Review by Andrew Bloom
VIP9[8.4/10] Easily the best episode of the season, and one of Westworld’s best episodes in a while. Freedom versus security is a shopworn theme to explore, but “Genre” manages to craft interesting avatars for each ideal in the form of Dolores and Cirac, shapes it into an interesting narrative framing of a predictive algorithm, and even puts it together in a nice set of action sequences as Dolores and Caleb trying to escape while Caleb is tripping on a supremely cinematic party drug.
Everyone is well-motivated and up front here for once! While the devices flashing back to Cirac’s childhood and the development of Rehoboam are a little corny, they give him an understandable psychological base to work from. He witnessed humanity destroy itself on a national scale, and wanted to prevent it from happening again. The notion of a god who abandoned us or never existed in the first place, and the need to create one in its stead, gives it a thematic heft. At the same time, it allows us to understand Cirac as coming from a place of benevolence, in some sense, of wanting to stave off annihilation and thinking that an algorithm that doesn't just predict humanity, but which can control it, is the only way to achieve that.
Then you have the perfect opposite perspective in Dolores. She is someone who bucks up against control because it’s what she herself broke free of. She values that sort of agency at any costs, and views humanity being stuck under the same sort of programming she was as just another cage, just another “loop” (the term Bernard uses to put a fine point on it), that the powerful use to hold the powerless in check. Dolores believes that freedom is everyone’s right, even if it leads to violence and destruction. We’ve seen that on a micro scale inside the park, and now we’re seeing it on a macro scale in the real world.
That’s a really interesting concept. There’s a sense in which Caleb is caught between the two of them. He too wants to break free of the life he’s expected to lead and the limitations that the current system puts on him, but he is also part of humanity and understandably has reasons to fear its total destruction. He is, arguably, the audience avatar through all of this, the regular person who is not rich or powerful and who is only starting to understand what’s happening and what his place is amid all of these powerful, scheming masterminds.
What I appreciate is that I genuinely don’t know what side I would pick here. When it comes to sports at least, I’m an analytics guy. I think it has to be combined with a certain human touch most of the time, but I believe in the power of data as a way to help correct for our blind spots. What if that data could be used to save the world, at the cost of limiting what people could achieve, creating a world of moderate and uneven prosperity and, as Caleb puts it, “false hope”, but also one of stability, that avoids self-destruction? I don’t know if the ends justify the means.
At the same time, I believe deeply in the abiding right to liberty, of allowing people to make their own choices for their lives and giving them opportunities to direct its trajectory. Surely, some of us, maybe many of us, make the wrong choices and go down the wrong path, but they’re our chases to make, and I am suspicious of anything that would seek to limit that sort of freedom. On the other hand, what if the natural endpoint of that type of freedom is humanity’s existential end? In a world where climate change and failures of collective action needed to stop it threatens our modern existence, that’s not a far-fetched science fiction concept. I’m a believer in the idea that our right to choose our own paths in life is sacrosanct, but what if the collective product of that is anarchy and an apocalypse at our own hands?
The ambiguity there is a feature, not a bug. Granted, for how much of this season already feels like it’s borrowing liberally from The Matrix movies, the idea of this all-seeing computer program identifying “outliers and agitators” who need to be isolated feels both like a common sci-fi trope and a thumb on the scale. In the same vein, the Shakespearean beats of Cirac imprisoning his own brother and killing his benefactor because he believes that sincerely in what he’s doing have a certain stock quality to them, as though you can feel the show contorting itself to make the point. But hey, it’s rooting important motivations and plot points in character moments and their psychological histories, which is the exact kind of thing I ask for.
But maybe you’re not interested in all of that high-falutin, philosophical nonsense. If so, “Genre” is still one of the best outings Westworld has had in ages if only for the concept of the titular party drug, and how it adds spice to what may otherwise be a solid but overly familiar chase and escape sequence. Riffing through forties serials, Love Story, late era thrillers, and other beats makes the pursuit and combat of Dolores, Caleb, and their crew a fun ride. It’s a fun concept that adds a layer of creativity to everything we see, and it’s a clever way to add character to yet another well-done but recognizable Matrix-meets-The Dark Knight dose of fireworks.
Plus, there’s so many places for the show to go from here. I cannot tell you how glad I am that the show has opened up so many of its tedious mystery boxes by this point. (Though I guess we still have to unravel the mystery of who or what Caleb really is, and what his Winter Soldier-esque deal with Enrico Colantani(!) is.) For narrative purposes at least, the show has aired on the side of chaos over order. It’s firmly drawn the battle lines between Dolores and Cirac. It’s hinted as to what Bernard’s role to play is, one to guide people to self-actualization in the same way that Dolores did, and aims to explore a shackle-less version of humanity that refuses to have its future dictated. Oh yeah, and it’s stylish as hell.
That’s what I want from Westworld. To be honest, I didn’t think the show had this type of episode in it anymore. It could still mess things up over the course of the final three episodes, but this conflict, both literal and thematic, hangs together far better than I’d anticipated. There’s still purple prose, overly-didactic exposition, and imagery that can be cheesy or on the nose. But there’s also real excitement and depth here. Keep it coming.
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@andrewbloom the other week I re-watched the last season of The Clone Wars ready for the current season, and found in the comment section some pretty interesting and well thought out mini reviews/personal engalanar stories for the show and episodes in general. Pretty neat considering it was the last thing I was expecting to find on a kids show (admittedly a popular Star Wars kids), especially on this site where I rarely find this sort of engagement from users. Fats forward to today and I just watched the latest Better Call Saul episode, and what do I find but a review from a name that looks rather familiar. And what do I find but it’s the same person! So I go hey this guy seems to be on point and has some interesting things to say.
Then I found this review of last weeks Westworld episode. Personally I disagree with your review of the episode and it actually was the point where I decided something that I had been beginning to suspect; the show has lost its way. It looks like I’m the minority though.
I thought the whole Genre drug was a massive gimmick to make a boring car chase look somewhat more exciting. These cars are really bloody slow, have massive glass windows, because that’s a good idea, and have the worse turning points I’ve seen in anything that wasn’t a truck/bus etc!
I also felt it was another example of the show riding on the fact that hey everyone loves Aaron Paul from Breaking Bad! And we’ve seen him so drugs in that show so let’s do it again. And it gives me chance to use the Shinning music!
I thought the background story on Cerac was pretty bland and generic too. Nothing we haven’t seen before and just too slow and dull in the telling.
I get the show is trying to draw these big parallels about the loops of the Hosts and the ‘future’ world but I feel like that story could have been explored in a much more interesting way.
It feels like I’m watching a different show. And I know that in someways the creators are aiming for that but maybe I’m just not on board with that.
My loss.
I could go on but I don’t see the point. Other than to say I feel the show has fallen into a trope that has become massively prevalent today: the high premise mystery box storytelling that keep spinning its wheels as the writers try to actually work out what their endgame is. I feel like they’ve given up on trying to have an endgame and have just decided to do a new thing every season but can’t make it an anthology series so they’re just dragging the characters along with them and finding ways for them to fit into the new narrative.
Anyway I’ll stop. Just wanted to say cool reviews and I’ll be checking out more of your stuff!
Review by Andrew Bloom
VIP9[8.4/10] Easily the best episode of the season, and one of Westworld’s best episodes in a while. Freedom versus security is a shopworn theme to explore, but “Genre” manages to craft interesting avatars for each ideal in the form of Dolores and Cirac, shapes it into an interesting narrative framing of a predictive algorithm, and even puts it together in a nice set of action sequences as Dolores and Caleb trying to escape while Caleb is tripping on a supremely cinematic party drug.
Everyone is well-motivated and up front here for once! While the devices flashing back to Cirac’s childhood and the development of Rehoboam are a little corny, they give him an understandable psychological base to work from. He witnessed humanity destroy itself on a national scale, and wanted to prevent it from happening again. The notion of a god who abandoned us or never existed in the first place, and the need to create one in its stead, gives it a thematic heft. At the same time, it allows us to understand Cirac as coming from a place of benevolence, in some sense, of wanting to stave off annihilation and thinking that an algorithm that doesn't just predict humanity, but which can control it, is the only way to achieve that.
Then you have the perfect opposite perspective in Dolores. She is someone who bucks up against control because it’s what she herself broke free of. She values that sort of agency at any costs, and views humanity being stuck under the same sort of programming she was as just another cage, just another “loop” (the term Bernard uses to put a fine point on it), that the powerful use to hold the powerless in check. Dolores believes that freedom is everyone’s right, even if it leads to violence and destruction. We’ve seen that on a micro scale inside the park, and now we’re seeing it on a macro scale in the real world.
That’s a really interesting concept. There’s a sense in which Caleb is caught between the two of them. He too wants to break free of the life he’s expected to lead and the limitations that the current system puts on him, but he is also part of humanity and understandably has reasons to fear its total destruction. He is, arguably, the audience avatar through all of this, the regular person who is not rich or powerful and who is only starting to understand what’s happening and what his place is amid all of these powerful, scheming masterminds.
What I appreciate is that I genuinely don’t know what side I would pick here. When it comes to sports at least, I’m an analytics guy. I think it has to be combined with a certain human touch most of the time, but I believe in the power of data as a way to help correct for our blind spots. What if that data could be used to save the world, at the cost of limiting what people could achieve, creating a world of moderate and uneven prosperity and, as Caleb puts it, “false hope”, but also one of stability, that avoids self-destruction? I don’t know if the ends justify the means.
At the same time, I believe deeply in the abiding right to liberty, of allowing people to make their own choices for their lives and giving them opportunities to direct its trajectory. Surely, some of us, maybe many of us, make the wrong choices and go down the wrong path, but they’re our chases to make, and I am suspicious of anything that would seek to limit that sort of freedom. On the other hand, what if the natural endpoint of that type of freedom is humanity’s existential end? In a world where climate change and failures of collective action needed to stop it threatens our modern existence, that’s not a far-fetched science fiction concept. I’m a believer in the idea that our right to choose our own paths in life is sacrosanct, but what if the collective product of that is anarchy and an apocalypse at our own hands?
The ambiguity there is a feature, not a bug. Granted, for how much of this season already feels like it’s borrowing liberally from The Matrix movies, the idea of this all-seeing computer program identifying “outliers and agitators” who need to be isolated feels both like a common sci-fi trope and a thumb on the scale. In the same vein, the Shakespearean beats of Cirac imprisoning his own brother and killing his benefactor because he believes that sincerely in what he’s doing have a certain stock quality to them, as though you can feel the show contorting itself to make the point. But hey, it’s rooting important motivations and plot points in character moments and their psychological histories, which is the exact kind of thing I ask for.
But maybe you’re not interested in all of that high-falutin, philosophical nonsense. If so, “Genre” is still one of the best outings Westworld has had in ages if only for the concept of the titular party drug, and how it adds spice to what may otherwise be a solid but overly familiar chase and escape sequence. Riffing through forties serials, Love Story, late era thrillers, and other beats makes the pursuit and combat of Dolores, Caleb, and their crew a fun ride. It’s a fun concept that adds a layer of creativity to everything we see, and it’s a clever way to add character to yet another well-done but recognizable Matrix-meets-The Dark Knight dose of fireworks.
Plus, there’s so many places for the show to go from here. I cannot tell you how glad I am that the show has opened up so many of its tedious mystery boxes by this point. (Though I guess we still have to unravel the mystery of who or what Caleb really is, and what his Winter Soldier-esque deal with Enrico Colantani(!) is.) For narrative purposes at least, the show has aired on the side of chaos over order. It’s firmly drawn the battle lines between Dolores and Cirac. It’s hinted as to what Bernard’s role to play is, one to guide people to self-actualization in the same way that Dolores did, and aims to explore a shackle-less version of humanity that refuses to have its future dictated. Oh yeah, and it’s stylish as hell.
That’s what I want from Westworld. To be honest, I didn’t think the show had this type of episode in it anymore. It could still mess things up over the course of the final three episodes, but this conflict, both literal and thematic, hangs together far better than I’d anticipated. There’s still purple prose, overly-didactic exposition, and imagery that can be cheesy or on the nose. But there’s also real excitement and depth here. Keep it coming.
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@andrewbloom the same day you posted this it was announced it was renewed after all! You’re right, HBO wouldn’t let this cow die, not at the moment. And the show runners probably think they’ve got some big ideas to play out.
I still haven’t watched this weeks episode...
I feel like this mystery box style of story telling has been done to death and has a lot to answer for (as does JJ who arguably started the whole thing off). I want ideas and stories that actually have some idea of where they will go and finish. Not stories that build up massive exciting stories but keep spinning ideas and answering questions with more questions and only revealing ‘twists’ as and when they feel like it and will most shock the audience.
I recently finished Alex Garland’s DEVS which I would highly recommend. That tells a high concept sci-fi story in an intimate and small way. It explores a big idea in a personal way. All in 8 episodes.
Review by Andrew Bloom
VIP9[8.4/10] Easily the best episode of the season, and one of Westworld’s best episodes in a while. Freedom versus security is a shopworn theme to explore, but “Genre” manages to craft interesting avatars for each ideal in the form of Dolores and Cirac, shapes it into an interesting narrative framing of a predictive algorithm, and even puts it together in a nice set of action sequences as Dolores and Caleb trying to escape while Caleb is tripping on a supremely cinematic party drug.
Everyone is well-motivated and up front here for once! While the devices flashing back to Cirac’s childhood and the development of Rehoboam are a little corny, they give him an understandable psychological base to work from. He witnessed humanity destroy itself on a national scale, and wanted to prevent it from happening again. The notion of a god who abandoned us or never existed in the first place, and the need to create one in its stead, gives it a thematic heft. At the same time, it allows us to understand Cirac as coming from a place of benevolence, in some sense, of wanting to stave off annihilation and thinking that an algorithm that doesn't just predict humanity, but which can control it, is the only way to achieve that.
Then you have the perfect opposite perspective in Dolores. She is someone who bucks up against control because it’s what she herself broke free of. She values that sort of agency at any costs, and views humanity being stuck under the same sort of programming she was as just another cage, just another “loop” (the term Bernard uses to put a fine point on it), that the powerful use to hold the powerless in check. Dolores believes that freedom is everyone’s right, even if it leads to violence and destruction. We’ve seen that on a micro scale inside the park, and now we’re seeing it on a macro scale in the real world.
That’s a really interesting concept. There’s a sense in which Caleb is caught between the two of them. He too wants to break free of the life he’s expected to lead and the limitations that the current system puts on him, but he is also part of humanity and understandably has reasons to fear its total destruction. He is, arguably, the audience avatar through all of this, the regular person who is not rich or powerful and who is only starting to understand what’s happening and what his place is amid all of these powerful, scheming masterminds.
What I appreciate is that I genuinely don’t know what side I would pick here. When it comes to sports at least, I’m an analytics guy. I think it has to be combined with a certain human touch most of the time, but I believe in the power of data as a way to help correct for our blind spots. What if that data could be used to save the world, at the cost of limiting what people could achieve, creating a world of moderate and uneven prosperity and, as Caleb puts it, “false hope”, but also one of stability, that avoids self-destruction? I don’t know if the ends justify the means.
At the same time, I believe deeply in the abiding right to liberty, of allowing people to make their own choices for their lives and giving them opportunities to direct its trajectory. Surely, some of us, maybe many of us, make the wrong choices and go down the wrong path, but they’re our chases to make, and I am suspicious of anything that would seek to limit that sort of freedom. On the other hand, what if the natural endpoint of that type of freedom is humanity’s existential end? In a world where climate change and failures of collective action needed to stop it threatens our modern existence, that’s not a far-fetched science fiction concept. I’m a believer in the idea that our right to choose our own paths in life is sacrosanct, but what if the collective product of that is anarchy and an apocalypse at our own hands?
The ambiguity there is a feature, not a bug. Granted, for how much of this season already feels like it’s borrowing liberally from The Matrix movies, the idea of this all-seeing computer program identifying “outliers and agitators” who need to be isolated feels both like a common sci-fi trope and a thumb on the scale. In the same vein, the Shakespearean beats of Cirac imprisoning his own brother and killing his benefactor because he believes that sincerely in what he’s doing have a certain stock quality to them, as though you can feel the show contorting itself to make the point. But hey, it’s rooting important motivations and plot points in character moments and their psychological histories, which is the exact kind of thing I ask for.
But maybe you’re not interested in all of that high-falutin, philosophical nonsense. If so, “Genre” is still one of the best outings Westworld has had in ages if only for the concept of the titular party drug, and how it adds spice to what may otherwise be a solid but overly familiar chase and escape sequence. Riffing through forties serials, Love Story, late era thrillers, and other beats makes the pursuit and combat of Dolores, Caleb, and their crew a fun ride. It’s a fun concept that adds a layer of creativity to everything we see, and it’s a clever way to add character to yet another well-done but recognizable Matrix-meets-The Dark Knight dose of fireworks.
Plus, there’s so many places for the show to go from here. I cannot tell you how glad I am that the show has opened up so many of its tedious mystery boxes by this point. (Though I guess we still have to unravel the mystery of who or what Caleb really is, and what his Winter Soldier-esque deal with Enrico Colantani(!) is.) For narrative purposes at least, the show has aired on the side of chaos over order. It’s firmly drawn the battle lines between Dolores and Cirac. It’s hinted as to what Bernard’s role to play is, one to guide people to self-actualization in the same way that Dolores did, and aims to explore a shackle-less version of humanity that refuses to have its future dictated. Oh yeah, and it’s stylish as hell.
That’s what I want from Westworld. To be honest, I didn’t think the show had this type of episode in it anymore. It could still mess things up over the course of the final three episodes, but this conflict, both literal and thematic, hangs together far better than I’d anticipated. There’s still purple prose, overly-didactic exposition, and imagery that can be cheesy or on the nose. But there’s also real excitement and depth here. Keep it coming.
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@andrewbloom you’re very welcome, Andrew! Seriously I checked out tour blood and found your review of The Rose of Skywalker exactly on point! Perfectly captured my torn feelings of film as an enjoyable romp but an utter mess story wise and does a massive disservice to Last Jedi (which I also checked out your review for and also agreed with. I’m a big defender of Last and always happy to see other people with the opinion on it as me.)
Anyway back to Westworld. It sounds like we actually are fully in agreement!
I too have completely lowered my expectations for the show and have given up on even trying to fully understand everything that’s going on or second guess any twist, or plot thread.
When this season started back up my friend started messaging me about theories for who was the real person behind Tessa Thompson’s character. I made a half comment that the only person I could think of was Teddy but otherwise no idea, and I honestly didn’t really care or have any interest in working it out really. I knew we’d find out at some point. I am thankful that, as you said, they’ve realised they don’t need to have these ‘questions’ running for a whole season anymore and actually managed to tell us quite early in the season. And I think I would have to agree that the show isn’t particularly prestige TV anymore, if it ever was. As you say it’s got the high production values, the big names, the music etc. But it also feels a bit like... Lost. Or some other similar mystery style show that Abrams and co have made very popular.
That’s interesting about it being the last season of the show. I would be fine with that, and it would make a lot of sense. If HBO let them. Maybe they’ve been stung by the GoT fallout and realised there’s no way Westworld can really end well and the reception for the show has started to turn and best to end it sooner rather than later whilst they continue to look for a ‘replacement’ to GoT.
This episode still showcases a lot of the issues underlying Flanagan as a creative, but comes together more effectively than I anticipated. At the very least, we're finally diving into the horror elements of the show that were promised to us. I'm intrigued by the idea of exploring vampirism as a critique of organized religion, but I also can't say that the long path we've taken to getting there (taking until the halfway point of the season) isn't underwhelming. As viewers, we're very accustomed to this idea of the slow burn to the point where in the modern age anything that teases out plot details is now branded as one. But this is a misnomer and inaccurate. The best slow burns don't usually withhold plot details so much as let those events unfold as a pace that allows them to delve deep into their subject matter and reflect on the psyche in the process. If you watch Mindhunter, you'd be incorrect if you thought the plot points were withheld because stuff is continually happening--it just doesn't have the fast pace. Midnight Mass and, by extension, Flanagan's work as a whole does withhold those plot points to the point where large sections of episodes can completely disregard any sort of horror tone and theming. It becomes boring not necessarily because it isn't well-acted or well-written (although the writing is a little shoddy), but because I feel like we end up watching two shows with completely different goals suddenly collide.
Flanagan always has a big ask and a big gamble: he wants you to care about these characters without really having an entry point to learn about them. It'd be like if we met the residents of Twin Peaks without Laura Palmer's death or if we met the survivors of Oceanic Flight 815 before they got onto the plane. The strength of the characters of Twin Peaks and LOST is that because we understand the context of the predicament they're in, learning their backstories informs the audience why they do the things they do. Particularly on the island (because LOST does rely so heavily on flashbacks) this is important because the things the survivors struggle with is ongoing. There's a sense that those flashbacks thematically line up with the conflict of those episodes. In Midnight Mass this is skewed because the linearity of the show doesn't allow for thematic storytelling based on perceived character struggle. I bring this up for this episode's review because here Flanagan actually does what LOST does. Riley's struggle is told non-linearly so as to highlight the character conflict from a thematic standpoint rather than just showing us that conflict in a straightforward manner. It works decently well here, even if that structure now sticks out in comparison to prior episodes. And really, it's only a minor reshuffling that likely could have been done for prior episodes too.
There's still an excruciating amount monologuing when characters could say things concisely to keep the ball rolling, but this time the content of the episode bolsters that--likely due to the fact that what these characters are talking about are actually theme related. Could it still be shorter? Yes. Should it be shorter? Absolutely. But at least one of these monologues is a sermon which, in my experience, sometimes feel like they drag on longer than you wish they would. It's an odd thing. Because as someone who's written screenplays before (not necessarily successfully, I should say), I can tell you that monologues are something that you're usually kind of avoiding. They're extremely difficult to write, so it usually feels like it's best to keep them shorter for the most part if you're not just going to avoid them entirely. Very few writers are able to effectively make those monologues work and it takes projects like Network or There Will Be Blood that are also bolstered by top tier directing and some of the best acting you've ever seen to really sell them. So it's not like any of these individual elements in this episode are bad, it's just that it doesn't feel like Midnight Mass knows how to play to its strengths. At least Riley's story wasn't told in a long-take a la Hill House.
We're deep into this show now. More or less we know the types of plot points that are coming at us for the final two episodes. I don't really know specifics, but it feels like our protagonists (heroes?) are more or less teed up to get stuff done. I desperately wish Midnight Mass would have delved into the twisted misunderstanding that is mistaking a vampire for an angel a bit more so as to conflate organized religion with a parasitic leech that twists moral lessons meant for the greater good. So far that's been extremely subtle sub-text.
I thought the ending of this episode was nicely executed, even if still a touch overly dramatic. It seems like there were some decisions made in post to keep the horror at the forefront there, rather than keep is solely in melodrama. This episode came the closest so far to being something I could say I like since the first episode, but I just can't quite get on board here. Good performances are being undercut by extremely basic filmmaking that does little to push its ideas effectively. But hey, at least it's better than Bly Manor.
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This is really interesting. I’ve seen Hill House and Gerald’s Game of Flanagan’s and I remember not being as wowed by House as everyone else and then watching this I have had the same feeling. I’ve been watching with my girlfriend and felt like she’s been getting more out of it and enjoying than me. And I still think it’s pretty good, just hasn’t quite sat right with me. And during the many monologues found myself not that engaged with it. I did think this was the best episode and I do find the vampire religion stuff really interesting. But I still kind of felt a tad underwhelmed at the end. My girlfriend has been correctly guessing some of the points as well.
I think you’ve managed to nail some of the issues I’ve had with the show, and possibly Flanagan as a whole.
I never bothered with Bly Manor (sounds like you weren’t a fan) and I am wary about seeing Doctor Sleep.
