Westworld: The Riddle of the Sphinx (2x04)

One of the best things about a show like Westworld is that as my brain starts spiraling down into all these crazy theories, I can trust that the show has thought about these things, and that there really is an insightful and clever answer waiting for me at the end of all of this.

Cons:

So... if I'm being charitable, I could say that the depiction of Native Americans in this show is meant to be really one-note and offensive, that it's a purposeful commentary on our society's problematic views of minority cultures. But... in order for me to be convinced of that, the show would need to lampshade it. I would need to see and understand that the show acknowledges how shitty their depiction of Native Americans has been so far. I don't have a problem with them kidnapping other hosts and humans. Hell, all the robots are doing that. But the fact that they speak in clipped, stoic sentences, and that I don't think we've learned any of their names, and the fact that we get nothing from their perspective... well, it's problematic to say the least.

Perhaps it's intentional, but I will admit that the sheer number of timelines is starting to concern me. At any given point I'm struggling to remember which characters know which pieces of information, and which things are happening concurrently. For some of the characters, especially Bernard, that lack of cohesion seems very much intentional and adds a lot to his narrative. But for others, I feel just a little bit confused.

Pros:

The stuff with William and his father-in-law was chilling. The more we learn about William, the more interesting and dark and confusing and intriguing he becomes. Essentially, James Delos (Logan's father) has been downloaded into a host, but his human consciousness keeps degrading no matter how many times they try. He and William keep going through the same loop again and again, with Delos having to remember over and over that he didn't get better, that time has passed. There's a shocking moment when William comes in to see his dear father-in-law, but it's actually older William, showing that Delos has been trapped in this consciousness loop for literal decades. Chilling.

I kept thinking to myself that if William actually had a soul and cared about people, it would have been really difficult for him to endure seeing James in this condition. But if anything, William seems to relish the pain he's causing. He actually lets James deteriorate slowly so they can "study his condition." It was inevitable that people would think of using the host technology to achieve immortality, but it looks like thus far it hasn't been working. We also learn that in the later timeline, with older William, Logan and Juliet are both deceased. I'm a little bummed about that - I wanted to see older Logan getting his revenge on William.

Then there's Bernard's part of the story, which literally made me gasp out loud at one point. See, he finds Elsie. Yeah. Elsie. Is alive. Clementine drags Bernard to a cave and he finds her, and she discovers that he's a host. Not only that, but that he's been glitching. The two of them try and investigate to figure out what's going on, and eventually they find a badly degraded host of James Delos in a now abandoned facility (the same one we've been seeing all episode, in the younger-William timeline). But what makes this plot thread so delicious is that Bernard is experiencing events out of order. His glitches are making him have memories without remembering the order. The part that made me gasp was when Elsie was talking about opening a door to see what's behind it, and Bernard keeps trying to tell her that it's not a good idea, but she's not listening. Suddenly he says "I'm not here with you, am I?" and I literally said, out loud to my TV, "oh, shit." Really excellent build-up and delivery of this moment.

And this is what I'm talking about when I say that I trust this show to have some master plan that I'm just not seeing yet. Who is controlling Clementine at this moment? Bernard keeps talking about Ford, but I was also curious if Maeve would find a way to use Clem, due to their past friendship? And did Ford want Bernard to keep Elsie alive and hide her away, or was that Bernard somehow defying his programming and going rogue? When it comes to Bernard, it's usually a safe bet to assume that Ford is pulling the strings. But is that true now that Ford is dead? Why would Ford want Bernard to spare Elsie, and find her now?

Also, just... speaking of Ford... you know what's so interesting to me? Now that we know that William actually helped out in developing the park and some of the technology involved, we can assume that he and Ford had more of a relationship after William's first experiences in the park/falling in love with Dolores. And now, William's unending faith in Ford, his belief that there's something bigger going on, is driving a significant portion of the plot. And it's not hard to believe that Ford has some grand master-plan. He was clearly willing to die for it, whatever it is. He continues his creepy trend of speaking through children to help guide William on his quest, and I'm all for it.

The woman we met in colonial India, named Emily, spends this episode in captivity with the offensively portrayed natives, but she ends up escaping, and as the episode ends, she and William have come face to face. The twist? Emily greets William by saying "hi, Dad." Well... damn. We spent the episode watching William actually do something to help Lawrence, but I'm not convinced it was an act of compassion. Now we know that William has a daughter who has her own level of fascination with the park. I can't wait to see how this relationship plays out.

A final note - I think my favorite small moment was when old William finds out that Dolores is on a recruiting mission/rampage, and he gets this little look on his face and says "good for her." That cracked me up. William and Dolores have one of the most supremely messed up dynamics imaginable. I hope that if anybody gets to take William out, it's Dolores.

So... there you have it. This show is good. It's a little convoluted, and it's definitely the kind of show that you have to pay special attention to. Sometimes my mind wanders, but this week I was really locked in.

9/10