Westworld Season 2 is full of flashbacks and time-twists that make it hard to tell what’s
happening.
Let’s figure out the timeline, from the beginning.
Bout thirty-five years ago, Ford and Arnold created Westworld and the hosts.
They got investment from Logan, the son of James Delos.
After Arnold’s son Charlie died, Arnold worked with the host Dolores to bring her
to consciousness, which is symbolised by the Maze.
But Arnold realised that conscious hosts would suffer in the Westworld park.
So he tried to stop the park opening by making Dolores kill the hosts and himself.
The host Akecheta found Arnold’s maze in the aftermath, which started his own path
to consciousness.
At some point, Ford and Dolores created Bernard, a host based on Arnold.
Despite Arnold’s death, Ford opened the park anyway.
A few years later, Logan brings William to the park.
William falls in love with Dolores, but then turns to violence and darkness, becoming the
Man in Black.
William leaves Logan in the desert, and he and James invest more in Westworld.
William builds the Forge in the Valley Beyond.
This place records data on Westworld guests, so they can decode the human mind and make
immortal copies of people . William marries James’ daughter Juliet and takes over the
Delos company.
Logan falls out with his father James, and later dies of an overdose.
When James dies, they make an immortal copy of him, though in a physical body he keeps
breaking down.
So all of this happens in the past.
Thirty years later, Season 1 happens.
After Juliet commits suicide, William visits the Delos clone one last time, then enters
the park and kills Maeve, and becomes obsessed with the Maze.
But the Maze is about host consciousness.
So Dolores awakes by remembering her past.
Maeve awakes, and decides to find her host daughter.
Westworld executives Theresa and Charlotte try to take power from Ford.
Charlotte puts a key to the Forge inside the host Peter Abernathy.
And in the Season 1 finale, Dolores starts a robot uprising.
She kills Ford – but Ford knew this would happen, and has Bernard make a digital backup
of Ford.
That’s Season 1.
Season 2 has two timelines.
Most of the season happens before the Valley floods.
But there’s also the stuff after the flood – with Bernard on the beach, and Karl Strand.
The rest is straightforward.
So Dolores fights her war on humans and hosts.
William faces his past, and ends up killing his daughter Emily.
Akecheta leads hosts to the Door to the Sublime – a digital paradise for hosts.
Maeve goes to Shogunworld, and gets her daughter into the Sublime before Maeve is killed.
Bernard gets caught up with Charlotte looking for Abernathy , then he and Elsie find James
Delos, and the copy of Ford gets in Bernard’s head for a bit.
Dolores attacks the Mesa and gets the Abernathy key.
She goes to the Forge with Bernard and uses its data to learn about the human mind.
Dolores starts the big flood and tries to destroy the Forge and the Sublime , so Bernard
kills her . But then Bernard helps Dolores by putting her mind inside a copied body of
Charlotte.
Bernard scrambles his own memories to hide the truth , lies on the beach –
and wakes up in Episode 1.
Strand looks for Abernathy with Charlotte who by then is actually Dolores.
So when Charlotte finds that Bernard’s a host, and tortures him – that Charlotte
is Dolores – call her Charlores.
The humans drain the Valley and return to the Forge, where Charlores kills Strand.
She decides to help the hosts in the Sublime by satellite transferring them somewhere safe.
Then Dolores kills Bernard, and takes his brain and others out of Westworld.
In Arnold’s old house, Dolores recreates her own body, and Bernard’s, and plans to
take over the re world.
Back in the park, William is still alive – But in some far future timeline , we a copy
of Bill go down an elevator into the old ruined Forge, and meet a host version of Emily.
This William is trapped in a loop – a prison of his own sins.
So that’s what happens in Westworld, but what does it mean?
We’ll answer that in a new video coming soon.
Last episode, Westworld referenced Slaughterhouse-Five – a story that’s also about a guy called
Bill who questions free will and is lost in a twisted timeline.
This book is tragic and weird and hilarious, and you can listen to it for free today by
signing up for a trial at audible.com/asx.
Members get a free book each month, and if you cancel, you keep the books.
They’ve got all the great Vonneguts, and even some Plutarch – who’s also referenced
last episode.
So get as well-read as the Man in Black, and help out Alt Shift X, by signing up at audible.com/asx,
or text asx to 500-500.
Thanks for watching – and thanks to the Patrons, including Amanda Crabtree, Byron
Ollerton, Josh Schenk, Brandon Burt, and Skudn.
Cheers