Is Westworld season 4 worth watching? Depends on why you came to Westworld

We’re greater than midway by the brand new season of Westworld, the dystopian sci-fi drama from writer-producers Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Pleasure primarily based on Michael Crichton’s 1973 movie of the identical identify. And the present is way from the halcyon days of its initial popularity.

Over the course of three seasons, Westworld has remodeled right into a joyless puzzle field of competing timelines and revelations nullified by the convolution and redundancy of their very own execution. Whereas it was a meditation on sport design, the mythologizing of the American frontier, and the character of humanity and free will, now it’s simply… so much. However now individuals are speaking about it once more — is it lastly time to revisit Westworld? To inform the reality, the reply to that query relies on what, if something, drew you to the collection within the first place, with this newest season streamlining the general plot of the collection whereas on the similar time indulging as soon as once more within the convoluted mystery-box reveals of its more and more difficult chronology.

To place it frankly: I’m of two minds on the subject of Westworld season 4, so I figured one of the best ways to sum up my ideas about this season to this point is to only put these two minds (i.e. myself, and a robotic host model of my very own consciousness) in a room collectively and have them duke it out.

[Ed. note: Spoilers ahead for Westworld season 4.]

Photograph: John Johnson/HBO

Toussaint: Deliver your self again on-line.

Host Toussaint: You already made that reference within the subhed of your Westworld season 3 recap. It wasn’t intelligent then and it isn’t intelligent now.

Toussaint: Says you, asshole. Anyway, that’s neither right here nor there. We’re not right here to be our personal worst critic, we’re right here to speak about Westworld. So let’s get all the way down to it: What do you consider season 4 to this point?

Host Toussaint: Westworld season 4 is nice to this point. The present’s writers have put sufficient area and time between the final season and this one to permit the results of Rehoboam’s destruction to settle and higher set up the brand new establishment for the present going ahead.

The plot is healthier paced and extra streamlined; starting with two alternating tales instructed from the perspective of returning protagonists Caleb (Aaron Paul) and Maeve (Thandiwe Newton), together with a number model of antagonist William (Ed Harris) and a mysterious new character named Christina (portrayed by collection common Evan Rachel Wooden), that briefly blossom into three with the return of Bernard (Jeffrey Wright) and Stubbs (Luke Hemsworth) in episode three earlier than converging again into roughly two storylines on the finish of episode 4.

We see the return of the parks within the type of a brand new Delos vacation spot that resumes the present’s deconstruction of sport design that we noticed again in season 1 with a intelligent nod to the observe of asset flipping located alongside a humorous, albeit transient, exploration of how resistance to exploitative programs will be defused, assimilated, and subsequently remodeled into leisure.

Toussaint: Yeah, that was cool. I obtained my very own ideas on the brand new Delos park, however I’ll save that until it’s my flip. Please proceed.

Host Toussaint: For certain. The place was I… Oh yeah, after which we get to the mid-season twist, which is essentially the most thrilling twist the collection has performed for the reason that first season of Westworld and blows up all the things we thought we knew and understood about one in every of this season’s characters in a method that centralizes a serious idea that was first launched all the way in which again in season 2.

Toussaint: You didn’t suppose that twist was too busy?

Host Toussaint: Eh, form of? I’ll admit, it didn’t fairly land with the emotional power of its intent, however I loved it for the way it upended the established order of our preliminary impressions of this season and opened the door to this complete new world of post-human prospects. The fifth episode, “Zhuangzi,” form of jogged my memory of that one episode from the fourth season of Fringe, “Letters of Transit,” the one the place they present the long run the place the Observers have taken over and Peter’s caught in amber?

Toussaint: Dude, I used to be considering the precise similar factor! I really like Fringe!

Host Toussaint: Yeah, it’s a enjoyable present. Anyway after three lengthy seasons, it lastly seems like Westworld has began to course-correct itself and tie all these disparate threads collectively in an intriguing new path shifting ahead. All in all, I land fairly soundly on the aspect of pro-Westworld season 4. What do you suppose?

Toussaint: So, Westworld season 4 is… high-quality. I might not go as far as to explain it as “good.” My reservations lie squarely in the truth that, for a present that makes an attempt to probe on the query of how its characters, each human and host, are ensnared in cycles of repetition and failure born out of their very own nature and design, the present itself follows within the very patterns it ostensibly is critiquing.

Photograph: John Johnson/HBO

You possibly can solely have so many variations of the identical scene with completely different characters asking each other, “Have you ever ever questioned the character of your actuality?” earlier than it loses all novelty and as an alternative curdles into redundancy for the sake of arbitrary rug pulls. Dr. Robert Ford actually summed up your entire thesis of seasons 2 and three all the way in which again in episode 8 of season 1, “Hint Decay,” when he mentioned, “We stay in loops as tight and as closed because the hosts do, seldom questioning our selections, content material, for essentially the most half, to be instructed what to do subsequent.” So… what precisely are we doing right here that complicates or advances that concept?

Host Toussaint: However see, I really feel just like the twist on the finish of episode 4 of this season does complicate and produce that concept full circle in a pure and thrilling method. Ford was proper; people seldom ever query their very own selections, identical to how we the viewers by no means thought to query or mistrust the obvious stability and nature of this new future we noticed on the opening of season 4 regardless of the dramatic occasions in the course of the conclusion of season 3.

The reveal that the Caleb we as soon as knew in season 3 is useless, and the Caleb we now see on this new season is a number, dovetails superbly into the query of what significant distinction if any, aside from the plain truth of biology, separates the hosts from the people. Taken into consideration with host William’s identification disaster with regard to his human predecessor and his host grasp Dolores-Hale, and Bernard’s persevering with arc of self-actualization, and I feel you’ve obtained a stable trifecta of tales centered on the hosts asking the query of who they are aside from their human forebears.

Toussaint: I agree that the twist in episode 4 of season 4 is fascinating, although it didn’t solely land for me till after I mulled it over for a couple of minutes whereas the credit rolled. However even then, the twist that the Caleb we’ve seen for everything of this season has been a number simply seems like a variation on the large twist again in season 1, that the Man in Black was an older model of William all alongside and that the timeline the place we see a younger William meet Dolores for the primary time in reality takes place prior to now. The identical will be mentioned of the next reveal on the finish of episode 4 that the setting that audiences had been led to imagine was the “current day” is definitely the previous, and that the season’s precise present-day storyline takes place in 2083, over twenty years after the loss of life of the unique human Caleb and Dolores-Hale’s subsequent subjugation of the human denizens of New York Metropolis and, presumably, your entire world. The writing for this season is operating in circles, without delay changing into a cleaner, leaner model of the present than any we’ve seen prior to now couple seasons whereas on the similar time counting on the identical ol’ bag of tips, simply with completely different characters.

Picture: HBO

I additionally agree that the brand new Delos park primarily based on the Roaring ’20s launched on the finish of episode 2 is a welcome return to the present’s roots in season 1. It even lampshades the collection’ tendency to recycle plot factors by Maeve’s commentary on this new park’s similarities to the unique Westworld. My greatest criticism is that this new setting is promptly dropped one episode later, which is attributable extra to the narrative priorities and the construction of the collection as an entire than anything. As humorous at first blush it’s to see Westworld contact on the observe of asset-flipping, the collection already kind of did this precise joke earlier than within the fifth episode of the second season, “Akane no Mai.” Once more, one other case of a good suggestion drawn out well beyond its expiration date.

Host Toussaint: Oh wow, you’re proper! I forgot all about that “Akane no Mai” episode however yeah, they did just about do this very same gag method again in season 2 — albeit in an Edo-period simulacrum.

Toussaint: Yeah, to be honest, a lot of stuff occurred in that second season. And one other factor — I’ve seen defenders of Westworld say that detractors of the collection simply need a dumb motion present with cowboy robotic shootouts as an alternative of a deep, philosophical sci-fi parable about consciousness, free will, and the malleability of sin. However I don’t suppose that individuals who’ve grown uninterested in Westworld have uncultured tastes, nor do I imagine the present is wherever as deep or profound because the present or its advertising would purport itself to be. Frankly, Westworld is a traditional instance of science fiction that thinks it’s smarter than it really is, and it exhibits by the drained, trite, Abrams-esque “thriller field” fashion of writing that insists on repeatedly circling across the similar questions, oftentimes verbatim, for the sake of eleventh-hour twists as an alternative of evincing any new insights into the thoughts or perspective of the characters to whom these questions have been requested.

Additionally — and admittedly this criticism is minor and kinda petty — the present in its latter seasons simply feels prefer it was written by a stereotypical, hoverboard-riding, West Coast tech yuppie who simply heard about this cool new band known as Loss of life Grips and actually believes with the entire of his coronary heart, thoughts, and soul that the “blockchain” is the way forward for all the things. If that’s not cringe, I don’t know what’s.

Picture: HBO

Photograph: John Johnson/HBO

Host Toussaint: Ouch. Nicely, why do you retain watching Westworld then? What precisely is holding you coming again to look at this new season each Sunday?

Toussaint: A sunk value fallacy? [Both Toussaints laugh] Nah, however critically, what’s really holding me coming again to Westworld each season is the present’s manufacturing design. I really like the creepiness of the drone hosts, which appear to be the Putty Patrollers from Mighty Morphin’ Energy Rangers however imagined with the sinuous musculature of a Physique Worlds exhibit and the milk-blood androids of Ridley Scott’s Alien and Raised by Wolves. The design of the Delos eVTOL aircrafts is incredible, as are the cumbersome riot-control robots launched in season 3 that remind me of the Boxguard safety robots in Deus Ex: Human Revolution. I simply want they inhabited a extra fascinating world, y’know? HBO actually should get round to releasing an artwork e-book for the collection already.

Writing apart, I actually benefit from the performances of the forged themselves. Evan Rachel Wooden, Thandiwe Newton, and Tessa Thompson are great, and Jeffrey Wright continues to be the driving coronary heart and soul of the collection, with Bernard’s arc arguably being essentially the most compelling of all of the principal characters up to now.

The rating for the collection continues to be one in every of Westworld’s sturdy factors, with composer Ramin Djawadi persevering with to seek out new and ingenious methods of iterating on modern pop and art-rock tracks past the anachronistic phonograph and participant piano covers of the primary season. That mentioned, I do imagine that the present depends too closely on these covers to contrive pathos, reminiscent of Westworld’s famous overreliance on Radiohead and the plaintive string cowl of Lana Del Rey’s 2011 single “Video Video games” on the finish of the season 4 premiere.

Picture: HBO

Host Toussaint: Hmmm. So what’s your verdict to this point? No extra splitting hairs; would you really suggest this new season or not? Even with all that’s been mentioned, I nonetheless really feel fairly optimistic about Westworld season 4 and would suggest somebody who fell off in season 3 to no less than watch the primary two episodes of this season and see what they suppose.

Toussaint: See, for me, it depends upon who’s asking the query. Westworld season 4 is admittedly one of the best the present has been since season 1. Sadly, Westworld remains to be… nicely, Westworld, with all the great and dangerous that entails. To grasp what’s happening on this season calls for an understanding of a number of key occasions from season 2 and season 3, which, as somebody who has watched these seasons, I can’t suggest in good conscience. It’s only a whole slog to rewatch them. In the event you’ve already knuckled your method by season 2 and gritted your tooth by season 3, or on the very least are prepared to brush up with explainers of season 2 and season 3, then I assume my reply can be sure, you must give this season a shot.

However in the event you’re in search of the present to lastly begin shifting right into a extra thorough exploration of why its human and host characters proceed to be trapped in programs and behaviors that contribute to their very own degradation past sophomoric “we stay in a society” philosophizing, nicely… it’s fairly late within the sport and I simply don’t suppose that’s going to occur, regardless of how a lot I wish to imagine that Westworld’s characters, and the present itself, can get away of the cycle of their very own dangerous habits.

Was there anything you wished to speak about relating to Westworld season 4?

Host Toussaint: Nah, I really feel like we lined all the things. You good?

Toussaint: Yeah, I’m good. Till subsequent time, could you relaxation in a deep and dreamless slumber.

Further reporting by Host Toussaint.

New episodes of Westworld are launched on HBO and HBO Max on Sundays.