@CharlesTheBold said:

Why do they go to all the trouble and expense of creating robot horses instead of purchasing them? Are they rare in the future ? Or are they somehow safer? Or did Ford have a secret reason?

Have you been around Horses? They can kick you enough to give you internal bleeding, they can stomp you to death. Google "barn sour".

So I guess the robot horses are programmed not to act that way and that's the point. (Of course somebody tried to get the Man In Black strung up by his own horse, but its programming probably didn't cover wierd cases like that)

@CharlesTheBold said:

So I guess the robot horses are programmed not to act that way and that's the point. (Of course somebody tried to get the Man In Black strung up by his own horse, but its programming probably didn't cover wierd cases like that)

IIRC I think it's mentioned in the pilot that only the flies are real.

HBO has an AD for the PARK that invites them to come see the KIND of BEASTS (Horses, BISON, ELEPHANTS, TIGERS) that no longer EXIST inside of their WORLD anymore.

This brings up a question I've wondered about -- if horses are extinct outside the park, why is it that all the guests are able to ride them without any riding lessons? Are the robot horses specially programmed to be safe and obedient?

(After all, certain actresses in GOT and WW seem to have trouble on horseback. I've noticed that Angela, and Sansa in GOT, is always shot sitting on a STATIONARY horse. If the character needs to go into motion, they switch to a distant shot so they can substitute a stunt rider)

"one would also suspect it's a MANDATORY part of their contract that they wouldn't be ALLOWED to do any STUNT riding."

I'm not talking about stunt riding; just another girl pretending to be Sophia Turner.

To see what I'm talking about, watch Arya riding in "DragonStone" versus Sansa riding in "Battle of the Bastards". Sophie even admitted being awkward when interviewed about that episode.

They were less careful 20 years ago. Lucy "Xena" Lawless fell off a horse, broke some bones, and it nearly forced them to cancel the TV show. Maybe that was a lesson for the rest of the industry.

"Xena the Warrior Princess" was produced out-of-network and was amateurish in certain ways. Lucy Lawless was not only the star but the producer's wife; she prided herself on her skill with horses, and there was nobody around to persuade her otherwise. In later seasons they did use a stunt woman. The show did have some interesting "firsts": the first to include a dramatic "musical episode" ( BUFFY imitated that 2 years later) and the first to end with the death of the main character ( which Deep Space 9 later did)

The star that insured her legs was dancer Betty Grable.

And some stars are famously accident prone. Jennifer Lawrence manages to injure either herself or somebody else ( on one occasion, Sophie Turner) in almost every movie she makes, and she tripped on her evening dress while being awarded her best-actress OSCAR.