Ultra HD Blu-ray Movie Reviews

Westworld: Season Two

David Vaughn  |  Feb 8, 2019

Picture
Sound
Extras
Westworld: Season One ended in a cliffhanger with Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood) taking charge of the adult amusement park. Westworld: Season Two picks up shortly after this event with the puppet show now over and the liberated “hosts” coming after the humans for their own pound of flesh.

219west2.1.jpg

Season Two follows four intersecting story lines: Dolores' revenge, Maeve's mission for her daughter, the Man in Black trying to solve the game, and Bernard seeking his own answers. What ensues is pure chaos as the hosts become more enlightened and begin to understand their own artificial consciousness. They grapple with philosophical questions of whether they are new form a life, and if the sins committed in Westworld have any consequences.

219west2.3.jpg

As much as I liked season one of Westworld, season two's ten episodes are a jumbled mess. You'll be thoroughly confused during the first half and wondering if you can make it to the end—not an easy adventure. Seriously, sitting through it is a chore. The first four episodes are almost unwatchable because the narrative doesn't make any sense until you finish the season, when everything finally comes into focus.

219west2.4.jpg

As much as I loathed the show's entertainment value (or lack of it), the disc's native 4K images are a sight to behold. Detail is off the charts in closeups, with every facial pore easily distinguishable from the next. Exteriors are just as impressive, especially the on-location shots in Monument Valley, Arizona, and Moab, Utah.

219west2.5.jpg

Westworld: Season Two includes a Dolby Atmos soundtrack to complement the show's stunning visuals. The track does a great job of placing the viewer within the scene by using discrete effects that fall into the three-dimensional space. For example, when a public announcement goes out to evacuate a building, the sound comes from all around you as if you were in the building. Gunshots ring out with clarity and impact, effects pan through the room with precision, and the dialogue is always intelligible.

Supplements include interviews with several main characters and ten production featurettes.

ULTRA HD BLU-RAY
STUDIO: Warner Bros.
ASPECT RATIO: 1.78:1/2.35:1
HDR FORMAT: Dolby Vision and HDR10
AUDIO FORMAT: Dolby Atmos with TrueHD 7.1 core
LENGTH: 580 mins.
DIRECTOR: Various
STARRING: Evan Rachel Wood, Thandie Newton, Ed Harris, Tessa Thompson

COMMENTS
ihopnavajo's picture
Submitted by ihopnavajo on February 9, 2019 - 9:39am

Was scrolling through on the main page of the website and greeted with the words "season 1 ended with the cliff-hanger where . . . " AAAAHHHH!!! You're actually going to SAY what the cliff-hanger was?! I mean, I managed to stop reading before I got to that point so I don't know if you found the decency to stop yourself from blatantly spoiling something for the people who haven't yet watched this show. Giving out spoilers without a preforementioned warning is bad enough in itself but to post spoilers where anyone who hasn't even clicked on your article can see them is about as low as it gets in entertainment media.

funambulistic's picture
Submitted by funambulistic on February 9, 2019 - 3:51pm

Rosebud was a sled, Verbal Kint is Kaiser Soze, Rollo Tomasi is a made up name, Malcolm Crowe is actually dead and The Narrator and Tyler Durden are one and the same. Oops - did I give anything away?

Season 1 of Westworld ended over two years ago. I think the spoiler grace period is over...

David Vaughn's picture
Submitted by David Vaughn on February 9, 2019 - 7:18pm
It's Season Two of a show and like the next poster said, it's been two years so the spoiler grace period is very much in the rear view mirror. Sorry if I offended you.
X