The boom of the television series, with large productions created by the Hollywood industry, has been with us for several years now. And being able to surprise with a new, surprising proposal that quickly attracts the attention of an important base of spectators is now a complicated task. Even HBO, an expert string in the sector, was struggling to replicate successes he had with The Sopranos or Game of Thrones. But, suddenly, Westworld arrived. A series that I've been putting off for a couple of years, and that I'm grateful to have done, because that way I will not have to wait to see the second season.

Source <<

Music to accompany the post.

Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, from the hand of J.J. Abrams as executive producer, present us this adaptation of the disturbing film of Michael Crichton and Yul Brynner made in 1973, where the robots of an amusement park go mad when the computer fails and begin to kill the visitors.

Like the film, the series is set in a futuristic theme park whose facilities have programmed biological beings that can be introduced in any fantasy, no matter how dark it may be. The new visitors are humans who pay a large amount of money to enter the park and make their dreams come true in a 100% immersive experience. This includes killing, sex, fun and experiencing the wild west personally.

Westworld I liked since the pilot episode. Although I know people who have told me that the first episodes have seemed too slow, and that they have a too slow rhythm and a too confused plot, I do not share that diagnosis. The first chapter is simply great, and beyond the delicious western setting of the series, the slight nuances remind us that this is a science fiction story.

The most important attraction is called Evan Rachel Woods, or Dolores. She is another host at the Westworld theme park, designed and programmed to satisfy the wishes of guests, trapped in an endless loop, repeating their routines and narratives for the amusement of visitors. But the magnificent pilot episode makes it clear that host roles are not going to continue to do exactly what they were programmed for.

The first chapters show us the two worlds that make up the park, the wild west of the hosts and guests and the world behind, made up of the programmers of artificial brains, the cleaning teams that remove the damages from the excesses in the park, the maintenance workers who clean and repair the bodies of the dead or mutilated hosts, and much more.

Exclusively with the history of the park itself, on its own, it was already an interesting project. How it was built, when and how such a degree of realism was achieved in the hosts. Topics such as the rules of the park itself, the things that the hosts can and can not do. But also the perversion of guests to unleash their most basic instincts in their facilities, the moral problem of creating artificial life and endow it with feelings and emotions almost human, to play later with them in a 'Disney World' of sex and extreme violence. All that was enough to create several seasons of a series. But this is a good science fiction story. And that requires that things get twisted.

While Dolores searches in her inner labyrinth to understand herself and what surrounds her, another hostess took the advantage and became the most captivating hostess of the series in many of her chapters: Maeve, the madam of the house less respectable and most frequented of the main town of the park. Thandie Newton is immense on paper, becoming aware of her existence, becoming the only hostess capable of changing things, at least for herself.

But as we watched the hosts of the first generation, created by the mysterious and disappeared Arnold, accumulate impossible memories and evolve their own programming acquiring a kind of consciousness, two human beings drew our attention: the co-creator of the Ford park ( Antony Hopkins) and his right hand Bernard (Jeffrey Wright).

And another pillar, of course, is the dark villain drawn from a classic western: The Man in Black (Ed Harris). Great counterpoint to all, hosts and guests, seems to know more than everyone else (except Ford) and looks at the park something much larger than other visitors. Something hidden.

Once all the characters have been presented, the secondary plots have been advanced and the main problems that seem to lead to a typical catastrophe of action film and science fiction have been presented, the plots give many twists and the true intentions of the majority of protagonists are revealed. Most questions are resolved and we reach a very satisfactory end.

If we refer to the technical section of Westworld, nothing has to envy any film production: locations, artistic design, photography, special effects. Everything works wonderfully. But the great attraction of the series is its great script, which we face two major dilemmas: what is it that makes us really human? The light thrown by the series on this question is rather gloomy because its thesis is that man is a predator that seeks exclusively to satisfy his most primal impulses. Hence the existence of that world in which there are no consequences and in which the true being of each person is revealed.

And, above all, it allows us to venture about what seems to be closer and closer: the creation of autonomous beings superior to us. The series tells us about a point where the last frontier of artificial creation has been surpassed and confirms that science fiction is getting closer and closer to ceasing to be a fiction, facing problems that could happen around the corner. The biological 3D printers are close to getting replicate organs, fully functional and biological so be careful, that the revolution is closer than we think.

Produce the first season has cost HBO approximately 100 million dollars, which means that expectations were and still are very high. In fact, when this series premiered it was proclaimed as the successor to Game of Thrones, a series with which it shares some elements such as the brutal scenes of sex and the perversion of the stories that are narrated. But Westworld is colder and has a slower pace, plus it does not have fantastic elements.

The resemblance of Westworld with Jurassic Park has also been pointed out, in the sense that it highlights the self-centeredness of the human being who does not hesitate to put others' lives at the service of his recreation. If in Jurassic Park the man played to be god daring to resuscitate the dinosaurs, in this case the sin is double of onerous since beings similar to ourself are created. What makes them different? Is it just self-awareness, determination and the ability to improvise? What path must they travel to be considered fully human? A whole philosophical and moral dilemma.

Trailer

Finally, I can only say that these first 10 chapters of Westworld are for me the best I've seen on television this year. The series has an exquisite technical elaboration and blends perfectly modern science fiction environments with the Western. And the soundtrack is wonderful, with the detail of the piano as an element that we can not fail to mention: those western melodies coming from sheets of The Rolling Stones, Radiohead, Soundgarden, Johnny Cash or The Animals result in the anachronistic of the scenes that we are seeing. It looks like the wild west, but everything is artificial, we are really in the future. Just fantastic!

Details like this, but many others, make Westworld a huge series, so I will see the second season soon, and if I consider it appropriate, I will comment on my impression about it.

Gentlemen, welcome to Westworld...