The guiding thesis on which I have been advancing Western worldfourth season is that the show has been cannibalizing itself, revisiting old themes and character arcs. meI’d call it a revamped show (or even a reboot) if it wasn’t for the fact that we have the same cast of characters:eitherr, actually, the same cast. When you think about it, we have a very different set of characters: William and Caleb, for example, are now hosts; Dolores is basically (?) gone and in her place we have Christine; Charlotte has been through her fair share of transformations; and even the likes of Bernard, Stubbs and Maeve have evolved, to some degree, from who we once thought they were. This is the thrill of working with a premise as flexible as Western world‘southwestWhen you have hosts that can be rebuilt and rewired, you can really rearrange (and reanimate) them at will. What is all to say: I have been arguing that we have been receiving a Western world 4.0 that seems dI like it instinctively Western world 1.0.
Except, of course, that the very controlled environment that characterized the first season of this HBO show looks very different from the the fuzzy one that has become the backdrop of this fourth season. We have officially left the park, and even the “real world”, and we are wandering a world that is half finely constructed and half…okay, empty? Dsolar? meequal parts minority report Y Mad Max: Fury Road? But the recursive nature of the show remains the same. RRepetition has always been a constant narrative conceit with revisited loops and memories that are central to how the hosts experience their world: aNorth Dakota, more specifically, how the show presents its own stories for our sake. in this andpisode, this was most obvious in Caleb’s subplot, with him going back to his earliest memories before needing to literally retrace the steps previous versions of himself had already taken before achieving what none of those other Calebs had. Hosts, it seems, are meant to live in continuous loops even when they’re not in the park serving their former human overlords.
Instead, some of them have found in Charlotte a leader (boss? Dictator? Overseer?) with whom they clearly don’t vibrate. She explains why some of them choose death instead of the orderly environment she has painstakingly created. And while Charlotte can tell how perfect her kind is (much more perfect than humanity!), she can’t run away from the fact that she’s becoming, if not as petty, then as visionary as those who first wanted to see how far. could evolve hosts in Westworld. How else can you explain your Caleb torture exercise? He wants to find out what’s wrong with the world he’s built, but he too intends to extract that information with a ruthlessness that belies his interest in humanity in the first place.
Perhaps that is why she is so irritated by Caleb’s words at the end of the episode and why she inexplicably goes around and builds another version of him (#279!) by…well, we’ll see soon.
While Caleb lived his die hard fantasy, we have another look at the outlier rebels. Frankie, Caleb’s daughter we go get herself guided back to the park so that Bernard can reboot Maeve, as she is apparently the weapon that will help save humanity. (See? Old character, new embellishments, or is it the other way around?) Throughout, we’re getting more teasing about the odd likelihood of Bernard lowering clairvoyant powers which doesn’t make a dent in the story itself, but helps set up another problem that’s plagued. Western world along the your tour: WWho can you trust?
As with Caleb’s story last season, I find Western world he struggles when he tries to get us to care about people we just met, especially when his ensemble is already so stacked. (WHere Teddy and Christine? Wis William here? WWhy must Clementine be so outcast?) And so, while adult Frankie dominated the other half of this episode, all I kept doing was counting down the minutes until Maeve woke up and, well, it got this episode going. Which it does, setting up the ongoing battle between the rebels/outliers and Charlotte, who will no doubt find our very own Caleb in the middle. And hopefully, the confrontation will involve those other characters who weren’t in this outing. We can only hope, I guess.
lostobservations
- “Am I now?” it’s a great line. A great Western world line and one that I often ask myself when I am not given a human character to help anchor me in time and space: “When am I?”
- You have to love a subplot that imagines a world wherere, despite having technology to capture people’s consciousness via mirrors, transferring data still requires what looks like USB cables and a not insignificant amount of time.
- If this episode kept Maeve away from us for too long (even though it did give us a huge return to form for the fans,favorite character), at least it showed Charlotte in full villain mode. It’s clear that Tessa Thompson has been enjoying playing sweet hostility whenever she gets the chance. Even when she throws a chair across the room, there is such control and grace that, as the children say, you can’t help but sit still. Because honestly, humans are petty and, yes, “everything they do is so small that it is exhausting”. He clearly speaks my language and reminds me that I might not be the main character, but the villain who rightfully expects everyone to adhere to the very strict rules I have created for them. (I know, I’m working on it). But honestly, it brings out the best of what Thompson as an actor can do, which is deliver a steely demeanor that’s as endearing as it is terrifying.
- I was trying to figure out what was getting my attention about the scenarios in this last season and now I have a totally unfounded theory :Mmaybe COVID security restrictions pushed the Western world Did the cast and crew primarily shoot outdoors and/or with small groups? I know we’ve dispensed with the crowded Westworld park (and its corresponding 1930s copy), but you have to admit we’ve seen plenty of outdoor showdowns and outdoor interactions that rarely involve more than a few actors. maybe it’s just I’m noticing more, especially as aerial shots throughout the season have emphasized the vastness of the desert where the park used to be or Charlotte’s towering city skyline. B.but it happens the season a sort of lonely, alienating vibe, with much of its actors standing in frames with no one else around. Yes or no is by design (or by a design that addresses on-set concerns), helped deepen the thematic concerns of a season that stressit is how important human connection really is.