HBO's Westworld show is officially dead, right? |
It’s official: Warner Bros. is rebooting Michael Crichton’s 1973 Westworld film. Aptly penning the script is David Koepp, who wrote 1993’s Jurassic Park and a few of its sequels, making the upcoming reboot an exciting prospect for long-time fans of the franchise — even if Steven Spielberg isn’t directing. But Koep and WB’s new endeavor begs the question: Where does this leave the 2016 HBO series?
Created by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, Westworld was a massive success in its first season, feeling more like high concept cinema than television, which likely helped earn the series 22 Emmy nominations. Using Crichton’s futuristic theme park as a foundation, Nolan and Joy explored identity, consciousness, free will, and the ethics of artificial intelligence years before ChatGPT made those conversations mainstream. Despite being positioned as HBO’s next Game of Thrones, Westworld steadily lost momentum with each passing season. By the end of Season 4 in 2022, average viewership had reportedly fallen by roughly 81%........