These violent delights have violent ends.In HBO’s Westworld, human-like robots populate a

These violent delights have violent ends.

In HBO’s Westworld, human-like robots populate a theme park where human guests can have violent, gory adventures in the Wild West without the repercussions. The robots are so lifelike that they fool the visitors and themselves. They bleed, die, grieve, and love—thinking themselves human.

“The human mind is not some golden benchmark glimmering on a green and distant hill,” park owner Robert Ford at one point tells his colleague Bernard, whose robotic nature remains unknown even to himself for much of the first season. Ford is convinced that there’s nothing special about human consciousness that marks the difference between a robot’s mind and ours. But as Westworld’s robots grow increasingly independent of their repetitive, programmed loops, the show incites viewers to question whether AI can truly be autonomous or conscious—and who in this story deserves empathy.

Photo by John P. Johnson/HBO