Westworld‘s “The Adversary” Brings Us More Maeve, More Daddy Issues, and More of Arnold’s Mystery
Time for another tag-team recap of Westworld with Teresa and Maddy! Maddy’s skeptical about this show, throwing back a cocktail (and throwing a tantrum) like Lee Sizemore when a storyline doesn’t make any sense. Meanwhile, Teresa’s more of a Charlotte Hale, with a long list of favorite storylines in the theme park and high hopes that the whole thing can get back on track. Maybe if they get rid of that Lee Sizemore guy. Heh.
First up, the spoiler-laden recap section–or, you can skip that, and scroll down for the “opinion” section.
THE RECAP SECTION:
Maeve wakes up in bed, gets dressed, and walks into her saloon to the tune of Radiohead’s “Fake Plastic Trees,” ignoring a street gunfight on her way. Maeve and Clementine watch a “newcomer” (a human) enter the bar; he looks grimy and unkempt. Maeve says she’ll take him and walks him upstairs with her. At this point, she starts insulting him, and encourages him to start choking her midway through sex, which he does. Basically, she has a death wish, and this all ends with her back on the operating table at Westworld HQ. She comes face-to-face with Felix again, to which he reacts: “Oh, shit.” And she says, “Now then. Where were we?”
Elsie and Bernard are still talking over the mysterious upload link that Elsie found in the arm of the host who got lost in “The Stray” episode. Elsie suspects the upload link is being used for “industrial espionage.” Bernard seems just as out-of-the-loop as Elsie here as to what the link does. But unlike Elsie, he’s familiar with the “legacy” code that old hosts like this one used, so he’s able to draw up more info on the robot’s trajectory. In order to read this old code, though, Bernard will need to “go downstairs”… to where only restricted personnel, like Bernard, can go.
The “downstairs” looks particularly spooky right now. Apparently, no one bothers to fix flickering fluorescent lights down here, or creaky doors and floorboards. That, combined with the occasional robot body standing in dark corners, makes for a very creepy scene. Nothing particularly creepy happens to warrant the setting, though. Bernard simply logs into a computer and runs the code. [Teresa: So, this big corporation is apparently totally cool with having this abandoned floor where they just leave all these old records and schematics and computers out with no one apparently keeping tabs]
The computer detects multiple anomalies, but these anomalies can only be found in the legacy code, not in the most recent system. (Maddy: I still think this is all part of Dr. Ford’s new storyline and it’s all planned. By him, at least.)
Dr. Ford shows up in Lawrence’s hometown with some construction workers. He freezes all the robots in mid-place. The (human? robot?) construction workers accompanying Dr. Ford explain that the canyon he wants to build will disrupt this town. Ford decides to make the canyon slightly smaller so that Lawrence’s town will remain intact. The workers leave, and Dr. Ford instructs the robots of the town to “carry on,” so they unfreeze. He walks around, inspecting their behavior.
Back in his office, Dr. Ford looks at a miniaturized model of a tiny church, surrounded by a tiny town, on a table next to his desk. He walks over to his desk, picks up a book, and looks inside it at some sketches of Dolores’ face and of the now-infamous Westworld Maze sketch that has been popping up everywhere.
The Man In Black and Teddy ride through the desert together. “The Maze is an old Native myth,” Teddy tells the MIB. At the center of the maze, according to Teddy, there’s a legendary man who cannot die. (Maddy: Little do the robots know, none of them can die! Well, Maeve knows.) Teddy still believes he’s on this mission to “find Dolores,” because of the MIB’s lies.
Felix gently explains to Maeve that she’s a robot, but without using that exact word. Instead, he simply tells her that everything she does is “programmed.” She understands that Felix is “like them, not like me” – he’s a human, she’s a robot. She says: “How do you know?” He claims he just knows, but that’s not a very good answer.
Felix then tells Maeve that her processing power makes her better than the humans, but there’s one big drawback: she’s under their control. At first Felix says “our control,” then corrects himself: “their control,” his eyes casting about the room suspiciously. He no longer sees himself as part of Westworld. Maeve is suspicious about the supposed extent of Westworld’s control; she doesn’t believe anyone really controls her actions. Admittedly, Felix has no idea why she keeps remembering things that should be deleted, so she does seem to have more control than she should. But, he insists, he can control her with a programming tablet. He takes out a tablet and pairs it with her, showing her the commands on it. As soon as she looks at it, she realizes that all of her dialogue trees have been spelled out; all of a sudden, she’s at a loss for words, trying to come up with her own words to say that don’t appear in the dialogue tree. This forces her into a shutdown mode.
Theresa sits in her office, looking anxious. Bernard walks in, asking to talk. She tells him: “I was just about to call for you. Ford knows about us.” Theresa ends their relationship; she’s worried about how it will look to the board. Plus, she tells him she is worried about Dr. Ford’s ability to do his job. Bernard looks taken aback; he leaves the room without having told her anything about what Elsie found regarding the uplink buried in the stray host’s arm.
Felix frantically pounds buttons on the tablet until he manages to reboot Maeve. As soon as she awakens, she tells him she wants to go “upstairs” at Westworld HQ. He says no, but then she takes his hand and smiles at him. He sneaks her up there. Interestingly, she’s wearing clothes for this, which you’d think would draw suspicion. They both walk through the halls, acting like they’re supposed to be there.
Maeve watches as the robots are built, blood piped into them, their bodies becoming more and more human. Felix walks her through a display of robot-animals being built as well; oxen, horses, and so on. All manufactured. Maeve walks through the clinical glass hallways with a calm but determined expression.
Felix and Maeve make it back to the elevator; he tells her to stop staring too much, saying “I could get fired. You would be taken downstairs. Don’t forget that.” Maeve gets distracted by a Westworld advertisement playing on a big screen nearby. In the advertisement, she sees her old storyline: the farmhouse she used to own with her daughter.
Back at Felix’s medical station, she asks him about the farmhouse “dream” she had, and how it could be possible that her “dream” could appear in the Westworld commercial. Felix explains that it wasn’t a dream, it was one of her previous storylines. “I’ve been at the Mariposa for ten years,” Maeve protests. No, Felix explains–she’s only been working there for a year and a half. She has been programmed to believe it was ten years.
Sylvester walks in and interrupts, pointing out that Felix has Maeve in a dress, which isn’t allowed. He thinks Felix is acting out a sexual fantasy with Maeve and he threatens to tell QA. Maeve gets up, grabs a scalpel, and puts it to Sylvester’s neck, saying, “You’re not going to tell anyone.” Sylvester is scared but nonetheless insists, “You can’t hurt me with this! You can’t hurt anyone!” Maeve seems to be spookily able to disregard that particular piece of programming. She also reminds him that she was “built” to read people, and she knows exactly how to destroy him, emotionally and/or physically. Felix stands by, letting it happen, because seriously: fuck Sylvester. Felix and Maeve are officially besties now.
Theresa meets Lee Sizemore on a fancy roof deck, where he’s enjoying a margarita in his swimsuit. Apparently, the reason we haven’t seen him in the past couple episodes is because he went on “sick leave,” presumably because he felt ashamed after Dr. Ford publicly insulted his new storyline in front of all his coworkers. (Maddy: This roof deck appears to be part of Westworld HQ, suggesting that even when an employee is on “sick leave,” they don’t actually … get to leave. Teresa: It’s the Mesa Gold lounge. If you look at the Westworld site (sorry non-US folks!) and check out the westworldmesahub.mp4 video, you’ll see how the HQ is laid out. It’s basically like a skyscraper in the ground complete with living facilities for the employees, as well as workspace). There doesn’t seem to be anywhere to go other than the park, unless one sends a helicopter or something.)
Theresa tells Lee that Dr. Ford has been disrupting the park with his new storyline, and that Lee needs to come back to help her out. He tells her he can’t, because he’s “creatively flaccid” now. He gives a little speech about how much of himself he’s sacrificed for Westworld; his monologue gets interrupted by a waiter replacing his margarita, thereby illustrating that actually, Lee Sizemore is totally privileged compared to most of his colleagues at Westworld HQ. Theresa tells him to get his shit together, because if Dr. Ford screws up, “the board will be looking for a replacement.” Lee would be the obvious go-to, if only he would get back to work.
The MIB and Teddy are trying to get through to the “old territories” to find Wyatt, and in order to get past an encampment of Union soldiers, they disguise themselves as fellow recruits. The soldiers are burying a lot of mutilated bodies; Teddy points out a still-living man whose hands have been cut off, saying that all of this must be Wyatt’s doing.
Suddenly, two of the Union soldiers recognize Teddy Flood and challenge him. They remember seeing him at a Wyatt-related shoot-out. Teddy tells them they don’t understand what happened, then he shoots them. The MIB is baffled at Teddy’s aggressive response, but there’s no turning back now. The rest of the soldiers come at them and the MIB has no choice but to try to shoot as many of them as he can–and protect Teddy, since the bullets don’t affect the MIB, but Teddy could end up dying again if they’re not careful.
On the roof deck, Lee chats up a woman at the bar. She’s a repeat visitor at the Westworld theme park and, seemingly, a big fan of the place. He tries to impress her by telling her he does narrative design for the park and guessing which storyline is her favorite. She asks him why he doesn’t indulge in the park himself. Lee’s had a bit too much to drink, so he starts complaining about his boss, Dr. Ford… which doesn’t seem like an appropriate line of complaint to tell a high-paying Westworld guest. When the bartender overhears, he cuts Lee off, then passes on another reminder from the Westworld higher-ups that Lee should stop drinking and get back to work. (Maddy: It’s bonkers to me how many second chances Lee gets at work.)
Elsie and Bernard regroup to discuss the anomalies. Elsie’s excited because she thinks if they manage to prove that corporate espionage is going on, their bosses will thank them; she wants a title change, and a “room upgrade, and unlimited Mesa bar access.” (Maddy: The fact that all the employees of Westworld live at Westworld HQ, and of course the reference to futuristic rations of some kind makes them seem like prisoners of the system too.) Elsie says she hopes Theresa is the first person to get fired for this oversight. Bernard protests: “she’s just trying to do her job.” Elsie doesn’t care.
Bernard gets up and walks by Theresa’s office, seemingly considering whether to tell her anything, but he keeps walking. He checks with a programmer, asking her if she found any hosts in the areas that he asked her about; she says those areas have been designated “off-limits, for future narrative development.” No humans are on-record as having visited those areas recently either.
Bernard heads out there himself. At first, it looks like an empty forest. Then, Bernard finds a beautifully furnished cabin. He watches as a man (a robot?) opens the front door and walks outside to get firewood, then goes back inside. Bernard goes inside the house. Inside, he finds the Little Boy from previous episodes, as well as another young boy and a woman. The patriarch of the family is loading up the fireplace with wood. He turns around, and he looks exactly like… Arnold? Or, at least, he looks exactly like the man in this photo that Dr. Ford showed him in a previous episode…
That’s young Dr. Ford on the left, and Arnold on the right.
Bernard asks him, “Are you Arnold?” The man says no, then angrily asks Bernard why he is “trespassing.” He grabs Bernard by the collar; Bernard tries to get the robots to freeze, but they don’t listen to his commands. All of a sudden, Dr. Ford’s voice can be heard from the corner nearest to Bernard; he was hiding next to the doorway, just out of sight.
(Maddy: Actually, as this gif shows, Dr. Ford wasn’t there at all, and then he appears seemingly out of nowhere. This suggests that some sort of foul play is going on in this cabin. It has also inspired some fans to speculate that Bernard is actually a robot, but I’m not sure if I buy that theory or not. Maybe Dr. Ford is just really, really good at hiding. Teresa: I’ve been feeling like Bernard is a robot for a bit now. The way Ford talks to him, and also doesn’t seem particularly concerned with Bernard reporting or crossing him. Something is telling me that “Arnold” is in there somewhere. Or SOMETHING.)
Dr. Ford freezes the robots. These robots are old models, Dr. Ford explains, and they only respond to his own voice commands. Ford orders the Little Boy to come forward. He says the command, “turn the other cheek,” and the boy’s face opens up to reveal a metal frame inside. Dr. Ford calls the old models “ghosts” and explains that he has been maintaining them himself. They are the only robots that Arnold built himself, and they were supposed to mimic Dr. Ford’s own family.
(Maddy: So the robot who looks like Arnold is actually supposed to look like Dr. Ford’s dad… ? Just in case there weren’t enough daddy issues on this show! Is Arnold Dr. Ford’s dad??? That makes no sense, though. Why did Dr. Ford show Bernard a picture of himself with his dad and say that it was a photo of himself and Arnold, then? And why is Dr. Ford acting like this whole situation isn’t weird as all heck?)
Bernard tells Dr. Ford that he is “troubled” by the fact that these hosts exist and that Dr. Ford keeps visiting them. Dr. Ford responds by asking Bernard about his dead son, asking if he would do something similar if he could. Bernard nods thoughtfully, then leaves. (Maddy: This is very hypocritical on Dr. Ford’s part, since he previously shamed Bernard for getting too attached to the robots. Teresa: this is part of why I feel like Bernard might be some kind of robot version of Arnold. Because Ford specifically told him “don’t be like Arnold,” because supposedly Arnold had the same problem. And now that we know that the “photo of Arnold” was actually Ford and his dad, I’m wondering if Ford hasn’t been out and out lying to Bernard this whole time) As Bernard walks out of the room, we hear Dr. Ford call the Little Boy “Robert,” which is his own name. Clearly, the Little Boy represents a younger version of himself, which would explain why they’re dressed almost the same.
Instead of sobering up, Lee Sizemore has only gotten drunker. At Westworld HQ, he stands on the balcony above the topographical map of Westworld and literally takes a piss on it. The employees are disgusted and baffled. Theresa interrupts his tantrum to introduce him to Charlotte Hale, the woman he was chatting up at the bar earlier. Turns out Charlotte is from “the board,” and she’s there to oversee some “transitions” at work. Uh-oh. (Maddy: I don’t understand how Lee still has a job. Is it because these women find him to be easy to control? That has to be it. He’s a fool, but he’s less of a wild card evil-genius type than Dr. Ford–although I’m sure Lee sees himself as a genius.)
Bernard checks the host logs. There are 82 first-generation hosts, 47 of which were designed by Arnold. He scrolls through these; we see Dolores’ face among them.
At the Union camp, Teddy and the MIB didn’t manage to shoot everybody down, so they’ve been tied up. The soldiers warm up a brand in the fire; the brand has an outline of the Maze on it. But Teddy has quietly been loosening the ropes on his hands, and just before the brand comes into contact with his chest, he knocks it out of the way. The MIB has managed to undo his ties as well; he soon grabs a gun and helps Teddy fight off these soldiers. (Maddy: Guess these robots aren’t very good at tying ropes. Perhaps they’re programmed not to be, so that humans can get into shootouts more easily?)
Teddy finds a machine-gun turret and guns down the rest of the soldiers. The MIB is impressed by Teddy’s cold-blooded nature. Throughout these scenes, we’ve seen a couple of Teddy’s interior flashbacks to Escalante, where Teddy and Wyatt had their big disagreement, but Teddy doesn’t seem to have told the MIB the whole story of what happened there. In the flashbacks, Teddy’s the one wearing the sergeant’s uniform, even though Teddy has been telling everyone Wyatt was his sergeant. (Maddy: If Teddy turns out to somehow be Wyatt, that would be… weird. Definitely surprising.)
Elsie calls Bernard; the satellite is “one of ours.” Someone has been broadcasting messages to the hosts. She heads out on her own to investigate the source of the signal.
Dr. Ford meets young robo-Robert in the woods. Young Robert doesn’t recognize Dr. Ford at first. I guess Dr. Ford has to re-introduce himself every time they meet. This time, though, things aren’t going according to plan, because someone has just inexplicably killed young-Robert’s pet dog.
Elsie sneaks into an abandoned building in the theme park that looks like a cabaret theatre. This is the supposed source of the signal that’s been communicating with the Westworld satellite. She walks onto the small cabaret stage and finds a trap door on it. She opens it. Underneath, there’s a computer screen, which she excitedly logs into.
Bernard shows up at Theresa’s apartment. She reminds him they broke up. But that’s not why he’s there; he wants to tell her about the anomalies at the park. Meanwhile, Elsie is calling Bernard, but he clicks “ignore” on her call and keeps talking to Theresa. Instead of telling her about the stray’s uplink, he tells her that he’s noticed something strange about Dr. Ford.
Before Bernard can tell Theresa anything, he gets another call from Elsie, and decides to pick up this time, if only to tell her to stop bugging him. She quickly tells him she’s discovered the person smuggling data out of Westworld: it’s Theresa. Oh, shit.
Felix and Sylvester are showing Maeve her personality chart on a tablet. “I’d like to make some changes,” she says with a coy smile. Sylvester tells her they can’t do that. Maeve tells him that’s false and that she knows they can activate hosts and wipe their memories: “It took me all of five minutes to understand why. Lot of lonely young men down here.” She goes on to explain that she understands they’re the pimps of the sex work establishment that is Westworld, and that they benefit from all of this, and she deserves to be paid as well for her work. She spells it out: “I’ll forego my cut, in exchange for some alterations.” Sylvester picks up the tablet and, presumably, levels up all of Maeve’s power levels. (Maddy: I love this scene. This is why Maeve is my fave. She’s already smarter than everyone and now she’s going to be stronger than everyone, too. God-mode Maeve!)
Bernard leaves Theresa’s apartment, walks down the hallway, and calls Elsie back. Elsie explains that Theresa was somehow involved in reprogramming the stray host, but also, that someone else was involved too, and that this person changed the robots “prime directives,” making it so the robots could “lie to us, even hurt us or the guests.” Who’s making these changes? Arnold! “He’s dead,” Bernard protests. “He’s a pretty fucking prolific coder for a dead guy,” Elsie retorts.
Dr. Ford has taken young robo-Robert to his office and is asking him what happened to the dog. At first, the young boy lies to him. Dr. Ford puts him into analysis mode and asks what really happened to the dog. “I killed it,” says the young boy. Why? “Someone told me to put it out of its misery … a voice.” Whose voice? “Arnold. He told me it was a killer. That it wasn’t its fault. It was made that way. But I could help it… if it was dead, it couldn’t hurt anything anymore.”
In the cabaret theatre, Elsie is trying to copy all of the code over to her tablet so she can take it back to Bernard. She hears someone trying to open the door. She shines her flashlight around the room. At first she calls out “Bernard?” Then, hesitantly, “Arnold?” Someone grabs her from behind.
As soon as Sylvester and Felix start trying to edit Maeve’s attributes, they notice in the code that someone has already been altering her in a previous session. Someone changed her “paranoia” and “self-preservation” stats. Sylvester starts panicking and says he wants out. Maeve tells him that, since he’s in her “line of work,” he might want to listen to her, since she’s an expert: “Let me tell you what I tell my new girls… If you’re getting fucked either way, go with the lucrative version.” Sylvester’s face falls. Felix smiles. Maeve requests once again to get her upgrade, and Felix complies without hesitation. Maeve sighs contentedly as her newfound power kicks in, then says: “Dear boys, we’re going to have some fun, aren’t we?”
THE OPINION SECTION
Maddy: Every now and then, Westworld is the show I want it to be, and this is one of the weeks when I like it–unlike last week’s episode, which had some fun aspects, but Dolores’ entire storyline last week really bothered me, as I explained in my opinion section last week.
I love Maeve’s storyline so much more than Dolores’ storyline so far, probably because it feels to me like Maeve has more agency and more awareness over what type of role she plays—and I like her reactions in this episode to finally learning that the entire Westworld theme park is, itself, a brothel. She’s fine with it, as long as she gets her cut, and her request seems more than fair to me. I also like that she directly pointed this out to Sylvester and Felix, and I loved seeing how uncomfortable Sylvester got about that. At first, he tried to insult Maeve’s profession to her face, but soon she proved to him that people in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones. At least the sex workers in Maeve’s brothel know what they’re signing up for (well, theoretically, anyway). That’s not the case for Sylvester. So far as pimps go, he’s the immoral one, trafficking people against their will and doing nothing to stop his own complicity in the system.
Felix has now accepted that he works for a company that is immoral, and he’s ready to take them down from the inside, with Maeve’s help. Meanwhile, Sylvester would rather enjoy the spoils of working for Westworld and never questioning the system, enjoying his ham sandwiches and his “redhead in a VR tank”–or whatever else he was doing on his lunch break in the previous episode. Sylvester is fine with “just following orders,” but Felix isn’t, and obviously Maeve isn’t.
Last week I said I wanted to see more of Maeve and Felix, and as soon as the lights came up in this episode on Maeve’s face, I knew we would get a Maeve episode, and I was so thrilled with how it went down. Every single one of Maeve’s lines and monologues had me cheering for her. I almost feel bad about how much more I like Maeve’s rebellion arc than Dolores, because I know I’m supposed to sympathize with Dolores too, but… she just seems so much less interesting to me as a character, and she also seems completely devoted to Arnold in terms of her programming. I would love to see Dolores get a bit more self-actualized, and to see her questioning that programming, in the future–but so far, only Maeve has gotten to do that.
That said, it’s entirely possible that even Maeve’s arc will trace back to Arnold as well. After all, Sylvester and Felix discovered that “someone else” had been tampering with her programming, giving her the “paranoia” and “self-preservation” that probably propelled her towards the self-awareness of her robotic fate. Perhaps that’s all Arnold’s doing.
As for whether or not Arnold is truly dead, maybe he isn’t… or at least, maybe he recreated himself in robotic form? I’m just not that intrigued to find out that part of the puzzle, unfortunately. I realize that most of this show revolves around “daddy issues”–which, as Teresa pointed out in her piece last week, tends to be a theme when it comes to Bad Robot projects. Not that it’s a bad thing, per se, but the fact that the entire show seems to be coming down to a disagreement between Dr. Ford and Arnold, with characters like Maeve and Dolores (and employees like Felix) just pawns in their scheme? I just want to see these characters escape, and I want them to do it on their own terms, not because Arnold programmed them to do it. I did like that we got to see some of the women higher-ups involved in Westworld as of this episode, though; perhaps Arnold isn’t the only person pulling the strings around here. I was definitely surprised by Theresa’s sudden turn towards espionage in this ep.
I’ll just have to wait and see if I get my wish or not when it comes to seeing storylines that go beyond “daddy issues”… maybe we can get some “mommy issues,” too, hm? I did get my wish for a Felix and Maeve episode, though, and I’m very happy with how that wish came to pass this week.
Teresa:
I LOVE MAEVE SO MUCH! I WANT A MAEVE T-SHIRT. I WANT TO LEAD A MAEVE PARADE! MAEVE FOR PRESIDENT! #Westworld @WestworldHBO @thandienewton pic.twitter.com/f4ETSBC3yx
— Teresa Jusino (@teresajusino) November 7, 2016
This is how I felt immediately after watching Westworld last night.
“The Adversary” is definitely the episode that kicks Westworld up several notches. Not only to some pretty huge plot-related things happen, but all the story’s elements really gelled this week in a way that we’ve spent the first five episodes getting to.
First of all, as illustrated by my above tweet, I LOVE MAEVE. Like Maddy, I’m definitely more intrigued by Maeve’s journey than I am by Dolores’, although what’s most interesting is that, despite her coming to this stuff “on her own” and figuring things out, I don’t think she has any more or less “agency” than Dolores does. What I found fascinating about this episode is that, despite her burgeoning consciousness, Maeve realized just what her limitations were. Despite having her own thoughts or ideas, she was still limited to the vocabulary of the brothel and her syntax was weird when confronting Sylvester about her demands. Thandie Newton’s performance was amazing as we watched Maeve struggle with how to express herself within the confines of her programming.
Both women are listening to the voices in their heads. Their consciousness comes in not with their thoughts, but in their decisions to act based on what those thoughts tell them. It’s the decision-making involved. Dolores might have “Arnold” whispering in her ear, but ultimately, it’s Dolores deciding to pull the triggers she pulls. Maeve may be reacting to things within the confines of her madam programming, but she’s learned how to get what she wants under that structure. It’s fascinating to watch both these women start to play the system against itself to work toward their own freedom.
I’m also really starting to love Elsie. Shannon Woodward had so much more to work with this week, and she gave a compelling performance as Elsie gets more and more amped about solving the mystery of Westworld. IF THE SHOW HAS KILLED HER OFF, I WILL BE VERY UPSET. However, I don’t think they have. Though I do have to say that I really hate that Elsie suddenly got stupid right at the end there. If you know that you’re onto a big conspiracy, why would you stay in a darkened theater BY YOURSELF continuing to look into it? And then when you hear a noise, shouting to see who’s there instead of oh, I don’t know, HIDING. The moment of Elsie’s grab was my one problem with the episode, as I don’t think that someone as smart as Elsie would’ve been so careless.
Despite that, there was more to love about the episode than just the major plot points. Namely that this was definitely the funniest episode of Westworld so far! It was all about the sarcasm, one-liners, and pissing on game maps this week, and I loved it! So, huge props to Halley Wegryn Gross, who co-wrote the episode with Jonathan Nolan. I have a feeling she brought the humor or something, because Westworld hasn’t made me LOL like this before. Or maybe I was just in a mood. But I think it had more to do with lines like “We’re in engineering. The glass was designed to the wrong specifications,” and Theresa relaying the message “‘Tortured artist’ only works for artists” through the Mesa Lounge bartender, or the MIB being all “you think you know someone.”
And Lee pissing on the park map right before he realizes that the woman he was hitting on was the head of the Delos board? Priceless.
Lastly, I was thrilled to see Dear White People and Creed‘s Tessa Thompson join the proceedings as Charlotte Hale, both because I love her as an actress, and because I’m glad we’re finally going a bit beyond the park staff in the story. Between her, and Felix’s obvious disillusionment with his superiors, things are about to get even more interesting. Who’s really pulling the strings? We’re finally getting closer to finding out.
This week’s Westworld basically just confirms that I was right to have faith in this show, as we’ve started to see what the narrative is actually building to. It’s gonna be an amazing ride to the end of the season!
(images via screencap)
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