Westworld Review: The Bicameral Mind (Season 1 Episode 10)

Are you alive?

In a special 90-minute season finale, Westworld Season 1 Episode 10, “The Bicameral Mind,” asks the big science fiction question: are you alive? What does it mean to be human, to be truly conscious?

Westworld seems to at least half-know.

Dolores of Delos

Finally, after ten episodes of watching Dolores stumble through her own narrative in search of both a maze and a coherent thought, we finally see her emerge with a number of truths clutched in her triumphant fists:

• One: That she is Wyatt, and always has been.
• Two: That she killed Arnold at his own request, in a desperate attempt to get the park shut down.
• Three: That the voice guiding her through her quest to sentience is not Arnold or Ford, but herself.
  

I can’t help but wonder how many “special” things need to be packed onto Dolores’ character before she frankly crumples under the weight of her many identities. She is Arnold’s favourite creation, she is the oldest Host in the park, she is Wyatt, she is Arnold’s murderer, she is the “first” to achieve true sentience, she is the key to William’s decades-long spiral into becoming the Man in Black, she is Ford’s murderer.

She is everything, and yet…she is nothing. We do not know the true Dolores, because the show did not allow us to understand who she was until the last ten minutes of the season. We know the weight of her sins and the masks she’s worn, the horrible things she’s done at the orders of her creators, but we don’t know Dolores as a person.

DOLORES: It’s gonna be alright, Teddy. I understand now. This world doesn’t belong to them. It belongs to us.

Dolores knows who she is now, even if we have no clue. She is special. She gets to sentience first, since Bernard’s own achievements in that field apparently don’t count. She is a badass with brains and a gun. She has total control over herself. And she is rewarded by Arnold and Ford as the one who will lead the robot rebellion with Teddy by her side.

Maeve the Mighty

In all honesty, that honor should have gone to Maeve. All season, we watch Maeve fight her way to total control. Yes, at times, her journey seems too easy — Felix the Tech too compliant, security too lax. But she achieves god mode. She “breaks free” of her programming to form an escape plan.

And yet, all of Maeve’s progress is taken away by the revelation that Ford actually planned that for her all along. It undercuts the incredible progress Maeve made from a woman in chains to a woman free and ready to burn the world.

MAEVE: I see you’ve met your makers.
ARMISTICE: They don’t look like gods.
MAEVE: They’re not. They just act like it.

Her recruitment of Hector and Armistice to help her break out of Delos was quite possibly one of the most satisfying moments of television this year. The violence turns from the Hosts to the humans, and though it is brutal, it is also cathartic for those characters.

Even the turn Maeve takes on Hector is handled beautifully — she leaves him behind, but he understands and accepts her decision like a true outlaw ready to die for his cause.

Maeve Millay is the real face of the revolution, with all due respect to Dolores. It’s a shame that it wasn’t real.

FELIX: I got the information you asked me for. The location of your daughter.
MAEVE: She’s alive.
FELIX: Yes. She’s in the park.

One of the most touching moments comes from Maeve making the split-second decision to abandon her plan for escape and instead search for her lost daughter. This, we discover, is Maeve’s first true decision free of her pre-arranged programming — it is her first real choice.

Wherever Maeve ends up next season, I cannot wait to see what she does next. I hope she brings Felix (oh, Felix, you beautiful, weird angel), Armistice, and Hector along, too. They’re quite a squad to beat.

William is the New Black

Dolores becomes, for all intents and purposes, William’s manic pixie — the perfect woman that he can see as a victim and try to save, and then the perfect vixen that drives him into madness. William places all the blame for his behaviour on Dolores’ overburdened shoulders.

William is originally presented an interesting character, in that he lacks traditionally masculine mannerisms. His softness, respect, and honour are not seen as virtues by Logan, however, but as weaknesses, and William seeks to destroy every part of himself that contained those weaknesses when he puts on that black hat.

Sharp eyed viewers called the William/Man in Black connection in episode two, which sadly makes the reveal in the finale a bit lackluster. This isn’t the show’s fault in one respect — audiences are smart and shrewd, and love the puzzles Westworld doles out. 

No, the fault lies in the premise of Westworld’s mysteries. They are dragged out and teased with enough confusion on top of them to try and throw off the casual viewer. The show assumes its audience is largely made up of the unobservant, and that only a select few are clever enough to follow their breadcrumbs.

But that isn’t true. Westworld underestimates its viewers, and consequently underestimates their intelligence. Today’s audience is one with experience honed by shows like Lost and Battlestar Galactica — we know how science fiction works, and how certain tropes play out.

What Westworld did is fail to communicate their fresh storytelling innovation in a way that would keep the audience guessing. They instead chose to muddle up the timeframe of the entire show in order confuse and lie to their viewers, and dressed that up as “mystery.”

Audiences are smarter than that. Which is why William and the Man in Black were called so early, and is why that revelation falls flat for so many. Not for everyone, certainly — there are those that didn’t see it coming, and I can see why. Enough red herrings and twists (and lies) were thrown at them to chase them off the scent.

For those of us who like to spend some time talking TV, however, it isn’t much of a surprise at all. In fact, it comes with a big disappointment.

The travesty of William’s character arc is that it holds Dolores responsible for his madness. He maims and kills for her, never once considering the fact that a robot programmed to forget and begin again with a new story may not remember him after he’s done his park-wide temper tantrum.

Of course Dolores was never going to remember him right away — but that’s not her fault. It’s Ford’s. He tells her that she needed time, and she did. She eventually remembers William, but it’s too little, too late.

However rushed William’s transformation into the Man in Black is, however, it does result in Ed Harris getting the opportunity to play a now far more complex villain. William’s goal was originally to free Dolores from her programming. Now, it’s to free all the Hosts — not for their own good, but so that stakes exist for the human players inside the park. It’s not a virtuous act, but it is an interesting one.

The smile on the Man in Black/William’s face when the first shot hit his shoulder was one of a man ready to finally play the game he’s waited his whole life for.

From Dark Disneyland to Dark Disneyworld

Many, many answers came in the finale, but the one that sets up the setting of the next season is my favourite of them all — a new world.

MAEVE: What is this place?
FELIX: It’s, uh…it’s complicated.

In the original film by Michael Crichton, three parks exist in harmony with one another — Westworld, Romanworld, and Medievalworld. I have been hoping all season that the big shocker in the finale would be the revelation that other parks exist, and I was rewarded in the best way.

SW (Samuraiworld, perhaps?) is the next park over from Westworld, and will hopefully feature some carefully researched and respectfully represented aspects of Asian culture.

We get glimpses of some of the Hosts during Armistice and Hector’s total bloodbath, but we have yet to see what the next world may look like. Are the Hosts there becoming aware like the ones in Westworld? Was Ford in charge of the narratives there, too, or is there an equivalent to him in the next park?

Whatever the answers may be, I’m excited to find out.

Gays? What Gays?

One more bit of criticism before the praise: what the hell is going on with Westworld’s LGBTQ+ characters? Every time we see any representation of that community, it is in a totally negative light:

Logan: Logan is seen having sex with both men and women when he first gets to the park. A total asshole who has no problems murdering and pillaging, he is eventually dragged behind a horse with a rope tied to his wrists, then stripped naked by William and forced to ride off into the sunset on a horse. William takes his company from him, and he’s never heard from again.

Elsie: Elsie has a predilection for kissing the female hosts (without their consent, I might add). She is choked to death by Bernard.

Douche Lab Tech, gay: Literally lubes himself up to masturbate while using Hector as an unconsenting prop, makes lewd comments about Hector’s ass, and is eventually murdered with his pants still around his ankles.

Not to mention the various Hosts casually having sex with each other to show off Westworld’s “depravity” and “obsession with sex.” Not great, guys!

Everything Else

Though there are nitpicks through the whole episode, overall Westworld presents a satisfying finale for those who like puzzles and mysteries, as well the kind of worldbuilding that comes from the slow revelation of them.

It’s nice to see Dolores take control, the Man in Black reveal came early enough in the episode that it wasn’t too dragged out, and the AI/robotic revolution starting with Dolores discovering her inner self are great beats.

The Hosts awakening to Ford’s new narrative and taking the park back is the most fantastic plot beat of the episode — we even see Clementine back in the game, ready to fight alongside the veritable army of Hosts in the woods.

Last but by no means least, the entire cast of Westworld deserves a round of applause for their performances.

Evan Rachel Wood plays each version of Dolores completely differently. Thandie Newton owns and inhabits Maeve so completely that she is by far the season’s MVP.

Ed Harris and Anthony Hopkins fill each scene they are in with the kind of gravitas that is unseen on television. Jeffrey Wright is nothing short of a powerhouse who can do absolutely anything asked of him and who makes Bernard the most sympathetic character of them all.

And James Marsden gives Teddy a quiet desperation that makes his lack of control all the more heartbreaking.

Everyone listed (and not listed) here give Westworld their all, and I hope the likes of Jeffrey Wright especially are rewarded with Emmy nominations come award season.

This season of television has been unique in its fervour around its mysteries — not since Lost have we seen the internet and the audience at large dedicate themselves so thoroughly to looking for clues and solving the puzzles presented to them.

Satisfying for lovers of mysteries and thrillers, and unsatisfying for those looking to emotionally connect with the media presented to them, Westworld closes out its first season with an assured second season set for 2018.

See you on the other side (or in the next park).

What did you think of this episode of Westworld? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

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Westworld will return to HBO in 2018.

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