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Thread: Westworld (Season 1)

  1. #276
    Piss off, ghost! number8's Avatar
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    That's part of my big problem with this show. They care so much about outsmarting the audience that they've built in multiple layers of doubt regarding the characters' sense of consciousness, especially with the twists on Dolores' and Maeve's. It's hard for me to get emotionally invested in them if I'm second guessing their autonomy, which is now going to be more so if I decide to watch the next season.
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  2. #277
    Quote Quoting Peng (view post)
    Wait, isn't Maeve getting off the train meant to signal that she has enough self-awareness apart from what Ford programs? When Bernard was looking over her code, he mentioned the steps underlying every part of her escape that has already been planned, including "when you reached the mainland..." before she snapped that machine in half. Her hesitating and finally making a decision on the train also corresponds nicely with Ford's last monologue in that way. And now whatever she does next will be completely on her own, not part of the coded steps.
    That's how I see it. I wonder what Ford intended for her when she reached the mainland. Perhaps that was always meant to be the breaking off point where Ford's script ends and total improvisation begins, but it just occurred a bit earlier.

  3. #278
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  4. #279
    At last, your 10 week nightmare is over.
    Last edited by Gittes; 12-08-2016 at 02:54 AM.

  5. #280
    Administrator Ezee E's Avatar
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    I thought it said that she went to look for her daughter, maybe I was wrong.

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  6. #281
    Quote Quoting Ezee E (view post)
    I thought it said that she went to look for her daughter, maybe I was wrong.
    Bernard says, "you recruit other hosts to help you. Then you're to make your way to the train. Then when you reach the mainland—" and that's when Maeve destroys the tablet. So, it's definitely a deviation and perhaps the first time she's actually demonstrated significant control over her actions. It could be argued that she's still obeying the programmed orders/other selves that exist within her, palimpsest-like, and which are now telling her she once had a daughter. However, I think the distinction here is that she recognizes that her connection to her daughter has a basis in fiction. She's choosing to believe the fiction, or to honour the legitimate bond that the fiction engendered.

  7. #282
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    I think what was most frustrating about this show is that they had genuinely good ideas and then bent over backwards to obfuscate them. The finale was better than anything that proceeded it, but how did they get to 10 fucking hours and not realize what they had?

    I mean, a character who deliberately hobbles artificial intelligence for his own ends would be an incredible villain. And opposite him, a guy who purposely attempts to raise the consciousness of those same intelligences-- but only does it out of a warped sense of love. That's a great fucking story. Too bad we saw almost none of it, and then only in hazy flashbacks and through monologue over monologue.

    This thing reminded me a helluva lot of amateurish writing that I used to see in writing workshops and classes -- where everybody is a little bit too afraid of their own voice and so tries to hide it behind ambiguity. (Because of the misguided sense that ambiguity sounds artful and profound.)

    I'd forgive that bad impulse here, except the people involved with this show had 5 solid years of producing stories with big ideas and big mysteries, but also real characters and actual structures.

    It's stuff like this that will kill the pseudo-auteurist movement in prestige TV. One of these dumbs shows is gonna hit huge costs with no oversight and turn the entire party into Heaven's Gate.

  8. #283
    Sorry if the jest of my last post was taken the wrong way. Here's a more straightforward olive branch.

    A while back, I thought you raised a valid point about the troubling optics of the Ford and Bernard relationship. Similar thoughts crossed my mind after the reveal about Bernard being a host. The details changed once we learned about the Arnold angle, the specifics of the real Arnold's death, and Ford's belated sympathy for Arnold's ideas, etc. Just curious, did those developments make that side of the story less weird for you, or…what did you think? I'm not sure what to make of it yet. The deferred revelations still left us in an odd place for a bit, wherein we were left to think that this wealthy white man had built a POC as his robot attendant. Are the troubling aspects sufficiently ameliorated by the fact that they eventually revealed that Ford was really this old man lamenting his mistakes, missing his partner/friend, and trying to honour him?
    Last edited by Gittes; 12-08-2016 at 03:43 AM.

  9. #284
    OK...Not sure why you deleted your response that was here last night, but I was able to read it before it vanished. Thanks for the reply. Not so sure your joke to your friend (Bernard kills Arnold?) constitutes a prediction, but maybe I misread it.

    I'll have to think this issue over a bit myself. I do think Ford's regard for Arnold — and other details like the fact that he controls white and black hosts alike, and is a key agent in their ostensible liberation — are complicating factors at the very least. But, yeah, that stretch of episodes where Ford just seemed like a cruel taskmaster put that relationship in a weird place. I also wonder to what degree the writers were conscious of the slaveowner angle and were deliberately activating that idea.

  10. #285
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    Just finished this tonight. Be back later to chime in with some thoughts. Some pretty ridiculous plot machinations at work and ton of things I still don't get, but overall it's rich material. The Delores / William storyline packed a mean punch.

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    Evan Rachel Wood and Thandie Newton won the Critics Choice Awards for Best Actress and Best Supporting Actress. Nice.
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  12. #287
    Quote Quoting Izzy Black (view post)
    The Delores / William storyline packed a mean punch.
    Looking forward to your take, as I thought this turned into one of the weaker aspects of the show. I mean, structurally, the William/Man in Black transition was underwritten by the right amount of clues and some increasingly obvious indications. However, the actual substance of that transition felt murky. William comes across as a baffling person, and his declension was rather sudden. In the finale, the match cut from William to the MiB was meant for the viewers who were still unsure about the identity of Ed Harris' character. In that case, the ostensible result is a closer empathetic alignment with Dolores: viewers are surprised to discover, along with her, that William's bright romanticism devolved into a deep cruelty. The pivot still fails to convince, though. Perhaps we'll learn more about William's transformation in season two.
    Last edited by Gittes; 12-12-2016 at 09:38 PM.

  13. #288
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    The "Let me tell you a story about a man in the third person........ AND THAT MAN WAS ME." trope has got to be one of my least favorite storytelling devices.
    Quote Quoting Donald Glover
    I was actually just reading about Matt Damon and he’s like, ‘There’s a culture of outrage.’ I’m like, ‘Well, they have a reason to be outraged.’ I think it’s a lot of dudes just being scared. They’re like, ‘What if I did something and I didn’t realize it?’ I’m like, ‘Deal with it.’
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  14. #289
    Quote Quoting number8 (view post)
    The "Let me tell you a story about a man in the third person........ AND THAT MAN WAS ME." trope has got to be one of my least favorite storytelling devices.
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  15. #290
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    Quote Quoting Gittes (view post)
    Looking forward to your take, as I thought this turned into one of the weaker aspects of the show. I mean, structurally, the William/Man in Black transition was underwritten by the right amount of clues and some increasingly obvious indications. However, the actual substance of that transition felt murky.
    I've seen a lot of people say this twist was obvious and easily predicted. But I've also noticed that a lot of people saying this (not suggesting this includes you) are people who are a part of this culture of constantly trying to make predictions about events in TV shows and putting forward theories about how everything is going to unfold. That's simply not my approach as a cinemagoer. I didn't invest much time, nor do I generally, in trying to "guess" what's going to happen next. If it occurs to me, so be it, but it's not something I generally try to do. Nevertheless, one might still maintain that, notwithstanding that, the execution was poorly done and by any standard it was too obvious, or something. In that case I'll just ask for some examples, because I didn't find out who William was until pretty close to when I was supposed to find out.

    And even if I had, I'm not sure it would matter much, because I still thought it was a powerful arc. I thought it was elegantly and seamlessly integrated into the show, the manner in which time / memory loops and overlaps, such that the show creates an experience for the audience, or at least for me, where we are almost in the same position as Delores in our inability to distinguish the vividness of our memories from the present. You are right that this has a highly empathetic effect, at least as far as it concerns our empathizing with Dolores, which is a noteworthy feat in my view.

    Quote Quoting Gittes (view post)
    William comes across as a baffling person, and his declension was rather sudden. In the finale, the match cut from William to the MiB was meant for the viewers who were still unsure about the identity of Ed Harris' character. In that case, the ostensible result is a closer empathetic alignment with Dolores: viewers are surprised to discover, along with her, that Williams' bright romanticism devolved into a deep cruelty. The pivot still fails to convince, though. Perhaps we'll learn more about William's transformation in season two.
    I didn't find William particularly baffling. His decline was a bit sudden, at least in terms of how it is revealed, that's true, but I found him less baffling than the other guests. Other guests in the parks are all surprisingly callous and indifferent to the suffering of the hosts, and are presumably steeped in an ideological distortion about the sentience of the hosts that isn't on its own sufficiently explored. By contrast, William is the only genuinely relatable guest in the park in that he isn't immediately callous and indifferent to their sentience like the others. But we are also supposed to think of William has having a violence inside of him that he's suppressing. This is something we may learn more about, but on the face of it, the suggestion offered by the narrative that he feels detachment and harbors resentment for people in the 'real world' due to some lack of authenticity is enough for me to bite on to buy into the conceit. Presumably, this frustration is only amplified and unleashed when he finds that his attempted refuge in Westworld turns out to be just another sham. As far as characterizations go, he's got quite a bit more going on than the others in the cast.

    As for his transformation, the show is, of course, making a significant request on us, however, in that we are supposed to imagine some 20-30+ years of William's torment in seeing his beloved not remembering him at all and taking in other suitors in just the same way she took him in, and that this contributes to his increasing violence and detachment taking over him, but this isn't too difficult for me to do. I again found that it was done very elegantly and to my satisfaction, especially in the sense that in a single moment the man in black gains a backstory and resonance that recolors all his initial interactions with the cast in a way that makes the character palatable and not a mere cipher of evil (although that is the role he's assumed). This was by far one of my favorite portions of the show. I am also happy there is much more room here to develop and further explore his backstory.

  16. #291
    Unfortunately, I'm afraid the traffic to this thread has probably been reduced since the finale, but your thoughts are still very much welcome.

    Quote Quoting Izzy Black (view post)
    I didn't invest much time, nor do I generally, in trying to "guess" what's going to happen next. If it occurs to me, so be it, but it's not something I generally try to do. Nevertheless, one might still maintain that, notwithstanding that, the execution was poorly done and by any standard it was too obvious, or something. In that case I'll just ask for some examples, because I didn't find out who William was until pretty close to when I was supposed to find out.
    I didn't think it was necessarily too obvious. Viewers interested in this sort of thing — seeking out clues, prognosticating — picked up on stuff like the discrepancy between the Westworld logo in William's scenes vs. other scenes, the very neat demarcation of William from certain events and characters (like Maeve not being at the Mariposa Saloon in William's scenes), and some overlap/echoes in Ed Harris and Jimmi Simpson's respective dialogue. Some of this was present from the beginning, with more clues appearing as the show progressed. So, for certain viewers who enjoy predicting developments, it may have become increasingly obvious. However, I totally would have missed some of this if I hadn't been perusing online discussions, and may have not foreseen the transition.

    My point was just that, mechanically, the fact of the transition was well supported (so that one section of the audience can pick up on clues, and the other section can later look back and discover the groundwork). So, that's not my quibble. Rather, I just think the actual emotional foundation felt a little insufficient. The violence that present-day William exhibits toward the hosts was vile and somewhat inexplicable in light of the romantic regard he once had for Dolores. It seemed to me that the telos motivating William in the present-day is this dream of making this fictional world of robots real — Ed Harris talks about real consequences, real stakes, etc. Perhaps I misread it, but that felt like a vestige of a starry-eyed hope, a dream that what he once thought he had with Dolores might one day become legitimate (i.e., the memory of that experience made retroactively legitimate via sentience)? That a better story — an alternative to his vaguely misanthropic view of humanity — might still be found in Westworld? Yet in the interim he assaults every host he sees. That's the kind of thing that I found baffling.

    Quote Quoting Izzy Black (view post)
    I didn't find William particularly baffling. His decline was a bit sudden, at least in terms of how it is revealed, that's true, but I found him less baffling than the other guests. Other guests in the parks are all surprisingly callous and indifferent to the suffering of the hosts, and are presumably steeped in an ideological distortion about the sentience of the hosts that isn't on its own sufficiently explored. By contrast, William is the only genuinely relatable guest in the park in that he isn't immediately callous and indifferent to their sentience like the others. But we are also supposed to think of William has having a violence inside of him that he's suppressing. This is something we may learn more about, but on the face of it, the suggestion offered by the narrative that he feels detachment and harbors resentment for people in the 'real world' due to some lack of authenticity is enough for me to bite on to buy into the conceit. Presumably, this frustration is only amplified and unleashed when he finds that his attempted refuge in Westworld turns out to be just another sham. As far as characterizations go, he's got quite a bit more going on than the others in the cast.

    As for his transformation, the show is, of course, making a significant request on us, however, in that we are supposed to imagine some 20-30+ years of William's torment in seeing his beloved not remembering him at all and taking in other suitors in just the same way she took him in, and that this contributes to his increasing violence and detachment taking over him, but this isn't too difficult for me to do. I again found that it was done very elegantly and to my satisfaction, especially in the sense that in a single moment the man in black gains a backstory and resonance that recolors all his initial interactions with the cast in a way that makes the character palatable and not a mere cipher of evil (although that is the role he's assumed). This was by far one of my favorite portions of the show. I am also happy there is much more room here to develop and further explore his backstory.
    These comments are great — bolded some of the highlights — and I'm now reevaluating my connection to this part of the show. I explained why I made my earlier assessment in my previous paragraph, but reading this has shaken away some of the cobwebs. I do think the show is a bit quick in its treatment of William's (Simpson) disillusionment, but thinking back to it now, there's a lot communicated by the visual of William discovering Dolores' lack of recognition upon his return to Sweetwater.

    I do find the idea of the devout man begrudgingly becoming an apostate interesting, but the affection that William expressed earlier — for stories, for Dolores — felt so ingenuous and sincere that I found his slaughtering of hosts to be an odd reaction to Dolores' mistreatment by Logan. It felt a bit exaggerated, like it was partly meant to amplify the drama and provide more violence. I mean, that slaughtering of hosts (while Logan slept) occurred before his disappointing reunion with Dolores. Also, I kept making the connection between his erstwhile affection and this hunch that present-day William must be trying to make his utopic dream a reality, to find a world that has the meaning and attraction of the books he reads. The dissonance of those twinned ideas — a dream at once sought and spurned — is interesting, but my initial thought was that the severe incongruity was a bit confusing.
    Last edited by Gittes; 12-14-2016 at 07:40 AM.

  17. #292
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  18. #293
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    Spoilers ahead.

    Binged this over a few days without a single look at this thread or reddit (only telling my friend who'd seen it already that I thought the Man in Black was Arnold after a few episodes).

    There's just so much meta wankery going on here. There's only so many curtains you can pull back with elaborate flourishes before we groan at the silliness of it all. A big problem with things like this is that a certain point, I can't really care about any character who has a better than average chance of being "not what they seem." It becomes sort of inevitable. I wasn't moved by a single story line here. With all these fucking glass walls, how were the various machinations not spied and called out? The scenes with Thandie and the low-level nutterbutters got more and more implausible; weirdly, even the revelation that they got her what she wanted because it was her new story didn't feel satisfying. If you can write your way out of anything by just saying "it was meant to happen that way...surprise!" then it's not very good writing. Was Dolores's gun...special? No explanation for why guns work on some and not others, or why her gun could kill the real Arnold.

    Feels exciting and interesting for a little while, but it breaks down upon digestion. But there's some very good stuff here, too. Finale was 90 minutes long and 80 minutes of talk, talk, talk. The upper management faintly failed their terrific and very game actors. The second season could stand being more straightforward, but I'm sure they won't be able to resist the temptation to really Truman Show this shit up even more.
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  19. #294
    Second star to the right [ETM]'s Avatar
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    I think it suffers when binged. Most satisfaction people got out of mulling over and discussing the possibilities in the week between the episodes.

  20. #295
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    Tsk tsk. Now where's my "rolleyes" emoji. I know I've got one here somewhere.

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  21. #296
    Administrator Ezee E's Avatar
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    Quote Quoting [ETM] (view post)
    I think it suffers when binged. Most satisfaction people got out of mulling over and discussing the possibilities in the week between the episodes.
    Agreed.

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  22. #297
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    Goddamit, now I need two.

    *continues rifling*

  23. #298
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    I finally watched the final episode a few days ago and thought it was stunningly stupid. How many scenes can we end with someone getting shot to death? It's like it was written by Michael Scarn or something. Except anyone who dies can come back the next episode. That one guy got his jugular cut and still came back to work.
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  24. #299
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    And William has very distinct facial markings that apparently disappeared as he got older.
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  25. #300
    Administrator Ezee E's Avatar
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    Quote Quoting Spinal (view post)
    And William has very distinct facial markings that apparently disappeared as he got older.
    He's a rich, rich man. So plastic surgery I guess.

    Ugh, can't really defend the William storyline at all.

    I'll see how long I can stick with it. In discussion, it's all pretty dumb, but it's just so fun to watch.

    The robots were never really set free by any means. It was all Ford's plan. Dolores never found consciousness, right?

    Oh well. Two years, a new thread will be made. Until then, bring on The New Pope I guess.

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