Howdy, fellow humans who are definitely not robots who just think you’re humans, and welcome to our review of HBO’s science fiction series, Westworld. This episode is full of revelations, like the true purpose of Westworld, the limit of Charlotte Hale’s cool confidence, and what must be a substantial portion of Dr. Ford’s grand plan. There will be heavy plot spoilers for season two episode seven only. So break open that brain, and digitize your consciousness, here are five thoughts on Westworld season two, episode seven: “Les Ecorches.”
1. The Even Truer Purpose of Westworld
We learned earlier that the Delos Corporation bought Westworld in order to collect data on its guests, just like how social media collects data on its users to sell to advertisers. Then we learned that James Delos used this technology to try to achieve immortality for himself, by copying his consciousness into a robot body identical to his own. In this episode we learn that Westworld has an even truer purpose. In the cradle, where back-ups of every robot live in a Westworld simulation, a digitized copy of Dr. Ford’s consciousness explains that the ultimate goal is to achieve immortality not just for James Delos, but for anyone who’d like to pay for it. As we saw with the failed Robo-Delos, the technology hasn’t advanced to allow human consciousness to live in robot form yet but they can live in digitized form, as Dr. Ford is doing in the cradle.
But could there be… an even truer purpose?! Let’s not pretend purpose is immutable. Surely there are lots of fun, nefarious, and most importantly, lucrative things one could do with such data and technology. When we the real life human viewers consider this, it forces us to also consider the lucrative things one could do with our real life human data, with the technology that currently exists, and with the technology that is yet to come in the near future… spooky!
2. Charlotte Hale’s Limit
So far, Charlotte Hale has remained the very picture of cool, calm, and collected. She didn’t flinch when Theresa Cullen was murdered, or when Dolores mass murdered that fancy party back in season one. She rolled her eyes at Bernarnold’s totally earned panic attack (okay it wasn’t a real panic attack, he was just covering for his leaky robot brain, but she didn’t know that) and she nonchalantly passed up the opportunity to flee to instead return to Westworld with an armed guard. Through all the chaos, she has stayed absolutely focused on her one and only goal to retrieve the data inside Peter Abernathy, which we now know is an encryption key to all the data collected inside the cradle.
This episode, we the real life human viewers finally see her lose her cool. Dolores and Teddy have reached her and Peter Abernathy in the laboratory, and Dolores astutely identifies Charlotte as the lady in charge. Dolores is about to torture and kill her, and Charlotte begs for her life. Peter Abernathy distracts Dolores for a moment, and Charlotte takes the opportunity to run. It’s not the first time her life has been in imminent danger, but it is the first time she’s abandoned her goal. Now Peter Abernathy and the key to all the data in the cradle belongs to Dolores. Lest we forget, that data includes back-ups of every Westworld robot ever made, and the digitized consciousness of Dr. Ford.
3. A Tale of Two Sacrifices
Dolores and Maeve reunite outside the main office of Westworld, and once again their differences are cast in stark relief. Dolores has just killed her own father to save her revolution. Well, “kill” is a strong word. In order to obtain the encryption key to the cradle, Dolores had to physically remove Peter Abernathy’s brain, severing the connection between his consciousness and his body. Usually that means killing, but we know there’s a copy of Peter Abernathy’s consciousness stored in the cradle, and that one hasn’t been driven to insanity by this encryption key, so he may not be gone for good. Still, it broke Dolores’ heart to do so, but she felt this sacrifice was necessary. She’s already sacrificed Teddy’s freedom and sweet demeanor, so add this to the list.
Continued belowMaeve has just failed to rescue her daughter, and as she lies bleeding from multiple bullet wounds, it’s possible she has paid for this attempt with her life. Even now, she’s determined to go back and save her daughter. When Dolores questions why, Maeve answers, “I made a promise.” In her very brief encounter with her daughter, she promised her that if someone took her away, she’d come rescue her. Dolores has sacrificed her father to gain freedom. Maeve will risk her freedom to save her daughter. Two robots in an identical situation have made opposite choices. They’re both exercising free will! Or are they? Maeve’s love for her daughter was programmed into her. Dolores’ lust for revenge was programmed into her too, via Wyatt. But is that so different from human beings? Does any real life human choose to love, or to need revenge? Robots: they’re just like us.
4. Bernarford
In the cradle, after Dr. Ford reveals most but not all of his villainous plan, he copies and pastes his consciousness into Bernarnold’s brain. Now Dr. Ford is controlling Bernarnold from inside his brain. Since we changed Bernard to Bernarnold when we found out his consciousness was not an exact duplicate but a close approximation of Arnold’s consciousness, let’s call this latest iteration of Jeffrey Wright’s image Bernarford. Bernarford sends Elsie on a distraction mission and shuts down the entire security apparatus of the park from the central control room so that Dolores and her team will have free reign. Dr. Ford claims to want freedom for the robots, but he takes away Bernarnold’s freedom in order to gain that freedom, just like how Dolores took away Teddy’s freedom in the name of her revolution. It’s not definitive proof, but the parallel suggests that Dolores may still be controlled by Dr. Ford. If she’s not being directly controlled by him like Bernarford is, she may just have been successfully manipulated by him. We still don’t know if Dr. Ford is controlling Ghost Nation or what they could accomplish for him, and we probably won’t know his whole grand plan until it concludes.
5. Invincible William
On the run from Ghost Nation, William happens to take shelter in the house where Maeve is hiding with her daughter. It’s the same house where he murdered both of them years ago, which led to Maeve’s emotional breakdown and reassignment to the saloon. Maeve shoots him, and controls Lawrence’s posse to shoot him too. Maeve can’t control Lawrence himself, for a mysterious reason, but she is able to unlock his memories. When Lawrence remembers all the times William tortured and murdered him and his family, he shoots William too. Bleeding from multiple bullet wounds, William shouts at Maeve as if he can speak to Dr. Ford through her, that this cannot be the place Dr. Ford wanted him to die. Though William professes to be thrilled that the robots can fight back, that the fight is finally “fair,” he still feels like he is protected by the structure of a game. He has always claimed to be searching for something “real” in Westworld, but when faced with the real danger of his imminent mortality, he clings to the hope that he is protected by an artificial drama concocted by someone he knows. He is correct that Dr. Ford continues to influence the goings on in Westworld, but Maeve’s part in Dr. Ford’s plan ended when she got off the train to search for her daughter… or so it seems.
In addition to being the most revelatory episode of season two so far, this was also the most confusing. For me personally, understanding this episode took extracurricular reading. A convoluted plot can be a fun challenge to piece together, but in this episode in particular, I didn’t find the experience enjoyable. It felt less like putting together a puzzle and more like walking through peanut butter. I found myself deeply relating to Ashley Stubbs in the moment he points a gun at Charlotte Hale and demands that she explain what’s inside Peter Abernathy’s brain. I too felt a desire to shout, “just tell me already!” Of course, I know I wouldn’t enjoy that either. Until next time, fellow humans who are definitely not just robots who think you’re humans, the center of your maze may yet await.
