'Westworld' episode 3 shot down a major fan theory
The timelines in Westworld are often unclear.
How long do guests stay in the park? How often are the hosts reset? How many times has Teddy been shot, or Dolores been assaulted, or Maeve recited her speech about the voice in her head? It’s never clear -- by design, of course. That’s part of the show’s mystique.
One major fan theory that sprang up over the last week hinged on this characteristic ambiguity. Based on a handful of clues, some fans posited that the story of William and Logan, who arrived in the park at the beginning of episode 2, was actually happening 30 years earlier than the show’s other events. They proposed that William is a younger version of the Man in Black.
You May Also Like
The pieces lined up somewhat nicely -- William’s fascination with Dolores in the "past" could have explained the MiB’s twisted obsession with her in the present, for example.
But based on the way Westworld episode 3, "The Stray" just ended, it seems the theory has been shot down.
Dolores opened the episode by heading down the rabbit hole with Bernie, reading some relevant passages from Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. "Dear, dear, how queer everything is today … I wonder if I've changed in the night?" She's been toying through the first three episodes with going against her code, urged along by the mysterious voice -- a voice we now know belongs to a character named Arnold -- and at the end of "The Stray," she finally did it.
Exactly how Dolores was able to break through her programming, fire the gun and escape her loop to fall directly into William's lap (in the present, unfortunately for the conspiracy theorists) isn't quite known.
Was it through sheer force of will? Is her programming coming unraveled one thread at a time thanks to the "violent delights" virus? Is Arnold egging her on from beyond the veil?
The show's characterization of Ford as the "fearless leader," the benevolent and reminiscing old fogey we met in the premiere, continued to slip this week.
His story of Arnold, the business partner whose ideology clashed with the park's lucrative potential, paints a stark contrast with Ford himself. While Arnold believed the hosts could achieve consciousness (he programmed them to eventually do so), Ford believed all along that was impossible.
Ford ensures that Westworld's technicians, scientists and other employees treat the hosts as subhumans -- which, to be fair, they are. Nevertheless, his insistence that the hosts remain unclothed. His reprimanding of the tech who threw a blanket over one old man robot rubbed the audiences the wrong way, perhaps because it called to mind dehumanization tactics such as those used by Nazis in concentration camps.
Ford continues to look more and more like the villain in this story, though we don’t yet know his evil plan.
Bernard doesn't either, it seems, though he knows one thing: Ford is wrong about the hosts. Dolores convinces him of that.
The exposition about the nature of consciousness and the "bicameral mind theory" is excellent. That scene between Bernard and Ford is what puts the "sci" in "sci-fi," and it's much more engrossing than the shoot-outs and sex scenes. More of that, please, Westworld.
The "stray" in episode is the wayward host that Elsie and Stubbs set out to track down. The scene in which several hosts have become stuck in a loop for days because none of them is authorized to wield an axe is both hilarious and enlightening -- it's fascinating to see the lengths these beings will go to in order to avoid breaking script.
It was horrifying, on the other hand, to see the lengths their lost host went to -- smashing its own head into pulp -- to prevent itself from hurting Elsie. How many hosts are struggling to follow their code at this point? How far has the virus spread?
The "stray” is also Dolores, who's fighting just at the edge of awareness, struggling to maintain her character while asking questions she didn't even know she had the words for. Did she know exactly what to say to Bernard to convince him not to change her back to how she was before?
Was she manipulating him, or did she do it subconsciously? Is there a difference when you're talking to a computer program?
There is a parallel being drawn between Bernie and Arnold. Ford remarks that Arnold’s personal life was marred by tragedy -- much like Bernard’s. And Bernard, like Arnold before him, is convinced that the hosts will achieve sentience. The show may be setting Bernard up to be Ford's next nemesis -- if any actual people live that long before Dolores puts a bullet between their eyes.
Ultimately Westworld episode 3 has only deepened the show’s central mystery, despite all the exposition and flashbacks: Who is behind the hosts' awakening? Given what we've learned about Ford, he doesn't seem a likely suspect and Arnold is apparently dead.
"The Stray" did answer one important question, though, in a chat between William and Logan: How much does it cost to stay in the park? $40K a day, apparently.
Rich people, man.
Westworld airs Sundays at 9 p.m. on HBO.
