With the debut of the third season of HBO's Westworld just days away, we will once again be thrown into a futuristic world of sentient machines, complex mysteries, and time-twisting narratives; but how long can the ambitious, and highly expensive, series last? While speaking with Variety, Westworld creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy said that they hope to make at least one more season of the series, but remained "coy" about any seasons beyond that.
HBO programming chief Casey Bloys said that they won't be making any decisions about a fourth season renewal until some point after the premiere of the third season, but even when (yes, I'll say when) the series is renewed, we shouldn't expect to see it for another 18-20 months. "As Jonah and Lisa will tell you, I will always say, 'Can we get it sooner?'" Bloys said. "As shows get bigger and more complicated, I think more time between seasons is probably becoming more of the norm." As for why Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy might be playing coy in regards to future Westworld seasons, that could have something to do with the pair leaving their deal at Warner Bros. Television for a new $150 million, five-year deal with Amazon. "Amazon’s ambitions are big," Nolan said. "They want to be making big, bold television series, and that’s what we like to do as well. In a moment in which people are making unbridled television, you want to be taking advantage of that." Their first project at Amazon is a series adaptation of William Gibson's "The Peripheral," which features "morally ambiguous characters and the tricky metaphysics of intersecting time periods." Sound familiar? The series is expected to start shooting later this year.
It was previously hinted that Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy had a five season plan for Westworld, but I suppose we'll have to wait and see where the third season leaves us before we consider that the fourth season might be the last. As we've seen from the trailers for the new season, audiences will finally get to spend some quality time in the real world, which is something Nolan and Joy have been working towards since the very beginning. "When Lisa and I were talking about the pilot, one of the things that was most exciting to us was, you learn the rules of these creatures and their world, and then you spring them out of there," Nolan said. "And you’ve withheld from the audience, for the most part to that point, what the outside world looks like."
The third season of Westworld will debut on HBO on March 15th.