.

Westworld, Season 1 was one of the greatest things in the history of television. It is absolutely no surprise that Season 2 was a disappointment; it couldn’t be anything else. But the second season was worse than it needed to be; it was as though they didn’t know what story they wanted to tell. (That said, there were three or four very good episodes and the show was, at least, interesting with high production values, good acting and excellent music by Ramin Djawadi).

The first episode of Season 3, Parce Domine (Parce Domine is a Roman Catholic antiphon whose text is derived from Joel 2.17: Parce, Domine, parce populo tuo; ne in aeternum irascaris nobis. “Spare, Lord, spare your people.

Be not angry with us forever.”), is an episode devoted entirely to exposition, which is a risky thing to do as modern people have a low tolerance for a lot of exposition. 

It’s a densely packed episode setting up an impending wrath and introducing a new main character, Caleb (played very well by Aaron Paul [Breaking Bad]). There is another new main character: the real world. 

Again, the production design is absolutely beautiful and the effects are, to my eyes, flawlessly realistic. 

The buildings are either real, present buildings, structures that are currently in planning or well-known architectural concepts or variations on them. Although this story is supposed to happen some thirty years in the future it is more likely to happen sixty or eighty years from now, given the technology and intensity of the infrastructure. With the sophistication of the androids and vastness of Westworld, the park (and where the hell is the park??? It’s gigantic! And how much did all this goddamn place cost? Like a trillion dollars or more? Do they even make any cash off this place? How can they even account for what must be an Everest of an overhead? I suspect we’ll never get an answer to that) would require an economy and technical facility beyond what we probably will have...uh...right now. In order for the story to happen thirty or so years in the future, that means the Delos Corporation would have to be building Westworld about right now. Last time I looked at the latest issue of Wired it looks like they haven’t even broken ground on it yet! 

Concept buildings 

The society, the political situation and some of the future history of the world are carefully and unobtrusively sketched in. Indeed, the episode (by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy) is poetry. It is a gorgeous exercise in allusion and frequent understatement (also risky things for modern audiences). 

Nolan and Joy 

♟ 

This first episode is like the opening moves of a great chess game. The characters are in position, the drama is about to begin, the fight for the center of the board is established. 

This is not to say Parce Domine is without action. The action scenes are beautifully realized and worrisomely realistic. We’re used to TV and movie action being (to be charitable), stylized, but here we see what looks like, pretty much, what would happen. Good tactics, good physics and realistic psychology. Bravo! This all gives a great deal of impact to the scenes. And nothing happens without a reason, nothing happens without consequence. In a cinematic landscape of TV shows and movies that pull their punches every time a character gets killed (I’m looking at YOU, Marvel!), lazy writing and social politics weighing more than honest drama, it’s good to feel uncomfortable worrying whether or not a character is going to make it or a well-crafted plan is going to come crashing down (this was a problem in Season 2. Another problem in Season 2 was complexity without the grace of clarity. I’m still not sure what was going on in those episodes!). 

If you haven’t seen Parce Domine yet, it’s best if you know no specifics of the plot. You want the story to let itself gradually come together, to feel it unspool itself and take the name of identity. In a way, that’s what the androids are doing and if the structure of the story is itself the story of the androids, then let it work its well-crafted magic on you and itself in a kind of reflective identity. 

These violent delights have violent ends / And in their triumph die, like fire and powder / Which as they kiss, consume. The sweetest honey is loathsome in his own deliciousness / and in the taste confounds the appetite. Therefore, love moderately.

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 6

William Shakespeare 

.

Westworld, Season 1 was one of the greatest things in the history of television. It is absolutely no surprise that Season 2 was a disappointment; it couldn’t be anything else. But the second season was worse than it needed to be; it was as though they didn’t know what story they wanted to tell. (That said, there were three or four very good episodes and the show was, at least, interesting with high production values, good acting and excellent music by Ramin Djawadi).

The first episode of Season 3, Parce Domine (Parce Domine is a Roman Catholic antiphon whose text is derived from Joel 2.17: Parce, Domine, parce populo tuo; ne in aeternum irascaris nobis. “Spare, Lord, spare your people.

Be not angry with us forever.”), is an episode devoted entirely to exposition, which is a risky thing to do as modern people have a low tolerance for a lot of exposition. 

It’s a densely packed episode setting up an impending wrath and introducing a new main character, Caleb (played very well by Aaron Paul [Breaking Bad]). There is another new main character: the real world. 

Again, the production design is absolutely beautiful and the effects are, to my eyes, flawlessly realistic. 

The buildings are either real, present buildings, structures that are currently in planning or well-known architectural concepts or variations on them. Although this story is supposed to happen some thirty years in the future it is more likely to happen sixty or eighty years from now, given the technology and intensity of the infrastructure. With the sophistication of the androids and vastness of Westworld, the park (and where the hell is the park??? It’s gigantic! And how much did all this goddamn place cost? Like a trillion dollars or more? Do they even make any cash off this place? How can they even account for what must be an Everest of an overhead? I suspect we’ll never get an answer to that) would require an economy and technical facility beyond what we probably will have...uh...right now. In order for the story to happen thirty or so years in the future, that means the Delos Corporation would have to be building Westworld about right now. Last time I looked at the latest issue of Wired it looks like they haven’t even broken ground on it yet! 

Concept buildings 

The society, the political situation and some of the future history of the world are carefully and unobtrusively sketched in. Indeed, the episode (by Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy) is poetry. It is a gorgeous exercise in allusion and frequent understatement (also risky things for modern audiences). 

Nolan and Joy 

♟ 

This first episode is like the opening moves of a great chess game. The characters are in position, the drama is about to begin, the fight for the center of the board is established. 

This is not to say Parce Domine is without action. The action scenes are beautifully realized and worrisomely realistic. We’re used to TV and movie action being (to be charitable), stylized, but here we see what looks like, pretty much, what would happen. Good tactics, good physics and realistic psychology. Bravo! This all gives a great deal of impact to the scenes. And nothing happens without a reason, nothing happens without consequence. In a cinematic landscape of TV shows and movies that pull their punches every time a character gets killed (I’m looking at YOU, Marvel!), lazy writing and social politics weighing more than honest drama, it’s good to feel uncomfortable worrying whether or not a character is going to make it or a well-crafted plan is going to come crashing down (this was a problem in Season 2. Another problem in Season 2 was complexity without the grace of clarity. I’m still not sure what was going on in those episodes!). 

If you haven’t seen Parce Domine yet, it’s best if you know no specifics of the plot. You want the story to let itself gradually come together, to feel it unspool itself and take the name of identity. In a way, that’s what the androids are doing and if the structure of the story is itself the story of the androids, then let it work its well-crafted magic on you and itself in a kind of reflective identity. 

These violent delights have violent ends / And in their triumph die, like fire and powder / Which as they kiss, consume. The sweetest honey is loathsome in his own deliciousness / and in the taste confounds the appetite. Therefore, love moderately.

Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 6

William Shakespeare 

Scott Giles Composer

Scott Giles is a composer, instrumentalist and conductor. He has been composing since 1979.

"Music should be as difficult as it needs to be," he says of his compositional process. "It shouldn't be any tougher or simpler than it has to be. That's why the easiest music I've written doesn't sound any more easy than the stuff that requires the height of virtuosity."

He explains, "I start with a musical idea and follow it through its inevitable and logical conclusion. Its like Chaos Theory and sensitivity to initial conditions. I have an idea of the orchestration and maybe a sense of the dramatic moments I want to hit upon, then I put the first ideas down. After the first few bars I start following the logic of the music and it almost writes itself with just a nudge here and there from me."

His aesthetic is eclectic, incorporating techniques that are as familiar as film music or as abstract as advanced math. "I use whatever I have to. It all depends on the music and its needs. It is not so much me saying 'I think I'll write a non-tonal piece,' as much as following what Copland called 'The Long Line.' If you're writing music it is always musical things that determine your action. Anything else results in self-conscious stuff."