Westworld and Philosophy by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Lightning Source Inc. (Tier 3)
Published: 2018-05-14T16:00:00+00:00

14

A Place of Unlimited Possibilities

SAMANTHA WESCH

The theme park Westworld, where the wealthy elite of the future go to vacation, is a place of contradiction. Artificial intelligence and biomechanics so advanced they are indistinguishable from living humans inhabit towns with only the technologies of the old West; horror and suffering are wiped away after each day; danger and romance come from situations where Guests can’t be harmed and the object of lust will not say no.

What does it mean to be human when our actions are reversible, harm to ourselves is impossible, and the “other” does not feel (or does she?). Westworld is a place totally different—or so, at least, it seems—from the world we live in, and that’s what makes it so alluring.

The park changes those who visit, it alters the way they think, feel, and who they think they are. Beyond all the special effects, beautiful settings, and even more beautiful Hosts, there’s something underneath, something that the characters sense and feel changing them, but can’t quite put their finger on.

Throughout the show, the characters try to describe the strange and disorienting effects of Westworld, to push them off or to embrace them, and to get a grip on how the park influences their sense of time, space, and self. It’s almost as if the park has a mind of its own. What is it that makes all those who visit Westworld question themselves, their sanity, and even their reality? All the Guests who vacation at Westworld are drawn in by its strange and wondrous ability to transform those who enter, and most leave different from how they arrived.

Live Without Limits

Everything that seems impossible and out of reach in the visitors’ “real” lives is readily available, and even encouraged at Westworld. Guests choose to be villains or heroes, black hat or white, and enter a completely consuming and detailed reproduction of the American Wild West, with outlaws, sheriffs, cavalry, indigenous tribes, bounty hunters, and bar maids. Lee, the narrative director of the park, exclaims, “We sell complete immersion in one hundred interconnected narratives. A relentless fucking experience” (“The Original”).

There’s only one rule in Westworld; the Guests can’t die. Everything else is on the table. Some Guests choose to romance gorgeous Hosts, track down outlaws with bounty hunters, and follow along with the “narratives,” the stories which the Hosts live out, conjured up by the programming and design teams at the park. Others “go straight evil” (“Chestnut”), using and abusing the Hosts for their cruelest and darkest desires. In a place where you can’t die, your actions, no matter how twisted and horrible, have no consequences, and where “what happens here stays here” (“The Well-Tempered Clavier”), anything and everything can happen.

William, an initially reluctant visitor to the park, observes, “Maybe that’s why they come here. Whoever you were doesn’t matter here. There’s no rules or restrictions. You could change the story of your life, you can become somebody else, no one will judge you, no one in the real world will ever know” (“Contrapasso”).

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