As we near the end of the year I’ve been in a bit of a holiday slump, not feeling like doing much but sleeping and watching television. Not a great few weeks. One good thing about that though is that it has allowed me to catch up on some shows I hadn’t gotten to watch previously. One such show I binge-watched this week was Westworld. 

Set in a western-theme amusement park containing extremely life-like androids, Westworld shows the park from three vantage points—that of the guests, the employees, and the robots. The thing is, we don’t always know which story we’re watching. Coming off of recently watching the Blade Runner series, this hit home for me a lot, approaching this morality tale of how to consider the moral ramifications of what we do to and how we use robots, especially humanist droids like this. Even if they may or may not have feelings, is it still right to treat them like slaves when they look just like us? If they do gain an understanding of that has happened in their lifetime, what are the ramifications?

In the Westworld park guests have several options of “rides.” Some can choose to spend their time at the saloon/brothel, where it is obvious what the pastime is. Adventurous guests can join teams to seek out wanted gunmen to collect a reward. If a guest wishes they can either be good or take the evil route and travel down their dark side as they pillage and kill. The park is large enough that there are plenty of routes to take.

While the park storylines became annoying as the repetitiveness took over, the show’s premise becomes most enjoyable when certain characters begin to notice the strangeness of their surroundings, and begin remembering events that had been wiped from their hard drives. Seeing how dreams and memories affect a person can be interesting to consider, but when these characters have been raped, murdered, tortured, had family stolen, and plenty more horrible histories, this can drive a person mad—especially when they learn that none of it, while at the same time all of it, was real, including their existence.

If you’re seeking an interesting science-fiction drama that incorporates the joy of old-fashioned westerns, the first season of Westworld is worth checking out.

Next week I won’t have a post, hopefully giving me time to defunk from the holiday slump and enjoy some time off work. I hope everybody has a good new year.