Westworld: 8 Flaws That Could Totally Ruin It

1. When You Think About It, We Have Absolutely No Idea What's Going On

Westworld maeve
HBO

Here is a small list of the things we don't know so far:

We don't know what the maze is. We don't know who Arnold really was. We don't know who Wyatt is. We don't know what Ford's new story line is, or why he's so insistent on completing it. We don't know with any certainty how many time periods there are. We don't know why Dolores keeps seeing herself everywhere. We don't know who the board overseeing Westworld are or what they want or why they're interfering.

These aren't just small, niggling questions. These questions make up the foundation of the show, of the mystery that drives it. And it's beginning to feel a bit like Lost, using massive, significant enigmas to drive the plot forward at the cost of actually being satisfying to watch. At this point, each subsequent episode of Westworld is exciting based on the premise of what it might actually answer next, rather than what its characters are going to do, feel or experience.

Westworld needs to decide where its central mystery lies and what it's really worth withholding from viewers, because if the show continues to pile on question after question without giving anything back, it's going to collapse under the weight of its own self-imposed ambiguity. Round out season one with a string of big answers and streamline the important mysteries during season two.

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How are you finding Westworld? Let us know in the comments!

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Contributor

Commonly found reading, sitting firmly in a seat at the cinema (bottle of water and a Freddo bar, please) or listening to the Mountain Goats.