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WESTWORLD (HBO TV)


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51 minutes ago, Disco Stu said:

Hopkins is great but by far my favorite performances are from Jeffrey Wright, James Marsden, Thandie Newton, and Evan Rachel Wood.  I'd give all 4 of them Emmies if I could.

 

I know right?  Hopkins is great, and DOES deserve a lot of lauding, but hot damn, Wright, Wood, and yes even Marsden are SO GOOD on the show too (and Ed Harris!  And whatever the name is of the person playing the manager lady! etc!)

 

I'd say Thandie Newton is least good out of all the major characters, actually.  And her storyline the most dragged out.

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2 minutes ago, Jay said:

 

I'd say Thandie Newton is least good out of all the major characters, actually.  And her storyline the most dragged out.

 

I guess I should spoiler tag this.

 

Spoiler

I found Newton's performance so effective and heartbreaking when she was playing the tug of war between her "old" programming (the death of daughter at the hands of Harris) and her "new" awakened self.  Personally, I thought she played that wonderfully.

 

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Yes, I finally came around to appreciating her in the final episodes for sure.  And I'm not saying she's bad, just that I preferred the acting by all the other leads, and the stories all the other main characters got.

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11 hours ago, Quintus said:

Nah I'm definitely going to try it, because of Anthony Hopkins. 

 

It's flawed, but entertaining. And Hopkins alone is reason enough to watch it. He's brilliant in this. He actually seemed rather invested in this role.

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  • 2 months later...
  • 8 months later...
  • 1 month later...

We haven't started season 2 yet.  Does anybody know if HBO Go / HBO Now offers it in 4K if you have a 4K TV?

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I’m finding this season much more satisfying than season 1.  Much better at stringing along the mystery without seeming unfocused and confusing. And it’s much clearer how the different timelines/strands relate to one another. It’s stronger episode to episode for me.

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  • 3 weeks later...

This weekend we finally found time to begin the new season!  If you want to talk about more recent episodes than I've seen, please just give me a head's up if you're gonna spoil something I don't know yet :)

 

 

Westworld 2x01 Journey into Night

 

OK, holy cow.  Even with a GENEROUSLY lengthy season 1 recap to begin the episode, I was struggling to remember all the details of season 1 and where we left off with everyone.  Took me a while to really get back into the swing of things here!

 

I loved the flashforward that opened and closed the episode, showing Bernard waking up on a beach and trying to figure out with some new characters how most of the hosts died.  The bulk of the episode that picked up after the hosts revolted in the park and killed Ford and revolted in the control room and killed most everyone there was good too.  I enjoyed seeing Dolores the badass, Maeve in control, Ed Harris being a badass, and Bernard trying to keep up with Charlotte and not reveal to her he's a host.  I was a bit confused about the clear goo that came out of his ear at one point though, and how he had to syringe some goo out of that other Host and inject it into himself.  Was I supposed to understand that or is it something that gets explained later?  Don't hosts have red "blood" too?  EDIT: OK I guess it's just coolant or whatever for his "brain"/cpu that was overheating, and if he got shot in the chest or something, that'd still be red.  I get it now.

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I just call it brain goo.

 

This season has gotten stronger with every episode for me.  Well, until episode 6 which was a bit jumbled.  But still lots of cool stuff even then.

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Latest episode was brilliant, things seem to be ramping up to catch up with the flash-forward/flash-back timelines. 

 

Also, Djawadi's scores for each episode seem to be just tracked music, but the last few have featured some nice underscore here and there, especially concerning Maeve.

 

Everyone went crazy for GoT, but this show, from its execution to the production design and acting have all been top-notch, far better than GoT in my opinion.

 

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Westworld 2x02 Reunion

 

Well, that was pretty good!  I was a bit bummed there was no continuation at all of the "flash forward" storyline (Bernard after the Hosts are found dead in the lake), and the "present" storyling (picking up after the season 1 finale massacre) was mostly just OK, but the flashbacks were great!

 

In the present storyline, we got a scene of Dolores intimidating people in a control room, blah blah.  I didn't really like this, I liked Dolores MUCH more in all her flashback scenes this week.  Her talking with Arnold is always great.  We got a small bit of Maeve as she crossed paths with Dolores's crew, which was kind of nice in showing they have similar but different agendas.   And the best present day storyline was Ed Harris trying to get some Confederatos to join him, only to find out Ford was one step ahead of him as always.  Giancarlo Esposito was great in this scene!  I had no idea he'd joined the show, that was a pleasant surprise (of course, this could easily be his only appearance).

 

All the flashbacks were great!  You got Logan Delos being wowwed by not being able to figure out everyone in the hotel room was a Host, and Arnold taking Delores out of the room because she wasn't ready and them having a nice conversation, and her getting to observe the real world.  Later, you got William persuading Papa Delos to invest, which was were the most intriguing information of the season was revealed, that kind of explains what I think the crux of the season will be about: The theme park for robots is just a premium gateway to get people in, when Delos' real goal is to collect information from them (and as we leaned last week from Bernard, DNA as well).  On the surface it sounds like William is saying it would be for optimal marketing to get maximum money out of every client, but I'm sure there's more to it than that.  This is made more explicit later, when Logan is high off something at his dad's retirement party and tells Dolores that humanity is now doomed.  Great stuff!  I'm glad we're getting more sci-fi in this sci-fi show.

 

The final bit where it was revealed William greenlit a project to terraform a section of the park, and that that was where both Dolores AND Ed Harris are heading was pretty intriguing.  Is it supposed to be the same area that is a lake filled with dead Host bodies in the flashforward timeline?  Hmmm.

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Westworld 2x03 Virtù e Fortuna

 

Was happy to see a continuation of the "flash forward" timeline, though not much happened other than revealing Charlotte won't die.

 

In the present timeline, it was nice to see Dolores talk to Bernard knowing what he really is, and interesting to reveal the state that the Peter Abernathy Host is in (full of encrypted data Bernard can't hack).  Makes you wonder if hiding the data in a Host is really the best way for Delos to sneak it out!


The big battle that takes place near the end of the episode was pretty good, though a bit silly that some Delos guys where able to sneak in and steal Peter's body without Dolores realizing until it was too late.

 

In Maeve's storyline, she ran into some of those native american black/white paint guys, and she couldn't control them.  So are they not part of Ford's game?  It was surprising that they then bumped into that tattoo-faced lady, who had been holding Felix and Sylvester (still love their character names).  I definitely just assumed they were killed into the massacre!  Nice ending where they get attacked by a Samurai, more indication that because of Ford's plan the parks are intermingling.


Oh yea, and the episode was bookended by new characters in some kind of jungle park, where the female has to outrun a bengal tiger (how do you outrun a freaking tiger?  Poorly programmed?).  Of course she ends up by the beach we saw in the first episode where they find the tiger body however many weeks later the flash forwards are.  Looking forward to learning more about this new character; She seemed to have some sort of plan to do some sort of subterfuge with the male character.

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Westworld 2x04 The Riddle of the Sphinx

 

Well, that was awesome!

 

The series of flashbacks showing how Williams was trying to create a Host that actually ran some kind of.... recording? of James Delos' memories and personality was pretty neat, though not a surprise that it never worked and William eventually, once looking like Ed Harris seemingly very close to the main timeline of the show, decides to stop trying entirely.  The other set of flashbacks that showed that just before Ford was killed, he sent Bernard in there to retrieve another recording thingy of some other human (presumably his own, I would guess) and then kill everyone there was also done well.  Of course the question is, did Ford let himself be shot by Dolores because he knew he could come back as a Host, or was what Dolores shot actually the host and the real Ford is still alive? (Probably not since maggots were eating his corpse in a recent episode and you saw real brain).

 

Ed Harris continuing on his path West while getting another message from Ford at the end was fine, but being paired with all the other more interesting stories this week made that one feel weaker.

 

The woman from the jungle park that survived the tiger that end sup running away from the weird black/white native american dudes and revealing herself to be William's daughter at the end was neat.

 

No continuation at all of last week's cliffhanger ending of a samurai robot charging towards Maeve?  Next week, hopefully!

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We’re certainly meant to think it’s a software copy of Delos’ consciousness itself, not just his memories, if you want to make a distinction between the two.  It just degrades when printed to a physical host.

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16 hours ago, Disco Stu said:

We’re certainly meant to think it’s a software copy of Delos’ consciousness itself, not just his memories, if you want to make a distinction between the two.  It just degrades when printed to a physical host.

 

But Stu I didn't just say "memories", I said "memories and personality".  Isn't that basically what a consciousness is?

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Yes, and the latest episode in particular tries to ruminate on that. The show's thesis seems to be leaning more toward the idea that consciousness is more than memories and personality; these can easily be simulated (i.e. "backstory"). True consciousness is the ability to grow beyond the shackles of the past, and one of the show's conceits is that most humans don't use that ability nearly as much as they could.

 

Thoughts on latest ep:

 

Spoiler

Ford seems to have "uploaded" himself onto the Cradle. But now that it's been destroyed, does he still exist? Why is Bernard still seeing him even after leaving the Cradle? Is he now sharing Bernard's body? I don't think the show would go in that direction, but it's interesting nonetheless.

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13 minutes ago, Docteur Qui said:

Yes, and the latest episode in particular tries to ruminate on that. The show's thesis seems to be leaning more toward the idea that consciousness is more than memories and personality; these can easily be simulated (i.e. "backstory"). True consciousness is the ability to grow beyond the shackles of the past, and one of the show's conceits is that most humans don't use that ability nearly as much as they could.

 

Thoughts on latest ep:

 

  Hide contents

Ford seems to have "uploaded" himself onto the Cradle. But now that it's been destroyed, does he still exist? Why is Bernard still seeing him even after leaving the Cradle? Is he now sharing Bernard's body? I don't think the show would go in that direction, but it's interesting nonetheless.

 

I found this more the be that Ford's transcended the cradle and he's like God who exists in the hosts' hearts.

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Westworld 2x05 Akane no Mai

 

Well, that was certainly the weakest episode of the season, but still had plenty of good stuff.

 

I realize there's a pattern now where the odd-numbered episodes feature flashforwards to Bernard and the Delos team figuring out what's up with all the dead hosts, and the even episodes do not.  This was the shortest flashforward yet, that barely revealed any new info (only that 1/3 of the hosts had no consciousness inside), making it feel somewhat obligatory.

 

For about 2/3 of the episode, Dolores was more like her old self again which was wonderful, then at the end when she betrayed Teddy she was back to being mopy again.  Oh well.

 

The bulk of the episode, and also ultimately the least interesting part, with the Maeve storyline in the Samurai world.  It started out great, with the wonderful location shots, and the great version of Paint It Black, etc.  But then it just got kinda boring when we were supposed to care about these brand  new characters and whether or not they lived or died, when they'll are just robots anyway.  It doesn't help that I don't find Maeve as interesting as most of the other Hosts, and her quest to find her daughter feels wayyy more dragged out than any other storyline.  I didn't like that this whole Shogun plot didn't resolve in one episode either, ending on another cliffhanging as another fight is about to begin.  Oh well.

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1 minute ago, Jay said:

when they'll are just robots anyway. 

 

Haha, I guess we know where you stand on at least one of the show's central philosophical questions!!!

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11 minutes ago, Margo Channing said:

 

I found this more the be that Ford's transcended the cradle and he's like God who exists in the hosts' hearts.

 

Oooh yes, I like that! Really speaks to his god-complex storyline, and creates some future conflict.

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29 minutes ago, Docteur Qui said:
Spoiler

Ford seems to have "uploaded" himself onto the Cradle. But now that it's been destroyed, does he still exist? Why is Bernard still seeing him even after leaving the Cradle? Is he now sharing Bernard's body? I don't think the show would go in that direction, but it's interesting nonetheless.

 

I took it as though...

 

Spoiler

Ford's code had infected Bernard's mind egg, sort of like a virus.

 

11 minutes ago, Jay said:

Well, that was certainly the weakest episode of the season...

 

I thought so, too. I was surprised when most of the responses that I saw were ecstatic about the episode.

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