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TV

‘Westworld’ takes a controversial gamble to prevent spoilers

By
Lauren Sarner
Published April 10, 2018
Updated April 10, 2018, 6:50 p.m. ET

Spoiler culture is rampant in TV today, and “Westworld” creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy decided to mock spoiler-happy fans of their HBO drama.

During a Reddit “AMA” (Ask Me Anything) session, they pretended that they were going to spoil their own show.

“We thought about this long and hard, and came to a difficult (and potentially highly controversial) decision,” they wrote. “If you guys agree, we’re going to post a video that lays out the plot (and twists and turns) of Season 2. Everything. The whole sordid thing. Up front.”

They claimed the idea was that the “community” would “protect” fans from spoilers. Nolan cited “Game of Thrones” as an example of such protectionism: Fans of the show who had read the books — and therefore knew the plots — were committed to keeping such information from those who hadn’t read the books.

“It’s a new age,” the message continues, “and a new world in terms of the relationship between the folks making shows and the community watching them. And trust is a big part of that . . . So, if this post reaches a 1000 upvotes, we’ll deliver the goods.”

Once the post got the desired number of votes, Nolan released the video. It was revealed to be an elaborate Rick-Roll ruse (an internet joke in which a link leads to the music video for the 1987 Rick Astley song “Never Gonna Give You Up”). In the “Westworld” spin on the video, the show’s star Evan Rachel Wood belts it out.

Nolan is right in saying that it’s a new age. Social media has given fans a direct line to the stars and creators of their favorite shows, and internet forums like Reddit and Twitter have allowed fans to crowdsource plot twists and dig into theories.

“Westworld” fans were particularly interested in uncovering twists, and the online community did accurately predict some of them — including the bombshell at the end of Season 1 that some seemingly human main characters were robots themselves.

And although the creators’ stunt did generate huge buzz about the upcoming second season, which premieres on HBO on April 22, making fun of their own fans could seriously backfire.