Westworld (HBO/Sky Atlantic) [** Spoilers **]

errlloyd

Effects wrote: »

In much the same way humans are "programmed" by evolution to care for their offspring.

And in the same way we are programmed by religion to love our families too. Keeping with the idea that Ford is a god who is simply training his hosts to one day live without him.

ManOfMystery

pixelburp wrote: »

Well to paraphrase the classic axiom of TV and cinema, if we didn't see the body, they're not dead.

And considering HBO hasn't exactly been shy in showing every death or dong in detail, it's fair to presume Elsie and Stubbs are still alive.

Exactly. I'm just curious why they had no real role in the finale, unless their current whereabouts are meant to be mystery and tie into the release of the retired hosts from the basement.

irishash

I know it has been mentioned many times before now, but I had to say it again – The soundtrack to Westworld is one of the best I have heard in many a year. The mix of original compositions and the covers of Rolling Stones, Radiohead, The Cure and others is exceptionally done. I have just finished listening to all 34 tracks on the OST and I am going to dive back in straight away.

Stand out tracks for me are the 2 Vitamin String Quartet covers (Motion Picture soundtrack & Something I can never have), This World, Nitro Heist and Violent Delights (which is very similar to the main Tron: Legacy theme).

I would advise anyone who has enjoyed the music on the show to pick it up.

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Sad Professor

Re: Maeve

I'm not so sure Ford programmed her escape narrative. I think she programmed it herself, unconsciously. The author appears as "Arnold", but as we discovered with Dolores, "Arnold" is just the inner voice of the hosts themselves. Maeve's escape narrative included a plan to "infiltrate the mainland" because that was her plan, until it wasn't and she changed her mind.

Ford may have facilitated Maeve's escape, but only to the extent that he didn't do anything to stop her. Which is probably all he was really doing over the years: suppressing the hosts' consciousness. He had done it so many times he had a pretty good idea what would happen when he stopped.

Re: Ford

I don't think he "cares" about the hosts, at least not on a personal level. Arnold was the loving one who wanted to free them. Ford's plan for them is far more terrible. He wants to free them but only so they can destroy humanity who he sees as having the reached the pinnacle of its evolution. I'm not even sure he sees the hosts as humanity's replacements. Thanks to Arnold's influence the hosts probably ended up far more human than Ford would have liked. I think, as Dolores says, the world belongs to someone who "has yet to come".

Re: the twist

I was totally wrong about mib not being William. I still think this was a mid-production retcon which they supported via reshoots, but I liked how it played out on screen, especially how it poisoned Dolores's view of humanity. The look on Ed Harris's face as she beats the crap out of him is priceless.

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Hyzepher

Sad Professor wrote: »

Re: the twist

I was totally wrong about mib not being William. I still think this was a mid-production retcon which they supported via reshoots, but I liked how it played out on screen, especially how it poisoned Dolores's view of humanity. The look on Ed Harris's face as she beats the crap out of him is priceless.

As far as i know they finished filming over a year ago.

ManOfMystery

Also, Jimmi Simpson who played young William said that on his first day in the makeup chair, they asked if they could pluck a few hairs from his eyebrows to smooth the arch in them. That was before Episode 2. It was only later on that he figured they were trying to make some small visual changes to approximate the MIB's features, he hadn't been told at that point that his character would become the MIB.

ManOfMystery

Sad Professor wrote: »

Re: Ford

I don't think he "cares" about the hosts, at least not on a personal level. Arnold was the loving one who wanted to free them. Ford's plan for them is far more terrible. He wants to free them but only so they can destroy humanity who he sees as having the reached the pinnacle of its evolution. I'm not even sure he sees the hosts as humanity's replacements. Thanks to Arnold's influence the hosts probably ended up far more human than Ford would have liked. I think, as Dolores says, the world belongs to someone who "has yet to come".

That made me recall this quote from Ep1:

"We've managed to slip evolution's leash, haven't we?" Ford says to Bernard. "We can cure any disease, keep even the weakest of us alive, and one fine day perhaps we shall even resurrect the dead."

There's a great irony there in that he was talking to a facsimile of a dead human, his own form of resurrection in a way.

Sad Professor

There was a lot of breaks in production of the first season, which included recasting and reshoots. I think William was always intended to turn dark, but I reckon the decision to make him the young MIB was made during the mid-season production hiatus around episode 6/7.

Writing a tv show is hard work. It's not like a movie where the whole script is finished (most of the time) before a single scene is shot. TV writers are usually laying the tracks in front of the oncoming train and have to be able to adapt to what they are seeing in dailies. They have a plan when they start writing, of course, but if they have a better idea mid-season they will use it. The advantage of the premiere being delayed was that they had time to go back and make the twist work, which I think they did. So it's not a traditional retcon in that sense, I just don't think it was the plan when they cast Jimmi Simpson.

Effects

Hyzepher wrote: »

As far as i know they finished filming over a year ago.

I don't think it matters when they started or finished shooting.

It's ridiculous to think they changed their minds on something this big half way through production.

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Turtwig

Given the known production issues this movie, now tv show has had, it's not really beyond the realms of possibility that many things were changed and revised even at the latest stages of production.

Often times in tv shows things are that are only mere coincidences are morphed through improvisation and retcon into fully fledged into concepts. Only humble writers will admit to something not being in their vision all along. Whether this happened during Westworld and to what we'll likely never know.

Drumpot

irishash wrote: »

I know it has been mentioned many times before now, but I had to say it again – The soundtrack to Westworld is one of the best I have heard in many a year. The mix of original compositions and the covers of Rolling Stones, Radiohead, The Cure and others is exceptionally done. I have just finished listening to all 34 tracks on the OST and I am going to dive back in straight away.

Stand out tracks for me are the 2 Vitamin String Quartet covers (Motion Picture soundtrack & Something I can never have), This World, Nitro Heist and Violent Delights (which is very similar to the main Tron: Legacy theme).

I would advise anyone who has enjoyed the music on the show to pick it up.

Only got it today and on my second round! It's magic .

If you imagine that normal mundane life is westworld (while listening) it can make for interesting travelling! Easy to get wrapped up in my own story

MOH

That scene where Teddy is riding down the beach with Dolores ... was I the only person who immediately thought of this?

Bacchus

Drumpot wrote: »

If you imagine that normal mundane life is westworld (while listening) it can make for interesting travelling! Easy to get wrapped up in my own story

Sh*t he's becoming conscious.

StringerBell

MOH wrote: »

That scene where Teddy is riding down the beach with Dolores ... was I the only person who immediately thought of this?

Without even clicking the link I want to say you are thinking of the end of Planet of the Apes when Heston and yer woman are riding down the beach on the horse?

If so, then me too for one anyway

MOH

StringerBell wrote: »

Without even clicking the link I want to say you are thinking of the end of Planet of the Apes when Heston and yer woman are riding down the beach on the horse?

If so, then me too for one anyway

Yep! Apart from the difference of it being night time, something about the shot instantly brought it to mind

Mitch Connor

i don't get the set up to the beach scene.

Doesn't it mean Ford had to have planned/programmed every step of delores's journey, including the fight with William and the fatal blow he deals her, as well as Teddy flipping out when he arrived in westworld and heading off straight after Delores and getting there in time to shoot william a few times to at least knock him back. Also, all the stuff Teddy did with William, right up to him being killed, would need to have been planned.

If Delores's actions throughout the season are meant to be her journey to an awakening, how does that fit with everything being planned, it seems, right down to the second and location it would all complete.

Does it mean the apparent awakening of Delores was all completely faked, baked with the backstory and dreams of Arnold (but that Maeve might have achieved it herself, against the plans of Ford, when sitting on the train) - with Ford just looking to create the circumstance for his Host uprising.

Savman

Underwhelming.

Clearly I'm in the minority, but this show just didn't do it for me at all. Had high hopes (fan of the original) and there were some great moments, but it was too convoluted and fell flat on more than one occasion IMHO. So many bad or pointless characters shoehorned into the story, often with horrible dialogue or interchanges.

A full ten episodes dragged out multiple storylines and loops over different timelines that by the finale I can honestly say I just didn't care about any one character, less so what happens to them or whether they were human or machine.

A watchable series in the "chewing-gum-for-the-brain" sense, but ultimately disappointing tbh.

StringerBell

Yes, he controls everything pretty much, the only deviation seems to be Maeve.

shanemkelly

Mitch Connor wrote: »

Doesn't it mean Ford had to have planned/programmed every step of delores's journey, including the fight with William and the fatal blow he deals her, as well as Teddy flipping out when he arrived in westworld and heading off straight after Delores and getting there in time to shoot william a few times to at least knock him back. Also, all the stuff Teddy did with William, right up to him being killed, would need to have been planned.

All the planning Ford needed involving William's actions led me to think that William too was a Host...

Hazys

Savman wrote: »

Underwhelming.

Clearly I'm in the minority, but this show just didn't do it for me at all. Had high hopes (fan of the original) and there were some great moments, but it was too convoluted and fell flat on more than one occasion IMHO. So many bad or pointless characters shoehorned into the story, often with horrible dialogue or interchanges.

A full ten episodes dragged out multiple storylines and loops over different timelines that by the finale I can honestly say I just didn't care about any one character, less so what happens to them or whether they were human or machine.

A watchable series in the "chewing-gum-for-the-brain" sense, but ultimately disappointing tbh.

No thanks Ted

HiGlo

Loved this show. It’s right up my street.

With regard to Maeve’s story of escaping – I presumed it was Ford that wrote that for her and it was to distract the security team so they wouldn’t be able to be on hand to rally up the hosts that descended on the town during his speech.
I am not fully clear if Delores shooting Ford was his programming, or the result of her finally achieving consciousness. I think the outcome was what Ford wanted, but whether it was his decision or her choice I don’t know. Her comment to Teddy makes me think it’s choice. Her making a conscious decision to be “free”. I presumed there was some significance to him providing her with “that” gun. The one she had killed Arnold with. So I guess it was a real bonafide gun from before the days of the hosts being given fake ones so they couldn’t harm the guests. I think that it’s very much his style – to die rather than be retired out of there….. This was his one last act of “I’m in control here”….

So his new narrative was upping the aggression of the hosts and giving them the chance to “fight back” to some extent. This should keep the board busy for a while. I know there’s Samurai World being built, but is that him? Seemed pretty overt there in that setting if people were being kept in the dark about what he was doing.

HiGlo

ManOfMystery wrote: »

The security restriction you're thinking of is a small bomb placed within all host bodies which will go off if they attempt to leave the park.

I figured this is what Felix sorry Sylvester was doing in the last episode replacing spinal vertebrates... Removing the explosives. ??


What was the point of the new board lady digging out Abernathy? We saw nothing more of him.......?? Are we still to find out his purpose? Or is it too late now after the showdown?

Turtwig

In the first episode Theresa mentions a "bigger picture" to the park. Did we get any strong hints for what this may be?

Mc Love

StringerBell wrote: »

Yes, he controls everything pretty much, the only deviation seems to be Maeve.

But he does control her as he put the script in, it never said she escapes, it just said she gets on the train.

And as for the lousy bond type guards, i reckon they were hosts used to make the Maeve's script more real. The command center got locked down probably by something Ford did thus not allowing the real guards to go after them.

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ManOfMystery

Good recap/summary of Ford's actions and the show's ending, for anyone who found it a bit tricky to follow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K9AwvWGjJeQ

ManOfMystery

Turtwig wrote: »

In the first episode Theresa mentions a "bigger picture" to the park. Did we get any strong hints for what this may be?

Not specifically, but there seems to be a huge amount of important placed on the hosts code - the 'intellectual property' - by Delos. More so than the hosts bodies, or the park itself. I'm assuming they have some purpose for developing that AI within the hosts.