Westworld

[Johnmgm]

Did anyone else catch the Season Two opener? I am amazed at the amount of violence and bad language in this show. My wife works for giant cable company, so we get all the premium channels, but rarely—if ever watch any premium continuing series including Game of Thrones. Are they all this coarse? I’m not a prude by any means, but Westworld seems to be written to excite high school boys—but judging by the reviews is considered sophisticated, adult stuff.
I guess I’m getting too fucking old. Am I cutting edge now?

[Monterey Jack]

"It's Not Porn, It's HBO."

Name ONE HBO series that isn't stuffed to the gills with violence, language and nudity.

[AndyDursin]

I left the TV on the other night and awoke to Seth Meyers, on NBC, GIVING THE MIDDLE FINGER. Not blurred out, not cropped -- completely on air, on over the air network television. Never mind cable! (Apparently, he does it all the time)

As far as WESTWORLD goes, did you see the first season? It literally took me almost a year to power through it.

The show has all kinds of talent in front of and behind the camera -- and yet it is painfully slow, convoluted, and populated with not one character you care about.

Add in all the "adult" stuff HBO has to include just because, and it's a borderline morose program. Who are we supposed to be rooting for? Why do we care about the robot revolution to begin with? It's truly amazing between JJ Abrams and Nolan's brother and all the other people involved, big stars and a massive budget higher than many movies, that not one of them could come up with an answer for any of that.

[Johnmgm]

I did watch Westworld Season One and thought the acting was tremendous, but everything else was so over-the-top it bordered on parody. It appears Season Two will be no different. I haven’t seen much of JJ’s product, but what I have seen hasn’t impressed me—with the possible exception of the first rebooted Star Trek movie.

[AndyDursin]

Directv gave me 6 months of HBO free for re-upping for another year, so I set my DVR for Season 2, really just because I made it through the first season and I'm curious to see if it's as humorless and convoluted this time around...though it will probably take me another 12 months to make it through this season also!

[KevinEK]

I enjoyed the first season of Westworld, particularly when it had the occasional nod toward the original Crichton film. (Not going anywhere with Futureworld, even though my dad worked on it - that movie is an epitome of 70s schlock)

JJ Abrams isn't really involved in the series as far as I know - at least beyond his name being on it.
The show is really in the hands of Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy.
The second season was apparently nearly as problematic in production as the first, although things never got as far as they did in 2015-16, when they actually had to shut the show down for months while Nolan and Joy finished writing it.

The first season was a neatly constructed puzzle box in the end. Whether it has any resonance past that puzzle box waits to be seen with what they've been doing to start the second season.

I did find characters in the show that were compelling to me - particularly William and Delores, and the stories with Bernard and Maeve. Waiting to see if those go anywhere interesting this year.