Each fall, most of the broadcast and cable networks debut a ton of new shows in the span of a few months, making it difficult to sort out which ones to make time for and which to skip. So we’re starting the WIRED Pilot Program, where we highlight what you should continue watching, and what you can just let sit on your DVR until it automatically deletes. Today's entry: Westworld
The Show: Westworld (Sundays, HBO)
The Premise: Based on Michel Crichton’s 1973 film of the same name, the series is set in and around a futuristic theme park with hundreds of advanced robots are used to form various experiences for park guests. Dr. Robert Ford (Anthony Hopkins), the creator of the park, and Bernard Lowe (Jeffrey Wright), build the artificial citizens; Theresa Cullen (Sidse Babett Knudsen) leads the operations of the park, and is responsible to shareholders and management; Dolores Abernathy (Evan Rachel Wood), Maeve Millay (Thandie Newton), and Hector Escaton (Rodrigo Santoro) are all characters at Westworld. The cast also includes Ed Harris, James Marsden, Clifton Collins Jr., and Luke Hemsworth.
The Pilot Program Take: Disney prides itself on preserving the magic of its theme parks by maintaining absolute order over all attractions and characters. But imagine if all the cast members playing familiar characters were instead complicated robots updated with increasingly complex behavioral possibilities and dense narrative webs that could be affected by guest interaction? That’s what’s going on in Westworld. It’s like a combination of The Truman Show and Jurassic Park (at the outset of the series there are “host” malfunctions spreading like a virus throughout the characters thanks to a recent software update).
The pilot is very slow, introducing viewers to the cyclical nature of the park and how guests interact with that daily routine to create widely varying experiences. Most of what the Gunslinger (Ed Harris) does has no connection to anything else going on in the park, and he’s the most mysterious element. But it ends in a place that suggests the series has planned a long journey, where the hosts slowly begin to rebel against their masters and the intentions of the company that owns Westworld go beyond that of providing a theme park for the super-rich. Some viewers will be put off by the insistence on playing things close to the vest; others will be pulled in by what doesn't get revealed in the first hour.
The Verdict: It is disheartening to watch yet another HBO drama contain the threat of sexual violence against female characters in the first half hour. If this is an entirely fantastical western setting where anything is possible, why is it one that adheres to historical detail so much that it caters almost exclusively to male pleasures of violence and sex? But it is also deeply compelling as a blend of the western genre and some Isaac Asimov-esque concerns about artificial intelligence and the advancement of robotics. There are so many things left unclear by the end of the pilot that it demands viewers keep watching just to keep getting details. From the few trailers HBO has released, the clips not from the first episode suggest there are many more layers left to peel away. It has the makings of a science-fiction drama juggernaut.
TL;DR You have to watch something until Game of Thrones comes back. It should be this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JctIuZfSsa4
