The Official WestWorld Thread

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O_P_T

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Anyone else watching this on HBO?

Damn!

This could be one of the best shows on TV right now.

It's created by Jonathon Nolan, who's the brother of Christopher Nolan. From his Wiki page.

Jonathan "Jonah" Nolan (born 1976)[1] is an English-American screenwriter, television producer, director and author. He is the creator of the science fiction television series Person of Interest (2011–2016) and Westworld (2016–present).

He has collaborated on several films with his brother, director Christopher Nolan, who adapted Jonathan's short story "Memento Mori" (2001) into the film Memento (2000). Together, they co-wrote the mystery thriller The Prestige (2006), the superhero films The Dark Knight (2008) and The Dark Knight Rises (2012), and the epic science fiction film Interstellar (2014).
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JJ Abrams is the producer, and it's got some things that remind me of how Lost posed the mystery.

Anthony Hopkins has that Hannibal Lector vibe going and Thandie Newton is nailing her character.

Anyone else watching?

Possible spoilers below.





























Is the use of the player piano a metaphor or is it something more?

What's the back story of the wrecked lower basement levels?

We haven't seen any direct evidence of something outside the park, excepting Sunday's conversation with the Japanese guy. Is there anything outside or is it not what one thinks? Does that relate to the wrecked basement levels?

Is all the staff really human or are they hosts as well?

Maybe I'm reading more into this than is there, but this is very reminiscent of how Lost spun the mystery of the island along for all those seasons.

Prediction time: Arnold isn't "dead", he uploaded himself to a computer/android and is the man at the center of the maze.
 
I'm watching and so far, I love the show. I didn't scroll to the bottom of your post tho, since I haven't seen last night's episode. :)
 
Haven't started watching yet. Recording it with the plan of binge watching once we have all the episodes.
 
I'm 3 episodes in and so far I find it very intriguing.
 
I am loving this show.

The casting is outstanding with Evan Rachel Wood as the intriguing Dolores, the always superb Anthony Hopkins and Ed Harris in his darkest role ever as a sociopath who thrives on living out his violent fantasies.

The episode Sunday night featured Thandie Newton as the Madame Maeve seducing a tech nerd and creating a Maeve 9.0 that might be unstoppable.

The plot is getting deeper as it goes along with unexpected layers being introduced every week.

I can't really remember the original Westworld movie with Yul Brenner, but this thing is so far superior to that piece of shit that they don't really bear any resemblance to one another.

I can't wait to find out more about the maze or to see the hosts continue to gain independence and consciousness. The whole place seems to be reaching terminal mass by the minute.

I think there is a really good referendum on technology taking place in the dark heart of this show, but in addition to being thought-provoking it is also stunning to look at and extremely well-acted and written.

Plus....BOOBS.
 
I am loving the show. First show in a while that I would call "appointment TV" - really rather surprised how much I am into it.

I really hate violent TV (and some of WW is unwatchable) but for the most part I can accept that idea that the victims are robots, so it doesn't bother me quite so much.

There was an episode of the twilight zone that made quite an impression on me as a child, in which a man realizes he is a robot (I think I subsequently saw the episode as an adult and it didn't seem as compelling, but a scene where the guy looks at his wrist and see mechanical stuff under his skin made quite an impression on me).

I love scenes like when Hopkins is telling the old cowboy a story about his dog and the robot responds "that's a humdinger of a story, partner. let's drink to the lady in the white shoes" as his programming can't think of what else to say.
 
Hawg73 said:
I am loving this show.

The casting is outstanding with Evan Rachel Wood as the intriguing Dolores, the always superb Anthony Hopkins and Ed Harris in his darkest role ever as a sociopath who thrives on living out his violent fantasies.

The episode Sunday night featured Thandie Newton as the Madame Maeve seducing a tech nerd and creating a Maeve 9.0 that might be unstoppable.

The plot is getting deeper as it goes along with unexpected layers being introduced every week.

I can't really remember the original Westworld movie with Yul Brenner, but this thing is so far superior to that piece of shit that they don't really bear any resemblance to one another.

I can't wait to find out more about the maze or to see the hosts continue to gain independence and consciousness. The whole place seems to be reaching terminal mass by the minute.

I think there is a really good referendum on technology taking place in the dark heart of this show, but in addition to being thought-provoking it is also stunning to look at and extremely well-acted and written.

Plus....BOOBS.
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And full frontal of the guys for the memberless members to view, if that's their thing.
 
The acting is awesome and so far the plot is progressing nicely, I can see this becoming kind of repetitive in future seasons if not executed well, but I'm really enjoying it for now.

I think the intriguing thing for me is are/when do the host become conscious, and what exactly does that mean.
 
I'm one episode back and still enjoying it.
 
Darth Despot said:
The acting is awesome and so far the plot is progressing nicely, I can see this becoming kind of repetitive in future seasons if not executed well, but I'm really enjoying it for now.

I think the intriguing thing for me is are/when do the host become conscious, and what exactly does that mean.
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There is an interesting article (which contains MAJOR SPOILERS) in yesterday's New York Times about the series:

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/14/a...ts-amazing-but-not-necessarily-good.html?_r=0

I don't necessarily agree with the opinions expressed but I am reminded of it by your remark about how the show could get repetitive in future seasons. It's not clear to me that that they can milk that many seasons out of the story, or if they try to, that it will keep our attention.
 
For me the article is reading too much into the series, just enjoy it while you can, it's not Masterpiece Theater.

A prediction, the printer that's putting together a new host in Ford's secret lab is printing a copy of Theresa.

Question, is Maeve conscious, or is she being controlled by Ford, Arnold or someone else?
 
Darth Despot said:
For me the article is reading too much into the series, just enjoy it while you can, it's not Masterpiece Theater.

A prediction, the printer that's putting together a new host in Ford's secret lab is printing a copy of Theresa.

Question, is Maeve conscious, or is she being controlled by Ford, Arnold or someone else?
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yes, I agree about the article. I'm enjoying the series now: not worried if I will enjoy it 5 years from now.

I think a lot of people assume that Ford is building a new Theresa. Not clear how he manages to keep Bernard around now that he's been fired, but we don't yet know exactly how Ford is going to fight the board. So maybe android Theresa lures that board member down to the secret lab and they clone her too, but that seems too simple.

I'm not completely buying the Maeve storyline as it seems to me that the lab guys could decommission her in an instant - I don't really understand what leverage she has with them.
 
thomas144 said:
yes, I agree about the article. I'm enjoying the series now: not worried if I will enjoy 5 years from now.

I think a lot of people assume that Ford is building a new Theresa. Not clear how he manages to keep Bernard around now that he's been fired, but we don't yet know exactly how Ford is going to fight the board. So maybe android Theresa lures that board member down to the secret lab and they clone her too, but that seems to simple.

I'm not completely buying the Maeve storyline as it seems to me that the lab guys could decommission her in an instant I don't really understand what leverage she has with them.[/QU-OTE]

Boobs :shrug_n:
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thomas144 said:
yes, I agree about the article. I'm enjoying the series now: not worried if I will enjoy it 5 years from now.

I think a lot of people assume that Ford is building a new Theresa. Not clear how he manages to keep Bernard around now that he's been fired, but we don't yet know exactly how Ford is going to fight the board. So maybe android Theresa lures that board member down to the secret lab and they clone her too, but that seems too simple.

I'm not completely buying the Maeve storyline as it seems to me that the lab guys could decommission her in an instant - I don't really understand what leverage she has with them.
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She caught the asian guy with the bird, which his budy had said earlier that was a firing offense since he wasn't authorized to have or work on.

When she first accosted the other guy she mentioned she knew he had been setting up other workers for "special time" with hosts.

So they both know that if either of these events/actions were known to the bosses, they'd be fired.

She also threatened to kill the ginger dude Sunday night.

Speaking of Sunday, Holy Prediction Batman.

As I said in my OP I thought we'd find out that some of the staff are hosts, but I was thinking of the flunkies downstairs, not Bernard.

Of course, this episode also raises a big new question about the show.

Just what is this data that the board is so interested in?

They made vague allusions to something the hosts generated, but were intentionally opaque.

My gut still tells me that the "outside world" isn't what we think it is.

I didn't read the NYT article, but I've got one simple question about how they could keep us interested for multiple seasons.

How many people were kept interested in Lost for all the seasons it aired? How did it manage to keep from being "repetitive" when the fundamental question was WTF is the island?

Swap that to WTF is Westworld and it's certainly possible that they could do something similar.
 
I was speculating the "data" was some combination of the activities of the guests and the way their reactions within the park help to identify their "real" personalities. Recall this is a $45k per day vacation so presumably these are heavy hitters.

It also occurs to me that a theme to explore is how real people are all artifice in real life but in WestWorld they are more truly themselves (think Will)
 
Darth Despot said:
I was speculating the "data" was some combination of the activities of the guests and the way their reactions within the park help to identify their "real" personalities. Recall this is a $45k per day vacation so presumably these are heavy hitters.

It also occurs to me that a theme to explore is how real people are all artifice in real life but in WestWorld they are more truly themselves (think Will)
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I'm not really sure what the whole "data" thing is, but I'm going with an off-the-wall speculation that what this is all leading up to is to develop artificial intellect to the point where you could, say, recreate a deceased loved one, perhaps similar to Ford's pet family, and therefore achieve immortality. That may be the whole point behind the "reveries" where artificial intelligence becomes indistinguishable from the real thing.

To take it a step further, maybe human consciousness can be encoded and transferred into a new body which offers all kinds of intriguing possibilities and also speaks to the aspect of immortality.

If they could pull that off I imagine the world would be beating a path to their door.

I see the theme as a wrinkle on "it's not nice to fool Mother Nature". As time goes on it seems that Ford's and Arnold's creations are getting closer to turning the tables on their masters because, you know, only God can create life and take it away.

Or......maybe Ford and Arnold are now God.
 
Hawg73 said:
I'm not really sure what the whole "data" thing is, but I'm going with an off-the-wall speculation that what this is all leading up to is to develop artificial intellect to the point where you could, say, recreate a deceased loved one, perhaps similar to Ford's pet family, and therefore achieve immortality. That may be the whole point behind the "reveries" where artificial intelligence becomes indistinguishable from the real thing.

To take it a step further, maybe human consciousness can be encoded and transferred into a new body which offers all kinds of intriguing possibilities and also speaks to the aspect of immortality.

If they could pull that off I imagine the world would be beating a path to their door.

I see the theme as a wrinkle on "it's not nice to fool Mother Nature". As time goes on it seems that Ford's and Arnold's creations are getting closer to turning the tables on their masters because, you know, only God can create life and take it away.

Or......maybe Ford and Arnold are now God.
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Read my OP.

I still say Arnold "uploaded" himself and didn't really "die".

I have a hunch that the world outside the park isn't what we think it is.

The things that make me think that are the following.

Williams speech just before he and Delores did the wild thing may have just been him convincing himself to let go, or it could actually be evidence of the "real world" not being what we think it is.

The whole wrecked sublevels thing. They look just like what something that had gone through a war, major earthquake, etc.

What if they had?

That would mean that the upper levels were built on a previous "civilization" that had been "destroyed".
 
A lot of interesting stuff last night.

There are a lot of factors keeping be engaged in this show, but a key one is "Who is the good guy / who is the bad guy?

I know MiB and Ford are opposed to each other, but I am not sure who's the protagonist. I guess Dolores is good, but can we be sure she's going to stay that way. If Will = MiB then what turned him into a bastard?

Logan is going to buy it at the hands of a host (Dolores?) Next Sunday.
 
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