***** WESTWORLD Season 2 (HBO) Official *****

262,175 Views | 2472 Replies | Last: 5 yr ago by bearamedic99
PatAg
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This was the first episode I found myself not really caring about what was happening. I will say, if season 1 taught me anything, you can't truly "grade" these episodes individually. They are all part of a whole piece. I did think there were some great visuals, and I thought it was amusing to have him just admit it's hard to come up with that many unique story lines. Little worried about this decision to have her apparently be able to control the other hosts with her mind,
PatAg
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I drove bus said:

Brian Earl Spilner said:

It's a bit worrisome that the viewership doesn't seem to be growing at all.

GoT started out averaging ~2.5 million per episode in the first season, and by this time in Season 2 was almost up to 4 million viewers.

Westworld ratings have actually dropped this season, with last episode getting only 1.59 million viewers.

Are these numbers good enough? With such a big budget, I doubt HBO is thrilled with these numbers. If these don't go way up in Season 3, I fear it may be done after 3.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/insertcoin/2018/05/13/westworld-season-2-ratings-are-moving-in-the-wrong-direction/

My wife bailed. She said she was tired of being non stop confused and wasn't interested in having to do extra internet work to keep up.
This is definitely a real outlook on these shows. I don't personally understand it, because it's part of the appeal to the show for me, having to actually think about what im seeing. For a lot of people, tv shows are just a way to turn their brain off for a bit and get some cheap entertainment.

Personally, I think 2-3 seasons is a better way to do a show like this, I don't really see it being something that could last for 5-6 seasons without the quality going down.
oragator
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Just looking at responses here, this episode might turn into the westworld version of the fly.
BBRex
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So do William and Dolores wind up together after all?
TV Casualty
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All I can say after that episode is; these are not the narratives that I'm interested in.
Gap
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I thought tonight's episode was a bit of a bore. Is there a storyline besides William's or Bernard's that I'm supposed to be interested in? Stop stalling and develop some plot. Maeve and Delores now bore me. I think the writers thought Shogun World was going to be something that people would think was cool, but the storyline has gotten so watered down and drawn out, I just didn't have interest in any of it.
dave94
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I thought tonight was absolutely fascinating. With a story this widespanning, an episode like this was a very nice departure from anything we've seen. The William story will get it's due, but I love seeing (or starting to see) the full scope of what's going on outside of just Westworld. And they did a great job of showing us that.
Zombie Jon Snow
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Loved it.

So much brilliant cinematography, and the beauty of another fully realized immersive world like Shogun - contrasted with how simplistic (and repetitive) the stories are. There were just so many little minor things really that were mirror images of what we've seen play out before. It was incredibly thorough and well done.

But the genius of the episode to me was seeing it through their eyes (the hosts) as they recognize their story and are awakened now to the reality of all of this. Feeling real empathy for them is a measure of how far we've come (them and the audience) and also their empathy for their Shogun equivalents like Maeve relating to Akane shows their evolving humanity. For a brief moment (an episode anyway) Maeve cared about more than finding her daughter.

And the blood and guts were approaching Tarantino level and it was a thing of beauty as well done swordplay usually is.

Had we seen this word or any world early on it would not have had this kind of depth - it would have just been a cheap card trick type thing and have no meaning. The characters had to get to this point.


And likewise for Delores and Teddy it was an episode of seemingly real emotion and depth for their relationship. And it was beautifully done - only to be completely stripped away at the end as Delores decides Teddy must change and we realize it was all a sweet little "what could have been" to Delores and a farewell to that possible life and the version of Teddy she loved.

I loved it, not so much from pushing the story forward but more from the artistic pleasures of it all and from the depth of the characters/hosts evolution.

Brian Earl Spilner
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TV Casualty said:

All I can say after that episode is; these are not the narratives that I'm interested in.


Complete Idiot
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Main takeaway is Teddy's ass is perfectly round, scientists in England calibrate their machines to it. It's hypnotic.

Oh, and Delos lost a third of their IP or something.
AgLiving06
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What I thought was interesting about this episode was the following:

Is Maeve's evolution the work of Ford or is this something unexpected?

A bit of what makes Dolore's story less interesting is that at this point, we still think she's following Ford's direction. His Wyatt program is driving her (though the extent is unknown).

With Maeve, we don't know what's going on with her other than she's evolving far faster than any other host.

I'm left wondering if she could control Dolores?
TexasAggie008
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Yep... terrible (agree with tv casualty)
Buck O Five
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TCTTS said:




Great article, thanks for sharing
bobinator
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I liked this episode, but didn't love it.

In some ways this show takes so much time and care to obfuscate the plot and the character's motivations that it's a little bit jarring when we take a whole episode to really focus on characters instead of the machinations of the bigger world. Especially when last week we had some big reveals about the world at large.
Brian Earl Spilner
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Quote:

Is Maeve's evolution the work of Ford or is this something unexpected?
Not sure, but it was foreshadowed by Bernard when he talked about the mesh network between all the hosts.

I think around eps 1-2?
DannyDuberstein
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Not sure how I feel about Maeve's evolving ability to control hosts.
Brian Earl Spilner
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At this point, I'm starting to think the big reveal of the season is going to be that Dolores was on her Wyatt narrative all along, and maybe even the whole revolution has been Ford's final narrative, EXCEPT Maeve and her crew.

And she's the only who is truly "awake", making her the real protagonist.
bobinator
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Except the Dolores part can't be true. Like the entire first season was about Dolores becoming awake. If the season two "big reveal" is a "actually we were just kidding in season one" then I'll stop watching this show. And Nolan and Joy have talked about her being awake.

I do, however, think there's a growing difference between hosts that "wake up" the way Ford thought they would, and Maeve, who didn't. Since Maeve woke up an way they didn't predict, she's able to do things they didn't expect either.

Kind of an unpredictability-of-life sort of theme.
AgEng06
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I'm kind of leaning that way as well.
M.C. Swag
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Brian Earl Spilner said:

At this point, I'm starting to think the big reveal of the season is going to be that Dolores was on her Wyatt narrative all along, and maybe even the whole revolution has been Ford's final narrative, EXCEPT Maeve and her crew.

And she's the only who is truly "awake", making her the real protagonist.
That wouldn't make sense. S1 was literally all about Dolores discovering her inner voice ('center of the maze'). If she's still beholden to some narrative, then it would render that entire journey as pointless.
Joseph Parrish
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I hope the Shogun thing is just a way to wake up the Westworld hosts. I hope it's a one time event like the Raj.
Brian Earl Spilner
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You're not wrong. But sadly I'm just losing interest in Dolores' story. (Well, that's been true for a few episodes now.) They need to figure out a way to make her interesting again.

There's one theory that all of S1 was actually part of an arc for William. (If he is in fact a host. Meaning S1 was a prelude to his story in S2.)
bobinator
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This is kind of what I mean about the puzzlebox problem.

Because of the way this show reveals itself, we don't really know what Dolores is doing, or why she's doing it, or how she plans to do it, and so it's hard to care about what she's doing.
irish pete ag06
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Brian Earl Spilner said:

Quote:

Is Maeve's evolution the work of Ford or is this something unexpected?
Not sure, but it was foreshadowed by Bernard when he talked about the mesh network between all the hosts.

I think around eps 1-2?
The mesh came to mind last night for me also. I am nearly positive that's what Maeve is doing.
Zombie Jon Snow
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irish pete ag06 said:

Brian Earl Spilner said:

Quote:

Is Maeve's evolution the work of Ford or is this something unexpected?
Not sure, but it was foreshadowed by Bernard when he talked about the mesh network between all the hosts.

I think around eps 1-2?
The mesh came to mind last night for me also. I am nearly positive that's what Maeve is doing.


Not sure why people are even questioning it. Like she has mind control or something. That's how it is presented I guess. but obviously she has simply tapped into the mesh network and is communicating via that as opposed to verbally. It's like a latent or otherwise hidden protocol and interface I guess. She has simply found it.
M.C. Swag
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I'm just having a hard time caring for any of the Maeve and Dolores/Teddy storylines. We're meant to believe that the 'stakes' are now real, but i personally feel like they've never been lower. Death ISNT final. A sword through the gut of Sakura is supposed to be sad but we've seen over and over that these hosts are just a button push away from resurrection. We are constantly being led down faulty narrative lines that have 0 consequence to the larger conflict at play.

I'm supposed to care about a rescue mission for a fake daughter in the scheme of a robot takeover? Like I understand that Maeve's character is obviously key to this robot rebellion, but I just find her current sub-plot as shallow. Deciding to rescue her daughter was key to her 'awakening' and thus obviously important, but is dragging out this rescue mission really the best way to forward Maeve's future development?

And as for Dolores, I don't understand what she's doing. She wants to be free and i guess rally a robot army to help fight for that freedom, but she's moving at a snail's pace that just got alot slower now that SHE too has embarked on a rescue mission (peter abernathy).

I just don't care about either of these sub plots that are just obviously stalling the true conflict.
Leggo My Elko
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Agreed, I still like watching it, but I really only "care" about whats going on with Bernard and MiB.
Txgunrnnr
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Did anyone catch the trailer for next weeks show, where Delores is "coaching" Bernard? Saying, "No, he wouldn't have said it that way". It was a short and quick blurb.

Or am I just making something up?
“If I had asked people what they wanted, they would have said faster horses.” -Henry Ford

#FJB
bobinator
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Txgunrnnr said:

Did anyone catch the trailer for next weeks show, where Delores is "coaching" Bernard? Saying, "No, he wouldn't have said it that way". It was a short and quick blurb.

Or am I just making something up?
Next week's show looks like it's back to the x's and o's plot again. A lot of what happened in that preview looks pretty wild.

It's kind of a fascinating part of this show is that on one hand you have these huge plot devices, but characters I don't really care about on an emotional level. Elsie, Stubbs, Charlotte, Bernard, etc. The only exception is maybe William.

And then on the other you have characters that have been developed extremely well emotionally, Maeve, Teddy, Dolores even Sizemore to some extent, but a plot that right now I don't particularly care about.
MGS
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So those hosts with the "blank" CPUs - anybody else think that the real CPUs have just been relocated somewhere else in their body?

I'm guessing the hosts will be reactivated at a later time to slaughter the people investigating.
Brian Earl Spilner
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Maybe they'll give an entirely new meaning to "thinking with your d**k".
Brian Earl Spilner
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Teddy before/after.



Removed:
Empathy
Humility
Patience
Imagination

Added:
Bulk Apperception set to MAX
Coordination set to MAX
Cruelty set to MAX
Courage set to MAX
Tenacity set to MAX
Decisiveness set to MAX
Self-preservation set to MAX
Candor increased

Interestingly, loyalty was kept the same. (Was very high to begin with.)
Brian Earl Spilner
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Dolores is basically a hypocrite to the max.

She wants the hosts to "wake up", but as soon as Teddy starts thinking for himself, she changes him to be how she wants.

Guess she is getting more and more human...
tk for tu juan
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Big changes like that without wiping him clean should be fun the next time he sees William
 
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