Westworld Telegraph – S02E09

Have a Theory? Share It Now!

Something came to mind while listening to this week’s deep dive.

One of the main themes in the show, even more so this season, is of duality, and I think the title “Vanishing Point” goes in with this, especially in two of our main characters.

We know that William is a man who has lived two lives. The “good guy” out in the “real world,” and the Man In Black in Westworld. Outside, he helps cure diseases, he donates mass amounts of money to charities, he is at the forefront of technological revolutions. Inside, he rapes, murders, burns down anything he sees and pleases. He is already narcissistic, paranoid, and sociopathic (traits that a lot of CEOs already have,) and this is exacerbated by spending so much time in a fantasy world. We can see how that affects him as he gets older, but there is another thing that feeds into all of this. William has also been behind the curtain, he sees how everything is made, how the resulting creations act, and how memories and thought patterns make them seem “real.” Real enough that he fell in love with one of those creations. He’s also the head of a project to not only capture the core of people but to possibly manipulate that as well. He was heading the project to bring Delos back from the dead. He was issuing the fidelity tests and watching the results. Almost more than anyone, he can see how reality is created and manipulated. Add into this mental and personality disorders, and you have a seriously hot mess. Seeing all of this makes him question every memory, every person he’s come across, and every decision he’s ever made. Are they his, have they been programmed, and how do you tell? With the death of his wife and Emily, his two anchors to the real world, that VERY thin wall between his two worlds just “vanished.”

Our second duality is Delores. We’ve debated all season on whether or not she’s really “woke” or if she’s playing the “Deathbringer” part in Ford’s narrative. But either way, she’s had two people battling inside that light bulb in her cortical shell. Something that I have absolutely loved is Evan Rachel Wood’s performance in this, how she can very subtly switch between the two personalities. You can see this when she removes the control unit from her “daddy.” Delores is beyond emotional at what has to be done, and then with a switch flip Wyatt takes over and finishes the job. With “daddy” gone, Teddy is the only real anchor left for Delores to take hold of. When he kills himself, that last anchor vanishes, and you can watch her face to see the battle between Delores and Wyatt taking place, almost like She is overwhelmed and can’t process the loss, but he is taking advantage of it and trying to take control. The question I think in the finale will be, who ends up on top and takes control. Or, in the end, I guess, was it all planned beforehand and it doesn’t matter.

That’s my ramble for this week, can’t wait for the next! Take care!
-Jason Stollery

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