HBO Max Westworld Season 4 (2 Viewers)

[Brian L]

‘Westworld’ Canceled After Four Seasons

It’s sunset for HBO–Bad Robot‘s Westworld, the premium cabler announced this afternoon. The show ended its fourth season on August 14. The series created by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, an adaptation of the 1973 Michael Crichton film, boasted nine Primetime Emmy wins during its run and 54 noms...

deadline.com

We enjoyed the show, but for us, they peaked in S1.

 

[Citizen87645]

Admittedly I am struggling to remember what happened at the end of this last season without reading past posts.

 

[benbess]

Thinking about it, this is probably for the best from my pov. The first season was often brilliant, but then after that it went off the rails, and was just so dreary and grim.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Admittedly I am struggling to remember what happened at the end of this last season without reading past posts.

From a post on the last page of posts reflecting my ruminations of season 4:

I felt the thud of disinterest as this season's finale winded down. I felt as invested as I did watching those old-school electronic football games with the vibrating field and the players move in all sorts of random-ass directions.

 

[Keith Cobby]

Cancelled.

 

[Lord Dalek]

Good riddence to bad rubbish.

 

[SamT]

I didn't even understand or like season one.

 

[TJPC]

I absolutely loved each season, but didn’t really understand it at all either!

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I’m not surprised by the news, but disappointed. I think that Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy had a great premise for their series but really pushed against the limits of their preferred “mystery box” format of storytelling by demanding a level of engagement that their storytelling choices ultimately, for me at least, did not reward. There’s a fine line between world building/establishing mystery and obfuscation, and I think they came down on the latter side of that divide more often than was necessary. They chased away a lot of their own audience by making creative choices that suggested a lack of understanding of what made their show interesting and attractive to an audience in the first place.

This abrupt way of ending does seem like the worst of all worlds, though. By depriving the audience of a proper ending, the network has devalued the entire property. I will rewatch imperfect shows and shows that ended before their time if they still manage to tell a complete story. But a show that has a beginning, middle, no end, and more to complain about than embrace isn’t exactly something begging for a rewatch or later discovery. At the least, providing a made-for-HBO movie or finale special would have allowed the story to be concluded, and would allow the property to retain some value by.

And so, one of HBO’s most promising shows in years ends with a whimper, rather than a bang. I think it’s just unfortunate. But I don’t really blame HBO; the showrunners seem to have been given free reign to make the show they wanted, and it’s failure to retain and satisfy its audience has to fall on them.

 

[Adam Lenhardt]

Not a surprise, especially given the old regime's seeming hesitation to renew it.

Now, David Zaslav seems to have the strategy: "You know what's cheaper than making new content? Not making new content!" So anything that was already on the bubble was definitely going to be SOL.

 

[Lord Dalek]

Just a reminder that Westworld went from 2m viewers a week at its height during Season 2 to just 300k last season. Even home video sales (which is apparently what saved the show from cancellation following season 3*) couldn't justify these horrible numbers.

Also the show was pretty godawful by the end and Lisa Joy lost a bundle for Warner with Reminiscence so its days were numbered no matter who was running the studio.

 

[JimmyO]

They should just do a final show that's 2 minutes long, and just have the man in black tap dancing, holding a sign that says "everyone was a robot" (fade)

 

[Citizen87645]

I think this means I need to re-watch Person of Interest...

 

[Keith Cobby]

The idea was great and the first season was good. The second began to get ever more complex and repetitive. The third was a return to form and looked really good but the fourth was a complete dud, people came and went, the timeline moved forward with no explanation.

I found myself having to use the internet to understand what was happening, and although I watched until the end I had given up on it. The show looks great on 4k disc but I won't be buying S4.

 

[Jeff Cooper]

I loved the first 9 episodes of Season 4. Then the finale came and just ripped everything to shreds and fell flat so hard it destroyed any hope I had of it's future. I've never seen a show go from 10 to -1 so quickly for me. I'm ok with no season 5 because I honestly couldn't imagine there is any story left to tell after that.

For me, Season 1 was amazingly great. Season 2 was the biggest cluster fuck I think I could imagine, it's definitely at the bottom. Season 3 was a great return to form, but slightly less than season 1. Season 4 really had me excited until the end, which puts it down just above Season 2.

 

[Randy Korstick]

I loved the first 9 episodes of Season 4. Then the finale came and just ripped everything to shreds and fell flat so hard it destroyed any hope I had of it's future. I've never seen a show go from 10 to -1 so quickly for me. I'm ok with no season 5 because I honestly couldn't imagine there is any story left to tell after that.

For me, Season 1 was amazingly great. Season 2 was the biggest cluster fuck I think I could imagine, it's definitely at the bottom. Season 3 was a great return to form, but slightly less than season 1. Season 4 really had me excited until the end, which puts it down just above Season 2.

My Rankings match yours.
Season One: Great
Season Two: Terrible
Season Three: OK but at least back on track
Season Four: Pretty good but final episode ruined it.

 

[ManW_TheUncool]

Yeah, hopefully, they'll come back to it at some point and make a proper, concluding 2-hour movie or something like that... which has certainly been done before (w/ varying degrees of success) for some otherwise quite good-to-excellent series that were canceled abruptly/prematurely.

Otherwise, I may simply end up treating this series like I do Heroes, LOL, and maybe only care/bother w/ S1 (and maybe S2) on any future revisits...

FWIW, I mixed on S2 and S3. Neither one is completely good/excellent or totally disastrous. There's plenty to like in each, but also plenty enough to detract. I felt S4 was at least finally building toward something more consistently again, but yeah, that ending really loses me. The biggest problem I find w/ the series is it's just being a bit too deliberately manipulative and veer too much toward the contrived... as though they felt all that to be necessary. Of course, it's also possible I might feel different upon revisiting the series, but so far, that's how I feel w/out revisiting the entire series...

BTW, what's up w/ them only releasing it in HD on iTunes and Vudu? I'd consider buying S1 or maybe the entire set on either if they're in 4K/HDR/Atmos (and on sale like now), but probably not in HD (at least for streaming).

_Man_

 

[Citizen87645]

Yeah, I look at Heroes Season 1 with a mix of affection and disappointment (for it devolving so quickly in subsequent seasons).

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Yeah, I look at Heroes Season 1 with a mix of affection and disappointment (for it devolving so quickly in subsequent seasons).

I think that’s another great example of a show where its creator/showrunners didn’t understand why it appealed to its audience and therefore had no idea where to go after a nearly perfect first season.

 

[Citizen87645]

My impression was Prison Break also had that problem.