US: Westworld

Associate
Joined
20 Dec 2005
Posts
1,930
What a ridiculous mess.

I've enjoyed this Season, maybe more than most, but that finale just didn't do it for me. It felt too unsatisfying. The whole Eden concept, the virtual worlds within worlds, all felt completely unnecessary and overthought. I love non-linear storytelling, but the overcomplicated plot was getting in it's own way.
 
Soldato
Joined
13 Mar 2007
Posts
13,528
Location
South Yorkshire
That's the first episode in a while I've lost track in parts so much happening and with all the different time jumps it was allover the shop, especially when you add in the after credits scene.

Alt shift X have their work cut out this week to make sense of it all :D
 
Soldato
Joined
28 Apr 2011
Posts
14,819
Location
Barnet, London
I feel a bit better, watching a YouTube review they seem to think it was rather all over the place and no-one seems to be too sure what's actually going on!

My first thought on the post credits scene was it was Bobby Ewing waking up from a dream all over again. Everything we'd been watching was just testing William in his own digital world!
 
Soldato
Joined
13 Mar 2007
Posts
13,528
Location
South Yorkshire
I think with the time jump William died on the beach where we last saw him and Delos have tried to bring him back and chosen the moment he was going down the lift as his starting point before the fidelity test.
 
Soldato
Joined
19 Oct 2010
Posts
2,643
Location
North Staffs
At this point I feel like the multiple timelines are detracting from the story. The idea is fantastic, but they are trying to be too clever.

Same here, good idea but they are doing it to death. It's making it all less coherent. My guess would be that there are actually no "hosts" as such at all. Everyone within Westworld a "customer" going through the "forge" to turn them into a full fidelity copy. Good show, if a tad convoluted, well more than a tad.:)
 

Deleted member 651465

D

Deleted member 651465

I agree to a point, but beyond the time jumps it really that difficult?

There are 4 locations (not counting shogun world / other simulations)

The real world
Westworld (simulated world)
The forge (a control system designed to test collected data)
The valley beyond (I'll call this a virtual machine (VM) inside westworld)

So far we know that...
  1. Humans live in the real world
  2. Delos Inc, invests in and runs Westworld to collects data/dna from visitors for ~30 years in an attempt to cheat death
  3. Ford likes to play silly buggers with wild narratives providing Delos agrees to keep out of his way
  4. After many years of being abused hosts become self-aware and rebel
  5. The hosts that have achieved consciousness decide to head for the valley beyond
  6. After many failed experiments humans realise that using a map of a human brain inside a host body to cheat death won't work
  7. Bernard/Ford realise that human minds can only exist inside the valley beyond / the forge
  8. In order to make convincing human-host hybrids the subjects must be tested for "fidelity" using the collected data as a baseline. This takes a long time.
  9. Delores is set against destroying humanity because Delores
I've enjoyed the subtle editing where they've played with time but what is bugging me is that they're slowly revealing that every human is basically a host. It's losing the impact it once did.
 
Soldato
Joined
19 Oct 2010
Posts
2,643
Location
North Staffs
I agree to a point, but beyond the time jumps it really that difficult?

There are 4 locations (not counting shogun world / other simulations)

The real world
Westworld (simulated world)
The forge (a control system designed to test collected data)
The valley beyond (I'll call this a virtual machine (VM) inside westworld)
(I think that the "real world" is also a simulated world again to test fidelity? What they perceive to be the real world )

So far we know that...
  1. Humans live in the real world
  2. Delos Inc, invests in and runs Westworld to collects data/dna from visitors for ~30 years in an attempt to cheat death
  3. Ford likes to play silly buggers with wild narratives providing Delos agrees to keep out of his way
  4. After many years of being abused hosts become self-aware and rebel (Now I think there is going to be a twist, in that all the "Host's" are actually "Human-copies" and Westworld is actually the "forge" they go through to reach "Fidelity." Some of them have been within the system for a very, very long time and almost become lost in the system. Some of them becoming "self-aware" before reaching full "fidelity" but wanting their own life anyway.)
  5. The hosts that have achieved consciousness decide to head for the valley beyond.
  6. After many failed experiments humans realise that using a map of a human brain inside a host body to cheat death won't work
  7. Bernard/Ford realise that human minds can only exist inside the valley beyond / the forge
  8. In order to make convincing human-host hybrids the subjects must be tested for "fidelity" using the collected data as a baseline. This takes a long time.
  9. Delores is set against destroying humanity because Delores
(What is Williams role going to be? I think the time-line is deliberately confused with William and we have seen him as Human and now Host. Might it be that willaim is trapped because he keeps looping back to his daughter is some way?)
I've enjoyed the subtle editing where they've played with time but what is bugging me is that they're slowly revealing that every human is basically a host. It's losing the impact it once did.

I'm not disagreeing with anything you've said. More musing on possibilities:)
 
Last edited:
Caporegime
Joined
20 May 2007
Posts
39,703
Location
Surrey
I've enjoyed this Season, maybe more than most, but that finale just didn't do it for me. It felt too unsatisfying. The whole Eden concept, the virtual worlds within worlds, all felt completely unnecessary and overthought. I love non-linear storytelling, but the overcomplicated plot was getting in it's own way.

I enjoyed season 1 but this was a mess and ridiculously stupid. I kept with it, but the finale was even worse than i thought it was going to be.

Season 1 was clever, thoughtful and well written. This was.....bad.
 
Man of Honour
Joined
13 Oct 2006
Posts
91,165
I'm glad I waited until I could watch the whole lot in one go - I think watching it weekly ruins it and makes it too hard to keep ahead of the different threads - I can see why people would have a negative impression of it if they watched in that manner.

Other than some oddities with Ake's story line and the Eastern world stuff where occasionally they seemed to forget the "rules" from season 1 I enjoyed pretty much every episode.

Also not really satisfied with the explanation as to what happened to Eden - the finale in general seemed the weakest bit of the whole season by a long way but on the other hand could be redeemed in season 3 aslong as they play the cards right.

Didn't think it was as far from season 1 as some complain - they just aren't paying enough attention though again that it something watching it weekly probably doesn't help with.
 
Caporegime
Joined
20 May 2007
Posts
39,703
Location
Surrey
Same goes for the dialogue, it felt like everyone was speaking in riddles this season, it was getting really silly.

When Dolores said " you just don't get it" or "you don't understand" or something along those lines to someone for the one hundredth time , i sighed.
 
Caporegime
Joined
1 Dec 2010
Posts
52,329
Location
Welling, London
I enjoyed it, but not as much as the first series. It was tiring to follow properly and became a bit of a chore to watch at times. Hope they keep the third series lineal without all the stupid alternating timelines.
 
Caporegime
Joined
20 May 2007
Posts
39,703
Location
Surrey
The more i think about it, the more everything annoyed me about this season.

The main thing, was the security clean up operation. This is the future with near realistic replications of humans, but they send a bunch of average soldiers with p90's to go in and sort it out?

A few drone like things could have killed all the hostile hosts in no time at all. Also, why don't they have some sort of targeted emp device that takes out the hosts brains which we know are electrical/computer based?

All the shoot outs in this season seemed like pointless and silly filler.

Why on earth were they still be using that stupid neck ordinance checker to see who was a host or not? By the end, they knew there was the potential for hosts made without this in them. Honestly, you are telling me that when this was set they had nothing that could scan the head and notice the difference between a human brain and the computer/AI brain inside?

I realise with sci-fi you have to suspend disbelief, but this for me was too much. The dissonance between how technologically advanced the AI and hosts were and how rubbish and 1990esque the tech and clean up crew were, was too much.
 
Last edited:
Back
Top Bottom