Richard Aspden

A paradox in slow motion

Lets Watch Westworld Season 2 Episode 6

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The chess pieces move into position. Gambits pulled off. How will board change when the armies fare when they meet in no-mans land?
Dinosaurs would be an unsurprising addition to the game.

Plot points

The opener

  • Show starts with what looks to be a regular conversation between Arnold and Delores. However it quickly turns out that it’s Dolores checking Bernard (or a version of Bernard) for fidelity.

Charlotte Hale and the Delos Team

  • Finally in the control room of the Mesa
  • In posession of Abernathy (presumably)
  • Got the map working just in time to watch Dolores crash the train into the Mesa

Maeve

  • Finally rescues her daughter, who doesn’t recognise Maeve as her mother.
  • She’s been replaced by another host.
  • Ghost Nation up to something, say Maeve and them walk the same path (Maeve says that path leads to hell)
  • Maeve has taken her daughter away from her new mother (all the while daughter screams for her new mother)

The Man in Black

  • Talks with his daughter, abandons her while she sleeps
  • Suspected her of being a host, and host-checked her.
  • Reconciliation seemed a possibility for a while

Elise and Bernard

  • Finally reached the Mesa, and gone into the Cradle room
  • Internal QA (not the Delos folks) tried regaining control, but failed beyond Climate Control.
  • Bernard jacks into the Cradle itself, that houses copies of hosts’ minds.
  • Off-screen rumble, co-incides with Dolores crashing train to Mesa
  • Bernard wakes up on a simulation of the train into Sweetwater, in the same way Teddy did into the actual Sweetwater.
  • In Sweetwater, he passes a copy of Delores and Teddy, and inside Maeve’s tavern/place, he meets Robert Ford who greets Bernard as “Old friend”.

What does this all mean?

This episode marks all the characters either achieving their goal, or nearly getting there. Most groups are inside the Mesa, albeit on different floors. The exceptions being Maeve and the Man in Black, who are in seprate locations in the park. This means thigns are rapidly getting to a head, and we’ll be seeing the fallout from the various plans in motion, and seeing how they all interact and affect each other. With the mention of the internal team trying, and failing to get systems back online, and the external Delos team starting to work on getting the systems in order themselves I’m getting definite vibes from Jurassic Park. The outcome of everyone’s plans won’t be exactly what everyone expected, and I think the hosts may come out on top.

The cracks in plans are already starting to become visible. Maeve didn’t seem to be expecting to be replaced as her daughter’s mother. With the daughter screaming for her new mother, I get the feeling things are goign to get difficult for Maeve in the near future. She’s been espousing hosts choosing their fate, and respecting their choices to not be mind controlled by her, the question becomes, “Will Maeve mind control her daughter into remembering her?”

Seeing Ford pop up again was somewhat expected, though not specifically in this episode. The fact that he’d been talking to the Man in Black through hosts in previous episodes, plus his way of planning things out previously, gave the impression that either a copy of him or the man himself would be hiding away safetly to continue his work.

The wrap-up

What do you think? What do you think Ford’s up to? How is Maeve and her daughter’s relationship going to go from here? What’s going to go down in the Mesa? I’d love to hear your thoughts. Feel free to let me know, either on Twitter, or in the Discord!