Westworld season four is going to be easier to follow than its previous season, according to one star, but don’t expect the series to let up on any of the twists, turns and themes that have made it great.
Speaking to The Hollywood Reporter during the HBO series’ fourth season red carpet premiere in New York City, showrunner Alison Schapker and co-creator Lisa Joy broke down how this season will take the TV hit’s themes into new places with recognizable subjects — from its unreliable narrators to its obfuscation of reality.
When it comes to characters and their experiences being trusted as real, human or in the present — something the show has toyed with since its beginnings — Schapker teased that viewers will have reliable narrators this season, but there’s a catch. “I’m gonna say yes, but only in the sense that I feel this season it’s very much something it’s going to explore and say,” she explains. “I do think there’ll be something to hold on to.”
Viewers having something — or someone — to hold on to will be explored in the show in a way that is as much of “a wild ride” as “Westworld always is,” according to the showrunner.
“We always want everyone to question the nature of their own reality, and I think that there’s no way to watch the series and not find yourself again and again questioning the assumptions we make, stories we tell ourselves and is that really real or is there something beneath this surface?”
Joy adds that the show’s exploration of what’s real, what’s happening and when will be steeped in how the characters grapple with subjectivity versus objectivity and whether anyone can actually see themselves as they truly are.
“You try to live your best life. You try to be the best you can with all the issues you have and the things that haunt you. For me, sometimes I wish there was like a court stenographer, taking notes of it so I can review my records objectively and figure out how to do better. But there’s not,” she explains. “Our entire history, our entire lives, are mired in this subjectivity. It’s impossible to get out of our own headspace. We all suffer from our own delusions and illusions good and bad, so part of that is reconciling our desire to live meaningful lives and to improve ourselves with our inability to truly objectively see ourselves at any point.”
Westworld season four is raising similar questions as the show has in its three previous seasons, but Joy notes that there is one major way this fourth go-around will diverge from its predecessors: the relationship between hosts and humans.
“We previously examined the ways in which hosts are like humans, and the ways in which their lives are on loops and their feelings and aspirations could be conceived as very humanistic,” she tells THR. “This season, we’re looking at it from the other way: How much of our own character is preprogrammed? How much of our own loops are irrevocable and unchangeable — the way that society filters us into something, the way our own DNA and predilections, hormones, moods and feelings predetermine a path?”
From left: Morningstar Angeline, Nozipho Mclean, Alison Schapker, Luke Hemsworth, Jeffrey Wright, Aaron Paul, Angela Sarafyan, Lisa Joy, Evan Rachel Wood, Tessa Thompson, Ed Harris, James Marsden, Ariana DeBose, Aurora Perrineau, Emily Somers and Daniel Wu
Taylor Hill/Getty Images
As for how the show will take its exploration of the park concept further — through its new 1920s-set location and beyond — the Westworld co-creator teases, “The idea of the park — the world is a park.”
“We have this limited-time experiment of consciousness to figure shit out and try to do the best we can,” she continues. “So all the things that used to be metaphorical about the show are now kind of literal this season as we explore those themes in a very direct way.”
For star Aaron Paul, who returns as Caleb in the story set seven years after the season three finale, one ongoing Westworld theme his character will explore is parenthood.
“When you are reintroduced to Caleb, you see him seven years post the finale of season three, and you realize that he’s married, he has a beautiful little girl,” Paul tells THR. “I have a little daughter myself, and I try not to dive into my personal life when tackling something, but you could definitely see some of my true raw emotions bleed through because of my own journey. [Caleb] being a father is a massive part of his trajectory this season and it’s what kind of gives him hope and purpose to march on.”
“The show is always questioning what’s real, and what’s important, and in some ways, I think, for children to be our cornerstones is very relatable, whether it’s a human or a host,” Schapker says about why the theme of children is so important within the show. “There’s something almost ineffably real about that relationship. Children give you something to fight for and something to live for and I don’t think that’s confined to Westworld, but I think we know that and we wanted that investment.”
While the dramatic twists, turns and resonant themes will continue on this season, and in some cases in new ways, actor Ed Harris, who’s behind the infamous Man in Black, promises that fans who might have struggled to keep up last season will be offered not just a clearer narrative but one — if not completely — certainly more easy to trust.
“I think season four is a little easier to grasp what’s happening — what the sides are, who’s trying to do what. I think it’s a little clearer than season three, which to me, was very confusing because there were so many dimensions and it really could be anybody,” he said. “That’s still the case, but it doesn’t get quite as complicated.”