★★★★★ 0/5

Axed: Westworld

After falling ratings and rising costs, HBO calls time on sci-fi series.

6
Leave a comment

HBO has made the surprising annoucement that Westworld has been cancelled after 4 seasons.

This marked the first time the sci-fi, by creators Lisa Joy, Jonah Nolan and executive producer J.J. Abrams, had not been renewed while it was on the air.

But the move was not entirely unexpected, falling from 12 million US viewers in S1 to 4 million in S4.

HBO said in a statement: “Over the past four seasons, Lisa and Jonah have taken viewers on a mind-bending odyssey, raising the bar at every step. We are tremendously grateful to them, along with their immensely talented cast, producers and crew, and all of our partners at Kilter Films, Bad Robot and Warner Bros. Television. It’s been a thrill to join them on this journey.”

Episodes were also expensive at $10m each, meaning it faced an $80m cost.

The Hollywood Reporter suggests Joy and Nolan — and even HBO — had plotted a six-season journey for Westworld. Just ahead of its fourth season renewal, the duo exited their deal with producers Warner Bros. Television for a nine-figure pact with Amazon. As part of the negotiations, Joy and Nolan had a carveout that allowed them to remain showrunners on Westworld through a potential sixth season.

Their new series The Peripheral, launched in recent weeks.

Westworld screened on FOX Showcase and Binge.

6 Responses

  1. As season one of HBO’s Westworld was adapted from source material from MGM’s 1973 movie of the same name, the show provided enough twists to keep the viewer guessing while fans were probably making comparisons with the movie, the ending to season one provided enough in prospect to offer at least a three season run. I enjoyed season two even though the screenplay was becoming erratic, especially when Ed Harris became a far too dominant and violent character, the story and the series started to go off the rails from there. (Breaking Bad’s) Aaron Paul was wasted in a later role as the show drifted into Matrix territory, plainly Season four was just a final wrap of the series, done mostly for the fans, as has been the case with other sci-fi shows like Falling Sky’s which had five seasons when perhaps four was more than enough. The shows long production time between seasons probably also didn’t help it’s chances of survival as viewers lost interest.

  2. S1 was brilliant – blew me away with how good it was. Then S2 was a massive disappointment – maybe S1 put my expectations too high, but I stopped watching after S2.

  3. While this is sad news for the production and the overall story being told, it’s not a complete surprise.

    Everyone was ravenous for it in season one with wild speculation and theories about it being two time periods and the same characters, to be confirmed in the second season, and then it got a bit meh in the third season and now I haven’t even started watching the fourth season yet, but I know I would have eventually.

  4. Darn HBO.. Westworld needed one more season to wrap it properly. I was so looking forward to a final season finale.
    I think Season 3 lost a big chunk of viewers, while Season 4 was very good and we “know” were its headed..
    Overall I’ll remember Season 1 as great Television story telling on many many levels..
    Evan Rachel Wood as Dolores held the show together with many other fine actors and characters.

  5. S1 was as good a season of TV you will get. S2 lost a lot of viewers and was it’s weakest one. S3 was good too… it showed signs of a revitalised and super smart show. S4 was the second best season and had me hooked all over again. I wish we had maybe an additional short run to wrap up the series, although the way S4 wrapped was fairly satisfying. The show always looked amazing and the acting (especially from my personal MVP Thandiwe Newton) was superb for such a far fetched premise. I will miss it.

Leave a Reply