Westworld: The Complete First Season (DVD)

With GAME OF THRONES just about donezy, HBO started casting about for the next must-see, Oscar-bait programming, and it looks like WESTWORLD is its huckleberry. Years ago I watched the 1973 sci-fi western that starred Yul Brenner. HBO's version is so much more. It's a bold reimagining, a ten-episode mind-f'ck that burrows bone-deep into what defines sentience, what it means to have a soul.Maybe in the present, maybe in the near future, the pastime sensation is Westworld, an immersive Old West-themed park in which the hosts - these chillingly lifelike robots - satiate their human guests' every whim and desire. Except it turns out, guests only ever want to bone and kill. The sun rises, and Westworld resets itself, the hosts re-enacting the same scenarios over and over, used and discarded and often murdered by them paying customers.Perhaps there's more to it than a narrative that repeats itself day after day after day. As the episodes progress, you and I catch a whiff of something gestating beneath the surface, maybe something disquieting. It's said one needs to experience real trauma to truly live. Here and there, a few of the original hosts begin to push back against their programming.It's such lush and layered plotting that you're actually better served if you binge-watch this. There's so much going on, it's so easy to miss things, that waiting a week for the next new episode can be more challenging. The writers - including Jonathan Nolan who helmed PERSON OF INTEREST - gleefully mess with the viewer. Memory glitches and time lapses throw you off-balance, and plenty of times you're left wondering what's real and what's not. The acting is excellent, apropos of a powerhouse cast. You may raise an eyebrow at Anthony Hopkin's detached performance, but give him space; he's going somewhere with it. Evan Rachel Wood is ostensibly the lead character, and she is fairly fantastic as she traverses her own twisty story arc. For those who eyeball the first few minutes of the pilot episode and assume that James Marsden has snagged the hero's journey, I say to you, "Hahaha!" It took me a minute to get with Marsden's character of Teddy. Teddy has the thankless role of the loser, fated to be s-- well, let's just say I feel that his story arc is maintained at status quo for far too long.In the 1973 film, Yul Brenner was the homicidal Man in Black, the robot gone rogue. In HBO's version, Ed Harris steps into Brenner's boots. Except his Man in Black isn't a robot (or is he?). Ed Harris, eyes sunken and glinty, deep wrinkles landscaping his face, oozes absolute menace and iron purpose. Such a good actor. I still love him best in THE ABYSS..But the breakout character is easily Thandie Newton's. Who would've thunk it that a brothel madame could project such swag? I did not see Maeve coming at all. To reiterate: it is said one needs to experience real trauma to truly live. No one communicates trauma and hurt and betrayal and devastation like Thandie Newton. I assumed she was only a side character, just another host to populate the backdrop. Oops. Tell me, did she win an Emmy for this? Tell me at least she was nominated...Scenes in the theme park are juxtaposed by scenes in the real world. We're made privy to corporate skullduggery and to what goes on behind the scenes as the hosts are poked and prodded and debriefed and repaired by a swarm of engineers and techies and behavior analysts and such. It's in these scenes, set in sterile laboratories, that we get desensitized to the rampant nekkidness. This show is so nekkid even GAME OF THRONES is catching the vapors. The hosts' state of naked is standard practice for when they are worked on by the geek squad. It only hammers home that humans perceive them as mere things. They are so much nude furniture.What constitutes self-awareness? And humanity? What is free will? What is a soul? The brainy writers of this show deal in deep cuts and dissonance and deception. They don't always play fair, as borne out, late in the game, by a sudden convergence of what had been two separate plot threads. In diving into this show, be prepared for surrealism and trickeration, for boardroom misbehavior and Wild West shoot-'em-ups. There's the savvy brothel madame and the sweet rancher's daughter, the heroic lamb led to slaughter time and again and the wicked man in black. There is the wise and benevolent creator. Believe none of them. Bring on Season 2. We'll have a robot uprising yet.

Good series to binge

Love the series even better in 4k,

Good show, but now that someone bought out HBO, this is no longer available with HBO streaming services.

While this set is advertised as coming with a digital copy, it can't be redeemed. WB expired all of the digital codes for season 1, even if you're buying a new copy. The discs are fine though.

It's an interesting watch however, careful on binge watching ... the flaws become super apparent when you do,So whats wrong?Well, everyone has their own agenda and it seems everyone working for the company is trying to screw it over for their own means. There is eventually a good story arc that forms but its around episode 7. So you have many mind bending suspension of disbelief to sit thru. There is copious amounts of nudity in the show to help keep the audience watching (its not as bad as the nudity in black sail as far as pointless/shock value). So careful watching this on a plane is all I am saying.Okay so onto the point. A company runs a theme park in the spirit of Cyberdine / Jurassic Park .. meaning as incompetently as possible while somehow making a profit. The overarching goal is to make the robots as human as possible by allowing them to remember things. This you will quickly figure out is a stupid idea and MANY people point it out in the show but the push the OKAY button and continue on even know its shown that its doing more harm than good. So in the robots mind they all now have PTSD as they recall past events they were apart of and it now starts messing with the current roles they are in.This issue somewhat drives the plot forward and introduces us to some of the worst company mismanagement possible. A few cast memebers ask the robots if anyone has modified them, they say no, then the person TELLS THEM TO DELETE THE ENCOUNTER.... SO they just forgot that the other people messing with the machines can do the same thing.Later tech guys really screw things up when they start changing robots codes... and what should SET OFF EVERY ALARM .. goes unnoticed. It's painful to shut your brain down hard enough to accept that story line... it's not even a McGuffin ...I won't go further down this line as its a major story/plot point....The real McGuffin of the story is "The Maze" .. it's halfA$$'ed explained at the end and it truly wrecks the story as one of the major actor's entire arc is pointless. He owns the company, he runs around being a GTA5 griefer (pointlessly), and he says his sole goal is to find the maze and break the AI. His overarching goal is he wants to fight things that can fight back... e.g. disable the safety.... Cause you know, noone would ever sue when their loved one is murdered by a robot in a vacation world.... He even tells the devs thats his plan AND THEY DON'T TELL HIM HOW DUMB THAT IS!.So, they make mention that anything can happen in this world, and they show, it does. Any human can cap anyone at anytime and instead of having multiple copies of the same robot they repair it and send it back out into the world.... this is dumb .. it's initially set up that they want to see what the robot remembers (which is again, a dumb thing to have), show nudity, and save budget as they are not showing an action scene.Lastly, Do laws not exist in this world? To the shows credit! They make the interactions between human robots very well .. as the robots are not allowed to kill humans they edit action scenes in a way where it doesn't look like they are pulling punches/throwing shots... I was quite impressed with this. However, there are events where one human interacts with another... and one takes the other hostage.... sooooo, anyone in the company want to step in... you know before a human knifes another human???? Also, guns are magic .. just accept that. They do what the scene needs them to do. Shoot a robot, chunks go flying, shot a person, knock them over, shoot glass and it shatters, shoot wood and leave bullet holes... so yeah magic.Anyway, I don't know where this story is going to go after the season finale ... but assuming the Story real world is just as dumb as the companies invested in WestWorld noone will care... However, you, you at home if you have stayed with this review to this point .. give your self a pat on the back... it sounds like a rant to avoid .. but the show is really something to see. The cinematography, actors, and action scenes are really well done. It's just the story has issues. But I do recommend watching this show.Last thought... is this a prequel to Terminator?

Ce coffret ne fait que 580 minutes.N'est n'y uncut,n'y version longue.Simple import Belge .trois blurays disk's .Francais 5.1,meme pas de DTS c'est une honte!J'adore cette serie et je voulais quelque chose de qualitée.Il était dit,version longue,non censuré 618 minutes!Je ne sais pas où ils ont pécho celà.Bon.Ceci étant dit.La durée parait quand meme plus importante que dans les autres coffrets.Peut-etre qu'avec les supplements on arrivera à 618 minutes.Peut-etre que je ferai un méaculpa apres avoir visionné le coffret.On nous vends des coffrets de plus en plus chers.Alors qu'ils nous fassent quelques chose de qualité.le code barres de cet import 3 bluray's disk's 10x58 minutes est(5051888233054) avec le logo 16 en bas à gauche.//// (rajout) J'ai à présent visioné ce coffret.Le premier épisode fait env.1H08,le dernier 1H28,les autres + ou - 58 MIN.Donc oui,on arrive à 620 minutes sans les suppléments.Seule ombre au tableau,les blurays ne reprennent pas là où on les a arretés.Lorsque vous rallumez votre lecteur bluray,ils se remettent au début(testé sur plusieurs lecteurs).Bon produit quand meme.Personellement,je suis satisfait.

Everything that the television had to offer, and more. Don;'t be fooled by the slow, predictable first two episodes. They but set the scene as we expect from the old Yul Brynner movie. But the, insidiously, it all starts to go deliciously wrong. What I find astounding is that in the season in which "The Handmaid's Tale" took over television, most didn't notice that this gem is also centered on the liberation and power of two women, and they are both sensationally performed, and who steal the show from even Anthony Hopkins.One flaw, in the booklets provided, the performers are totally ignored but technical elements are extensively detailed. But this show depends upon the actors involved, and they deserve more praise than the material enclosed provides The discs remedy that a bit, but insufficiently so.A Season to watch over and over, discovering new and insightful new details with each viewing.I loved "The Handmaid's Tale", but doubt I will ever give it a second viewing. This one is just as significant, but entertains as well as educates, and gives us the much better ride for our money. Try it - you'll love it.

One of the best TV shows I've seen in many years.Intelligent (and beautifully poetic) dialogue, very engaging characters, great visuals. A word of warning, it IS rather gruesome in parts, very gory, however this really reinforces the ideas being explored in the series.It is a radical departure from Crichton's book and movie, taking a different approach: the series looks at the story but more from the robots' point of view.Neither my spouse nor I are fans of the western genre (at all), and yet we were fully involved by the story and the characters, and are now chomping at the bit waiting for season 2 to come out on Bluray.There's nothing to say about Amazon.ca's service, as usual. They have been impeccable at every turn since I started purchasing from them.

I am very glad that I decided to purchase the 4K UHD + Blu-ray + Digital HD version of this brilliant rendition of Michael Crichton's novel.For those of you who aren't sure whether it's worth to fork over the extra cash, I have included some pictures of what's included.There's six discs in total - 3 Blu-rays + 3 UHD discs + a digital HD code (although it's not iTunes, unfortunately).Also included is an episode guide, and, a 'Corporate Guidebook' which provides some surprisingly insightful information on the different departments, park layout and other logistical tidbits which yield an efficiently-streamlined experience for the park's guests.All in all, I love this compilation, and I absolutely recommend it over the older Blu-ray-only release.9/10 - Would be 10/10 if the digital HD version was iTunes, but I digress.I cannot wait for Season 2!

loved it. Made better sense watching it the second time. Flipping back and forth through time had me confused while watching it on tv. But watching with a bit of knowledge as to what's going on still had a few great susorises and a great enjoyment like I was watching it for the first time. I'm sure this will be a series I will pop into that DVD and rewatching again. There are just some shows that are the type we can comfortablely rematch and this for us is one. It's so interesting. Lots of mini stories throughout each episode.. One thing that boggled me was the speed of how fast one gdead/injured person/robot was repaired and back into the store within hours. Looking past that I loved the little hint of the new logo for next season calls EW they slipped in there on one of the episodse Played on th X special menu, (east world) this seso. Was WW. Measning West World.) So I hope East world season