HBO has decided to cancel its Emmy-winning sci-fi drama “Westward” after its recent fourth season. The series’ cancellation came less than three months after its fourth season concluded in August. The cast included Evan Rachel Wood, Ed Harris, Jeffrey Wright, Aaron Paul and Thandiwe Newton. Newton earned a best supporting actress Emmy in 2018, and the series received more than 50 nominations and won nine awards from the TV academy. The series debuted in 2016 as a ratings success for the cable channel; however, viewership fell in the third season and again in the fourth.
In a statement, HBO said: “Over the past four seasons, Lisa and [Jonathan] 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.”
Last month, co-creator Jonathan Nolan said in an interview that he hoped HBO would order a fifth season to properly end the show’s story, which has chronicled a robot uprising that changed the fate of humanity. Said Nolan at the time: “We always planned for a fifth and final season. We are still in conversations with the network. We very much hope to make them.” Co-creator Lisa Joy added that the series has always been working toward a specific ending: “Jonah and I have always had an ending in mind that we hope to reach. We have not quite reached it yet.”
Inspired by the 1973 film titled “Westworld,” the series was initially set in a Western-style amusement park that allowed guests to realize their fantasies with the help of androids. The show later broadened into a artificial intelligence vs. human global conflict. Nolan said in a statement: “We’ve been privileged to tell these stories about the future of consciousness — both human and beyond — in the brief window of time before our AI overlords forbid us from doing so.”
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