Ryan Shoots First: Westworld (S3 Ep1) “Parce Domine”

I know everyone is sick and tired of hearing about the apocalypse being brought on by a rampant virus so allow me to indulge you in some escapism. Can I interest you in an apocalypse brought on by killer robots? Yes, after a long wait season 3 of Westworld is finally here. The bots are out of the park and ready to burn it all down. First some ground rules for these weekly recaps, I will be jotting notes and observations during the show and writing the recap afterwards. This means I will NOT have time to break down and analyze still frames of every scene to present the next big theory. I will try my best to keep up and discuss what’s going on in the background as this is an incredibly intricate show to follow. It’s also entirely likely we have more timeline wonkiness as we have in seasons 1 and 2 so bear with me if I’m not in the right time zone from time to time. With that said let’s all figure this out and navigate this maze together as we start Westworld season 3. 

We start with a rare cold open with what looks like a Delos investor not happy about the deaths in the park. Cool look at modern tech available In the real world which is something new this season. Seeing what we’ve seen in the park it’s largely been what we can imagine the outside world is like.

Someone hacks his smart house and gasses the man and his wife. Certainly not hard to see the parallel drawn from our increasingly smart homes. The man wakes up with a gas mask on and runs to the window to see Delores swimming in his pool. Delores on the revenge tour as she reveals to him that she remembers when he came to the park to let loose before his first wedding. She straps his glasses to his head making him remember the death of his wife through the visual AR-like interface. Delores reveals she read his book that was in the Westworld mainframe that reveal everything about the guests.She convinces him to trade her secret files from a company called Incite for his life. As she walks away he charges her but she reveals that was also AR and as he falls into his pool he smashes his head and drowns. As his wife walks out she asks “who are you?” And Deloris answers “The one who set you free”. 

This leads into the new opening…

We are shown another anomaly in LA this time like the ones revealed in the early trailer as we get our first look at Aaron Paul’s characters Caleb. Caleb shows us a little more of what the downtrodden in this world live like and as the creators of the show have said, give us hope in humanity since the first two seasons make humans look pretty awful. He is having a conversation with someone named Francis over voice over while we see his average day working with a robot. He has multiple calls from Francis through the day that he declines. He is then reading to his mom who appears to be suffering from Alzheimer’s. He then logs into an app called Rico which is like a Uber for crimes. We then see him meet up with two other criminals one of which is Marshawn Lynch and they blow up and rob and ATM. It is revealed on the app he doesn’t do “Personals” which is kidnapping or murder. This causes his rating to not be that great on the app. 

We cut to Charlotte Hale who we know is a host meeting with the board. She is struggling to restore the brand. She wants to keep the park open, capitalizing on the idea  of “danger” people crave has never been better. She is putting the blame on Bernard and pushing forward as everyone believes Will is dead. With him dead and her just the interim head her ideas are ran through a algorithm machine that has a seat on the board and it decides her plan is good. Business in the year 2050 ladies and gentlemen!

Cut to Bernard who is farming and is tending to a hurt cow. He is going by a different name and is in hiding. He is logging into his code and asking himself questions on the regular. He doesn’t trust himself and isn’t sure if he is being forced to do things he doesn’t want to by Dolores. The paranoias of living in a body you can’t trust and knowing it is taking a toll on Bernard. 

Back to Dolores who shows up at a party for a man named Liam Dempsey. She is his date and he appears to work for Incite. She is going by the name Laura. A man comes up to him at the party and invites he take a meeting with people who I am sure are upstanding characters.

We’re back to Aaron Paul who again has a VO with Francis who appears to be a deceased buddy he served with in the Army. There must be some program where people can leave you voicemails from the dead? He appears to be in a trial program to see if this helps with coping but he is not participating as much as they desire. On his way out he receives a call from Francis but instead logs back into the Uber Crime app.

Jump back to Dolores with her boo at Incite HQ. He shows her the giant AI brain his father built. I’m guessing she has some serious interest in it. The man he met at the party is his head of security and he tells him “She wants to see you now”. Dolores tells him they’ll meet up later. She takes an awesome future bike and follows him. At his meeting his client is nervous someone on the inside is looking at their data and a infamous “he” is brought up. No doubt a mystery we will be watching closely. 

Back to Bernard who is confronted by two men at his farm/factory/whatever the heck it is who has figured out who he is. Bernard pulls out a remote and goes full super host to take care of the bullies. After the threat is over he turns the remote back on. 

Back to Caleb who has found out he did not get a job he was hoping for.

No time to mourn missed job opportunities as Dolores and Liam are on a date as Dolores convinces him to tell her what’s going on. The system Dolores thinks he controls he admits he does not control it. He tells her no one knows what the system is doing other than the original architect. Dolores tries to get it out of him but before his Head of Security from earlier comes up behind Dolores and takes her out. He proceeds to tell Liam the real Laura is a dead teenage girl from Kiev. His security guy tells him he will take care of her. He plans to hire some local talent which is, you guessed it, Caleb. 

It turns out Caleb was only supposed to drop off a bag. He walks off as they load Deloris into the car to drive off. Caleb finally accepts the call from Francis as we cut to them under the overpass where Dolores had arranged a meeting. After waiting for a bit they decide to go ahead and kill her. They inject her with future death syndrome but she is still breathing. Soon after a truck pulls up. The security guy notices something and calls for the rest of the guys. Before he can Dolores wakes up and takes out the guys in the vehicle with her. There is a very cool shot involving the backup camera and Dolores taking out goons. She then proceeds to chase down the security head that is running from her. 

Caleb is having his conversation with Francis and he doesn’t think what the fake voice of Francis is saying is what real Francis would say at all. It’s revealed Francis did in fact die as we thought during what appears to be criminal activity. Caleb decides he needs to move on and unsubscribes from the service. 

Back to the chase Dolores has taken out the head of security. She reveals she remembers him from the park. He reveals the name of the man who has control of the system is Sharaq (spelling?). Dolores tells him she won’t need to get close to Liam cause he will and it is revealed who was in the car is a host who looks just like him. Host security guy (I suppose I’ll need to get his name) takes out his real world self as Dolores opens fire on his buddies near the drone transport. While they are fighting Caleb is walking back. He finds Dolores wounded in the tunnel. As the classic Westworld music starts we see Bernard paying some fishermen to get him back into Westworld. The credits roll as the ship sets off. 

After the credits we get a scene of Maeve waking up in period outfit with a pistol. She walks into the next room to find one man dead and another tied up and beaten. He is speaking German and she figures out by her bloody knuckles this is her handy work. She goes to the window to find Nazis taking over the town. 

Quite the episode, this show is so hard to recap because every little thing I feel is crucial. Every detail and line of dialogue could be essential to the overarching story. From a strictly production standpoint the show continues to be top notch. The change now that the show has shifted to the real world opens up so many possibilities. Not just the aesthetic but the focus on architecture, tech, vehicles and mobility is like jumping 30 years in the future. I also enjoy the change in music, gone is the Western saloon sweeping orchestras to a more synthetic Blade Runner-esque sound. The old score did return at the very end of the episode when Bernard sets out to return to Westworld which was an excellent touch. Another major change is the addition of Logan Paul as the human Caleb. He fits the mold of the type of person Dolores can recruit and the episode ends with her in distress and falling into his arms much in the way she did Williams back in season 1. He is the bug under the shoe of this society and Dolores will no doubt twist that to achieve her goals. We did not see much of Charlotte in this episode but it looks like soon we will get some backstory of Dolores training her to mimic the real Hale to be in place on the Delos Board. Its possible that brain in Charlotte is Teddy’s which will add a whole new level to analyze as if timelines and who’s a host and who’s not were not enough things, now we have to figure out which host brains are in which host bodies. Again bare with me folks. 

I absolutely love seeing what the real world is like and look forward to more glimpses as the season goes on but it will also be cool to see what remains of Westworld as Bernard heads back and Charlotte Host is pushing forward with business as usual and how that affects those back at the park. Westworld appears to be as deep as ever and I’m sure over the next few days numerous YouTubers and bloggers will break down every aspect of the show but for now I’m going to try and digest what’s going on while looking forward to the only thing entertainment wise I have right now with nearly everything being cancelled or suspended. 

Observations

• Not sure if the wife in the open is a host of the guys first wife or just resembles her, probably just the latter.
• Audi plug, they love getting future cars into shows and movies.
• Marshawn Lynch’s shirt expressing his current emotions would be perfect now days and something I could totally see happening.
• Cool shots of future cities with green spaces all over the roofs and terraces.
• As a fan of electric cars and future vehicles the show is killing it with the drones, and cars with no driving positions. They have done their homework with where many analysts and scientists think vehicles and transportation are heading. Many concept cars now have minimal steering inputs as the future moves toward autonomy, like Dolores in 30 years you may not even need to sit in the driver position. 
• Bernard synthetic meat plant again realistic future seen in the show. As population grows billions are being spent in synthetic meat and plant based meat. 
• Good to see Staples Center is still up and running.
• Cool touch implying people don’t even know how to drive old cars like we have now as the one guy asks Caleb “Can you even drive that thing?”
• I really wanna know if one of though drone things could really fly. Someone on YouTube get on that.
• Def a little Black Mirror in our WestWorld this season.
• How can Dolores’ gun carry that much ammo? Future Micro Bullets?
• Interesting to see how the circle showing the worldwide events factors into things, similar to the trailer for the show a few months ago. 
• You know Dolores wants that big AI brain, reminded me of iRobot.
• That E-Bike is sick.
• I know I mentioned it in the piece but the mirroring of Dolores falling into Caleb’s arms like she did Wills is so nice.
• You gotta be pretty sick to go to “Nazi World” 

Predictions 

• Maeve wont be in Nazi World too long before she starts on her path to fight Deloris.
• I’m guessing the French Thief from Oceans 12 is the guy who has access to the AI data Deloris wants. 
• Caleb will turn on Deloris by the end of the season.
• I have no earthly clue what is up with Will/Man In Black