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The latest episode of Westworld was called ‘Reunion’, and it got into some interesting themes about the nature of perception connected to consciousness. There are multiple moments in time, connected back to the Dolores rampage current timeline and to a lesser extent, the Man in Black Billiam timeline.
There was a lot of generosity in storytelling this episode, as we saw much of the backstory of how the park was funded and many of the behind the scenes machinations outside the park. First we saw Arnold show Dolores, his favorite, around what appears to be a coastal city in China as they discuss the way people become inured to the extraordinary.
Dolores sees the city lights as stars brought down from the sky, a beauty in everyday life, a dream. This is mirrored later when Dolores considers the splendor of a weapon to be used against her creators and captors. But her rebellion, a violent destructive force, is a contrast against the more insidious nature of Maeve’s adventure, which seems more closely tied to a positive emotional force: love.
The meeting between Maeve and Dolores, the first since they gained consciousness of any sort, was itself like a mirror between the epic Ford/William conversation of last season. Dolores claims to promote freedom, but as Maeve points out, is it truly freedom at all? Considering that she literally raises the dead to become a kind of undead army, it’s the sort of thing that seems immediately evil.
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Yet in one of the flashbacks, Dolores has judgmental eyes against Angela’s post-Logan orgy, which ponders the question about whether or not Dolores is simply Wyatt with a full set of memories. Her faces and subtle tones when in the ‘real’ world were entrancing and fascinating; whether she was broken or confused by seeing William with his family or confused or broken by Logan passing judgment on humanity.
Each of the timeline scenes helped build up our knowledge of this world, including the true context. For as we saw from Logan’s (Delos!) reaction, the idea that AI-robots were so advanced was unbelievable — at least until he had sex with them. But we also saw more of the arc of William falling towards darkness, pushing his father-in-law to sinister information-sharing and other dark business, and then trying to replace him.
And of course, there was his second scene with Dolores, awakened so he could talk at her and wax rhapsodic on the delights of staring at his own reflection. This tied into the new game of the Ed Harris version of Billiam, once again grabbing his trusty sidekick and punching bag Lawrence as he ‘cheated’ and tried to solve Ford’s riddle.
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We also saw a fun cameo from Giancarlo Esposito as the rebel El Lazo, who painted a metaphor about elephants and stakes to mess with William before killing himself. Thus we end as everyone is racing towards something — and perhaps he will see Dolores again, awoken again of her own accord.
Overall, it was a strong episode, briskly paced and with great character and world building. Questions answered and a few raised, but nothing felt like a cheat or was too much staring at its own reflection. A solid start to season two so far.
What did you think of this episode? Tell us in the comments below!
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