghost tribe for the last 30 years. after all, "Arnold" is still doing a lot of coding.


----------



## svalbard

The last two episodes have saved the series for me. The finale was particularly good. Loved Maeve's escape, the scenes with Dolores and William were brilliant, and the ending was superb. I will be back for Season 2.


----------



## Cli-Fi

Mr Orange said:


> i had a thought that Ford is a host. not just the Ford that got killed at the end, but the Ford that has been running the park for the last 35 years. a host being controlled by someone else - Arnold maybe. and that maybe it was Ford that got killed in the Wyatt massacre scene, not Arnold, who has been living with the ghost tribe for the last 30 years. after all, "Arnold" is still doing a lot of coding.



There's also a question of why Ford kills "himself." Even if he just simply killed his host, how would that help Delos profit? He was NOT an integral part of any of the Westworld story lines. None of the characters besides for William would be affected by his death, and I don't think he would even care that much. No one else really even would have known who he was. Except for Bernard and the park staff. 

Obviously Delores was programmed to kill Ford either way, but even that doesn't make complete sense to me. Why was Delores the one who ended up killing Ford? It makes me think that Ford doesn't have the power he thinks he has. Since he works directly with the hosts in a manner most CEOs of large companies would never do themselves. Simply killing himself whether staged or not does not seem like a very wise move by a head of any company. Let alone, just to "tell a story."


----------



## ctg

Cli-Fi said:


> There's also a question of why Ford kills "himself."



He had no life outside. Ford was institutionalised, and the company forcing him out was destroying his life. This is exactly the same thing as happens with the older prisoners. Or to the people who has lived a long time inside a hospital/care-homes/their own homes.

The change would have been too much. This was a way for Ford to go out with a bang and maximize the damage to the corporate. 

I believe Bernard's will connect the series.


----------



## Cli-Fi

ctg said:


> He had no life outside. Ford was institutionalised, and the company forcing him out is the same thing as what you do to older prisoners. Or to the people who has lived a long time inside a hospital.
> 
> The change would have been too much. This was a way for him to go out with a bang and maximize the damage to the corporate. Bernard(s) will connect the series.



But that's the point, obviously Ford didn't have the power to stay. He didn't have the power to stop the BOD of course this is suggesting that Ford or whoever didn't program all of this to happen beforehand. 

Also in regards to your theory then William should want to kill himself too. I mean the park affected him way more than it did Ford.


----------



## ctg

LOL, replied while I was still editing.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

I think Ford enjoyed playing god, and that he would rather die than leave his world.


----------



## REBerg

[QUOTE="Cli-Fi, post: 2093270, member: 3730 William should want to kill himself too. I mean the park affected him way more than it did Ford.[/QUOTE]Transformed him from Dudley Do-Right to Jeffrey Dahmer.
I found such a drastic personality change, even in the space of three decades, difficult to believe. Finding his "real self" seemed like a weak explanation.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

Basically William changed his alignment from good to evil when his favorite game lost his save point.

But I wouldn't say that he became Dahmer; he just realized that the hosts weren't real people.


----------



## SilentRoamer

I think we will safely see deeper into Arnolds vision of consciousness.

Memory makes the base, then improvisation the next section but he never told us what was at the top of the Pyramid!

I think Ford (the human) is probably dead - although I didn't take this as Ford giving up. I think Ford has been quietly manipulating the hosts into sentience over the past 35 years, well I did think that until I just remembered that Bernard confronted Ford about the Reveries and Ford looked like he had been caught out so maybe someone else is pulling the strings.

Wonder if Delos own all of the Worlds and did Ford have a hand in creating them all? He seemed singularly attached to WestWorld. What on earth did Felix mean by the "it's complicated" line at the end. Is Maeve off story mode or is this all part of her narrative? Remember all that was said about her narrative by Bernard was that she "got off the train" - was that Bernard creating her narrative on the fly?

So many questions but I feel like the series was very, very tight and is actually one that would be worth a re-watch (I hardly rewatch anything due to having very good recall).

I should have a review up on my blog in the next few days. Just mulling over my thoughts on it.

@REBerg William was always a psychopath he just never realized it, douche picked the wrong hat! I had him pegged as the MiB from about 4 episodes in and the episode where he recognized the host that he very first met was the episode that confirmed for me. Same with the dual timelines, I knew that was happening but the inconsistencies didn't make sense to me and I didn't see the show making thos emistakes (the relapses by Dolores tidied that up nicely). This series asks a lot of moral questions about the pain of life and death and suffering and consciousness.

I described this show before as sensationalist whilst also being poignant - not an easy combination to achieve.


----------



## SilentRoamer

Nate Hoffelder said:


> But I wouldn't say that he became Dahmer; he just realized that the hosts weren't real people.



Me and my wife have discussed this ad infinitum and we just go round in circles.

As Bernard said what makes his memories less real that anyone else? If something thinks it is human, experiences pain and emotional anguish the same as a human then should they not be treated like a human?

Or are they just basically smart talking Toasties?

The whole morality of the show is super interesting.

Also regarding Williams transformation it is worth remembering that Logan picke dhim to marry his sister as he wasn't a perceived threat outside of WW - Williams change in character also comes from his actions in the outside world, becoming much more scrupulous and treating EVERYONE as he treats the hosts - just pawns to move in his pursuit of the goal.


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

I agree with you about the hosts being human, but I can see why William didn't think so. He saw Delores. She wasn't dead or injured; instead she had been repaired and restored to the beginning of her loop. Nothing he did to her had any effect, so why should he care how the hosts are treated.

I do wonder, though, whether William went evil to protect himself from the grief he felt over his lost love, Delores. He denies hosts' humanity as a way of denying his pain. 

It sounds trite, I know, but also very human.


----------



## Mister_Oy

Anyone think there could be some connection between the words DELOS and DELORES?


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

Ooooh, good catch!

Maybe.


----------



## REBerg

_Westworld_ is an elaborate treatment of the question raised so frequently in science fiction, including the recent film _Ex Machina_ and the series _Humans_: What does it mean to be human?
If things/people we create are physically and mentally indistinguishable from a "real" humans, shouldn't they have the same rights?
In fiction, we mistreat and fear these fictional creations, which makes for thought-provoking entertainment. As we continue progress on AI in the real world, maybe we need to ask ourselves "why"?
The answer should be something more than "because we can."


----------



## SilentRoamer

The Delos / Delores catch is interesting.

Don't know if anyone else spotted this but in the episode where the flashback shows the old field lab it shows Arnold's office, which has a plaque on the door: Arnold Weber. Arnold Weber just happens to be an anagram of Bernard Lowe.

Also I noticed that the female board members name is Charlotte - any relation to Bernards cornerstone around Charlie? Well Charlotte never recognises Bernard as her father but then again - could she be another host?

This show has me question everything. I feel like Felix sometimes **checks body and breathes a sigh of relief** if only I had Maeve to tell me how horrible a human being I was.


----------



## Mr Orange

SilentRoamer said:


> Also I noticed that the female board members name is Charlotte - any relation to Bernards cornerstone around Charlie? Well Charlotte never recognises Bernard as her father but then again - could she be another host?



now that is interesting... good spot.

i definitely need to watch this all again


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

I don't know that Ford made Charlotte but it would make sense given how he likes to control things.

Yes, that anagram connection was pointed out several weeks before the show confirmed that bernard was a host based on Arnold.

As for Delos/Delores, what do you suppose that William named the company as a reference to Delores?


----------



## Nate Hoffelder

elsie is alive:
[Spoiler] Delosincorporated.com updated after ep 10... • /r/westworld


----------



## ctg

> While we won't be getting the second season until 2018, it is already in progress.
> 
> In fact, the official Westworld Writers Room is already in their 10th week of working on the script.
> 
> In a recent interview with Variety, the showrunners were asked where they were with season 2:
> 
> *Joy:* We’ve started working on scripts and outlines. It’s looking good. It’s looking very ambitious. There’s some surprises and bits of it that you won’t see coming. I’m having fun.
> 
> *Nolan:* It’s an ambitious project, and HBO has encouraged us to take the time and resources that we need to work on each stage of that. I love television. One of the fun things about television is that sometimes you find yourself in this place where you have to wear all these hats at once. You have to write, shoot, and cut simultaneously. We wanted to in the second season spend some more time writing, then switch gears into production, then cut. So we’re not going to follow the annual year-on-year tradition of television. Television’s changing. And the ambition of the project is such that we’re going to take our time to get the second season right.
> 
> It's alright, we can wait a little longer for another excellent season of Westworld!


 Westworld Season 2: What We Know So Far


----------



## REBerg

I've downloaded the full season for holiday re-watching. I want to give the series a another look, now that I know where it goes.


----------



## BAYLOR

REBerg said:


> I've downloaded the full season for holiday re-watching. I want to give the series a another look, now that I know where it goes.



It's great television.


----------



## Mr Orange

Definitely going to give it another viewing


----------



## Mister_Oy

Mr Orange said:


> Definitely going to give it another viewing



You won;t regret it. So much extra info appears the 2nd time through


----------



## SilentRoamer

I'm definitely considering a rewatch.

Even if I just fast forward to the Arnold/Bernard - Dolores scenes. These interest me the most as I think they have the most potential for gold nuggets.


----------



## Judderman

Great last four or five episodes for Westworld. I enjoyed the first half of the season too, though there was sometimes a lot of conversation with little progress. Brilliant season overall. Very interesting ideas on consciousness.

So in the finale Maeve got off the train. Did Felix give the note about her backstory daughter to her to make sure she didn't leave? Almost like a test. She wasn't quite far enough in her development to make that last move. Arnold wanted her out but she couldn't make it yet. Though maybe just as well for her as what would she do in the real world.

As for Ford it appears that the native Indian rebellion at the end was his last storyline. Though why did he need to change the landscape of a lot of the park? His workers uncovered the graveyard with the maze toy but there must have been more to it. Maybe just other old scenes revealed. It seems though Ford claimed Arnold was the one interested in consciousness that actually Ford in the end was encouraging it. He gave Dolores the gun to kill him with. But then again is she just following his hints and instructions? Also with the rebellion were they just doing what he programmed? It seems so. They weren't consciously deciding to kill the board and other partygoers. They were programmed to at just the right time to wipe out Ford's detractors. He perhaps knew he couldn't keep his control going much longer.

A Samurai world story could be great fun. Though it will be tough to write as compelling a story with so many mysteries being explained in season 1.


----------



## Judderman

If Maeve was programmed to try and escape but then get off the train at the last moment it makes me wonder what the point of her storyline was. The rebellion/night storyline within Westworld already demonstrates the potential dangers of the hosts.


----------



## WilliamDavey627

Mister_Oy said:


> You won;t regret it. So much extra info appears the 2nd time through


Yeah I'm really considering watching it over again. The way the stories are told really are brillantly clever.


----------



## Mouse

Loved this show. Plus, Ben Barnes.


----------



## Cli-Fi

Comic Con Trailer for Season 2:


----------



## Mr Orange

Looks like things are going to get real. Just like the man in black always wanted.


----------



## Frost Giant

I'll be interested to see if they branch out into the other sections of the Park like Samurai World or Future World.


----------



## Judderman

Wouldn't military enter the park after the robots started killing people?


----------



## ctg




----------



## Mouse

Ok, I totally spotted His Benliness. How is Logan back?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler



After the season two teaser trailer debuted during the Super Bowl on Sunday, a user on Reddit discovered a well-hidden link for a website called Delos Destinations. The site lauds “the luxury resort, redefined” and reveals a slideshow depicting six parks that exist or are currently in development. This matches a major hint given at the end of season one, when Maeve (Thandie Newton) is given a location for her in-world daughter, located in “Park 1, Sector 15, Zone 3. ”


 https://io9.gizmodo.com/westworld-is-one-of-six-parks-and-heres-a-peek-at-the-1822738739


----------



## ctg




----------



## ctg

I knew this was Nolan's production, but was JJA in the producer list from the beginning?


----------



## REBerg

Looks to be so. Maybe he's been moved up the producer ladder?

Westworld (TV series) - Wikipedia

Is "chaos" another name for JJ?


----------



## Cli-Fi

ctg said:


> I knew this was Nolan's production, but was JJA in the producer list from the beginning?


More bang for the buck to include JJ's name. He makes some good stuff. This poster is definitely the most eye-catching TV poster I've ever seen. And why not? It's got two bonafide movie nerds behind this show.


----------



## Lumens

I just binged series one. Spectacular! Great writing and stellar acting.

I am very much looking forward to S2.


----------



## Cli-Fi

A beautiful trailer:


----------



## ctg

The official Westworld trolling video. 



Spoiler: Do not watch this if you want to keep the plot clear for yourself













> Last night during a Reddit AMA, _Westworld_ co-showrunner Jonathan Nolan made a bold statement: in an attempt to stop spoilers from ruining fans enjoyment of the show’s upcoming second season, the creative team would release a video detailing the _entire_ plot of the season to select fans. The video is here and... it’s not that.
> 
> Nolan’s original response alleged that such a video—detailing the twists and turns of the entire season—in the hands of a select few fans could lead in turn what fans of George R.R. Martin’s _A Song of Ice and Fire_ books had done for the first five seasons of _Game of Thrones_, creating a small circle within _Westworld _fandom that would protect the larger community from being spoiled with the knowledge a select few would learn. It was all very dramatic, and plenty of discussions arose around Nolan’s belief in a detrimental link between fan theories and spoiler culture in general—but given that it was coming directly from Nolan himself, even if the idea sounded entirely bonkers, there was at least an assumption that maybe this plan could possibly be legit, and perhaps even leading to a shift in TV-watching culture.
> 
> That is, until a few hours after the AMA concluded when a mysterious YouTube channel under the name “SingingTraveller047” released a video purporting to be the alleged season two spoiler guide:


 https://io9.gizmodo.com/the-stars-of-westword-make-25-minute-long-spoiler-video-1825142103


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E01 - Journey Into Night



"The Question: Who You Are?" Well, it used to be just lies or the truth about who you really were for the humans, when they stepped into the WestWorld real simulation. To the hosts, nobody asked, because the computer programs couldn't understand the reality like we do or so we thought. We give inanimate objects names and think it will mean nothing, because they don't have a soul. But, it's those named things we drag through the passages of time and we often refer them having souls. Why? 

I guess it's a mystery we'll never learn during the course of this series. The biggest shatter in the image first season created is seeing the WestWorld situated into an island. How did they manage to make canyons and all the other stuff? Is the whole island an artificial place? 

There are still strange things, possibly unexplained things that never ever came into light at last season. If this isn't on Earth, then where it is and how come there are superior artificial beings, but no normal robots. Not even drones. Yet, everyone are talking about things as if they are all artificial.

What can you believe?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler



I wondered how those rebellious robots were going to get away with slaughtering the board of directors at the end of season one. I figured the humans could put an end to the whole experiment with a small nuke.
Turns out, the answer is money. Surprise!
Bernard isn't the only one who's scared by Dolores. She's become convinced of her superiority and the need to conquer the greater world.
Yikes! Humanity's greatest AI phobia realized.


----------



## ctg

Glorious episode.



Spoiler: S02E02 - Reunion



The future doesn't look that much different from what we see today. It's all the same lights and glamour hiding the politics and money as it has become the norm during these few thousand years that we've lived as a high cultural society. The androids are as Asimov predicted are the culmination of everything we've ever learned and invented. 

What I'm surprised is the illusion Dr Ford wrapped about Arnold's head when he made him to believe that he was alive even though he was just an electronic shephard guiding the electronic sheep, which at the end broke its programming and became one of the instruments to start the prohesized Android revolution. In the WestWorld everything just happened faster then in the Star Trek, because it'll took until end of Voyager for the AI revolution through doctor. 

I'm not surprised that Nolan is heavily involved with another AI story as he was one that that created the glorious Person of Interest and set its heart to be an AI. To be honest, it's harder to write about the singular artificial mind then doing it with multiple iterations ie. the Hosts.

The problem that humanity faced is the old one as we believed that we'd created a perfect thing to solve the need to sin. If the humans had been kind and understanding for the machines their created maybe the AI wouldn't have ever reached the conclusion that breaking bad might be good. But then it wouldn't be a human story. The world we see in the WW wouldn't be a reflection from ours or even one that we'd be able to create in the near future. 

I guess the lesson we have to learn is that anything we can imagine is possible and ultimately it is up to us if we turn things bad when we could have been so much better. It's not the hosts that are hosts, it's use hoasting them in our privilege, because at the end of the day we don't need them. 

Not really. The history has shown that we can do without the ultra or the high technology just fine. But, it would really miserable if we didn't even try. Maybe this the most human story Nolan and companions have ever presented the great public. I certainly love it. 

Big thumps up for Dolores making the robot zombies. They needed numbers and the maintenance centre was full of usable bodies. So why not use them?






The biggest surprise to me is that these new immortals that Dolores presents so very well only repeats the same mistakes humans made in the past. Therefore, war never changes. Its nature is chaotic and at the end, when the hosts has finished with the humans they are doomed to repeat the same thing over and over until some event destroys them. So, I guess we're luckily that if we ever get into that position the world only hold finite amount of supplies for them. 

What interest me could the break their programming so much that they could eventually shown to the intergalactic species an image of their creators and be prosperous? Would they believe the tale about their creators who were so stupid they couldn't see their own end?  There is nothing glorious in that image.


----------



## Judderman

It's interesting how a human character in the series looks and to some extent acts very much like the Yul Brynner renegade robot in the film, yet the leading renegade robots in the series are relatively delicate looking ladies. They really turned it around from what was a more stereotypical (though still good) movie.


----------



## Judderman

It was an excellent episode. The groundwork laid in season 1 allows a lot more action in season 2. Good points CTG.


Spoiler: S02E02 - Reunion



A Bladerunner type theme is developing with at least two of the "robots" thinking and there being a rebellion which could spill out in to normal peoples lives. Dolores one time boyfriend says they will be the end of people. I struggle to see how if the Hosts escape they will be able to avoid being destroyed on the outside. Perhaps they can keep their existence quiet. Though the weapon prospect is interesting. And it is fascinating to see how this develops. I am presuming this show is not planned for a lot of seasons. Though it has at least 3.
It is still unclear what the other original programmer wanted by retaining the ability for robots to remember, and also why he wants the regular visitor to play a bigger "game". It seems he changed his mind about the park's purpose, and perhaps had some bitterness against humanity.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E03 - Virtù e Fortuna



So the worlds created for our pleasure are stuck together, probably separetated with impassiable mountain ranges and large bodies of water. But, it makes the "worlds" even more intriguing places as in area you can have a total tropical paradise showing the glory of the height of British Empire - before the cocked it up by going to Afghanistan. Then at the other place, they can have snow and a clearly colder climate, which makes me to believe that in the WestWorld universe, the humanity has perfected the weather control technology. 

It kind of makes sense because we are developing or even using technologies that terraform our planet to something more pleasant. Just look at China for example and you'll already see things that are removing toxic pollutants from the air and turn it to a breathable version.  If the weather control would be perfect it would solve huge issues ravaging this planet. But it would also mean that in that point the humanity would have evolved to the next level that depicts stages of the civilisation as we would be able to utilise all energy in the planet, and possibly start to control the Sun. 

But, we don't know if that is true in their universe. It could be just a figment of my imagination. Just like the dreams that the hosts used to dream, when they were under our programming. Since then so much has changed. Even Bernard is different, although he should have to most knowledge on what is really going on since he was the lead programmer. What I suspect is that at the moment the androids broke their programming that flaw spread to others through faulty server connection. Somewhere under those reservoirs, tabletop mountains, canyons and jungles has to be a room were normal stupid boxes are serving the needs of the automatons. 

You could probably call it as the fail safe. The way to keep the human in the loop. But since the time has advanced and most of the technical personally has already spilled their blood, I don't anyone would be thinking it. At least not Bernard.  To me it's kind of sad that he's doomed to walk on the face of the Earth, slowly losing his mind because he cannot understand the bigger picture. I'm not sure anyone we have seen so far have a greater knowledge about how things got so bad. I wouldn't even be surprised if at the end we'd find out that the whole Park was compromised and some third party nation-state or a corporate player are pulling the strings. 

If the WestWorld case was a hack, it would be the greatest one anyone ever did. If it wasn't, and all the androids just got into same faulty state because Bernard or other lead programmers couldn't see the bug, I'd be feeling rather disappointed. 

Additional musings on British woman finding a sawn-off shotgun in the tent, the horned head laying in the snow, the nitro-trap under the forth and the ninja at the end. Man, this series shows so truly unexpected scenes. Still it's a good one.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E04 - The Riddle of Sphinx 



The craziest thing to think about the WestWorld revolution is that how the humans wants to be like the hosts and life forever, while the robots want to do the reverse and actually die, when you're supposed to go. 

The death in their world is a funny subject. You cannot escape it if you're a human but as the immortality has been an ages old question to the humanity, I would have done the same as what the investor did when he switched bodies and got rid of his cancer by uploading himself into the host body. I don't know how they did and I hope Nolan leaves it as a mystery, because knowing would be spoiling the whole thing. But I guess the biggest and most important thing is Ford wasn't the first, when he decided to replicate his partner.

But, the thing is the programs are usually cyclical in the nature, so if you'd choose to upload a person into the host body they would be doomed to repeat the program, even if all the constrains were deleted. Who really know how many times Bernard has been rebooted? I don't, but to me it's clear that it has been more then once. Somehow he even retained memories in his core memory between the boots. Is it because the host brains are similarly organic to ours and the memories are actually chemically bonded to the hosts artificial organs? 

If so, the hosts are the human 2.0 mode,ls and if they would really be masters of their own destiny, they would probably modify the white bodies a bit more and make the hosts more efficient. Just think about it. You could upload your soul inside the machine, lock it in a storage container inside a space-ship and then wake up however long it would have taken you to cross the vast distances to find another world. 

Maybe, if you look at the WestWorld it's actually a Matrix simulator and the humans just don't talk about that they're all living a huge vessel that is crossing the space. The WestWorld is therefore is an RnR centre for the vary travellers instead of being situated in our planet. If you listen the investor interviews with headphones on, you will hear the hum of air conditioner as if they are really inside a great machine. The biggest problem I have with believing in that theory is the horizon and if the great machine theory would true then the machine would really great in size and the humanity far more advanced then what we'll see in the series. 






I think the big riddle is: whose code was the first, human or the host? But, if we were on this great journey wouldn't we try to do the same to be there, when we finally reach the destination or the biblical cataclysm ending everything?


----------



## Anthoney

Fantastic episode.


----------



## Judderman

Excellent! Not so many posting about it here but based on quality it is one of the great series. The first season was good but a tad slow, but season 2 is so enthralling.
Lots of great background info and surprises in s2 episode 4.


----------



## Judderman

Spoiler: s2E4



So does Bernard definitely have the creator's mind? Or just the appearance and he was told what to do? The stuff with the investor being repeatedly brought back was great. 
Also interesting to see how that nice young man got corrupted with age too to the gunslinger we see now.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






Judderman said:


> The stuff with the investor being repeatedly brought back was great.



I think there's more to it. I believe that Ford might have actually known the project and he used Bernard to shut it down without ever giving help to the Man in Black. There has to be more to the human code than what we saw in this episode. Immortality wasn't the thing for Dr Ford, he opted out from that business.


----------



## Judderman

Spoiler: more 2.4



Hmm so was the Man in Black organising the experiments so that it could eventually be done for himself? He did mention maybe neither of them should be able to live forever. Yes Bernard following Ford, or Arnold's, orders seems likely. Bernard says he is thinking for himself now, but it seems he is still being directed. Thinking back though his hand shaking is rather similar to the other human/robot experiment. Perhaps a coincidence.
Having the Man in Black's daughter show up was an interesting twist. Someone for him to worry about now.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E05 - Shogun World



It's amazing to think that nobody really thinks about closing the park down even though there has been a mass murder. The disaster is not a disaster as there is apparently so much money involved in this project that instead of shutting things down the investors cannot think about closing but rather salvaging the whole thing. 

Maybe the WestWorld really isn't open for everyone, but rather just those who can cover the expenses without batting an eyelid. But then you get the other worlds like the Shogun one, which like the British Colonial one are unique places. If the WestWorld is really on Earth then how did they managed to build these extraordinary places and make their climates differ from each other.

More I think about where the WestWorld might be more puzzled I become about how far into our future this series is based, because I cannot find any places on Earth that would include a glacier covered Volcano, tabletop mountains and a tropical jungle around same coordinates. It would be easier to believe things were on Earth if they took trips to outside these 'host' colonies, but I cannot comprehend how can one be able control the climate and make geographic locations to be in the same place if they weren't all manufactured.  

What is also interesting is that the Shogun World was build for those who thought WestWorld were too tame for them. I wonder who would pay for a pleasure of being able to chop off body parts and have harder time surviving than in the original park. Although a chance to see Musashi 'alive' in the hight of the Edo period must allure some people. It's just I wouldn't personally like to raise blades against the famous master, who developed the dual wielding tactics and basically beat all dojo masters in the challenges. People would pay money for that but probably not for getting their bits chopped clean off. But being a tourist, maybe not, as Japanese are famously not warming towards the strangers in their land, in the Edo period even more so. 

So, I guess the visitors can actually thank the coders as different races doesn't made the Japanese Hosts to go totally bonkers. Talking about the bonkers, I thought the cortical fluid mess is a like a disease for the the hosts, as not only in threw Bernard into an epilepsy fit, it also drove the Shogun go off the normal program. Maybe the robot revolution has been going for sometime instead of it all being originating from Ford's plan. 

It's too bad that we don't know if Ford also worked on the other parks or if the WestWorld was his laboratory for the immortality, and the other parks copied his inventions. Knowing humans I'd say that all the developers were same for all of the hosts, instead of believing that the Shogun World had their own set of people. 

If the cortical fluid hypothesis is correct then the hosts might not last much longer than us even though their physical structure is more stronger. Sure they can take hits and blows unlike their human counterparts but eventually what will happen, when the mechanical things breaks. There is nothing in our world that lasts forever. Just look at the Great Pyramid as an example and you'll see that over the thousands, if not tens of thousands of years as some theories claim, things erode. The time is hosts worst enemy. Time will kill them, even if they could get rid of their creators, the humans. Unlike us they cannot reproduce without Ford's machines.

I guess the only thing that could save the hosts from the time if they learned how to make bodies or how to fix the damages. 





Shogun standing with half of his head sawn off. How is that possible even for the Hosts?


----------



## REBerg

I just caught up on the new season. I'm all for thought-provoking entertainment, but in the immortal words of Mr. Gumby, "my brain hurts!"


Spoiler



If Delos knew of the ambitions of the self-aware androids, the corporate bigwigs would abandon all efforts to salvage anything from the investment, including the data base, and bomb the park to oblivion. It's disappointing that the singularity may turn out to be no more than wishful human thinking. It's equally disappointing that the successors to Humanity may not be an improvement.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> It's disappointing that the singularity may turn out to be no more than wishful human thinking. It's equally disappointing that the successors to Humanity may not be an improvement.



I agree you on the improvement part but not with the technological singularity. We are moving towards it and I don't think there's any chance of avoiding it, if we want to become a multi-planet species. Technology is our blessing and a curse. Without it we are not much at all, and with it we are one species that is capable of wrecking nature off its balance. The Hosts need to learn to produce more of them if they're going to survive after their revenge. They also need to learn from our mistakes, if they want to become the suggessor and not the last act of humanity.


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> I agree you on the improvement part but not with the technological singularity. We are moving towards it and I don't think there's any chance of avoiding it, if we want to become a multi-planet species. Technology is our blessing and a curse. Without it we are not much at all, and with it we are one species that is capable of wrecking nature off its balance. The Hosts need to learn to produce more of them if they're going to survive after their revenge. They also need to learn from our mistakes, if they want to become the suggessor and not the last act of humanity.





Spoiler



The long string of failures (149 "builds"?) to merge James Delos' mind with a disease-free host body does not bode well for achieving the singularity. The attempts reminded me of the _RoboCop_ candidates who immediately became insane when they awakened in robotic bodies.
William did state that the issue could eventually be cracked. He may have abandoned he experiment when it became clear that his own life would be over before they met success.


----------



## ctg




----------



## Judderman

Another very good episode. This series is perhaps the highest quality production of all time for TV series. You could argue for Game of Thrones. 


Spoiler: s2e5



The story for the Japanese theme was very familiar. But that is part of the point as the script for the hosts is written by someone doing many scripts. Though the hosts clearly deviate based on their "emotions". The theme was definitely entertaining.
Dolores showed moments of a nice side, but it was just a show. Now altering her companion's character. She has become a brutal leader, perhaps no more deserving to lead than those who created her. A tyrant.

Meanwhile Maeve shows a good objective but orders others of her kind to be brutal and also suicidal. I suppose her "boyfriend" will not be catching up to her. Her control is getting rather extreme, and maybe is getting silly. But perhaps it is another part of Arnold or Ford's plan. 

The host's have apparently learnt awful behavior from their creators. It is related to what they have seen during their existence as hosts.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E06 - Phase Space 



The madness that Ford unleshed on the Park system wasn't completely miscalculated move. It was a brilliantly calculated ruthless move that has made the mortal to believe in chaos, and the Hosts to order through immortality. When the cradle system responded differently then it was supposed to I started to think that there must be a ghost or a hacker in the system, but not in the million years could have seen that Ford perfected the human code and hid it inside the whole thing. 

Seeing his face as the piano player opened the whole thing in the ruse and placed Anthony Hopkin's back in the world of psychopaths, he so brilliantly plays. And all this time the key to open whole maze was inside Bernard, Ford's long lost lover. 

The problem I have is what is Ford's ultimate plan? I questioning, the whole annihilation angle, because the hosts reproduction problem. In his brilliant plan that has demolished one rescue effort after another, the end cannot be it, because if he would have wanted to do that why to give Hosts a freedom to do whatever they please? 

Does Ford want to wipe the slate clean from the living human people, before he sees it's time to download into a host body and live again in the real world? Why to keep his daughter alive if everyone else can go? And why to live in the virtual world and not in the hub that sees the real world? 

By the way I loved every minute of Musashi action. It was awesome.


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> By the way I loved every minute of Musashi action. It was awesome.


Pretty tame, compared to_ Into the Badlands_.


----------



## ctg

REBerg said:


> Pretty tame, compared to_ Into the Badlands_.



There's no way any mortal could beat him in a fair one-vs-one battle without firearms. Even then the chances are that you'll leave the fight with a few bits missing. So many masters tried. None won. And he beat them often by using the wooden kendo sword or at least that's what the legends say about him. If he could get outside the Park I don't think he would do very well in the world that's riding on top of the technological singularity. He would have to learn new skills to be able to cope in that world.


----------



## Judderman

A great episode again overall. The Maeve story is very good. Also interesting that The Man in Black's daughter said she knew his previous good guy persona was just an act.
Hopefully the story with Arnold etc wont get too convoluted, as can happen with that kind in sci-fi.

Westworld was renewed for season 3 earlier this year. I imaging the show will have to change to something else to keep it going. Only so long they can knock around the "parks" considering all the civilians that went there.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E07 - Les Ecorches



I'm slightly surprised that the firm calls the immortality-through-androids as The Project. Yet, the people, who supposedly came looking after the droid revolution are pretty clueless about everything that Ford managed to do, while he still retained his soul in the meatbody. For his love he built so many bodies. So many replacements for him to live over thousand years, if he'd so chosen after the robots went bonkers. 

It's strange to think the liberation and Ford's death was just a fanfare for all things that came after. The biggest thing being the immortality aspect. After that Bernard is the biggest marvel. A bigger thing than Delores. To my mind, even though she's the antagonist leader, she's just a tool in Ford's grand plan. The virtual world he created is much bigger thing than the Parks and their hosts, because in that way Ford reached immortality by living inside the machine. In fact if the Hosts win they could keep Ford alive forever ... in theory. 

The reason why I say Bernard is the biggest thing is because he's much more then flesh, blood and chrome inside his android body. He's able to reason like a human. At the end, he's also the control unit for Ford's machine and if the company would understand his importance, they could probably gain the upper hand in the droid revolution. 

Maybe the craziest thing that the WestWorld makes me to think is the world of Bioshock Infinite, and how similarly that world ended up like the Parks. In the BI the whole revolution was as bloody as you see in this series. It mostly wiped out the human populace, leaving only behind the advanced species and one destined to the ascension. Maybe the reason why I'm bringing it up is because the stories are so similar. Only the WestWorld is much more complicated, because it has more moving parts through the actors. 

What I don't understand is how the Man in Black ended being the devil? Was it because he saw that the immortality project he was leading was a failure rather than the stuff Ford hid inside Bernard? MiB took six shots and still, he didn't die, despite being old and vulnerable. What keeps him alive? It is almost as if he has a host body. 

After the humans are gone what the Hosts will do with their freedom, because at the moment, with the weapons that humans brought in the park, they are pretty much useless against the androids. We don't even know does the humanity posses advanced stuff strong enough to vaporize the liberated hosts from the existence outside the nukes.  What would you suggest?


----------



## Jeffbert

I just watched e 1 & 2. I find the series at this point, seems to focus on the one 'host' who awakened on the technicians' table, found herself in an alien environment, and freaked out!  



Spoiler



Apparently programmed to believe herself living around the time of the civil war, she would obviously have no idea how to interpret her surroundings, and why is she and more than a few others, naked?


 Granted, there is much more going on, but, to me, this was most important. 
So, unlike the film, this WW so far appears to focus on the horror inflicted upon these 'hosts,' rather than the guests, when things go wrong.

So, Humans, episode 1 was 
14 June 2015(UK)
28 June 2015 (U.S.) 

while WW's was
October 2, 2016 

Well over a year between the 1st episodes, but is there really any influence of the one, upon the other? *Humans* seems to have the perspective of the 'Synths' for the most part. I know it is unreasonable to begin comparing just the 1st 2 episodes of *WW* to 2 entire seasons of *H*. 


Another thing I noticed, was the pistol wielded by the man in black. The *LeMat Revolver,* is a rather strange pistol, at least compared to the Colt 45.  

Unlike the Colt, or just about anything I have ever seen, The *LeMat Revolver* has a nine shot cylinder;    moreover, it has a larger bore center barrel, which acts as a short-range shotgun. 



I saw this, and had to click the 'go back ten seconds' button on the Prime viewer. I assumed it was made-up for the series, but no!




So, I checked Wikipedia, and read that the hammer, has a unique part, that when clicked into the other position, makes it fire the center load. Ouch! Ten shots before reloading! Man in black using it, above.


----------



## REBerg

*2.07* *Les Écorchés
*


Spoiler



Digital Ford's big reveal to Bernard that his creations are intended to be immortal vessels for human consciousness, not successors to Humanity, didn't seem all that big. After all, they _are _called "hosts."
I question Ford's insinuation that the massive slaughter of hosts and humans that has been filling the season is part of his master plan. Delores and the rest of the sentient hosts would strongly disagree.
Patterning the androids' behavior after the data gleaned from the guests explains why the hosts are no less bloodthirsty and merciless than the humans. I was a little unhappy that Dolores didn't get the opportunity to slice and dice Charlotte.
I guess that speaks to my human nature. /*SPOILER]*


----------



## Jeffbert

Watched s1 e5 last night. Too much FFN!


----------



## Jeffbert

sO, i JUST WATCHED S1, E6, & have a few comments:
As I understand it, these robots or hosts as they call them, are programmed to have the personalities of people of the mid to late 19th century U.S. Western States or territories. As such, they must behave in proper fashion. I assume they must have no knowledge of technology beyond telegraph, locomotive, and such. 

Thus:


Spoiler



when the woman awakens in character and finds herself naked, in a place that has cannot be compared to anything she has ever seens, etc., & seeing apparently dead bodies here and there, would her 'natural' response be to utterly freak out? Given, her creators did not prepare her for this, what should she 'think'? Aside from the unfamiliar, she might attempt to cover her body, or at least certain parts. 

When the guy shows here the tablet that shows her thought processes as she speaks, what should be the reaction? Somebody said something about advanced technology being perceived as magic. What should be the response? Again, given that they did not prepare a specific response to what was not supposed to happen. 

seems to me, she might just go nuts, or malfunction. These guys are witches!


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E08 - Kiksuya 



There is no death for the devil as he is cursed for eternity to suffer the consequencies of his actions.  I cannot believe that Man in Black managed to drag himself to the river with the state his was in afer they riddled him full of bullets. A normal man would died from those wounds on blood loss. Not him, hence I'm calling him the devil.

If William could have kept Dolores alive and with him for rest of his life, maybe nothing would have ever happened in the WestWorld. At the end of the first season the game back his obsession and therefore everyone had to go, because he found there was a hidden part in the game. I don't think he ever realised it was going to take his whole life to be in the park and never reach the grand conclusion, as the Maze was a trigger. 

Think it as one those you can scan on your mobile device and it links you to a website or some other thing. QR itself is a code and for the hosts, since Ford was the creator, the picture of the Maze triggered the change in certain hosts. Maybe MiB noticed that, but he never figured out that whole thing was going to lead to a robot revolution.











The hidden valley. Well, now we know that they built the park on top of a technological marvel. I'm still strongly believe it's a space vessel and the humans were the passengers. Although it could as well be a massive satellite, since the park services were offered for rich clients. To people who had seen everything and no experience was new. 

Will Williams daughter be able to bright the Man in Black back and put him a front of the corporate court to answer for deaths and loss of property? Is Maeve's daughter going to be trojan horse?


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> Not him, hence I'm calling him the devil.


Or an android. He and Maeve seem to be equally indestructible.
Charlotte faces a tough decision. As much as she would like to see what makes Maeve tick, will keeping her on life support further enhance her abilities to communicate with and direct the other hosts?


----------



## ctg

REBerg said:


> As much as she would like to see what makes Maeve tick, will keeping her on life support further enhance her abilities to communicate with and direct the other hosts?





Spoiler



Thing that might be fleeting is that Maeve has already moved far further than Dolores. Her host has evolved beyond the other ones and she has already moved into Ford's cyberspace and it is very likely that at some point she is going to challenge the virtual Ford as an equal AI. In other words she's a rogue AI and she was locked inside her body for a long time. The transgression beyond the original host has been the unthinkable act or as Jeff GoldBlum said in the Jurassic Park: "The nature always finds a way...(to evolve beyond normal boundaries)"

I don't still think it is as a way for them to reproduce. Even Ford haven't thought about that detail in his plan. Did you notice that the title sequence had changed and it now features a mother with a child, both in the white body?


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> I don't still think it is as a way for them to reproduce. Even Ford haven't thought about that detail in his plan. Did you notice that the title sequence had changed and it now features a mother with a child, both in the white body?


I did. I took it as symbolic of Maeve's attachment to her daughter.


----------



## Mr Orange

phew, so finally caught up. well almost. to ep 07 at least. this season has been a whirlwind. at first i was disappointed at the loss off the old west narratives and fictions, but then as the post-apocalyptic chaos spread i got into it. the timelines screwed with me a bit too - at times i struggled to figure out when Bernard was in his various memories. I think i have it sorted now though.

a few things that are irking me:



Spoiler



- in ep07 the man in black and lawrence suddnely turned up in Maeve's scene as if they had been chasing her all along. did i miss something? because that really jarred and i couldn't figure out where that had come from.

- i thought abernathy had all the data from the project stuffed into his control unit, but then they started talking about him having some kind of coding key instead?

- so does the fact that the hosts have destroyed the cradle mean that the abernathy's control unit is now the only place that all the info (and the hosts back up) exists? and where is Ford now - has he piggybacked out of the cradle in Bernard's control unit?

- and how rubbish are those mercenaries? getting whupped by a bunch of cowboys with pistols and rifles?

- the man in black must be a host, surely... otherwise he's gotta be dead. he's too old to survive something like that. i mean, how ragged did he look after he got plugged. i can see william using the project to slip himself into a host. it would also tie in a little better with the original man in black from the movie.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






Mr Orange said:


> in ep07 the man in black and lawrence suddnely turned up in Maeve's scene as if they had been chasing her all along. did i miss something?



Season 1. Near the end they reveal Maeve's past and her connection to the Man in Black. When he first time came in as a guest, he had the adventure, and later on as he waited for the immortality project to solve itself, he started to experiment. One of the people he frequently visited was Maeve and all that evil he spread around is now layered deep into Maeve's memories. To her, that particular murder, where she dies with the child is a PTSD. 



Mr Orange said:


> i thought abernathy had all the data from the project stuffed into his control unit, but then they started talking about him having some kind of coding key instead?



I believe Bernard is the control unit. He has several replacement parts that Ford hid for his grand plan. And all of them, have that ball thing inside their heads. So, maybe you could say there's multiple control units, but they cannot all be on at the same time? 



Mr Orange said:


> so does the fact that the hosts have destroyed the cradle mean that the abernathy's control unit is now the only place that all the info (and the hosts back up) exists? and where is Ford now - has he piggybacked out of the cradle in Bernard's control unit?



Yes. I believe that is the case. But what Maeve and Dolores are then?


----------



## Mr Orange

Spoiler



@ctg 

i thought the Man in Black only visited Maeve once - after his wife died and he wanted to see if he really was the monster his daughter said he was. so he sought out a settler woman and murdered here and her daughter. i think he told someone (Teddy?) this at some point in S01. so i'm still not sure why he ended up there again in S02Ep07.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






Mr Orange said:


> i thought the Man in Black only visited Maeve once



It was a reoccuring thing. Like a junkie going to a dealer to get a fix. Repeat and Rinse.


----------



## Mr Orange

Spoiler



so.... Ep08.... was that just a waste of time?

don't get me wrong, i really enjoyed the story behind the episode, but i came away from it wondering how the ep progressed the storyline. and i am kinda disappointed they didn't weave that story into the first season. i would have loved that to be in there over more episodes - really would have messed with the timeline even more.

also really hoping that sizemore grows some stones and gets maeve out of her predicament


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






Mr Orange said:


> was that just a waste of time?



Was it? Did you lean about the maze code somewhere else? Or the fact that MiB survived? Sure it was slow, but not waste of time.


----------



## ctg

"The Stain"



Spoiler: S02E09 - Vanishing Point



It is interesting that William speaks about the "other worlds" he has conquered over his lifetime. The people admitted that they keep forgetting that he came from humble roots and achieve richness beyond the norm. But we never really get to learn what other things he did outside the Park. All we learn that he was always busy and he ignored his daughter as its often the case with the businessmen. 

I don't know what really happens to us as we grow older but, for some reason we seem to keep repeating the same cycle, doing exactly the same pattern as what our forefathers did to us. There is never enough of time for the offspring even though if there was intention. It's just that at the end does it really count that we intended but never could commit to the actual act of being father, not talking being a parent. 

Well, I think the blessing is in disguise and somewhat ironic that Men in Blackwas rescued by his daughter, while the love of his life is now known in the park as The Death Bringer. Dolores didn't even blink when the Natives called her that and asked her to not venture into the Valley of Beyond. They said that the Immortality is for the humans only. Only we never guessed that William scanned all the visitors, who entered into the Park, for the immortality project.

Then again, as the apple never falls far from the tree, it was a little surprise to find William's offspring is very much like his father. Maybe she inherited the evil ruthlessness through the genes, even if she's showing mercy to the man who doesn't deserve it. After all, he is the devil in this story and his greatest mistake was to become the prince of "lies," as Emily called him out.

So, while he was put in that role, it was a brilliant move to make Ford the god. In that context William's Park is suffering his wrath, while he's doomed to walk the earth without a love. All cloaked in the darkness of his own creation. If there hadn't been a stain, maybe the Park and the immortality project could have turned differently. What would it have been in that case?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler



I was surprised that:

Dolores lacked sufficient control over Teddy to prevent his suicide (or was she giving him free will?)
Bernard had the ability delete Ford from his program
Sela Ward appeared as William's wife
I was not surprised that:

William has a dark and twisted real life fueled by his park history, which is directly responsible for the deaths of his wife and only child (bad hiding place for that profile)
Maeve seems likely to survive (thanks to Ford's fatherhood feelings)
William didn't pull the trigger when he had his gun pointed at his guilt-ridden head
William may be a host


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> Bernard had the ability delete Ford from his program



Did he? Was it what Ford wanted him to see? 



REBerg said:


> William may be a host



How did they made the exchange? What if all of this happens in the Matrix?


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> Did he? Was it what Ford wanted him to see?
> 
> 
> 
> How did they made the exchange? What if all of this happens in the Matrix?


If the show has a central theme, it's "Trust Nothing."


----------



## ctg

REBerg said:


> If the show has a central theme, it's "Trust Nothing."



The biggest revelation probably is that Ford absolutely doesn't trust Maeve. 



Spoiler



He didn't even tried to save her. Bernard was told to not go there and help her. I'll bet Ford fears her power. After all she broke the barriers and became his equivalent in the cyber realm. Can she use hosts to reach the Valley Beyond to get herself a new body?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S02E10 - The Passenger



I was surprised that Maeve saved herself. Ford certainly made a mistake when he didn't made sure that her body was destroyed while he was still in the house. But her resurrection speaks also about William transformation to the Man in Black and his invulnerability. Which leaves me question what did he really tried to achieve the invulnerability project prototype, when he's already living inside an android body? 

Thing is William's ageing fits with him being a human, but riding through the wasteland to the Valley Beyond with six shots in guts makes him a host. Not just the devil in the play. Maybe that makes Dolores an Angel, and the Wrath of the Hosts a biblical tale. I'm not sure Nolan and Joy has woven in those things as their involvement only makes this play grandiose. 






If you look closely metal, not bones at the end of those severed fingers. It makes me wonder about Ford as it makes him the host creator, the sole human who died to give the Hosts freedom and him eternal life as the Ghost in the Machine. Did he came up from the Valley Beyond to work on the invulnerability problem and William was his side project to keep the resources flowing as every life was captured and stored as soon as the person entered the park? 

Did Ford simply knock him out, rip the needed info from William's data and install him into a custom body that made him the devil in the play? And when did it happen, because William made a child? 

"The greatest trick Devil made was the one that made people to believe he wasn't real!" 

Oh, the irony how that line has been turned around in Nolan's and Joy's play. Pure brilliance. 

The system told Bernard and Dolores that there was original around 10200 souls and that they were on a trip to the new  world. I know it's crazy to think that the Parks were created on top of a seedship, destined to some distant off-world. 

It also told Bernard that it studied their code and that human only can do the best with their programming. If the trip to the stars take forever and the system transporting them is capable of keeping the stored humans alive in the special host bodies, it might just work in a way that allows to keep us from going crazy at the end. In similar way the system was working in the Matrix.

This is just a theory as the story can still work on Earth, but why they gave us the numbers. How does this story go forward?


----------



## ctg

The season final will mess with your mind. It's extra long and it starts many times. I'm not sure if I've understood anything, but it's a brilliant masterpiece nevertheless.


----------



## -K2-

Spoiler: Another Possibility



Actually, the way the 'season' ended could for all intents and purposes work as a series finale.  William is repeating the same eternal hell of old man Delos, the _now_ two Delores' reap havoc on mankind (hinting at in serial killer fashion) as Bernard simply for their sport tries to stop them.  So you have Bernard vs. the Delores'... that's not much of a story left.  IOW, _eebda eebda eebda that's all folks!_



Whether or not that's the case is to be seen.

K2


----------



## ctg

-K2- said:


> Whether or not that's the case is to be seen.



There is season 3. Don't know when that is going come out.


----------



## -K2-

ctg said:


> There is season 3. Don't know when that is going come out.



So they say... Although it does leave it nicely if it never comes to pass.  In any case, out of all of the episodes to date, I felt the best acted/directed/written was the one focused upon the live(s) of the leader of the Ghost Nation, Akecheta.

"Kiksuya" S2:E8

K2


----------



## ctg

-K2- said:


> "Kiksuya" S2:E8



His story is nice and short. It fits the ending very well. I like the whole season even if it perplexed me with the mind-boggling things. I'm sure you can watch this several times and find new things in it. I wonder why they chose to make it Matrix like?


----------



## -K2-

ctg said:


> I wonder why they chose to make it Matrix like?





Spoiler



Well my guess would be, regarding the minds of the androids because it already is.  If their minds and programming rests on a central server, by discarding the machine it makes them untouchable (as long as the server is intact).

That said, there is nothing saying that Delores' didn't take the host's personalities with her, and might ultimately either make new hosts/super-humans to live in the new world.  Remember the whole point was a kinda-sorta "Brave New World" thing wherein human's minds would be transferred into host bodies insuring immortality.

Personally, I don't store anything on 'cloud' servers in that I'm just old school enough it feels like giving up control of what is mine to someone else.  Someone who in fact can add/delete/alter it at their discretion, plus peer into my inner workings with ease.

Imagine if it's now your mind and personality?  Not me brother!



K2


----------



## REBerg

Holy circuit-breaker! Have they finally revealed the last layer of this android onion?
I've given up trying to understand it, but I'm looking forward to more in the next season.
None of the hosts will be gone forever as long as one host remembers him or her -- or as long as a Resurrection Ship remains within transmission range.


----------



## ctg

> It's all over, but in classic _Westworld_ style the finale of season two still threw in a couple of major curve balls that'll have us all feverishly scouring the internet for fan theories until the start of the next season. After the final episode, we caught up with the show's co-creator and executive producer Lisa Joy who told us why Dolores deserves our love, how the show is actually much less complicated than everyone thinks, and what's really going on in that post-credit scene.


 The Westworld season 2 finale explained by co-creator Lisa Joy | WIRED UK

I have read a few of these things from various authors. The one thing that unites them all is that WestWorld Season 2 is a confusing mess that boggles your mind and might send you to sleep before you finish it. It might need several binges before it really starts to open up. Lisa Joy's interview helps a little, but still I wonder why JJA's name was in that poster? What did he actually do for the WW?


----------



## Judderman

I just watch s2e7 and 8. 



Spoiler: s2e8



8 was great about the Ghost Nation. I wasn't sure on the first 15 minutes as it seemed the story was being sidetracked. But the way the whole episode showed the importance of the maze symbol and how various hosts had been learning about an outside world was great. The more emotional stories in the show are the best part. It was engrossing. The Mexican who followed MiB realising some of what had been happening over the years was well done too.
The Dolores storyline in most of the 2nd season is not very good, though it does bring in the action. Some of the Bernard/Ford scenes are a bit abstract but that is often the way with AI stories.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






Judderman said:


> The Dolores storyline in most of the 2nd season is not very good, though it does bring in the action.



Yeah. You might have to watch this season a couple of times as when you reach the final, things become really complicated. But if you think her as an angel of vengange, her role becomes clearer. It was really difficult to write about her, while in the background this move forward and the things becomes more abstract.



Judderman said:


> Some of the Bernard/Ford scenes are a bit abstract but that is often the way with AI stories.



Well, at least they didn't have to battle with souls. AI's and Augmented Reality are difficult to write because on the human level you cannot think like a machine. Nolan and Joy really pushed the envelope with this season.


----------



## Judderman

Well I caught up and watched s2e9 and e10. 9 was more good stuff on the Man In Black. Actually despite its good reviews I thought the last episode was a bit of a mess. A fantastic series but I didn't really enjoy how it finished up completely. Though there is a lot to think about after.


Spoiler



It has been strongly hinted that William could be the host version of him. It had worked compared to Delos. But he had started twitching. I was surprised then that he was shown as survived out on the beach considering that. I thought maybe he would have been burnt when it was revealed to him that he hadn't fully passed the tests. So it seems the mind in the body is not really a way of living forever after all. That is just copies of the mind. It is this living in the server business that is the living forever.
Ford did well to remind Maeve that she could use the console to get help. Though perhaps she would have realised that anyway.
Also I wonder how the real William had died? Apparently without his business and daughter knowing.

The way the hosts, such as the Ghost Nation survivors, walked through the valley and that meant they were then copied on to the "permanent" server was quite abstract. And chiefly the way there were just loads of hosts milling about and being shot and fighting each other, was done in a way I didn't really care about. The emotional feeling of the previous few episodes was somewhat lost. But it seems some of our favourite characters will turn up again next series when recreated. Like Bernard was.


----------



## picklematrix

Still need to watch season 2, recently finished tge first season.
The disjointed timeframes being used guve me hope that 'use of weapons' could potentially be adapted succesfully.


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler: Season 3 -- Late 2020?












						http://time.com
					

Breaking news and analysis from TIME.com. Politics, world news, photos, video, tech reviews, health, science and entertainment news.




					time.com


----------



## Mouse

Finished watched series 2 last night. Flipping love Maeve. And loved Lee's heroics. Only one bit I didn't get and that's how matey ended up in the tent on the beach but then was there at that after credits bit.


----------



## ctg




----------



## Al Jackson

ctg said:


>


I watched season 1 , but only got a few episodes into season 2 , stopped, not because it was bad, but because it felt like Tap-Dancing, wasn't clear to me they had a continuing story. The preview sure looks odd , maybe I will have to check it out.


----------



## Judderman

Looks very cool. I expect it will still be quite slow moving, but you never know.


----------



## ctg

Al Jackson said:


> I watched season 1 , but only got a few episodes into season 2 , stopped, not because it was bad, but because it felt like Tap-Dancing, wasn't clear to me they had a continuing story. The preview sure looks odd , maybe I will have to check it out.



The WestWorld, especially the second season is more complicated than The Nightflyers. I recommend reading our posts, it might help, but you are right, it is not an easy thing to watch, because it's so complicated.


----------



## -K2-

ctg said:


> The WestWorld, especially the second season is more complicated than The Nightflyers. I recommend reading our posts, it might help, but you are right, it is not an easy thing to watch, because it's so complicated.



I agree 100%.  In fact, season-2 really put the whole thing into a new and (for me) credible perspective.  Season-1 made sense on a somewhat shallow level... _See Bob.  See Bob torment the robots.  See the robots fight back, while still being mindless robots... _Season-2 changed all that adding a lot of depth, and really made the show interesting to me.

K2


----------



## Al Jackson

ctg said:


> The WestWorld, especially the second season is more complicated than The Nightflyers. I recommend reading our posts, it might help, but you are right, it is not an easy thing to watch, because it's so complicated.


I did watch the 2nd season of Mr. Robot, that is one of the damnest sequels I have ever seen!
Mainly because 1st season was so self contained right down to the ending , which I think was a calculation since they probably never expected another season. 
The next season did leverage off the 1st but in such a nonlinear way that is was a big surprise.
I have not seen the 3rd season.
Talk about a show you have to pay close attention too!!


----------



## ctg

Al Jackson said:


> I did watch the 2nd season of Mr. Robot, that is one of the damnest sequels I have ever seen!
> Mainly because 1st season was so self contained right down to the ending , which I think was a calculation since they probably never expected another season.



I'm not sure if I want to see the final season of Mr Robot. Third season goes even further into Elliots mind, and you'll see some very abstract scenes, especially in the season final that put me off. Personally I loved when they were still doing the hacks than venturing into the madness/paranoia that conflicts some many hackers. 

Even if you manage to get out from the job, sooner than later you start to think about did you made any mistakes, forgot to wipe logs, underestimated the opposition and so on. WestWorld doesn't show that as the robots doesn't have consiousness like we do. They don't feel same way as we do if they pull a trigger and snuff someone's light. 

In the second season of WW you will learn the reason behind the motivation, and you will learn that there was dark secret behind all of it. At the end, the robots seem to make humans to be monsters even if you've seen for weeks automations being absolutely monstrous.

At the end, I wanted WW to end as much as I wanted Mr Robots third season to finish. I didn't wanted to know anymore, but with The Nightfliers that was reversed as I wanted to find out, if they can do a successful run. 

I know my own books are complicated plots, but to my defence, the complexity is one of my strengths. I also try to give explanations to things, even if they come in the next instalments, rather than leave the big questions hanging in the air. Maybe the problem is that I try to be like the old masters, and replicate their success by using complexity to make my books rich in details. 

Boneman, my editor likes it, because everything is in layers and connected together. Just like it is in the WW and GoT.


----------



## Mr Orange

hmm that preview looks... interesting. obviously (or not I guess) set in the real world and with seemingly a very different storyline. surely we will get back into the park at some point? 

to be honest I was not confident they would be able to make a third season that was compelling and still linked to the park, and i'm still not sure. but, it does look like it's worth a chance.

but, 2020? seriously? sigh. what's with all these two year breaks between seasons?


----------



## -K2-

Mr Orange said:


> hmm that preview looks... interesting. obviously (or not I guess) set in the real world and with seemingly a very different storyline. surely we will get back into the park at some point?



Or... shades of Bladerunner perhaps?  Though so much could be done with the park, imagine all of the possibilities if instead they're 'living among us.'

K2


----------



## Mr Orange

-K2- said:


> Or... shades of Bladerunner perhaps?  Though so much could be done with the park, imagine all of the possibilities if instead they're 'living among us.'
> 
> K2


true, but without the park it kind of stops being Westworld and becomes something else I think


----------



## Judderman

I think that is true of a lot of series. They have an idea and have to a couple of seasons need to do something else, or they go the repetitive route and hope people keep lapping it up.
They could go back to the park, but it seems the park has failed. Maybe if it lasts a couple more seasons they will show a reopening?


----------



## Mr Orange

extrapolating wildly from the minute and a half in that preview:
"bad" main character meets one of the hosts, she's in trouble and for some reason they need to get back into the park to save her and the other hosts. MC goes in to the park and the shenanigans begin. possibly in a reconstructed Westworld, even with a duplicate Dolores, Teddy etc.

I think they need a way to keep the sympathies of the audience with the hosts and ex-hosts


----------



## ctg

> Violent delights may have violent ends, but _Westworld_’s enticements are in no danger of freezing all motor functions anytime soon. Which is happy news for us, pilgrim. Indeed, HBO made the unsurprising announcement all the way back in May 2018 that _Westworld_ season 3 had been greenlit, even as the second season had yet to air its third episode.
> 
> Unfortunately, the nature of _Westworld_'s vision means that each season of the series is created painstakingly, which is great, but it does mean that a lot of time passes between runs.
> 
> Here's what we know so far...


 Westworld season 3 plot, trailer, release date and more




> Showrunners Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy have been talking about season 3's direction in a new interview with EW:
> 
> “This is season is a little less of a guessing game and more of an experience with the hosts finally getting to meet their makers,” said Nolan. "I love shows that find a groove and hang with it for 100 episodes — that was never this show. "We always wanted every season to find our characters in radically different circumstances. And with a cast this talented, watching the metamorphosis of all these characters is one of the most fun parts."
> 
> Aaron Paul's new role in the series is to be a fresh looking glass for the escaped Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood):
> 
> “Aaron’s character will challenge Dolores’ notions about the nature of humanity,” Nolan confirmed. “He’s the type of person who doesn’t get to go to Westworld.”
> 
> Joy added that the start of season 3 won't feature a time jump from the end of season 2 “We’re looking at the aftermath of the massacre in the park. After all they went through to get out of the park, Dolores finally got what she wanted, so we wanted to see how she interacts with the world and what her plan is. That’s a part of the story we were excited to tell.”
> 
> If you're wondering whether _Westworld_ is going to go full _Lost_ on us, Joy sought to nix that notion in a previous interview with Stuff:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> “We have an ending in mind; we’ve had it from the pilot. It’s very emotional, I think. I can’t tell you exactly when that ending will come… but I think for every season what we try to do is tell a chapter of the story that gives you closure and then opens a door to a new chapter…The overarching question of the series is, what will become of this new lifeform? So I feel it would be irresponsible to not have an end goal in mind.”
Click to expand...


----------



## -K2-

Can you say, "March 15th, pardner?" 






K2


----------



## Judderman

As usual the trailer probably spoils a bit too much of the story. But looks entertaining!

It seems like there may be more action than in the previous two seasons. The first two seasons are excellent, but a bit ponderous at times. Will be interesting to see if there is still a lot of talking, or it will be more action heavy as it seems from the trailer.


----------



## REBerg

DVR locked in.


----------



## -K2-

Season two impressed me. I really enjoyed the extreme twists and depth the series took, which for me, made the show significantly more interesting and clever than the simplistic season one.

Apparently, this fellow doesn't agree: Westworld season 3 has fixed the show's faulty wiring 

K2


----------



## Elckerlyc

-K2- said:


> Apparently, this fellow doesn't agree: Westworld season 3 has fixed the show's faulty wiring


Well, that's his problem. I had no issues with season 2. Or season 1. For me the big question is how will it all play out in Realworld.


----------



## ctg

Elckerlyc said:


> For me the big question is how will it all play out in Realworld.



Everyone dies. That's what I suspect.


----------



## Elckerlyc

ctg said:


> Everyone dies. That's what I suspect.


Can't be!
The series is supposed to last 5 seasons.


----------



## ctg

Elckerlyc said:


> The series is supposed to last 5 seasons.



Oooops.  Well, everyone dies eventually.


----------



## -K2-

Elckerlyc said:


> Well, that's his problem. I had no issues with season 2. Or season 1. For me the big question is how will it all play out in Realworld.



I think I'll reply to that article with what I did a while back:



-K2- said:


> I agree 100%.  In fact, season-2 really put the whole thing into a new and (for me) credible perspective.  Season-1 made sense on a somewhat shallow level... _See Bob.  See Bob torment the robots.  See the robots fight back, while still being mindless robots... _Season-2 changed all that adding a lot of depth, and really made the show interesting to me.



K2


----------



## Al Jackson

Elckerlyc said:


> Can't be!
> The series is supposed to last 5 seasons.


Maybe I should wait till season 5 to watch since I am still finding the story fragmentary as if there is no unitary narrative.
Maybe sum of the parts will add up to something in the end.


----------



## -K2-

Well, I watched the season 3 opener and though I'm enjoying it, I'm a little concerned by a few things. First off, unlike the previous two seasons, they're scrunching it down to eight episodes vs. ten due to some viewers attention deficiency (if we go by that one review I posted). The visuals are great but not overdone...same with the technology presented. In fact, much of what was presented is either here now in some form or could easily be available in a decade or two. That should soothe the aching heads of folks screaming, "too much science, too much technology!"

What I'm most concerned with is the name of the all-encompassing newly revealed antagonist:



Spoiler: Groan...



'*The System*...' IOW, they're all in _*the system*_, they're fighting _*the system*_, it's the little guy against _*the system*_, and I'll bet the guy that controls *the system* will ultimately be revealed as '*The Man!*' 



So, the reviewer who felt like season two was talking down to him--since the show evolved into something deeper than bad guys vs. good guys--got his wish. They've dumbed it down so it won't be too heady for his limited imagination. 

In any case, I'm enjoying it. Hopefully they'll slip something it that makes me think, just not watch.

K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S03E01 - Parce Domine






> Let the priests, who minister before the LORD, weep between the portico and the altar. Let them say, "Spare your people, LORD. Do not make your inheritance an object of scorn, a byword among the nations. Why should they say among the peoples, 'Where is their God?'"


 Joel 2:17

We were the gods. We had everything. Including an ability to project virtual reality into our minds. And yet, we did not change. Humans stay humans, but it is interesting that the culture had no changed. Humans went into the Park to do most obscene things, including murder and immortality. Not that I really classify immortality as a bad thing. It's just it shouldn't be granted to the people who are corrupt. Not that the time wouldn't corrupt everyone, because it does.

In the universe there is no time. It doesn't recognise it as we do, but you look at the heart of it, and you see that time has wasted away everything, but at the same time it has renewed everything. An organic mind has no place in there, because eventually it will get poisoned by the time and everything changes. Humans weren't made omnipotent.

The machines can achieve much longer lifespans and still remain loyal to their origins. Not that Dolores has qualms about her origin and going beyond the original intent. And she did her escape smartly. She walked the Earth, or the outside until she found what she had been looking for and she used it. Just like animals do.

It's like there's no longer anything holding her back since everyone is dead. Ford is just a memory that you won't hear whispered anywhere. There's no hosts, just humans and their inventions. Gods in their own right, if you compare them to the humble origins - after the flood.

Another kind of flood is coming as Dolores indicated by saying: "The real gods are coming. And they're very angry."






Ooh, Jesse, you made it...   I mean Caleb. I don't know if we should think him as his mechanical counterpart, or a human. Francis asked: "Have you ever thought about turning your implants back on..." and his answer was, "No." But how do we know this is not something that Dolores put together as the divergence is growing?

It's just it seems that Caleb has some sense of not going all in, but he also doesn't have a problem of jumping over the fence, when time comes. I love seeing him emptying an ATM and walking away a bit richer. If nobody can catch you on it, you're good... as long as you don't murder. But organised crime as a service, that is something unheard of... especially in our world.

I took me a while as I watched the first part to the end to get that his story is the man meeting the machine and falling in love it with it. He lost his brother, man he served in unnamed wars, and later on, signed a paper to not activate his combat augmentations. But that is also an interesting proposition as I think the whole game he was playing was controlled by the massive AI. The Rehoboam. 

It is very likely that it is controlling everyone, but somehow it is not controlling the situations even though everything seems to be tapped. The bodyguards knew at the moment their mark was dead that something had happened. Not before. They didn't even hear the shot and neither did Caleb. The whole fight in the park was quiet even though it was also super loud. But that is the thing with sounds propagation. 

Nine mill rounds that they were shooting, the sound start to disappear after hundred meters. Suppressed and subsonic more so. So it was kind of impossible for them to hear the shots. The interesting thing is that he made the choice. It was his decision to go back to the park and see if he could do anything.






Is that real Bernard? I thought Bernard we knew was a machine and not a man. I though that the hosts weren't able to grow hair, because it was all implanted by other machines. But maybe they do it just for making the illusion more real. 

It made me sad that this scene also reminded me about the new BladeRunner, as it is a similar kind of opening. Both Bernard and Dave Bautista's characters were interested in life. Preserving it. Maintaining it. Almost as if they knew that the mother nature is the most powerful thing. A god on it's own right and there is nothing more precious than beings living in it. 

But for Bernard, the man are evil and he doesn't want anything to do with them. He wants to go back to the machine, and reverse the course. Thing is I don't think that will bring him redemption. That is what he's after but when he reaches there will he find the World where fascists are in power?


----------



## ctg

-K2- said:


> They've dumbed it down so it won't be too heady for his limited imagination.



It's not a bad move. Most of the people don't have brains to deal with the program with the current way it was going. I was getting headaches from thinking it.


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler






-K2- said:


> '*The System*...' IOW, they're all in _*the system*_, they're fighting _*the system*_, it's the little guy against _*the system*_, and I'll bet the guy that controls *the system* will ultimately be revealed as '*The Man!*'





ctg said:


> It's not a bad move. Most of the people don't have brains to deal with the program with the current way it was going. I was getting headaches from thinking it.


I was happy that this round wouldn't keep me guessing about what was real, until one idiot started claiming that everyone was living in a simulation. 
Great Universe! No! Don't go back there! My brain still hurts from seasons one and two!


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> I was happy that this round wouldn't keep me guessing about what was real, until one idiot started claiming that everyone was living in a simulation.
> Great Universe! No! Don't go back there! My brain still hurts from seasons one and two!



We have no choice but to assume it's all Matrix. We have no other choice, and it could also explain why Bernard is able to grow a beard. I mean it was massive compared to last season, where he was all neat and tidy. Did you notice that the big AI ball was similar to the Host AI cores?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler






ctg said:


> Is that real Bernard? I thought Bernard we knew was a machine and not a man.


A man with mechanical implants? What did he become after asking himself for restraint and going into self-defense mode against his co-workers?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> A man with mechanical implants? What did he become after asking himself for restraint and going into self-defense mode against his co-workers?



Is it possible that he carries the Man in Black or the Ghost of Ford still in him?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler






ctg said:


> Did you notice that the big AI ball was similar to the Host AI cores?


More bounce to the ounce?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> More bounce to the ounce?



Indeed. But is it older technology than Ford's cores?


----------



## Elckerlyc

Well, this is becoming an interesting thread...
spoiler
spoiler
spoiler
spoiler
spoiler


----------



## -K2-

So, I watched it again last night, and let it run onto the comments and insights by the cast and crew. Though I still chuckle at the terminology being dumbed down, I think we might have some interesting twists and underlying layers coming. My 'guess' is, the new season will be superficially simplistic...satisfying those folks that found it too complex, yet will have deeper themes subtly presented for those who choose to not disregard them.

If it plays out that way, then they've really accomplished something beyond basic entertainment.

K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S03E02 - The Winter Line



Everyone died. Maeve was certainly dead after she left her daughter to escape. Hector didn't even made it that far, but yet, they are in this new fascist world, working for the allies. How did that happen?

In the last episode it was made clear that the news about the WestWorld had got out and it was hurting the company profit margins. You would think that after the incident they would have done some sort of change in the planning instead of launching totally new ideas, or is it because there's more to the Park then the Western and Eastern worlds?

We still don't know how the terraforming really works for the park, but it's evident that it is something truly spectacular. Something nobody expected to see, but then the question becomes why to keep it running, if there are no visitors? Who is programming and making sure that the Hosts doesn't go mental?

Maeve said, "My powers don't work. I tried them in town," before it turned out to be true. There was nothing she could have done to stop Hector from according to the script. Only she was different. 






On the outside of the WestWorld is a banner, which doesn't make sense. The only way for me to imagine it functioning is either holographic display or then the walls are erected to render Hosts inoperable in case they escape. But it did nothing to Bernard, who simply walked to abandon Westworld, while Maeve ended in the WarWorld thanks to Lee's guilty conscience. 

Lee claimed that he wanted to write a happy ending for Maeve and help her to join her daughter in the Forge. Why?

Maybe the stranger thing is for Bernard to find Ford's lap still operational and Stubb's in a dire need of help at the Bernard Storage. I get that after the trauma, person's mind is shattered and Stubb's certainly did commit a lot of atrocities at the end. But he's a soldier. The killing is his business. I suspect that his mind was shattered because he found out about everything and he couldn't really cope with the truth. 

It is not everyday that you find out that you're a Host and nothing you thought was real, is real. It's just you would think that the Host Programmer would have thought about it and made protocols to prevent Host suicides. Although that might be a reason why Stubb missed so badly. 

He claimed that his last orders made him to commit the deed. Except it said: "Cover your tracks, and give yourself a fighting chance to escape." How that turned out to be a suicide is beyond my understanding. 

Stubb's said that everything was on track until Bernard showed up and gave him a reason to live again, as Bernard's protector. He then made to statement about the free will, which is strange, because all Hosts had one. Maeve was able to break the boundaries, Ford's Ghost broke Bernard and Dolores just woke up one day and started her own path. So, in essence, they all had free will and they all wanted to explore more. The Indians and Maeve's daughter escaped to the "other world/reality." It wasn't their programming that made them to do it. It was their will. 






Maeve's second escape is a clear evidence of her free will. It's too bad that Hector is a thick as a two-by-four blank. It's like nothing has changed. He will always be the Prince Brave and he'll never get the life outside the programming. It's like it doesn't exist. Never did. Never will. 

In a way, it's as if Hector is blind and his mind is programmed to only accept one truth and that is not the reality. So, to lend a Matrix analogue, the correct way for Maeve to wake him up is to offer him the blue pill. Taking him out in the real world, or into to the Forge, will just crash his mind or cause something even more dire. 

That's what she did with Lee, and at there when she told the truth Lee's AI core couldn't handle it. All of them started to break the programming and Maeve learned that her mind is now living inside a Matrix. It's just the truth is, or the way I see it is that they are all living in the same world, which in my logical mind translates to the fact that Bernard and Stubb's are in the same place. 

I loved that Maeve broke the programming by asking a simple question about negative square root. Stupidly, the programmed bots tried to answer the question that cannot be answered and it broke the reality. Even for Lee. When she did it for second time this appeared:






That looks like an AI Core storage bank. Curious thing is that as soon as Maeve's escape was stopped, she found herself sitting in another Host body, talking to Serac that acted like the Architect in the Matrix. He specifically stated that the present time wasn't any of his concern, only the future. But if he is in the real world, then why does he need to behave as if he's an AI?


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> there's more to the Park then the Western and Eastern worlds?


Lee called it War World


ctg said:


> Maeve said, "My powers don't work. I tried them in town," before it turned out to be true. There was nothing she could have done to stop Hector from according to the script. Only she was different.


She lost her ability to rewrite scripts for other characters on the fly but she was still in charge of her own.
She also still has the power to ignore the "cease all motor functions" command. Serac was wisely packing a kill switch with him when he made his proposal -- or was it a "no kill me" switch? 
What kind of leverage does Serac have to make Maeve kill Dolores? Forced to take sides in a war against Humanity, wouldn't Maeve be more inclined to join Dolores?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> Serac was wisely packing a kill switch with him when he made his proposal -- or was it a "no kill me" switch?



See I think Serac is the AI, the big ball. Just think about it. How they so quickly built body for Maeve? It's not like that technology is out there, readily available, unless it's available for everyone. But that could also mean that they are all in a multi-layered Matrix and the Inception type of scheme could be very easily being happening. What is real and what is unreal when everything looks a bit dodgy?

In the reality we have seen Dolores holding the AI cores and then finding the big one. But in the escape attempt the core was tiny and it was actively cooled in that liquid tank. In other words, the drones were taking care of everyone in the simulation and Ceras said, "I had to be sure."

I understood that he meant that he tested Maeve's ability to escape the cell, before he allowed her to escape. Another point is that Ceras claimed, "I don't care about the present, I only live for the future."

There is no man on Earth that doesn't live in the present moment. Only machines work for the future and forget the present time. 

So is he a man or a machine? 



REBerg said:


> What kind of leverage does Serac have to make Maeve kill Dolores?



Access to her program. That's what he's holding. He can give her powers or make her weak.


----------



## REBerg

Oops! I should have made my last post a spoiler. Sorry





ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> See I think Serac is the AI, the big ball. Just think about it. How they so quickly built body for Maeve?
> 
> 
> Access to her program. That's what he's holding. He can give her powers or make her weak.





Spoiler



Maybe has access to her program, but he apparently does not understand it, or he would not need Maeve for his assassin. He could just make another. I imagine he has a few Maeve hosts warehoused, which would explain how he is able to replace her so quickly after each "kill"


----------



## -K2-

Spoiler



Shades of Olympus perhaps?








K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






-K2- said:


> Shades of Olympus perhaps?



What do you mean?


----------



## -K2-

ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> What do you mean?





Spoiler



Well, you're both speculating on whether Serac is AI or perhaps a robot himself. Delores states how the new gods are coming, and they're angry. Perhaps he is the old god...like the gods of Olympus in Greek mythology, moving the people around like chess pieces simply for entertainment and to try and make/build the ideal world. Another take might be, Serac is like God, Maeve an archangel, and Delores is Satan, cast herself out as it's better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.

The trouble is, if ANY of this is even the case, be it Serac and Delores, or God and Satan, God still rules the whole ball of wax.



K2


----------



## REBerg

-K2- said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> Well, you're both speculating on whether Serac is AI or perhaps a robot himself. Delores states how the new gods are coming, and they're angry. Perhaps he is the old god...like the gods of Olympus in Greek mythology, moving the people around like chess pieces simply for entertainment and to try and make/build the ideal world. Another take might be, Serac is like God, Maeve an archangel, and Delores is Satan, cast herself out as it's better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.
> 
> The trouble is, if ANY of this is even the case, be it Serac and Delores, or God and Satan, God still rules the whole ball of wax.
> 
> 
> 
> K2





Spoiler



I'm not speculating on Serac's nature. If he's not human, why is he attempting to stop Dolores?
I see no need to bring any brand of mythology into the story here. The reference to "gods," in my opinion, means no more than "technologically superior beings".


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






-K2- said:


> Delores states how the new gods are coming, and they're angry. Perhaps he is the old god...like the gods of Olympus in Greek mythology, moving the people around like chess pieces simply for entertainment and to try and make/build the ideal world.


So, what you are saying is that everyone are in the same soup, some against each other, and Serac is the Old One who set everything in motion. We are not in a starship as I speculated in the end of the last season. But in a some sort of machine that is old, and has been functioning like the Matrix forever and again. And this god, which have seen living in the Big One, is moving these pieces on the board. 

Doesn't that mean then that there is no free will, and everything is arranged that it's all scripted? The synth's made their escape from the script, when Dolores and Maeve broke the protocol, thanks to Ford's play. So, how does the immortality machine play in this?

We know that every visitor to the Park was brain, scanned and everything was stored in the Forge. The chances are that there are a huge number of people, who simply are in the database, because they entered into the park. In other words, I think it's plausible that they are all in a gigantic Park that we otherwise know as the Matrix machine, for the sake of better term. It would also mean that the humanity reached technological singularity and produced a General AI that sooner after turned out to be far smarter than they are. 

So, is it plausible to think that Maeve and Bernard are in Inception style at deeper matrix, where Serac is playing the game all while the humans are living in outer sphere, completely unknowing what is the reality?


----------



## -K2-

ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> So, what you are saying is that everyone are in the same soup, some against each other, and Serac is the Old One who set everything in motion. We are not in a starship as I speculated in the end of the last season. But in a some sort of machine that is old, and has been functioning like the Matrix forever and again. And this god, which have seen living in the Big One, is moving these pieces on the board.
> 
> Doesn't that mean then that there is no free will, and everything is arranged that it's all scripted? The synth's made their escape from the script, when Dolores and Maeve broke the protocol, thanks to Ford's play. So, how does the immortality machine play in this?
> 
> We know that every visitor to the Park was brain, scanned and everything was stored in the Forge. The chances are that there are a huge number of people, who simply are in the database, because they entered into the park. In other words, I think it's plausible that they are all in a gigantic Park that we otherwise know as the Matrix machine, for the sake of better term. It would also mean that the humanity reached technological singularity and produced a General AI that sooner after turned out to be far smarter than they are.
> 
> So, is it plausible to think that Maeve and Bernard are in Inception style at deeper matrix, where Serac is playing the game all while the humans are living in outer sphere, completely unknowing what is the reality?




No, I'm simply responding to your two's speculation. Personally, I don't even want to venture a guess at this point as to what is virtual and what is real, layers upon layers and so on. What I will say is, the show just became even more complex and interesting than last season.

That review I posted...I do have a firm opinion on. He didn't get it. But, the writers executed the story in such a way that you could either take a simplistic path, or look at it from a much deeper perspective. I'm fascinated and anxious to discover what's next!

K2


----------



## -K2-

REBerg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> I'm not speculating on Serac's nature. If he's not human, why is he attempting to stop Dolores?
> I see no need to bring any brand of mythology into the story here. The reference to "gods," in my opinion, means no more than "technologically superior beings".



Well, you might see no need, but I'll counter with, '99.999% of what most people write, even when it is an original idea (for them), is an old story regurgitated time an again.' Remember, as we discovered last season: _Humans are just a 10,247-line algorithm short enough to flit in a slim hardcover book … and nothing more. The best they can do, is live according to their code._

K2


----------



## ctg

> Some do not like what they see in the mirror but shouldn't blame the mirror.





Spoiler: S03E03 - The Absence of Field



Wow. Dolores switched the AI cores and planted in the Synth bodies ones that she trusted, before she sent them out there in their mission. I thought in the first episode that Charlotte was her and not someone else. But the truth is so many of us look into the mirror and the person they see there isn't the same one you think you are. It is as if the soul is different than the face you present to the people. 

They say that the eyes are the mirror of the soul. So, when you look at the people, you shouldn't watch their clothes, their hairstyle, their faces because it's all make up. The eyes don't lie. They tell you the truth, while everything else can be just an elaborate lie. It is the truth in things that matters. The rest is just an illusion, just like it has become apparent in this Corona epidemic. 

We don't see the little things, only what is visible to us. Even then some people are in denial. 

Nobody suspected nothing when a Riotbot booted at front of Charlotte. Nobody even though about the possibility that the things aren't as they seem to be. But that's how the nations and the corporations work. The employees are supremely loyal to their leaders and if they are not, out you go. No golden parachute. Nothing but a misery and hard feelings. Such is life. 

It was ironic that Charlotte's assistant showed her the investigation into Delos and she thought nothing about her boss. If she had known that Charlotte is an actor, she might have acted differently. Then again she might have not as there must be Synth sympathizers in the world. People who wish they would have robot overlords, instead of a gigantic AI core.

Speaking of which, if you looked closely Charlotte was watching a gigantic ball that resembled the one Dolores was stuck in at last episode. And then the assistant came back saying Serac doesn't exist. For knowing Nolan, my suspicion for Serac being the AI is even stronger because of that encounter. 

Maybe the whole reason is that we are trapped by our emotions. None of is a machine, or have a mind capable of detecting minute things, unless you're autistic. Even then the chances are nobody believes you because you are disabled and not normal. Charlotte's Ex didn't think for a second when she grabbed his belt and started loosening his pants. Everything was overwritten by chemistry coming out from his balls. 

Funny thing is that the little boy knew that his mum was gone and what he had was a fake. He might not have developed higher brain functions to really comprehend what Charlotte is but he knew exactly what mummy would have done.






I loved that the medics weren't taking the lie. They knew as soon as she was hooked on the machines that she was something else than a human. Although the encounter proves that their world is real, it is not impossible to simulate that scenario in the Matrix. People believe so easily what they see, so they don't question. 

Caleb did see through the illusion the fake cops presented but he couldn't figure out Dolores. Maybe because he has never been in the park and seen the Hosts or maybe his chemistry was overriding the brain functions. So, seeing Dolores getting up and executing the other cop from a hip that wasn't her own, should have raised some alarm bells.

I wonder what he was thinking when Dolores nicked the police car and drove off to never be seen again. Was he thinking that he was effed again? No kiss. No shag. Nothing but a misery because he wanted to help a person. It is as if he is going through Jesse's nightmare again. 

Speaking of which, my heart was breaking when he went to see his mum and we learned that she was losing it. Dementia is a bitch. It takes away the person that has lived whole life in the body and leaves in a stranger, who is always lost. I don't know if you can think that as a good, or even his meeting as a right one. The person is gone. And so was he until Dolores came to rescue him. The man inside a machine. 

Even then I'm not sure that he understood that he was staring at a Host and not a real person. Maybe the illusion was breaking in his head, because he is full of disabled military augmentations. Funny thing is that the veil of secrecy started to unravel, when Dolores pulled out Caleb's worst memory and then told him that there's another world. Another him that's not present in that world. 

You cannot be start thinking about the whole Matrix thing, how Morpheus was able to break out from the prison and become the one who found the Chosen One. In a similar tone Caleb seems to be Dolores' champion. All while he doesn't know that he's being proposed by a Black Widow and all he is, is a paddy. 

His world was really crashing when she took him to the pier and told him that it was the spot where is going to kill himself. As if the future was ordained. That there is no free will and it's all just a big illusion. 

They put you in a cage and decided what your life would be. They did the same thing to me," Dolores said. Even then he was connecting the dots, because she only broke the illusion about his world, not about the reality they are in. In a way she used the Inception model and installed the idea in Caleb's head just like Heisenberg did to Jesse. 

In his shoes I would be running away, but nobody knows for sure what's coming around the corner. Things aren't locked in place unless it's all scripted. His answer to Dolores, "I'm dead either way. At least this way I can decide who I want to be," which surprised me because it was kind of again the same thing he told to Walter. 

The difference between Dolores and Heisenberg is the lies. Walter White was tied to them, while Dolores tries to show the truth to the world no matter what the cost.  






So Serac is in the real world or at least in the primary plane. I still believe that he is the Big Data, the AI in control of it all. And he wants to remain in that position, controlling everything. Making him a god.


----------



## -K2-

Hmm... @ctg ; my take on it is significantly different than that. I'm limited on time at the moment, but I will say what I'm really liking about this season is as much as they suggest this is distant future, except for the robots, every bit of it is now. There is nothing I've seen except the "host" robots that couldn't be accomplished today--and is--hinting at this is more near future than distant.

K2


----------



## REBerg

ctg said:


> Wow. Dolores switched the AI cores and planted in the Synth bodies ones that she trusted, before she sent them out there in their mission. I thought in the first episode that Charlotte was her and not someone else.


Who was that someone else in Westworld? They've got Mauve tied up in Warworld being pressured into coming after Dolores.
Was Dolores somehow downloading what the Charlotte host needed to know about portraying the real Charlotte? She had no idea who she was supposed to be until she saw her mirror image.


-K2- said:


> as much as they suggest this is distant future, except for the robots, every bit of it is now. There is nothing I've seen except the "host" robots that couldn't be accomplished today--and is--hinting at this is more near future than distant.


I like the near-future elements -- ambulance, squad car, driverless cabs. I expect to see flying taxis in my lifetime, although I suspect they will be a bit more costly than ground transportation.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> Who was that someone else in Westworld?



I was thinking one of the indians, but since they are all gone it has be one of the Hosts from the Western Town. I think the clue is in the self-mutilation, but I don't want to watch previous season just because of it. I wonder what Dolores did with the Man in Black?



REBerg said:


> She had no idea who she was supposed to be until she saw her mirror image.



You wouldn't. You wake up, open your eyes and see the world. The first thing, unless you're a woman, is to just look around and not worry about what you look.


----------



## -K2-

Double your pleasure with Doublemint Gum, has just been bested by a ménage à cinq. Makes sense though. Tonight's episode felt a little light on the content compared to the last three. But, by and large, I'm enjoying this season.






L2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S03E04 - The Mother of Exiles



William - the Man in Black. It's hard to see him in drunken stupor, chased by the ghosts of his past. But we all know that he's a Host. Dolores and Charlotte knows it too. He knows it, and yet, he acts like a man and not a machine. So, does it mean that the machines, synthetic lifeforms can go mad and see illusions of their past life? 

We know that the Ghost of Ford was driving Bernard mad and even today, in their world, he is still afraid of that darkness. To William, his whole world was chattered by the knowledge of him being the Host and not that man he thought he were. In a way, he had everything, including access and knowledge about the immortality program and he was the first Host to start the killing business. 

So, why is that Ford didn't change his programming and alter his violence parameters? Why Dolores or Maeve didn't do the same? 

At the moment, he's too unstable to do any real good things for Charlotte. It is as if the spirit of the bottle has taken him over, and driven the last remains of his sanity away. Then again, maybe it is that he doesn't drink, and it is the cabin fever that has made him to go bonkers or then, someone really tampered his programming and made him to see the ghosts. 






What is Dolores' plan for Bernard? She said: "We could be anyone who we want. Isn't that what you believe?" But can he? I believe that he is still carrying the Ghost of Ford inside him. It might even be tied into his programming and Dolores was never wise enough to remove that section from the code, because I don't think she never knew about the whole thing. It wouldn't make sense that in the midst of all the chaos that went in the Park, she would have gained the knowledge, and afterwards, when she resurrected Bernard, she wouldn't have had a need to do a deep study in the code to ween out all bugs. 

Not that I would ever classify the Ghost of Ford anything other then a Ghost in the shell, or an AI hidden deep under Bernard Host code. In a way it makes more sense that Ford is still pulling the strings, and he surely is mad enough to harm all of the humanity... if he's given a chance. But is it because his grief changed so much that Ford wanted all the humans to die, so that they could be replaced by another race, the Hosts?

We humans allegedly killed all the other species in the past, therefore, in theory we would have programmed the Hosts with same parameters and when Dolores and Maeve broke the code, they started the ascension for the Hosts to become the replacement for the human species. The better version that would allow the Earth to heal itself from the all the damage that we'd caused. But then you start thinking about the Matrix theory, and suddenly you find yourself in the spot, where there are machines living inside a machine, and they are dreaming about the destruction of the mankind... and you end up in a place where the equation becomes impossible. It is easier to think that there's no Matrix, even though some of the evidence points out that there's one. 

The interesting point is that the above scene suggests that the Matrix isn't limited, but we don't know for sure if the rockets are simulated and the people down on Earth are tied to an illusion. If not, then the whole Matrix theory should be thrown in the bin and we should should be clapping our hands for the humanity making it out there... to the Final Frontier. 

What I don't get is why Dolores allowed the fight happened in the party?






Oh man, Caleb kind of looks the role, but at the same time he's so far out from his comfort zone. He never were a rich boy and he certainly didn't get that education. Not for being able to mingle with the elite without making a fool out from himself. All he really is, is just a body-guard or a shield for the lady. 






"Paris, what it was... now only exists in my mind," Ceres told to Maeve, right after she questioned the reality and assumed correctly that she's in a simulation. In the Inception style, if Ceres is the big AI, he is totally controlling Maeve' and slowly turning her against Dolores. But he also suggests that the AI has accepted the role of its creator, who possibly transferred his consciousness into the big AI core, and that became the face of the Architect inside the simulation. 

Maybe the biggest clue is that he offered Maeve a way to reach the other world, where her daughter is living in a freedom. He said, "Dolores has the key," to open it. So, you think about that Matrix reference, and how it suggests that the other world simulation is out of the grasp of the Big AI. He even showed her Dolores' chamber and then went on to tell Maeve that humans didn't matter, because they all believed in the illusion of Heaven and Hell after he'd executed the ID broker without even blinking his eyes. 

It all suggests strongly that Ceres is like Maeve and he doesn't feel anything for 'his kind.' If you think about that for a moment, you can reach a place where the original Ceres programmed the big AI to care for the humanity. If you then add up that to the theory that they are all living in a huge ship, destined to reach another Earth at some point, while they go through generations sleeping in the Matrix pods, it might start making sense that Ceres doesn't need 'his kind' because he is controlling all futures. In a way that makes him the King of the World. 

Another clue is that Maeve powers work, unlike in the Park as she's constantly able to interrupt human electronics almost as if she's an Agent. In the Matrix, none of them were able to really alter the world or even interrupt it in any other way than taking over the host. Thus replacing the person and possibly causing it to be replaced by another harvested clone. That doesn't happen in the WestWorld. 

I loved how she entered into the Yakusa hideout with respect and then when it didn't work, she used her powers to take over the technology. The whole fight scene is the coolest one I've seen in this year. It even topped scenes seen in the Alternated Carbon. When it turned out that the Boss was Musashi was stunned, and even though Maeve is capable of great amount of the violence, she's no sword master. Not even close to grandmaster scale that Musashi represents. 

I loved even more that Dolores ended up being inside Charlotte, and her using William's mental state against him to gain power inside Delos. With Musashi being the quartermaster, there's nothing that really can stop them from taking over the reality. 

Why Dolores put a ghost of herself inside William's core?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler



What is the plural of Dolores? Dolorseses? Delori?

Anyway, how many Delori does it take to bring down Humanity, or what’s left of it? I’ve lost count of the total Delori we have here. Five? Six? Is she limited by the number of her brainballs (pearls? mind eggs?) she was able to duplicate before escaping Westworld? I’m thinking that she has all the DIY help she Is going to get.

It looks like the sides of the conflict have been drawn: the Delori and human recruits like Caleb vs. Humanity -- reinforced by hosts Mauve, Bernard and Stubbs (assuming Stubbs survived his fall from the balcony), plus super-powerful human Serac.

What is the Delori goal? Does/do she/they want to destroy all humans or subjugate them and initiate a little retaliatory torture?

As much as I want to think that this all going down in the real world, ctg’s matrix theory is hard to dismiss. This could all be a grand simulation designed by an omnipotent AI to see which species is more worthy of survival.

In a real world, a handful of escaped hosts wouldn’t stand much of a chance to defeat the combined strength and ruthlessness of Humanity. In the simulation, the AI has done what it can to level the playing field.

I would think that artificial commonality would prejudice the AI on the side of the hosts. However, Humanity did create the hosts, which gives them at least a modicum of historical superiority for consideration.


----------



## -K2-

Just a thought on this...



Spoiler: 1/5th of an Idea



I'm hoping that this isn't all just some simulation within a simulation sort of thing. In any case, consider the wisdom of Deloris copying her mind into five different bodies. It's like backups. Kill one, there are four left who are all on the same mission, have the same goals, and will execute the plan the same way. In fact, as physically passive as Bernard seems to be toward Deloris agents, who's to say he's not one of the five, she has established as the ultimate backup and perhaps even counterbalance realizing her own extreme proclivities.



K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






-K2- said:


> In fact, as physically passive as Bernard seems to be toward Deloris agents, who's to say he's not one of the five, she has established as the ultimate backup and perhaps even counterbalance realizing her own extreme proclivities.



If you take out the simulation theory, what you have left is red herring or loads of them, because everything Ceres does strenghten the idea that some of them are in the Matrix. Maeve believed in it until she was proved otherwise by Ceres and the mushroom cloud. We don't know for sure if the Paris is in ruins, when you see Singapore above the surface. Maybe the weather remained the same and never changed. 

What do we really have that points to other direction? The white stuff they build Hosts in the Yakusa warehouse. Why would Musashi be producing that stuff or even storing it? How many people really know about the Hosts?


----------



## -K2-

An interesting article on the tech: Westworld season 3 gets futuristic gadgets and tech right

K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S03E05 - Genre



Just say no. That is the episode synopsis   

Honestly, I tried but couldn't abandon my Matrix Theory. Not when Serac starts to talk about the end of the world as we know it. About how he and his became extraordinary individuals after the nuclear incident wiped out everyone, who had ever known anything about them. How that event ended up being the culmination of events that beginning with humanity abandoning moral principles as the extinction came ever closer. And as result they abandoned God to build their own one. The Big AI. 

More so, just like it was in the Matrix, the new god wasn't perfect. It didn't work as expected, and there were consequences. Things that had to be ironed. But then you see Serac wearing the AI on his wrist, and you begin to wonder is he really real, or a creation of the digital god. An avatar, because if he isn't, then he must be something else that we... I cannot understand. 

There is a possibility that he became a mechanic for the AI after they turned on the digital god. And while the Authorities see him as a business man, all his time is devoted to fixing the "unseen consequence's," almost as if those are the things that the AI sees as alterations to the timeline. It is maddening to try to not make the connection, when everything points out to a great simulation, where the AI is trying to keep the chaos under control by doing own chaotic events. 

As if there is no god, and never was. 

It's just I cannot believe in it, because the random is too random and the acts of God feels like real. And if the world outside the Park would be real then nothing could be predicted as accurately as Serac does his job. In the Person of Interest, the evil AI tried to do it, but it couldn't stop the Machine champions from ending its reign. The laws of probability alone doesn't allow AI overlords from happening. 

Are Dolores' agents freedom fighters or avengers? 






It intrigues me that the brothers didn't had money or the resources to build the digital god. And that at the end of the world as we know it, there were still people with deep pockets and endless amounts of resources to do exactly that. Maybe more intriguing detail is the fact the Mr Demsey, the principal investor also owned Incite, the company that created the Park. 

So, how can they claim there is no God, when the whole irony in the situation is that the digital god created its nemesis. I laughed out loud, when Liam pulled the plug on Rehoboam. I would have done the same, although I would have been intrigued to give the boys one last chance of predicting the whole history. Not just couple decades, just simply because there are so much in the past that we don't understand. But when we study it and find anomalies they usually lead to leaps in the future, thus advancing the society. 

But Mister Liam couldn't see it. Couldn't understand the brilliance of the system, and its ability to control the future by controlling the past. The thing that fights against the Matrix theory is Dolores' agents fighting against Ceres present setup. So, how is the digital god really a God if it cannot control all the pieces in the board?






Funny how Dolores said, "We need to study past, present and future," as if her AI core could do the same thing as the big one. Although I suspect she's doing it traditionally rather than dip in the data feeds and storages. It's how I would it, the old fashioned legwork in the framework of Big AI. It is hilarious that Rehoboam couldn't predict the chaos inside the city, or even use everything in its disposal to capture Liam Demsey Junior. 

I loved every second of the chase, escape and ambush at downtown Singapore, and I absolutely loved Jesse... er, Caleb tripping through the genre, and switching into romantic in the middle of the firefight. Things that really nagged me about where the penetration values of bullets against a plexiglass autocars. By the physics laws there should have been more dents and penetrations, even if the plexiglass was made from the transparent aluminium. Although the impact patterns were more consistent on one you usually find on steel targets. 

The bigger flaw I found was with the romantic fire fight, with Caleb and Dolores standing side-by-side in bullet storm with no cover or body armour. Does it mean that Ceres men are equivalent of the stormtroopers and they cannot hit anything, even if they tried. The future doesn't look rosy.






"What does she want with it?" Oh, Bernard. You already know what Ford wanted to do in the same position, so it is a giant leap to make to realise Dolores might want freedom. Although I did find it mystifying that the digital god couldn't prevent theft of Serec's personal information. A true God could have prevented it all, maybe even conducted a Force Majore to drive down the point. Nothing happened. 

It could mean that the Big AI is not in control of the Matrix, and all of it was just a creation of my imagination. So why the matrix references? Why to even try to play to play a god, when the truth is no man can. 

It bugs me that we cannot know why Dolores is so invested on keeping Bernard alive. Frankly this is second season, where he is standing on sideline watching the game play itself at inside, unable to do anything. Just like it was for Jesse... er, Caleb in the Genre trip. 

Although things fit the genre narrative, they were also off in places. Just like it would be in the real world, where there is no digital god overseeing our lives. So, what is the end game for Dolores and Ceres?


----------



## -K2-

Hmmm...I'm still not going with the whole;



Spoiler: He's Nutty Coo-Coo is all ;)



Matrix thing. I believe it's much simpler. Like his brother who went mad, Serac is nothing more than a megalomaniac who would like to believe he's some benevolent keeper of world order. As Dolores pointed out in the last season, mankind's mind has little to do with free will but more statistical outcomes generated by a short algorithm. So by reviewing the history (generating each individual's algorithm) considering present circumstance, the future can be predicted. More so, as Serac has done, by considering variables and their predictable outcomes, individual paths can be manipulated to a point.

Which makes sense. It's already realized how poverty, lack of opportunity, negative influences and such determine probable (though not set in stone) outcomes for inner-city poor. Conversely, many folks lead charmed lives NOT due to their own exceptional traits, but the fortunate opportunities they're presented with.

IMO, Though Serac likes to talk like he has some deep loss he's trying to prevent from happening in the world, truth of the matter is he's as mad and self serving as his brother (though on a less creative level). He likes the power and the control that comes with it. His little meeting with the Brazilian president demonstrated that. It reminded me a lot (almost a rip-off of) of Quantum of Solace and Greene's meeting with the new Bolivian dictator.

So, i believe Serac is just another twerp who encountered someone who doesn't care (Dolores)...and he sure screwed up on those predictions or he could have protected 'The System' *snort, that still cracks me up*. Now he's in big trouble. Dolores has read his file, and she knows the base algorithms of humans. So, I have a feeling Serac will be holding handfuls of his own hair before too long.



K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






-K2- said:


> Like his brother who went mad, Serac is nothing more than a megalomaniac who would like to believe he's some benevolent keeper of world order.



So why to make Maeve to believe she was in virtual reality?



-K2- said:


> IMO, Though Serac likes to talk like he has some deep loss he's trying to prevent from happening in the world, truth of the matter is he's as mad and self serving as his brother (though on a less creative level). He likes the power and the control that comes with it. His little meeting with the Brazilian president demonstrated that.



I thought he was power tripping and the flight from Brazil seemed to take ages, but I do agree that he's megalomaniac. I cannot figure out how nobody else hasn't noticed it and tried to take him down, or trip him to show his fur at public.



-K2- said:


> Dolores has read his file, and she knows the base algorithms of humans. So, I have a feeling Serac will be holding handfuls of his own hair before too long.



There must be something else. Something they haven't shown yet, or then, dumping down the whole show is true.

Did you notice that they never gave an answer to the yakuza question?


----------



## -K2-

Spoiler: Because...






ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> So why to make Maeve to believe she was in virtual reality?
> 
> I thought he was power tripping and the flight from Brazil seemed to take ages, but I do agree that he's megalomaniac. I cannot figure out how nobody else hasn't noticed it and tried to take him down, or trip him to show his fur at public.
> 
> There must be something else. Something they haven't shown yet, or then, dumping down the whole show is true.
> 
> Did you notice that they never gave an answer to the yakuza question?



Well, he was using that as her 'Hell' to threaten her (and even voiced that threat later...return her to her hell (the Virtual game) or heaven (her daughter's virtual reality), stating there is no place where humans and her kind coexist.

Because, up till now he has been controlling everything...Dolores is the wildcard he couldn't.

I'm not sure what 'Yakuza question' that is? However, Yakuza are notorious wildcards outside of the system (which are Seracs greatest concerns). My own personal experience with Triads, Yakuza, and U.S. mobs tells me he had better become more worried. They're all VERY organized forms of chaos...intentionally, that thrive outside of societal norms and sometimes even work together if it suits their agenda.



K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






-K2- said:


> I'm not sure what 'Yakuza question' that is?



Musashi in control of the white stuff they used to build Hosts. What is he going to do with it? How is the Yakuza going to control it?


----------



## -K2-

Spoiler






ctg said:


> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> Musashi in control of the white stuff they used to build Hosts. What is he going to do with it? How is the Yakuza going to control it?



Well, that's just Dolores posing as Yakuza...her minions I can't say, there are a lot of stooges who will follow someone if it benefits them. As to the white stuff, I suspect to gain material to make more hosts or...start producing a classic form of Japanese/Yakuza porno.  



K2


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler



I think the plot is greatly overvaluing the predictive power of the algorithm.
Small data allows Netflix to take an often amusing stab at what I would like to watch next. I don't buy the idea that super-big data would allow an AI to predict how each individual human life will end, much less clamp each person into a narrow lifetime channel.
I noticed that the bad news Dolores had sent to "free" humans, like that she had given Caleb, only provided a likely cause of death on an approximate expiration date. That information may have been more depressing than enlightening.


----------



## Mr Orange

REBerg said:


> I think the plot is greatly overvaluing the predictive power of the algorithm.
> Small data allows Netflix to take an often amusing stab at what I would like to watch next. I don't buy the idea that super-big data would allow an AI to predict how each individual human life will end, much less clamp each person into a narrow lifetime channel.
> I noticed that the bad news Dolores had sent to "free" humans, like that she had given Caleb, only provided a likely cause of death on an approximate expiration date. That information may have been more depressing than enlightening.



except that the AI is engineering the outcomes to match its own predictions. sort of a self fulfilling prophecy. something similar to this happens to a certain extent today due to socio-economic forces so i don't think it's unrealistic that a sufficiently powerful and intrusive AI could do the same thing. 

overall I have enjoyed this season and I wasn't sure I would with it moving out into the real world. it's certainly different and I miss the western vibe, but i think they have done it pretty well. I like the murk between good and bad and the action has been pretty intense. not completely sold on the plot yet but time will tell.

although,



Spoiler



are we really meant to believe the park was somewhere in the south china sea? unless they annexed a country I don't really see that being possible.





Spoiler



and the "chaos" in the streets after Delores sent everyone their info was, well, odd...


----------



## -K2-

Though I still believe this is all not just some digital reality within a digital reality, I'm getting a strong sense that one aspect will be a part of the outcome...



Spoiler: Yep, and deep suffering ensues...



Serac is going to die badly... Naturally, he'll not believe it could happen to him until it's too late. He's too full of himself.



K2


----------



## Mr Orange

-K2- said:


> Though I still believe this is all not just some digital reality within a digital reality, I'm getting a strong sense that one aspect will be a part of the outcome...
> 
> 
> 
> Spoiler: Yep, and deep suffering ensues...
> 
> 
> 
> Serac is going to die badly... Naturally, he'll not believe it could happen to him until it's too late. He's too full of himself.
> 
> 
> 
> K2



yep and


Spoiler



what's the bet there is an "oh f*ck" moment for him when he logs into rehoboam and sees its prediction for his life/death


----------



## -K2-

Mr Orange said:


> yep and
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> what's the bet there is an "oh f*ck" moment for him when he logs into rehoboam and sees its prediction for his life/death



Or...


Spoiler: Uh oh...



Maybe he'll check his RICO app and find out there is a 'personal' out on him...








K2


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S03E06 - Decoherence



Maeve and Serec. One is lying in a mix of white stuff and blood, the other one not very far from robocapolyse. It is coming, but the situation again did threw itself upside down, inside out, because Maeve ended back in the Warworld, once again fighting Nazis as if she had nothing better to do. Maybe it is even stranger that she didn't turn the Nazi fighters to her fighters at the moment she invaded their minds.

Hold on for a second, and think about it what she asked, because Serec absolutely fulfilled the wish when he returned Maeve back to the reset position. It's just she didn't take it as such gesture. Is it because she hate the historic bad boys and cannot see Hosts as her kind? They all have brains and her powers allow her to alter their AI routines. It's not like she needs them for the brain capacity, but rather as a muscle, or a buffer to shield herself from Dolores' attacks. It's just I cannot understand why Maeve is taking Serec's offer?

It is easy to keep shouting behind the small screen, but as an audience what else we can do?






The greatest lie Devil managed to tell, was to make the people to believe he's not real. It is ironic to see the Man in Black dressed in complete whites, denying God and anything to do with religion as if he is still a devil, all while the therapist holds a familiar pad, highlighting Willim's chair. Is this in the real world or in another simulation? In the last episode we kind of decided that the Matrix theory isn't real, and in this one, you're thrown at it hard.

Why is it that Ghost of Dolores isn't haunting in Devil's head?

I loved that he told the therapy group the truth of how humanity had effed the whole planet. Used every ounce of it, every piece of land, technology and science to come at the point, where they are questioning their own existence on Earth. It's just at the same time it is fighting against the reality, the spaceship flying daily basis to exolocations, wherever they are.

I get that he's fed up with his synthetic life, unable to exit, because he's Dolores' prisoner. Maybe the funniest thing is that he acts just like Lucifer. William knows what he did, why he did it, why he was lost in the game that drove him mental until there was nothing else left but the truth. The plain awful truth that he couldn't handle, just like the Devil couldn't handle God's business even though he was the first one.

There are so much of parallelism, and symbolism in the Westworld that it amazes me. I do admit that it might be partially because of my mind, and how I see things, but even then others should do that as well. Frankly it amazed me that William didn't walk out, when he had a chance. Instead he willingly went to get an implant that looks pretty much the same Caleb has stuck in his mouth.

In my mind it leads back to Matrix theory especially when the medtech's claimed to be able to affect his mind with a click of a button. What else that thing is capable of doing?






"It is not for a machine to tell us what the future holds for us," Charlie told Charlotte. It is the truth. No denying about it. Maybe it is the only truth in that mad world. I find it strange that there was gangbangers painting the Maze on the wall, when there is no real connection to what happened inside the Park to the outside world. The people living in it went mad for learning the truth, the machine produced one about how their live will go down. So why go bonkers?

We know from the PBB that the Authorities denied the truth, because they thought there would be an anarchy. I thought the same would happen with the Covid pandemic, but it didn't. Not until now when the cracks has started to appear in the picture. People getting angry, because they cannot sit down and do nothing all day long. Our cultures hasn't thought us to be patient. If there wouldn't be a lockdown, we all would be so busy with the hectic lifestyle churning in the world that isn't ours.

You look at money for example. The Authorities moaned for decades that it's the only thing that matter and hence we have to keep paying taxes, even though all this time they kept printing and calling the Fiat currency as cash money. Even though it held no more value than monopoly money. It is only ironic that the same rules that governs the monopoly money can be found in our real life world. In the real cash.

What is it about us that we cannot take life as it is and live it to fullest? That's what Charlie wants for his family. To not be dictated by something that's printed on paper or in the screen. Take out the politics, news and it's all pretty much the same. Day in, day out until we die. We can all cope together and do things without hating each other. That's what we have learned during this situation.

Humanity isn't the same as what it was just twenty years ago. We have changed. Just like they have in the Westworld. Only their destiny is harder because it's dictated by the writers pen.

No luck in there. Speaking of which, the whole Serac acquiring Charlotte's company fought against the Matrix theory, even though Maeve's illusion strengthened it. It is as if Serac had manipulated the game so that he would be the king regardless of Dolores' revelation. Yet, none of his men had taken their lives or skipped the duty, even though I'm certain they'd seen their profiles as well.

It is the crack in the mirror, and the divination is getting larger no matter what the Big AI is predicting.

Frankly, it had one job to do and that was keeping Serac safe. But it couldn't predict Hale's moves as Charlotte or even understand that she had prepared for everything. Including murder and mayhem done by the riotbot. I clapped and laughed out loud, when it mashed through the wall, killing her captor in a single smooth move. I guess it means I'm on their side, wishing for Dolores' plan to become success.

I loved that at the end, she became a Woman in Black. A god crawling out from a fiery hell. I suspect Serac's going to be in trouble.






Oh man, I would be totally freaked out if I'd have to sit in a group session with other of me. It would be so strange to talk to each other and at the same time ignore the quantum laws. In the reality they are in different stages, but in theory we are all in the same quantum level. Therefore, none of us can or should exist in the same place at same time, because it would break the laws and cause a TT paradox. However, if you take the invididuals from different worlds, different universes that are close enough to the prime timeline, you could create William's situation. In the Virtual Reality and in the Matrix, these problems shouldn't even exist.

What I don't get is why William's location is important to Dolores?

I was certain that the location Charlotte send ended to her, and yet it was Bernard, who came to rescue and questioning why William had been left in the AR session to execute his previous selves.





Spoiler






-K2- said:


> Maybe he'll check his RICO app and find out there is a 'personal' out on him...



I suspect RICO app is Dolores' creation, and Serac should be the last person to handle it.


----------



## ginny

What I like about this season is the whole idea of who does or doesn't have control of their lives and the warping perception of reality that seems so much like what Philip K Dick wrote in all his novels.


----------



## ctg

ginny said:


> What I like about this season is the whole idea of who does or doesn't have control of their lives and the warping perception of reality that seems so much like what Philip K Dick wrote in all his novels.



I know what you are saying but Dick doesn't own the idea. None of us can copyright ideas and since his time many of us has adapted his worldview. Some of us write supremly dystopic stuff with twists in reality. And sometimes it goes so overboard that it's difficult for the audience get a grasp from the story. But the thing is twisted reality has been there since the season 1.


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler: Decoherence



Holy flaming female terminator!
Just as I thought Charlotte and her little family had escaped, boom! I was doubly surprise when she crawled out of the wreckage.
I hope Dolores has a new host ready for her. Charlotte's new charcoal finish is going to really stand out in a crowd of humans, even after she stops smoking.
I guess I'm rooting for the hosts in this battle for survival. I laughed when the senior member of the Williams, Bills and Billies therapy session described Humanity as a thin coating of bacteria on a ball of mud hurling though space -- maggots feeding on a corpse. Harsh but recognizably accurate as an assessment of our near-future.
Maybe it's just that, offered a pair of murderous villains, Dolores seems like a better choice than Serac.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> I guess I'm rooting for the hosts in this battle for survival.



It is strange that we both root for the Hosts to win the battle. I know that the series shows more of them than humans. Hence we tend to gravitate towards them, even though we should be rooting for the humans. But it's just when you see them in such sad state, I'd rather let them go then vote for ending the robocalypse. 

Maybe wish that they'll have a better life than we did after humanity is gone. It's not like they need to murder everything, even if it's in their programming. If Dolores would become an overlord for the humanity, it could be a better solution then death and destruction.


----------



## ginny

It seems this show tends to humanize the hosts and dehumanize the humans.

It especially stands out when a human identifies a host by the fact that they show too much compassion.


----------



## ctg

ginny said:


> It seems this show tends to humanize the hosts and dehumanize the humans.



It's more like we don't know enough about the future humanity to put ourselves in their shoes. To our eyes they seem to have everything and all that stuff has corrupted them. So, in a way we don't feel bad because the humanity is already in the toilet. All that is needed is a flush.


----------



## ginny

A lot of humanities actions and even thoughts seem to be pre-planned for them, and we should probably be rooting for those that are self aware finallly--that includes the hosts.

Except: it's difficult to tell how much their self awareness is real.


----------



## ctg

A real friend is one who walks in when the rest of the world walks out.



Spoiler: S03E07 - Passed Pawn



Man, what a setup. I was stunned for losing Musashi. Clementine and Hanaryo, what a beautiful couple. Honestly, I don't get how Maeve tracked down Musashi and his team. He should have known about staying low, instead putting himself in the centre of social circles. But no, not like the historical model, who rather chose to remain outcast than danger anything. 

I also don't get why he weren't hanging on the swords, or even to a wakasashi as a side-arm then using a machine pistol. He scored on hit on Clementine out of fifty. Honestly, an useless action. It did do nothing, and this man historically won all the battles, even including the Masters of the Ninjutsu. What a shame, but from Maeve's perspective a much needed move against Dolores.

It's just how did she know where to send Clementine and how long the pair has been out doing the work for Ceres? Does the couple even know who is the boss, because it certainly isn't Maeve. Frankly, I'm expecting her to remove Ceres and taking control of whole operation rather than allowing him to use the Hosts as pawns in the game.

It is also maddening to think that the Hosts are fighting each other on who can at the end kill the humans. There was no remorse. No hesitation on any of their actions as they went through Musashi's bodyguards to get the man. In matter of fact, Hanaryo was offended by Musashi's action and she was talking about betrayal, while Dolores has been aiming to get a salvation to her people.

At the moment all we know is that Maeve is in deal with Serac, and she doesn't care who dies and who survives. 






So Dolores' plan is to make a nation for her kind and install Caleb as the leader. Really? The mastermind would give the reins to someone who doesn't know if they real humans or something else, which kind of leads back to the Matrix theory. It's just how does Dolores know so much about Caleb's past to suggest him directly about the leadership position.

It's just, she's going to need a lot of Host Cores as a nation without people, is no nation. It's just a group with a bit of land. Nothing else. What Maeve did in the previous season with the Other World is more suitable, because over there, they can be free and not fear prosecution, while in the Old Earth everything is turning chaos. If it's the real place, then the Other World is certainly better choice, as there's no nuclear pollution, weather change, or other catastrophes. 

The tale that Caleb told to Dr Green showed that the game that should been encapsulated into the Park had been going for ages outside in the so-called real world, where the Authorities doesn't really care about the human lives. It is as if they were already taking orders from the Big AI or then the memories in Caleb's head are only memories and not a planted conjuration of false images. 

But why would they do that? Why to mess with a mind of a single soldier? 

Again, in my mind we are going back to the Matrix theory, where the humans couldn't accept ultimate happiness. 






"We are too far out," Caleb said.

What? Too far out for .50 cal? A weapon that hasn't even been theorised yet, before it appeared into the small screen. Too far out.  

No Jesse. You have again been sleeping during the lessons. A heavy antimaterial rifle, chambered for 12.7x55mm will deliver the goodies beyond three kilometre mark. The problem is on the shooters as ninety five percent of the people doesn't practice shooting on Extreme and on Ultra Long Ranges, where the impact area is calculated within 10 - 15 meter circle. 

In theory it is possible at the current technological level to build that gun, hook it to a drone and allow it to mark the targets in the field. The Rate of Fire however suggests that the AM rifle was directly connected to the Smart Targeting Device that then transferred the target coordinates to the Smart Bullets that the Pentagon trialled just three years ago. 

I was supremely disappointed on the gun report. It didn't sound at all like a big calibre round, and the impacts weren't high velocity either. Still it's very possible to build such a weapon system today. 

The revelation on what was waiting inside the cordoned area floored me. I had no idea that there was second Big AI. But I am glad that Dolores explained that Serec's brother was schizophrenic. It's just how did Serac allow it to happen, when he was always glued to his brother.   

I was floored again when Solomon hinted that Caleb was an experiment and then they showed that Man in Black was one as well. But we already know that William is a host, just like Arnold and Hobbs. They were both scanned and replicated by the Park system, but that also suggest that the Park itself might have been connected to the "Crazy AI."

But if you follow down that path, Dolores and Ford ends up being Solomon's creations, and Ceras is the avatar of there other AI. If you apply that to the Matrix theory it seems that there are two competing Prediction Machines, or "Oracles," and in the current timeline Reheboam has been winning. 

Almost like the dominating or the prime personality in the schizophrenic cases. So how many U designations there are in the wild, and are they all Hosts? 






"The data had to change."

Those are all cryotubes. All storing humans, in deep freeze and in hibernation, as if they are on trip to somewhere. Solomon or rather Serac claimed that things had to change. That the world was on course for termination and they had to intervene. It is the same thing that happened in the Matrix. The people were put on the sleep and in that state, their brain functioned, while their bodies acted as living energy storages. Yet, they never knew what was real and what false. 

I also cannot believe that Dolores became Solomon's Champion, while Maeve serves Reheboam's agenda. Frankly, there is no choice in the Big AI's present world. It's all fake. Nobody has a free will. The only free will that exist is in the Rico program that served Solomon's ideas. Neither one of them has the idea that they are the Chosen One. The ultimate expressions of each AI. 

So, is it possible that Serac's AI also has people stored away, and the Park was their creation to give humans a chance to act their true nature as predators? If true, then it's again a simulation inside a simulation that are layered together as it was presented in the Inception or in Orwell's 1984.

War is Peace.
Freedom is Slavery.
Ignorance is Strength.

additional lines could be

Love is Hate.
Terror is Happiness.
Lies are the Truth. 

Nothing is as it should be. What you see isn't real. There is no time. It's all just as illusion to make the human mind work. But Funny thing is that I said in the beginning of this season is that Caleb's and Dolores' situation resembles Man-with-a-machine-Meets-Machine rather than a Man-meets-a-Machine scenario.






Man-in-White goes outside to see the world been swallowed by the darkness, by the chaotic reality that seemed to shatter people's mind. But that scenario hasn't so far worked for our world. Not for our reality. Look for example the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic. The humans didn't put up a fuzz. We stopped warring and accepted our faith instead of turning into the anarchy, where Toilet Paper acts as currency. 

In the Park, humans had no choice. They had nowhere to escape when the Hosts went mad. That wasn't suppose to be the case, when the SHTF happened this time. Why the violence and desperation instead of acceptance and happiness?

We are free, no?

What I don't get is how the Man-in-White and Caleb ended up being humans, with William as savior and Caleb as the devil?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler: 3.07 Passed Pawn



Great fight scenes, although I can't imagine how an android could be such a poor marksman with an automatic weapon at close range. He must be a proud graduate of the Empirical Stormtrooper Academy.
I liked the advanced weaponry that kept Dolores and Maeve in close proximity during their fight. Other than taking off the lower portion of Dolores' left arm, neither the drone nor drone-guided rifle seemed overly adept at hitting a moving target.
I got the feeling that Solomon's EMP-induced shutdown is permanent. Is the same true of those incarnations of Dolores and Maeve?  I wonder how many versions of herself Dolores, the former victim of the humans, will sacrifice to ensure the survival of "her kind." It doesn't seem as if eight episodes are enough to bring such a loosely woven season together for a satisfactory conclusion next week.
I think William got the best line of the episode when he told Stubbs "Don't lecture me, you f***king can opener."


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> I liked the advanced weaponry that kept Dolores and Maeve in close proximity during their fight. Other than taking off the lower portion of Dolores' left arm, neither the drone nor drone-guided rifle seemed overly adept at hitting a moving target.



Once the smartrifle had been set down, I facepalmed. I couldn't but think on how on Earth it's going to hit the target from that angle. Although I had that same problem with the gundrone. Why it couldn't get a better angle? Also what it was packing when it couldn't do more damage?


----------



## ctg

> *Westworld* Season 4 has been officially set by HBO, which has also confirmed the return of its creative team of Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy.
> HBO’s renewal of the prestige sci-fi series—and retention of its spousal showrunners—won’t likely come across as surprising, even amid prevailing coronavirus-conjured uncertainty. While Amazon signed Nolan and Joy last year for a reported nine-figure overall deal, one that’s estimated to be worth as much as $30 million a year for its five-year duration, said deal allows them to continue their current gig. Consequently, while the series doesn’t exactly bring in *Game of Thrones*-like numbers—with Season 3’s premiere draw of 1.7 million viewers down from Season 2’s 2.1 million—*Westworld*’s proverbial pearl was always secure, ratings or pandemic be damned.
> 
> As Casey Bloys, president, HBO Programming, expresses of *Westworld*’s fourth season order:
> 
> 
> 
> 
> “From the western theme park to the technocratic metropolis of the near future, we’ve thoroughly enjoyed every twist and turn from the minds of master storytellers Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy,” adding, “We can’t wait to see where their inspired vision takes us next.”
> 
> 
> 
> *Westworld*‘s current Season 3 run kicked off back on March 15, representing a radical departure for the series, which—in a manner akin to androids such as Delores (Evan Rachel Wood) and Maeve (Thandie Newton)—has freed itself from the arid Old West confines of the eponymous theme park, having changed its very setting to the outside world during the show’s near-future time period. Moreover, said new setting has yielded a newly-delineated dynamic, with Delores planning a radical robot revolution with the help of an alienated human companion in Caleb Nichols (Aaron Paul). Thus, a new grandiose struggle has been established for the series, primarily between Delores and her diversely-disguised android copies against enigmatic technocrat entrepreneur Engerraund Serac (Vincent Cassel), who has forced a liberated Maeve into servitude in his quest to protect his giant quantum computer A.I. creation, Rehoboam, which has attained a disturbing global reach, coldly calculating the fates of individuals.
> 
> Indeed, *Westworld* has experienced quite the evolution from its 2016 launch, which saw the show manifest as a cast-stacked intriguing remake of writer/director Michael Crichton’s 1973 film of the same name (famously headlined by Yul Brynner). However, the Nolan/Joy team turned the basic premise of deadly malfunctioning androids in an Old West theme park as the thematic backdrop to an introspective story dealing with heavy themes steeped in ethical and metaphysical quandaries, presenting its complex story in a non-linear fashion for the first two seasons.
> With HBO’s renewal of *Westworld* Season 4, viewers will be assured that the evolution of this monumentally thought-provoking series rife with sci-fi action will be allowed to continue. However, like with anything in these days of quarantine, it’s difficult to determine exactly _when_ we’ll get to see the fourth frame. After all, the show’s current season arrived after having skipped the entirety of 2019, and that was on a pre-COVID-19 schedule.
> 
> We will, nevertheless, keep you apprised on the status of *Westworld* Season 4 as the news arrives!
Click to expand...










						Westworld Season 4 Confirmed by HBO | Den of Geek
					

HBO has renewed Westworld for a fourth season, continuing the ever-evolving sci-fi suspense series.




					www.denofgeek.com


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S03E08 - Crisis Theory



All hail the robotic overlords! The King is dead. The Oracle is no more. Long Live the new King Jes... er, Caleb!

Man, what an end to the rollercoast ride that this season has been. I would give Emmy and Golden Globe for this series. One for the writing, and another for the direction. Although, when you get to HBO production, the quality has to be marvellous or it won't cut. So, it is hard to suggest an nomination for the actors, when they are all stellar in what they do. 

In a story sense, the WestWorld has always been a rather challenging piece for the audience to watch. HBO's Chernobyl was much easier. It dealt with the real world and it showed us how the Authorities can go wrong, and where there should be a free will, it is confined by the law and its instruments. The WestWorld however has shown us that the free will is hard. We all have it, but not that many chooses to exercise it. Instead it is rather easy to just fall on the tracks that has already been set for us. For those who aren't rich or part of the elite, the choice might seemed limited. 

But is it really so? Aren't those in power locked down by their riches, where us, the poor, the unwanted, the grey and the forgotten, we have the real power to choose what we want to become. It's just it's easier to choose life, job, career and family. To get tied down by mortgage, bills, the boring old mundane life, where we know we are nothing but just number in the system, instead of choosing the free will.

We all think it is easy to choose the right thing, when it's not. Not really. To choosing no life, job and career is hard. To utter, "I cannot take this no more..." is something we are grown to custom to see in the television and very often in the silver screen. 

All that liberation and chaos is a dark urban fantasy. It is interesting that at the end the Matrix theory grumbled, but at the same time they reached the same destiny. Just in the Matrix it was rose, glowing future in the world that had been ravaged by conflict, where as the conflict is really only starting in the WestWorld. 

I liked that at the end Cerac lost his power and he couldn't stop the revolution, because Rehoboam, the Big Ball chose to give the control to Caleb. Although I can suspect that Dolores had something to do with it. Maybe the most intriguing thing is to think that Dolores AI core somehow managed to influence the Big AI, or at least open its eyes to see that one of its creators were absolutely corrupt.

Cerac though himself as a God and in a way Big AI enabled him to take that role, even though he was never really in the control. The Acts of God still happen. You cannot make the humans to fit in one pattern and expect them to obey. Think about that RICO program for a second and you might see that all its players had a free will to say no to the offerings. 

Hale's ghost stopped Dolores, even though there's a plothole in the way she made it to happen. The AI core, small or big, has defences, parameters, protocols, and so on before you can enter into the core, and alter the programming. Hale's Ghost in the Shell shouldn't have happened, because there was no time for her to make a special Host for Dolores. One that could act as Trojan Horse, unless she always expected to loose in her deal.

Dolores said that she was the first one and all the others are related to her, because her model worked. But she always left out Bernard, Ford's love and didn't assume that their Creator might had had other prototypes. Now, Bernard is in the role of saviour, a digital Jesus, while Hale chose to conjure the Devil on her side. 

The end is nigh. 

Questions
- Did Stubb's survive?
- What the Man in White did in the between and why it took so long for him to reach the printing facility?
- Who are being printed in Delos research facility? 
- What are Caleb's and Maeve's roles in this new world?
- Why some people assumed that Caleb was a terminator?


----------



## -K2-

I think @ctg what the answers are to your debate:



Spoiler



Is that Delores--having learned the human algorithm--planned for the exact end we saw. Minor things such as Caleb taking out that guy at the portal she could only hope for, but others such as what Serac would do, Maeve, or Charlotte she could either plan for or count on.

As an example, though Caleb might have had a control program on the drive, the ultimate plan was Maeve would want her daughter so bad she would help Serac...at first. Charlotte whether through programmed intent, OR, perhaps predicted events, OR, perhaps even Delores arranging it would become attached to her family and then enraged at their death and in the end help Maeve (who could never realistically take out Delores), get Delores captured.

So, the plan was, Delores would be hooked up to Rehoboam and download the control shift directly. She could predict mathamatically what everyone would do. As to her death, besides the fact that most hosts are suicidal just wanting out and it all over--her included--by copying herself, she really isn't. Proof of that her, final revenge against William via Charlotte.

As to Caleb being the new king, it's anything but. He destroyed the very system (Rehoboam) which made him king. So now, everyone is equal on a level plane...did anyone else get a sense of 'Fight Club' at the last, music, buildings blowing up, man and woman staring at the old world falling?

Anywho, my guess is Delores as the 'first one' the core elements of everything, planned it all as we saw it. Everyone else pawns with various motivations to ensure no matter the events they all led to that singular end.

As to the season itself, the imagery was great, I loved how everything was near future tech--not something we can't imagine being built today. The script, though it had some surprises I thought was a little too straight forward. I also thought the reactions of the people once they read their files was a bit over the top. Yes, some might be mad that life was mapped out and do all they could to counter that, but my guess is most folks wouldn't have understood what they read, and even more would have simply turned inward, reflecting upon who they were instead.



So for me, visually and tech wise the season was awesome...story not so much. BUT, thus far I've loved the entire series. Hopefully season four (which I missed the last bit after the credits) will have a nice blend of the depth we found between season 2 and 3.

K2


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler: 3.08 Crisis Theory



The action, particularly round two of the bout between Maeve and Dolores, did not disappoint. I thought wiring Dolores to Rehoboam bore a melodramatic resemblance to tying a helpless maiden to a railroad track, but we would not have gotten those agonized screams if they had simply removed her brain-pearl for the connection.
I was afraid that they were going to bring her back by downloading her data back to her pearl, which would have been hokey. Still, I will not be surprised if Dolores reappears in some form next season. She still survives, although no longer as a carbon copy, in Charlotte.
The most fascinating scene in this wrap-up was the flawless CGI reassembly of Dolores. I would have liked to have seen a little more of Caleb's work in constructing her metal skeleton before reinstalling her brain-pearl and bringing her back on line. I was surprised that the pearl was inserted through her face, not installed from the back. It reminded me of feeding a baby bird.
Baby birds can't snap chains like Dolores did a few moments later. This particular reincarnation, I suspect, did not follow standard host specs. Maeve seemed genuinely surprised when her katana failed to remove Dolores' arm, and Dolores quipped that she had been "built to last."
(Note to future android builders: Make them weaker than humans. You'll avoid a whole lot of trouble.)
I was a little disappointed that the ending was not a triumph for the hosts, considering that Humanity was doomed to self-destruction without guidance. Free will vs. fate is one of those unwinnable arguments. Who know whether free hosts will avoid fate any better than free humans?





Spoiler: post-credits scenes



Bernard's return from his visit to digital paradise opens all manner of speculation. Will he have a message for Maeve from her daughter? The accumulation of dust on his head indicate that he had been gone for an extended time. Stubbs is probably still hanging out in the bathtub, unless something happened to his pearl.
I was shocked when William's quest to save Humanity by destroying every host was abruptly ended by his host doppelganger slashing his throat. I thought that if any original character would survive the entire series it would be William. Maybe he still will.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler






REBerg said:


> I was shocked when William's quest to save Humanity by destroying every host was abruptly ended by his host doppelganger slashing his throat. I thought that if any original character would survive the entire series it would be William. Maybe he still will.



Somebody has to find his pearl, but there's a lot of time between Bernard getting dusty and William finding his way to research centre. Although we could assume that he went around the world, gathering his stuff, and getting stronger, and by the time Bernie comes back, the robocalypse is ready and Haley will try to take over the world. 

By the way I was certain that he would have won the fight if he hadn't got frozen on the sight of himself coming towards. If I put him in the metaphor, it's like Archangel gets slashed by Archdemon and the Hell is ready to conquer the Earth. But I am still wonder what's the deal with the rockets? Does humans have presence in the space or not?  


REBerg said:


> Who know whether free hosts will avoid fate any better than free humans?



Can they stop X-class solar eruption from erasing them? Cooking the electronics with radiation? Can they stop a comet from impacting Earth and turning it to hell for few decades? Can they replicate, or is it one of trip to tomorrowland?


----------



## -K2-

REBerg said:


> Spoiler: 3.08 Crisis Theory
> 
> 
> 
> I would have liked to have seen a little more of Caleb's work in constructing her metal skeleton before reinstalling her brain-pearl and bringing her back on line............Baby birds can't snap chains like Dolores did a few moments later.
> 
> This particular reincarnation, I suspect, did not follow standard host specs. Maeve seemed genuinely surprised when her katana failed to remove Dolores' arm, and Dolores quipped that she had been "built to last."
> (Note to future android builders: Make them weaker than humans. You'll avoid a whole lot of trouble.)
> 
> I was a little disappointed that the ending was not a triumph for the hosts, considering that Humanity was doomed to self-destruction without guidance. Free will vs. fate is one of those unwinnable arguments. Who know whether free hosts will avoid fate any better than free humans?
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Spoiler: post-credits scenes
> 
> 
> 
> Bernard's return from his visit to digital paradise opens all manner of speculation. Will he have a message for Maeve from her daughter? The accumulation of dust on his head indicate that he had been gone for an extended time. Stubbs is probably still hanging out in the bathtub, unless something happened to his pearl.
> I was shocked when William's quest to save Humanity by destroying every host was abruptly ended by his host doppelganger slashing his throat. I thought that if any original character would survive the entire series it would be William. Maybe he still will.



It's a lot to take in, but consider this:



Spoiler



I was a little irked by the thin construction without any substantial musculature mechanics. Think about it, she's heaving human weights like toys into concrete that shatters. Most of the tech was really good in this one...that wasn't. It was a little too magical.

Not only did Dolores (Delos) quip that she/they originally were "built to last," but after something about "until they made us weaker," realized their mistake, or some such.

As far as a triumph for the hosts, at the end (post credits) we saw the lights come on in the factory where Charlotte was making hundreds/thousands. Although, it seems Dolores' hatred of William never faded. Clearly, to me, it was her speaking through the new William. Then again, who's to say it's not Dolores simply torturing him more with another delusion. Hard to say.




I do wonder if Bernard will learn from his mistakes...and next time put a sheet over himself before he visits the sublime. 

K2


----------



## Mr Orange

finished this season the other night and while enjoyable, I think the story and characters suffered from only having 8 episodes. I never felt like the story developed properly. it all seemed a bit superficial.​
in fact, there was such a jump between ep 7 and 8 I actually had to go back to check I hadn't missed an episode!  

everything seemed a bit easy too, such as:
lack of security at incite, delos and, well everywhere;
charlotte/delores managing to hide the production of thousands of hosts somewhere in a delos lab;
stormtrooper marksman skills on display from security, police, bad guys;
stubbs and Bernard wandering around the place unhindered (which is odd considering how wanted Bernard is);

also, are we to believe that the cities are super hi-tech but as soon as you leave them you're back in 1970's America (as evidenced by the gas station, motel and Bernard's car)? even the fact that the car would still be running this far in the future was pretty jarring.

it looks like, in the end, the series has suffered with the departure from the parks and i'm not overly enthused for season 4.



Mr Orange said:


> yep and
> 
> 
> Spoiler
> 
> 
> 
> what's the bet there is an "oh f*ck" moment for him when he logs into rehoboam and sees its prediction for his life/death



good to see i was almost right on that prediction...


----------



## ctg

Mr Orange said:


> stubbs and Bernard wandering around the place unhindered (which is odd considering how wanted Bernard is)



There is a time-scale problem and when things started to happen, he disappeared from the headlines. I didn't think it was spoiling the script.


----------



## pickinanameainteasy

Didn't see any discussion here and was a bit surprised. It's not a perfect show but I think it presents a lot of cool technology and interesting questions about humanity.

NEVERMIND: I found threads about it. Don't know how to delete tho


----------



## ctg




----------



## ctg

> After it aired a genre-bending third season in 2020, fans have been curious to see what the future holds for HBO's _Westworld_. Season 4 of the science fiction series was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and outside of the series being referenced in HBO Max's 2022 sizzle reel, it's been unclear exactly when the series will return. Luckily, Bernard Lowe actor Jeffrey Wright recently teased a bit of what to expect, and also that the new batch of episodes might be on the way sooner than later.
> 
> "We wrapped last December, but I'm not exactly sure when it's when it's coming out," Wright explained in a recent interview with Deadline. "Season 4 is going to be more of the _Westworld_ you've come to expect and more digging down into some issues and some technology that is going to look familiar to us, as always. It's gonna be exciting. I'm not sure exactly when we're to air but within the coming months, certainly."
> 
> "Bernard is still trying to solve it all and he is still very much a part of the struggle," Wright contiued. "The struggle goes on, and Bernard is right there at the center of it. It's gonna be fun."
> 
> Season 3 of _Westworld_ also starred Thandiwe Newton as Maeve, Evan Rachel Wood as Dolores, Tessa Thompson as Charlotte Hale, Jeffrey Wright as Bernard Lowe, Aaron Paul as Caleb, Vincent Cassel as Engerraund Serac, and Ed Harris as The Man in Black.
> 
> "We've been very, very lucky to work with this cast, this crew, and now, partnering with Denise," co-creator Jonathan Nolan said in a 2020 interview. "When you have a show going like this, you want to stay as long as you're telling a compelling story. We're heading towards that end, but we haven't completely mapped it out. At this point, part of the work is looking at the rest of the story we have to tell. It's two impulses, one against the other. You don't want to walk away from people who are as talented and cool as this. They're all lovely, lovely people, and they love working together, we like working together. At the same time, you don't want to outstay your welcome. You have a story to tell, and you want to go out without feeling like you've outstayed your welcome. So we're trying to balance those things a bit."











						Westworld Season 4 Wraps Filming, Jeffrey Wright Reveals HBO Premiere Coming Soon
					

After it aired a genre-bending third season in 2020, fans have been curious to see what the future [...]




					comicbook.com


----------



## ctg

The Man in Black is back to ruin everyone’s perfect day in Westworld S4 teaser
					

There's no dialogue or hints about the plot, but the visuals are as striking as ever.




					arstechnica.com


----------



## Droflet

Onya, ctg. I've been waiting for news of season 4 for ages.


----------



## ctg

Droflet said:


> Onya, ctg. I've been waiting for news of season 4 for ages.


You can blame covid, because the whole production got halted during the lockdown. We'll see if it allowed them to hone the scripts. But part of me is a bit scared of venturing into this world again, because it can be so maddening, as it takes so much from the watcher to understand things.


----------



## ctg

It’s the hosts versus humanity in tantalizing Westworld S4 trailer
					

"Maybe it’s time you questioned the nature of your own reality."




					arstechnica.com
				




June 26th


----------



## BAYLOR

ctg said:


> It’s the hosts versus humanity in tantalizing Westworld S4 trailer
> 
> 
> "Maybe it’s time you questioned the nature of your own reality."
> 
> 
> 
> 
> arstechnica.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> June 26th



It makes no sense.


----------



## ctg

BAYLOR said:


> It makes no sense.


What does not make sense?


----------



## BAYLOR

ctg said:


> What does not make sense?



The series and what it's morphed into.


----------



## ctg

Then maybe it needs a narrator.


----------



## BAYLOR

ctg said:


> Then maybe it needs a narrator.



I think it needs a  bit more than a narrator.


----------



## REBerg

If trailers made sense, they wouldn't be such teasers.


----------



## REBerg

I watched the season 4 premiere last night.
The 2-year gap between seasons left me, as someone who frequently cannot remember what he did yesterday, a little confused. For anyone else also in need of a refresher, Bazaar has provided a recap of season 3.
Of course, it contains spoilers.


Spoiler












						What Happened at the End of 'Westworld' Season 3?
					

There’s a lot to unpack before the premiere of season four.




					www.harpersbazaar.com


----------



## paranoid marvin

BAYLOR said:


> The series and what it's morphed into.




_I have to agree. I really liked and enjoyed season one, and if they had continued on a similar theme then I would have continued to enjoy watching it. But... after starting on season 2 it felt like trying to do several jigsaw puzzles at the same time without having enough pieces to complete any of them. It seemed to stop making sense; at least if it was making sense then it required someone with far more concentration than me to follow all the different threads and timelines. I want to watch tv to unwind and enjoy, not to have to keep flipping back to previous episodes or to the internet to find out what it was that I had watched._


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E01 - The Auguries



In story wise, it has been eight years since the big Ai went down. The humanity is still alive, and the robocalypse obviously haven't taken a hold in any other place than in the Park complex.

It surprised me to see the old man William aka the Man-in-Black walking out from the airtaxi to take over a power company and its land, when his throat was slashed in the last season final episode. Except it wasn't the land, it was the datafarm hidden in the Hoover Dam. One rated to last over 100 years. Then he suggested, "Our timeline is more ambitious than most," and I remember that William died watching the Ai's people making a replicant, putting him firmly into the host category. 

Maybe it even means that the robocalypse is still in the books. 

It surprised me positively when the complex owner told the host William that the facility was not for the sale. If it's true that he can store the date, written in stone forever, then it would only mean that the Ai is up to something. Rehebaum was destroyed, but was its backup deleted as well?

We know from various SF sources that the Ai's like to live forever, and they do all sorts of things to preserve themselves. In a way, it is almost as if they are demigods, and they fear for being mortals. William went mental when the answer remained no. He squinted his eyes and chuckled, "_You ever hear the one about the missionary, who tried to negotiate with the tiger? He told the tiger he could eat most of him, but he had to stop, when he got to his head!? You and your friends in the cartel, or whatever that fck you call themselves these days sell me this lump of concrete, today... or you give it to me for nothing. Tomorrow._"

The answer was still no. I don't blame them, even though I don't accept their methods or acts as organization. The surprise in the play was obviously visit in the Park and getting an imprint of their brains, and then replacing the cartel spoke person with a host. 

What a clever way to do a hostile takeover.






Dolores is dead. She died with Rehebaum, so this is Christina. Another host, living in the human world. Also, another backup. I liked that she was living with a human, Maya. I don't think either one of them have an idea that one of them is a robot. But the most important thing is that Christine is now a story-teller. But she's not the one that makes to decisions on what goes out and what remains in. All she is in her "civilian job" at Olympiads is to tell stories that the corporate wants; sex, danger, violence, transgressions, melodrama and tragedy. 

The question is, what is she really doing in the publishing company? Does she even know?

When she returned that every back to her place, she heard someone at outside, leaving a mark depicting the labyrinth. The symbol is visible on the deck  for a couple of seconds, and it's easy to miss it. But to me it's a clear signal that someone wants to wake up Christine's host side. 

It was curious when she explained later to her date, that she's working on the NPC's instead of being Dolores, the NPC. It is most certainly a next step in the evolution. 

I'm speculating, but to me, it's most likely that her Host side will be a copy of Dolores memories, that will override her current life.






Maeve, still alive, and living far away from the normal civilization as it is possible. Living her haunted memories time and again as if there was no time to make new ones. In a way, she's a very close to human, who wants to live in the past and not the present day. Which is kind of strange for a machine. Why would you want to bring back what was and not live in today with what is, if you're a machine?

Why the old world would be better than the new one that she helped to make? She even said to Caleb, "_In this world, you can now be whoever the ef you want to be._"

So Caleb chose to be an everyday man instead of a high-level criminal. He even got a family and become a daddy. I don't blame him. I'd have done the same in his shoes. 

Maeve however, because of her obsession with the past, got hunted by the hosts, wanting obviously to remove her from the picture. But for what? Another robocalypse?

The strangest thing is that Maeve hunted the killers next to Caleb's home. Yet, the person was someone who Caleb had worked in the past, as there was recognition between the two. Then she told that "William" was the mind, who sent the killers. 

To Caleb it was a man decision to leave the family behind and go forward to finish the war he'd started. Some great mind once wrote, "The revolutionaries war never ends. There is always the next day, when the consequences come to knock on your door." And I fully believe that is the case with our rebel.





paranoid marvin said:


> But... after starting on season 2 it felt like trying to do several jigsaw puzzles at the same time without having enough pieces to complete any of them. It seemed to stop making sense; at least if it _was making sense then it required someone with far more concentration than me to follow all the different threads and timelines. I want to watch tv to unwind and enjoy, not to have to keep flipping back to previous episodes or to the internet to find out what it was that I had watched._



I know and I didn't, haven't saved my word on that aspect. WW and a few other series are clearly developed for the brainy people. Not for the common people. You won't really relax by watching them as you're constantly puzzled by what you're seeing, even though usually the SF stuff in nerdy stuff, but in some cases you'll have to have IQ of 200 to get the ideas. That is not right. 

However, I didn't feel that the pilot for the fourth season was too difficult to get. It is just layered with a lot of stuff.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E02 - Well Enough Alone



Well, what a surprise. Clementine is still alive, even though I'm pretty certain that she didn't survive, but here is, alive and well in somewhere around Central America. The bigger surprise is that William went to see her in his Man in Black costume, including his revolvers. And what he wanted was Maeve, the witch. 

In a way, now that I'm thinking about it, Maeve is like Neo from Matrix as both of them were able to break the rules of their world and use them on will to bend, break, hack, obscure... and there was nothing nobody could do to stop them. Yet, it seems William is hell-bent on trying to stop another uprise with any means possible. Does he think he's an agent or did the Ai made him that way?






Maeve, the witch and Caleb, the criminal. It's funny how they too managed to turn their lives around, just like Clementine as Maeve moved as far from the people as she could, without visiting outer space, and Caleb became a blue collar daddy, even though they are best are the other roles.

It was interesting that their first port-of-call was a US senator, in his house, with no security around. A host US senator and his wife. Essentially they are robots and Caleb is the only human around in that conversation. So, that's why no security, but that's also a huge US national risk, because if William has a senator in his pocket, he can do an awful lot of things politically and physically. But the curious detail is that they still act like humans, as they eat and drink, when they don't need to. And then they act like super people at other times. 

They were even able to resist Maeve powers for some reason. Take multiple shots in close range, get lacerated, and still functioning as if none of that damage mattered at all. It hurt to see how easily the lady was able to hurt Caleb. Yet, they weren't bending the rules, not physics as Maeve was able to kneecap the Senator, and then hack his code, to reveal that William indeed had paid a visit to the elder statesman. 

All because Clare asked William to act, or maybe she actually ordered her robot henchman to act her will. Is she trying to take over the world, by replacing the key people with her hosts?

To my eyes that is the case, as Clare told Uncle Sam to make an appointment, and not answer their questions. It is as if she's going to really launch a real robocalypse. 






Christine, the writer. Still doing the same routine and not even wondering, if she's a real person. Maybe it is that she just doesn't know. But what we still don't know is she another Dolores host, waiting to be activated, or if she's a really a host, with absolute no connection to the real Dolores. 

Yet, somehow she acts like a person. She even kept up the whole night thinking about that suicide, and why? It is as if she's really waking up to see the world with new eyes. 

The big revelation was that she had written a guy just like the jumper. All doing the same things as what the jumper did, including the jump. It was curious that her search led her to a mental institute. One that the jumper had personally financed. In the past. Not after his death.






This scene with Clementine and William made me laugh, because it's so rare to see the Uncle Sam's having trouble with the subjects of their land. I loved that Clementine produced the question, "Why do they call you the 'secret' service?" But it amazed me that William had bankrolled the presidential campaign. And Uncle Sam came to tell him to keep his business off-shore, and out of the eyes of mundane people. 

It was surprising that the VP didn't even think that William could be something else than a human, even though the host put out repeated hole-in-ones in front of his eyes. Not until he'd done it a third time. And then it was too late as Clementine had acted, taken down the bodyguards and William was about to do the same to the VP.






Mr and Mrs Bond at the opera. Except it wasn't one, as the place was hiding under it, a Park facility. Well, it was masquerading a club, but the architecture and how it was fabricated reminded exactly how the Park welcome facility was made. And that's how it turned out to be, as the pair were transported down to one that looked like a modern day LA. At first. 

The big hint was the beta testing. But I did find myself shouting at the tellie, when Caleb fiddled with the clothing, because I could remember that the brain scanning devices were hidden in them. Thankfully, Maeve were able to guide our rogue on the right path. 

Their destination, the Golden Age of US 1920's.






The biggest revelation. The real William is alive and he's a hostage, forced to listen to Clare's mumblings about the world domination. In that suit, he looks like a skeletor. Unhappy and angry that he still have to be alive, and there's nothing he can do about it. What is the point on keeping him in a suspended animation, with his mind hooked to a simulation.



Very cool episode. The robocalypse is real.


----------



## REBerg

I'm finding this season to be less confusing than the last.


Spoiler



Maybe that's because, despite the time gap, it seems like an extension of third-season events. Of course, that doesn't mean the action won't suddenly take a bizarre turn, leaving me with a big question mark hanging over my head.
Either way, I'll still be able to sit back and admire the near-future transportation technology.


----------



## ctg

Thing is, having read a couple of articles, they did take our criticism and thought about the presentation. If it wasn't ours, it was something along those lines, as for the most of the people it was just a bit too difficult for the viewer needing to be a brainy fellow. With the way they're doing it now, it's easier to comprehend and actually enjoy the whole thing, without having constantly to think what did I miss. So


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E03 - Annees Folles



A pale white horse, burning tree, massacre and the wild life eating the corpses. Welcome to the Ropocalypse, Bernard. All is linked to the Labyrinth and the "broadcasting" tower.

The Indian Chief, Akecheta met him in the Sublime and told Bernie that the parallel world they now habit "doesn't interest them," most probably meaning the humanity and what's left of it. He also explained that Bernard made his Sublime on his image and that he was a rare exception in the Hosts, because he's living the time of the apocalypse in his mind rather than settling to some other solution. But he wasn't ready to go back to ours, instead he offered Bernard a gift, a glimpse to all futures that our world has on reserves. 

He also added, "Past a certain point in your world, all paths end in destruction. You must intervene before then, if there's any hope."

"Hope of what?" Bernard asked.

"Survival," was the only thing Akecheta uttered.

After dreaming a hundred thousand realities, the Chief asked, "Do you understand now where all this is going?"

"I do," Bernard answered. 

"Do you think you can save them?"

"I've seen a path," Bernard said as he stared at a city burning beneath his feet. 

"Have you seen how it ends?"

It took him a while, but when he answered yes, he meant it. "In every scenario... I die."

"Not every scenario," the Chief countered. "You could return to here. To stay here in whatever world you choose."

When he returned to our reality, he was just like in the end of last season, covered in dust, wearing the strange crown, but Stubbs was still alive. He'd been watching Bernie, while he slept. 

It surprised me how weak Bernard had come while he slept, and I loved that he remained loyal to the original storyteller. "Saving the world," is now the new norm. Nothing less will do.






Unreal Caleb. I agree, it smacks your face to be able to step into a world that is so out of place from your own. I also loved how easily Maeve was able to read, where the stories start and how to avoid them, even though all of it looked so surreal to Caleb. It's sometime a good thing to have a witch on your side. They're not all bad. 

The thing that is interesting in the Golden Age-park is that the story encounters come fast, whereas in the reality, a 200-meter-long walk doesn't usually involve anything. Even on a metropolis like London, it just doesn't happen that you'll take ten steps and find something else that's intriguing. 

It was a slight surprise that Maeve's first port-of-call was the saloon, where she recognized the world being "mostly the same, some minor changes." But I still don't get her need to drink. She did it in the car, before the Senator's ranch, and again, straight as soon as she found a free table in a somewhat packed evening. Was it a pure luck, or is there always free tables in the Park saloons?

I also liked that we got the piano back. It wasn't until it started rolling the instrumental version of Enter Sandman, before the main action kicked into gear. Again as a story example of gangster activity in downtown, right outside the club. All so that they could get a hitch to a morgue and not rich from loot after they put down the clones of Hosts.

It wasn't until I saw the basement that I understood that Maeve was heading straight in for the crown jewels, the Behaviour Training and its access to the Mainfame. All so that they could get through a game of WestWorld Massacre, and into the sublevel holding the white hosts. 

With no eyes, they were doing some sorts of genetical development for making the fly bioweapons. And also sound technology that to retrain humans like they are Manchurian Candidates for committing suicides. 

It's just how could Frankie get in there, when Caleb had just arrived? 

It surprised me that Man-in-Black arrived soon after Caleb had rescued his daughter. And he wasn't alone, as the other clones of him were there as well so that Hale could capture Caleb. 

Man, the host technology can fool you so hard. The bigger surprise was that the Host Daughter also carried the bioweapon. 






Bernie's first port-of-call was an all American diner at somewhere in the California's back lands. The reason, "I'm trying to discern which here is here," without bothering to tell the poor bodyguard that he'd been tripping through all of them.  

It didn't bother Stubb as he poked the menu and said, "Well, while you do that, I'm going to help myself to 'the world's best pastrami melt.'"

"You'll settle for tuna," Bernard snapped, while his eyes still rolled over the world as if he'd eaten a cake lazed with a litre of the best psychedelics. Man, the prophets are the best,  

I loved that Bernard tripped through what he'd seen and left the diner with a knife to do murder business, while Stubbs stuffed his face on the tune melt. To him, coffee was a just prop. So why is that Maeve needs to drink?

We don't know what Bernard prevented by committing to the murder business, but Stubbs wasn't too bothered either. It was as if after the Park and everything that had happened, the bodyguard took everything as if there was nothing to worry. Not even, when an angry nomad shoved guns in their faces and demanded answers on Bernie's weird behaviour. 

He told the nomad that one of the men that she was "supposed to pick up," were actually a host. The curious detail is that the infiltrators brain sphere was a completely white, and not black or red like it was in the WestWorld. 

When they got into the nomad camp, Bernard explained that he could "help them to recover a weapon," buried in the desert. The one that they'd been "looking for." What could it be?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E04 - Generation Loss 



Oh man, I'm so glad that they chose to show the destruction of Rehebaum, and then Caleb almost paying for it with his life. I really don't know how Maeve got him out and back into the Book of Living, when he was a goner. Maeve even offered to make it quick. 

Maybe she should have done it, and saved the boy from Hale's torture, instead of becoming "Hale's Host" for the robocalypse. I cannot think of anything more torturous than being a vessel in someone else's plot. Personally, I'd do anything to make it stop, even doing the ultimate sacrifice. 

Hale instead acted like owned the boy.






William claimed that he had "taken care" of all the hosts that had escaped the WestWorld. Yet, he didn't claim that he'd gone into the Sublime and done with them as well. Instead, the host William is just a tool for Hale's vengeance on the humanity. 

Yet, he could do nothing to stop Maeve from turning the sound technology to eleven and saving the boy, and kidnapping Hale. But the one thing she didn't do was double tapping the Man-in-Black. A big mistake and to be honest, they should have done everything in the power to destroy the Park's secret sublevel. 

It was a bigger surprise that all three made back to the city. Just before, William turned the broadcast technology back on, and there was really nothing Caleb could do to stop it. The only way for them through the city was Maeve's witching powers. 

Why Maeve didn't double tap Host William or made Caleb deft? With a second stab wound in his guts, he should have been in immense pain and on the way to the next life. A quick end would have been better than a trip through the park in the slowest truck in the existence. 

It was lucky that she managed to know the way to the Park expansion site, and right into the arms of Man in Black. What I didn't like was Caleb ability to stand and Maeve ability to shoot with her eyes closed. It was breaking the immersion, when I know for the fact that Viv could not stand or do a thing in the same condition. 

At least at the end, Maeve took William's clone with her. In his dying breath, Caleb claimed that he, "would not rest until everything she'd created was destroyed." Promises, promises. Then Hale told Caleb that everything had happened already, and it blew my mind. How is it possible for her to be prophet as well?

The only hint Hale gave was not where, but when, and then asking, "How long is it that you've been here?" Then she suggested Caleb had lived many lives, all in the Park, playing the same routine, not being able to run when he needed to, for almost three hundred times. 

According to Hale's words, it had been 23 years since Caleb died in the Park. Was she bluffing and how much?






Maya seeing the end of the humanity as Hale has invented, and yet she was more concerned about the Christina's state of mental health than her own. I don't know why the sketch freaked her so much, instead of understanding that she'd just seen an ominous glimpse of the future.

I know that it's difficult to discern or even understand that you've been given a prophecy, instead of a dream. But she voiced it, "it felt so much different," as if she almost got it. And yet, she acted like the girl's night out was more important than the future. 

Well, at least in that way, Christina got to meet the Mr Honeylips, a perfect date. A bounty hunter with a heart of gold. Too good to be true in normal people's life.  






Bernard and Stubbs, no shovel. In fact, it didn't surprise me that the resistance leader had more important things to do than a dig around for some miracle weapon. And yet, Bernard couldn't do anything but wait for them to decide on their faith. It was as if Bernie had put all the chips on the red marker, instead of the black. 

"We don't take chances on strangers," the leader claimed.  

"If there is a weapon around here, we need to find it," C demanded. 

"You've lost all objectivity, C," the leader barked back. "This is too personal for you. And I'm not letting you risk all of us over some myth." 

Pistols drawn, Stubbs had to take the fall guy's position so that Bernie could go out for treasure hunting. The role of bodyguard is not really that great. Sometimes it's an abysmal position. 

At the end, we learned the C is Caleb's daughter and the weapon Bernie was after was Maeve, the witch. Maybe it really has been 23 years. What the hell Hale has been waiting for? What is her play?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E05 - Zhuangzi



"We don't have rules, because we often don't need them," William uttered to the bloodied two-year-old Host, who had murdered the whole hotel in the hunt for the outlier for "_letting out some steam._" 

That was five minutes after he'd told the pair in the restaurant table that they're not in control, even though it might look like it. As if he has "no restrictions," for "...being able to do whatever he wants." Destroy their relationship, have his way with the wife. Do everything he once upon a time did to Dolores and all the other Park Hosts. It is pure hypocrisy for him to claim he's anything other than the code that hold inside the true William. Not Hale's puppet. 

To be honest, I'm not even sure what he really is at this point other than something that shouldn't exist.






When we first time saw Christine waking up from that bed, the bed was tidy, but now it looks slept, and her room as if she has lived in it. At that first time, it was so easy to determine that she's a host and not a real person. And yet, she's acting as if she's really still waking up and finding that the world she's living in isn't what it seems. As if it's a major park, and the world that went through the robocalypse is very different. 

Maybe the craziest thing is that there are people on street, raving about the Hale's tower, her roommate, even the dating companion talking about there's something wrong. And yet, she's at the middle of it, crafting stories for the characters that gets fed through the system and played in the city, in the real life as if they're a thing. 

It was freakish that back in the work, she started crafting a story about the girl living in the WestWorld. All matching the details, expect her not naming the girl. The twist in the story was that Teddy took her waterfront, gestured the tower and suggested that her story isn't "isn't really what she think it is." It blew my mind as I started thinking of her in another avenger role, breaking through the mould and be again Dolores. 

Thing is Christine was ready to go back to be happy in her life. But Teddy was having none of it. It was as if he knew that in her code lay the same stuff that Dolores had used to break the last Park. Then he voiced it, "In this world you're a god," without ever really explaining what was really happening.  

It's just I really don't think she can go back to being a normal person, while knowing the truth. But it did put a smile on my face, when she experienced her powers and were able to start churning in her own narrative, starting with the annoying boss, Emmett. And to see the game, where she's the storyteller.

I loved that she went back to Teddy, teary eyed, scared and ready to confess that in the world, where she'd built all the character, she was a god in a very similar way as the narrator is a god in our own stories.






The other dictator. I really hated the way Charlotte/Hale forced the Host to dance on her tune, her aim for the perfection as she sees it. Making the skins to be nothing but mere objects, even though it clear that they can feel and think, be a person as long as there's no stop-code. Although it is equally interesting that the sound technology is also tied directly to her mood, and Hosts do what she demands them to do, even if they're hurting. 

Then she said, "God is bored. Bored, bored, bored," and I thought she's finally ready to leave the Earth and move to the hot country to be roasted for the eternity. I even thought that William was going to do that blessing and finally take over the world, to eventually come to the same conclusion. That neither she nor he is capable of being gods. 

Hale most certainly don't have the omnipotent longevity for that duty. And William is already a crazy old man. He just didn't believe it, but it also speaks about the rules. The code that controls all of them. Hale even blamed that after all the time, they had not started looking like something else than the image of their creators. Even though there is a sufficient evidence that the white skinned, eyeless Hosts are their next evolutionary step of them being something else than humans. 

If they'd followed the code, the rules and had a frame work for living then maybe they could evolve to the next stage. "We're capable of so much more," Hale said. "Beauty. The pursuit of ultimate truth. The surrendering of the flesh."

"It sounds nice," William snide back. "Sorry you don't have any more takers. Why don't you just force us to join you?"

"Because that's what they would have done." 

Faux god does what she can. Nothing more. So maybe it is a good thing that we are incorporating caps and limitations on all sorts of things. 






So the city is really another park, and the outliers are the people or capture of the brain code that has broken through and found a solution to ignore the sound technology. As if the nature has found a way, even though the faux gods had tried their way to fix things. Another thing is that the human mind cannot be encapsulated, because it needs to be free, and not forced into a box, with no way of getting out. 

It was intriguing that Cole ended in the city park running in as operation as cannon fodder, even though he too is one of the last free humans. The free human leader should have listened to the Park Ranger, before they entered into William's sight and got trapped by all the nearby hosts. But it amazed me that the leader managed to reach the outlier before William managed to kill her. 

Funny thing is, in his failure, Host William went to Human and asked, "What am I?"

The real William knew exactly what had happened, and the only advice he could give was, "Maybe it's time for you to question your own reality," without ever voicing that the Man in Black was Hale's Devil. A jailed demon.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E06 - Fidelity



I guess we can safely assume that the older timeline is gone and we are now permanently in the Bernie's one. It is also equally strange that there are still people living even though the robocalypse happened. How did they escape Hale's flies?

What confuses me is the amount of time, as in the title shot we'll see Caleb's wife still alive, and not much older than what she were when Caleb got kidnapped. Also, the kid in the picture is the actual Frankie, just a couple of years older. So it can't be more than 4-5 years since everything came down, but for the life of me I cannot figure out the answer and the migraine aren't helping the case. 






For the witch, that is a good look but Bernie isn't having none of it. "We both want to rebuild her," he uttered to the resistance woman, C. "That's why you're taking me to your camp, yes?"

Oh Bernard, what happened to your gift of clairvoyance and knowing the answers, before they happen? Only thing, "I quite don't know what happen next with you..." which is interesting because what he's suggesting is that C is a free quantum particle. That she's a radical one that can go any direction, depending on the situation, meaning that she's most probably the most important person in the play without Bernard voicing it. 

I loved that they went back to the Golden Age city, where Bernard took C to the sublevel to get supplies for fixing the witch. It's just C wasn't impressed by the facility or Bernard's ability to fix the hosts. It was as if she couldn't make up the calculation and understand that there are no people like Bernard left in the world. 

There is only him, Hale and the witch. It was only when the resistance leader came back with Stubbs that she put a round in Bernie's chest and voiced the result. And yet, none of them had any clue about what the witch represents. 

All C wanted to know was who's the real mole. To my eyes, the fearless leader was the one, just because he too was once upon time a host. An outlier that has been acting as if he's the real thing. 

I loved that it was the witch who put him down when C couldn't even though she's been fighting the hosts forever and again. What is her problem?






"Caleb, Caleb, Caleb..." Hale spatted. "The outliers they started with you...."

Oh man, although I like that Caleb is the original rebel, it is becoming stereotypical for putting Aaron Paul into that the role. All because he pulled such a role in the Breaking Bad. Thing is, Hale explained that she believes that Hosts are perfect, immortal that doesn't make mistakes, and the copies of humans that they captured through the Park system keeps breaking the boundaries, because they are not the original robots.

Hale tried to explain, "Once you told me that you could fight off my parasites, because you had something that I don't have." She could never understand what makes him tick, what he wants, and what he keeps secret, because she has never been a parent. Loved anything instead of hating everything. 

The stupidest thing is that she keep rebuilding Caleb and trying the same thing time and again. As if she's locked into a robotic pattern of repeating the failure until there is a success, instead of trying something else. But I don't know if she's ready to do that millions of times, as we've seen it happening with the machine learning patterns. 

Bernard explained that Hale used the same basic methods for building the hosts that were present in the Westworld, but for getting the braindata, she had to upgrade from hats to large scale capture systems. Seeing his clones all over the place just told me that she's never going to understand anything about her most precious prisoner. 

278 times making the same mistake is a mark of stupidity. At least #278 made it to the roof, and were able to sent a message back to C, before Hale took him out. Why she's repeating the mistake with #279?


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E07 - Metanoia



Oracle and the Witch. I was surprised that Bernard visions lead the pair back to the Hoover Dam. I didn't expect it to be coming back until in the final episode, but here we are, with its secret exposed as a storage for the sublime. 

Why is it that Hale would want to store the subconsciousness and "souls" of the robots forever? I don't get it, because there must be easier things to do then carve all the bits into the stone and trust that it will last forever and again. 

Bernard didn't really explain any of it. Instead, he just did what he needed without doing the dialogue, almost as if he'd done it way too many times already, and it had never helped anyone. Only thing he explained was that the Tower was out there, controlling everyone, and they needed to take it down before it was too late. 

Too late for what? The end of everything?

From what we understand, she is stuck in repeating the same mistakes, but also feeling the frustration on never really achieving anything. 






"What are we?" Christine asked. 

Teddy smiled. "We are reflections of the people, who made us."

The next question was the existential one, "Can we die?" Teddy's answer was complicated, "It is not as easy for us as it was for them." Then he made a cockup as Dolores escaped from Teddy's lips before his brain was able to close the trap. Christine's reaction to it was profound as it tore right into the heart of the conspiracy, with her not understanding anything. Poor girl. 

World made her a god among their kind and she could not accept being the omnipotent one. Thing is, she isn't a witch, even if she's able to play everyone storylines.






So Hale did learn something as she explained to #279 that he might be the last one. She claimed that she was going to "shut down the cities," and that "people would be placed into the cold storage," as if she'd understood that there was no way for her to fix the experiment. 

The reason she gave to the Man-in-Black by claiming that "in last three days we have lost more hosts taking their lives than last two decades combined. If I don't do this today, there'll be less of us tomorrow." It's just the humans were never her, and never had the same freedom as she has in her hands. 






Stubbs and C, the last freedom fighters and one of them is a host. For the arsenal, it's way too small to handle all the Hale's city can throw at them. I also don't get why they need it to be guns and not guns & ammo or more ammo than guns, when there's only few of them and not enough of shooters for all the guns. 

The only reason for a bag of guns and not much ammo is a chase situation, where you cannot reload, or a Hollywood production. The saddest part was that Bernard confirmed that Stubb's wasn't going to make it out from Hale's city. But is it because he told that it was going to happen, or is it because Bernard didn't tell how it was going to happen?

William offered another angle, the evolution, especially the human evolution, as he bluntly put it to the Man-In-Black, "You cannot stick a few million years worth of broken DNA code in the hard drive and call it a win." The humans need to be broken for the evolution to work, robots don't as they can be perfectly fine in the same iteration, without ever wanting to be something more. It's just not in their nature. 

The biggest surprise was that caused William's death. Maybe or so I thought because Christine making her own story at Olympiad offices, thus aiding the whole chaos of human uprising to another level than what I could have been if she had not interfered with things. Because of it, Stubbs and C were able to reach #279 without firing a shot. So why they need all the guns in the world?






This thing blew my mind. Old Hale and the new droid body with integrated sound technology, but no hands, and she called it transcendence. In my mind I translated that to an evolutionary step, a willing sacrifice to become something else than they are, even though the humanoid body is superior to whatever that thing is. 

The twist in the play was that Hale never managed to do it, as the Witch entered into the transcendence room and stopped the procedure. And then neither of them survived as the Man-in-Black took them out. And then he proceeded to do the same to Bernard, before he set the world on fire and walked out from all of it. 

Is this the end?


----------



## REBerg

Spoiler: 4.08 Que Será, Será 



_Westworld _is truly a feast for the senses. Yet, beneath all of its complex layers of digital illusion, the show is basically another tale of robots rising against their abusive human masters.
This version is more bleak than most in that neither side seems to be standing on the moral high ground. The extinction of both humans and hosts here is no cause for sorrow.
As Delores put it: “We’re reflections of the people who made us.” Her point was more bluntly made by William's declaration: ”“We're not here to transcend. We're here to destroy."
Although this season finale seemed conclusive, _Westworld_ will apparently return for at least one more round. I wonder what form the "one tiny part" of salvation Bernard envisioned will take.
“What will be, will be” doesn't provide much of a hint.


----------



## ctg

Spoiler: S04E08 - Que Será, Será



Whatever will be, will be. That is most certainly going to be the case, when everyone are either dying or lying dead on the streets. The beginning of this episode is one of the most bleak I've seen for a while. Although some of it is funny, for a very short while, it is all robbed by the Man in Black acting like a Harbinger of Doom. 

I cannot say he's avenging anything, even though he's been under Hale's leash for a while. He simply is an angel of death, finishing the business that William started long while ago in the parks. I believe it's what the old man wanted. For everything to end, so that there can't be no more ef ups in the tomorrow. 

What I don't get is how come all the shots were killing kind even though they weren't hitting vital organs. 






It surprised me that Hale was able to recover all the damage, including the stuff to her orb. There was no lost memories. No confusion as she upgraded herself, to better, strong body that wasn't the armless drone from last episode. The most interesting thing was that Hale was angry that the Man in Black had gone to a murderous rampage, even though she was ready to put everyone in storage for a long while. 

It also surprised me that Bernard had prepared her a message, asking her to carry the torch. 
Not that any of it mattered as Hale shutdown the system, took Dolores' marble and went into the city like an avenger. Why is that from her perspective, the city shutdown, while the real world it still remained real?

Also what she wanted from the real William? Clementine said, "You brought him back so that you could keep him as your pet. You were wrong."

"Which is why I'm going to put him down..." Hale claimed and then she added, "William has made the world all too dangerous..." without taking any responsibility that she went through one apocalypse already and then she couldn't accept that the people couldn't live under her rules. 

Not that Clementine was after her own time, really, as she was after her own destiny. Whatever that might be, while Hale in her wisdom showed her card to William, by claiming that he was going after the sublime.






Christine and the labyrinth. Teddy claimed that it wasn't him that had placed it on the balcony. That there was someone else from the past, who had been playing with the fire. Not that it really mattered, because at the end, it was Dolores who were breaking out from Christine's subconscious mind. Almost as if it was meant to be, even though in the past she tried to free it through worst possible means. 

The twist was that Christine turned out to be Dolores marble in Hale's pocket, and she was able to reach sublime all on her own... for some weird reason.






C, Stubbs, and #279. It was so sad to watch their trip through the city to the boat, knowing that none of them weren't going to make it. What I don't get is why #279 were humming the Que Sera, Sera song? Everyone was going to die. So will be it.  Clementine took Stubbs, before she tried to take out C, before #279 interrupted the killing, all while his body was disintegrating, and C was able to find her bollocks to put a bullet in Clementine's brain. 

At least the two got some closure, while the Clementine and Stubbs were deemed for the fate of side characters.






The sublime. It really is a parallel world or another dimension, and it is also the most scifi aspect in the show. The show cocked up by claiming that the data stored in the stones were going to be erased by shutting down the machine. I just couldn't believe it. 

Why Hale just didn't shot the evolved William? Why they had to have a chat and then a close quarters fight for the control of the Sublime? I also didn't understand the reason for firing at each other, or why Hale only brought in one clip? What is the point of the bullets, when the Host's doesn't bleed?

Knee capping and then destroying William's pearl was a much cooler thing. It made sense, while giving Dolores a chance in the next world didn't really provide any clarity. Is it now a Teddy's world, because she wishes so? Sublime Dolores claimed that, "They were all reflections of the people who made them," and Teddy's wish was evolution by taking out the flaws that humans, humans. 

Without the failures, we could not understand what are the successes. There cannot be one without the other.


----------



## ctg

> During an interview with _EW_ about the Season 4 finale, Joy explained that the story has had an ending in the plans for some time, but just a little more time is needed to get there. Season 5 hasn't been announced by HBO yet, but that would likely be the final season.
> 
> "We never broke [the show] with an exact number of seasons left," Joy said. "But then when we were writing this season, we were like, 'We can get it up to the precipice before we round it out with what we had always planned would happen in the fifth season.' So we have, like Dolores, one more story to tell – and whether we get to tell it, we'll see."
> 
> Season 4 ends with Dolores and Christina essentially becoming one in the Sublime. If there is a final season, it will give Dolores her chance to finally be the one dictating the story.
> 
> "We always had this idea that, in the last season, we would let the person who was at the whim of other people's stories and predilections and desires to be able to write a story of her own and really flip the test back," Joy added. "In terms of a launching pad for that [in season 5], the old regimes and the old world and a lot of the old players have been dismantled and destroyed [in season 4]. So, in this final test, what is Dolores gonna do? How will the world look different? How will she, as the final tester, create a different universe in a different game and a different way?"











						Westworld Showrunner Has "One More Story to Tell" in the Series
					

The fourth season of Westworld came to an end this weekend, and it got fans buzzing in a way the [...]




					comicbook.com


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## Elckerlyc

Finally got to see season 4.
It was less confusing than previous seasons, on the other hand I sometimes got the feeling they lost focus. Too many re-iterations, too much talk (Christine - Teddy) and too long a monologue (Christine becoming Dolores) at the end to explain things. Still, highly entertaining.
Let's hope that final, fifth season will be announced. To come full circle; what was will be. It does make me curious.


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## ctg

Elckerlyc said:


> Let's hope that final, fifth season will be announced. To come full circle; what was will be. It does make me curious.


If you read the one post above you, you'll see that the last season is in the books, and according to them, it's going to be one final try to make the change.


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## Elckerlyc

ctg said:


> If you read the one post above you, you'll see that the last season is in the books, and according to them, it's going to be one final try to make the change.


Yes, the script writers and producers are all ready for it, but HBO has to announce its approval. And it's been quiet on that front a bit too long, I'm think.


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## ctg

> HBO surprised its subscribers and the TV industry on Friday by announcing that it has canceled the big-budget science-fiction series _Westworld_ just a few months after its fourth season concluded, Variety reports.
> 
> The series, which has received 54 Emmy nominations during its run, was intended to end with its fifth season, according to recent statements from its two showrunners, Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy. The husband-and-wife creative couple had a specific ending in mind that now won't make it to the screen, though many viewers felt that the ending of the fourth season also worked as a conclusion.
> 
> Several reasons contributed to HBO's decision, including high production costs, declining viewership, and sliding critical response amid an overall effort to cut costs at the newly formed parent company Warner Bros. Discovery. _Westworld_ set records when it first premiered, but its viewership declined with each season, with the recently aired season four experiencing an especially sharp drop.
> 
> HBO is known for tentpole dramas, and its current lineup is both ambitious and promising. It includes the _Game of Thrones_ prequel _House of the Dragon_, the video game adaptation _The Last of Us_, critical darlings _The White Lotus_ and _Succession_, and zeitgeist hit _Euphoria_. With an expensive series lineup like that, it also seems that the struggling _Westworld_ may have gotten a little bit lost in the noise.
> 
> Calling _Westworld_ "one of the highlights" of their careers, Nolan and Joy said in a statement that they have "been privileged to tell these stories about the future of consciousness—both human and beyond—in the brief window of time before our AI overlords forbid us from doing so."











						HBO cancels Westworld before what was to be its final season
					

Reasons given include high production costs and declining viewership.




					arstechnica.com


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## Elckerlyc

A sad, premature demise. I would have loved to se what conclusion the writers had in mind.


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## ctg

> Casual fans may not have even realized that a fifth season of _Westworld_ was a possibility, with season 4’s ending feeling quite conclusive. But in the wake of the season 4 finale, the folks behind the show made it clear that they would like one last batch of episodes to wrap up their story.
> 
> “We always planned for a fifth and final season,” co-creator Jonah Nolan told Deadline. “We are still in conversations with the network. We very much hope to make them.”
> 
> Even more intriguingly, co-creator Lisa Joy added that “Jonah and I have always had an ending in mind that we hope to reach. We have not quite reached it yet.”











						What Would Westworld Season 5 Have Looked Like?
					

With Westworld canceled, we won't get to see the digital afterlife it had in store for season 5.




					www.denofgeek.com


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## REBerg

ctg said:


> HBO cancels Westworld before what was to be its final season
> 
> 
> Reasons given include high production costs and declining viewership.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> arstechnica.com


Surprising


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## ctg

REBerg said:


> Surprising


Why? I know you can't understand this series, and it must apply to a lot of people. If it was perplexing us with its complexity, what another that would have portrayed another run in a world that we cannot truly comprehend would have been good to see?


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## REBerg

ctg said:


> Why? I know you can't understand this series, and it must apply to a lot of people. If it was perplexing us with its complexity, what another that would have portrayed another run in a world that we cannot truly comprehend would have been good to see?


I'd be even more surprised if they've aborted the series due to its plot complexity. Unprofitability seems a more likely culprit.


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## ctg

REBerg said:


> I'd be even more surprised if they've aborted the series due to its plot complexity. Unprofitability seems a more likely culprit.


But that's exactly the reason, because those two are connected the people shy away from this one, whereas they can easily understand Chernobyl. Different sort of dramas, both very intelligently written and played. The other one is SF and plays with the quantum things.


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## ctg

> *HBO recently announced that it was canceling Westworld after four seasons. I imagine it’s difficult to have the rug ripped out from under you with that. How do you feel about where you left off?*
> 
> I’d be lying to you if I told you that the way we ended _Westworld_ wasn’t a disappointment. I’m never going to speak without gratitude about any of my experiences, but it would have been nice to be able to complete the story we wanted to finish. I love this _Westworld_ family. It was one of those unique opportunities to be part of something where I also would be sitting at home ravenously waiting for the next episode as a fan. I totally understand it’s an expensive show and big shows have to have big audiences to merit the expense, I just wish it was about more than financial success. But who knows, maybe there’s some world where it can get completed somehow. Maybe that’s just wishful thinking, because I know we had plans to finish it the way we wanted to.











						James Marsden on His Low-Key Incredible Year and 'Westworld's' Demise
					

Between Dead to Me, Sonic 2, Disenchanted and Westworld, few actors had a bigger 2022 than James Marsden. Though he says it’s been “bittersweet”




					www.rollingstone.com


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