Westworld Season 4 Episode 1 was very intriguing.
This season has a lot of potential.
There are already several subplots, occurring in different physical locations, different
timelines, and possibly in different realities.
At the end of Season 2, Dolores sent data off to a mystery location.
We now know where that is.
A storage center at the Hoover Dam.
As a reminder, that data had two components.
The Forge Data and the Sublime.
The Forge stored data on four million guests, and the Sublime is another way of saying the
Valley Beyond.
The place were hosts such as Akecheta and Maeve’s daughter went.
At the end of Season 3, Bernard also went into the Sublime.
It’s worth noting that Dolores had begun to delete the Forge Data in Season 2, but
Bernard stopped her.
So some of that data is gone, but there is presumably a lot of valuable data left.
The Man in Black went to the Hoover Dam to buy that data.
So it begs the question: which Man in Black?
At the end of Season 3, Hale had a host Man in Black slit the Man in Black’s throat.
But that doesn’t mean that he is dead.
Maeve sliced Sylvester’s throat in Season 1, and he’s still alive.
So this Man in Black might be the human or he might be a host working for Hale.
Either way, the Man in Black has a problem.
The Man in Black said that the person with the encryption key died.
So he doesn’t know that Dolores had stored the encryption key in Bernard.
That also means that, if this is a host working for Hale, then she doesn’t know that either.
The Man in Black offered to buy the data, but the cartel declined his offer, so he took
it by force.
The man saw flies.
He woke up the next day, and killed his partners.
Then, he killed himself.
That’s the first of three subplots.
The Man in Black now has control of the data stored at the Hoover Dam, but he doesn’t
have the encryption key.
That might actually be related to the next subplot.
Christina.
Serac deleted all of Dolores’s memories at the end of Season 3.
So she’s dead dead.
But she’s back.
At face value, she is a girl named Christina.
She lives in New York City with a roommate named Maya, and she is a writer for a game
company called Olympiad Entertainment.
But is that what’s really happening?
Probably not.
So who brought her back?
And why?
In Season 3, Serac placed Maeve into a construct and tried to get her to tell him the encryption
key.
Hale might be doing something similar to Christina.
Hale might be trying to get Christina to remember the encryption key.
And she might be doing it inside of a construct.
So this world might not even be real.
Maya asked Christina whether she should wear the white shoes or black shoes.
That was a nod back to Westworld.
White hat or black hat.
It may also have been a clue that this was just a game.
A virtual game.
Later, when Christina walked up the stairs, a man told his friend that he couldn’t believe
this was his first time.
He also told him that he knew a spot that would blow his mind.
Those lines implied that the men were playing a game.
That doesn’t necessarily mean that they were in a virtual reality.
They might be playing a game in augmented reality.
But either way, they appeared to be playing a game.
Christina just so happens to write stories for a gaming company.
So here’s the theory that I am going to run with for now.
Hale created a virtual reality world that is a new park.
She is using that world as a way to record data on humans.
And in this game world, Christina is the new Lee Sizemore.
So humans are the players.
And Christina writes stories for non-player characters.
Peter might have been one of those.
At the beginning of the episode, Christina’s boss encouraged her to write tragic stories
such as the one that she had written a couple months back.
In that story, a poor schmuck lost everything.
He drowned in his sorrows.
He stalked some girl.
And everyone died.
A real tearjerker.
Low and behold, that is exactly what happened to Peter.
Peter found Christina and told her that he lost his job and his wife.
That he had thought it was the tower, but it was actually Christina.
Peter believed that Christina had made him do those things.
Peter went on to say that Christina had written his family into the game.
He then told her that he needed his story to change.
Unfortunately, nothing changed.
The next day, Peter ended up jumping off of a roof.
So Christina writes stories for non-player characters.
One of her stories matched up with Peter’s life.
So Peter might have been a non-player character in a virtual construct.
A game.
It’s worth noting that someone drew a maze on her balcony.
So some of the hosts within the construct might be waking up.
A homeless guy mentioned the tower, so he might be waking up.
And then there’s Maya.
At the beginning of the episode, Maya said that she had been having nightmares.
So Maya might also be a host that is waking up inside of a virtual construct.
What about Teddy?
In Season 2, Dolores changed his code so that he would be a better ally in their fight.
Teddy resented that, so he shot himself.
Dolores uploaded his pearl to the Valley Beyond.
Yet now he’s back.
How is that possible?
Dolores created Bernard from her memory of him.
When she got into the real world, she recreated him again.
It would be beautiful if Dolores unknowingly created Teddy out of subconscious memories.
Wouldn’t it be cool if Teddy was the one who drew the Maze?
So this time, Teddy might be helping Dolores wake up.
Unfortunately, there is a darker option.
When Peter attacked Christina, someone showed up and fought him off.
That was probably Teddy.
But did he do it out of love?
Or is he a pawn?
Right after the fight, both Teddy and Peter disappeared.
That was very strange, and it could mean a couple things.
It might be a timeline issue.
Christina might be retracing her steps the way that Dolores did in Season 1.
Another option ties back to the idea of a virtual reality.
Hale might have created a new Teddy to look after Christina.
But not in a good way.
Teddy might be a sort of system control.
When he saw Peter acting up, he grabbed him, and they disappeared.
In other words, Teddy might have brought Peter back to where he should have been on his loop.
Something like that.
The main takeaway for now is that Teddy might not be a good guy.
So let’s keep our guards up.
Now, let’s talk about Ford’s favorite host.
And mine as well.
Maeve.
Maeve dreamt of a memory of her and Caleb destroying a super computer.
As a reminder, the Serac brothers had created at least four versions.
Saul, David, Solomon, and Rehoboam.
So Maeve and Caleb went out and destroyed Saul or David.
They probably destroyed them all.
That was seven years ago.
Maeve moved off of the grid, and Caleb began a family.
Caleb now has a wife and a daughter.
He also has the same job.
He’s still a construction worker.
Caleb’s friend suggested that Rehoboam didn’t tell them who they could be.
It told them who they were.
So Caleb might be struggling with the same question.
Back at home, Caleb’s wife said that she knew that it was not an easy day for Caleb.
So the episode might have taken place on the seven-year anniversary of the revolution.
Caleb was thinking about it.
And so was Maeve.
Maeve had been living off the grid for the last seven years.
In her opening scene, she dreamt of people whom she loved and missed.
Her daughter, Hector, Clementine, and even Caleb.
Maeve had a surge of emotions, which caused a power outage.
That surge also allowed her to be found.
Maeve is a badass, so she killed her attackers.
Afterwards, she plugged herself in to Colonel Brigham’s host control unit so as to read
his memories.
She looked back in time and saw that he and the Man in Black had met with a Senator in
California.
Maeve then went to Caleb’s and arrived just in time to save Caleb and his daughter from
Walter.
As a reminder, Walter was a host from Season 1 who had been programmed to kill Peter Abernathy
and his daughter Dolores.
So someone sent him after Caleb and his daughter.
The parallel to Peter and Dolores cannot be just a coincidence.
Someone was playing a sick game.
Odds are, that someone was Hale.
So the Man in Black took over the data at the dam.
Dolores is back as Christina.
And Maeve and Caleb are headed to California.