Warning: Major spoilers for “Westworld” below. Stop reading now unless you’ve watched the Season 1 finale!
When “Westworld” Season 1 cuts to its final black on Sunday, gunfire is just beginning to spread through the futuristic theme park as hosts turn on their human overlords, led by the newly conscious Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood). After Dolores shoots Dr. Ford (Anthony Hopkins) from behind just as she shot his partner Arnold over 30 years before, William (Ed Harris) is shot in the arm, joyously getting to see what the end of the Maze looks like, the command center goes into lockdown mode, and Teddy ... looks on, confused as ever.
The good news is that ― although it likely won’t be out until 2018 ― HBO has renewed “Westworld” for Season 2. Here’s what to expect.
The park will be closed for a while, and we aren’t sure how many guests are still inside.
Just after Episode 10 aired, HBO’s companion sites DiscoverWestworld.com and DelosIncorporated.com began “malfunctioning” to reflect the chaos in the park. (Or, rather, Park 1.) A chat with formerly chipper host Aeden on the Westworld tourism site leads to the following hints at what’s to come:
The park won’t be taking reservations for a long time to come, and you have to take responsibility for your small part in that. Wyatt will be coming to collect.
It hasn’t taken long for the hosts’ revolutionary mission to spread throughout the park, where there are an untold number of living humans still inside. And, by the way, the year all of this goes down appears to be 2052. An eagle-eyed Reddit user found a date stamp on a bit of footage while rooting around the official sites.
Dolores is out, and “Wyatt” is in.
When she finally found the center of the maze, Dolores knew what she had to do — this time it is her choice. Wyatt has arrived.
Wyatt, it turns out, is something of Dolores’ murderous alter ego, whom she unlocks after achieving consciousness.
Speaking about the show, Wood hinted that the real drama actually begins in Season 2, going so far as to call the whole of Season 1 “backstory and set up” in an interview with Indiewire.
William, aka the Man in Black, will return in Season 2 for a real adventure.
Harris has already stated he’ll be back for Season 2, which begins filming this summer. (So it seems like that really was only a flesh wound on his arm.) Aeden suggests enigmatically that “time will tell if he’s truly prepared to meet what’s at the center.”
Elsie (Shannon Woodward) might still be around after all.
An Easter egg on DelosIncorporated.com shows Elsie still online, in Sector 20 of the park, despite her grim interaction with Bernard (Jeffrey Wright) in Sector 3. Unless, of course, her tablet is being used by someone else after Bernard strangled her. But another hidden gem ― a voice recording of Elsie saying “Hello?” ― gives us more reason to hold out hope.
If Elsie is still around, that could mean Stubbs (Luke Hemsworth) has managed to survive his apparent abduction, too.
Dr. Ford, however, is a different story ― although there’s a pretty clever way he could also find his way back into the script.
Westworld is just one of at least two themed parks.
The clues are there in Episode 10: When Arnold awakens Dolores, he welcomes her to “the world,” not “Westworld,” and when Felix (Leonardo Nam) gives Maeve the location of her daughter, he writes “Park 1,” suggesting the existence of a Park 2 and perhaps others.
Later, Felix, Maeve (Thandie Newton) and Hector (Rodrigo Santoro) stumble into another host testing area, with doors labeled “SW,” not “WW” for “Westworld.” Inside, the hosts don heavy armor and fight with long swords. (”Samuraiworld”?)
Reddit sleuths have also uncovered several key words ― “future world,” “roman world,” “medieval world” ― suggesting other themed areas might appear in Season 2. The original 1973 movie featured a Wild West park, but also Roman-themed and medieval-themed areas, so it’d make sense. (Side note: DiscoverSamuraiworld.com redirects to the “Westworld” subreddit.)
Bernard must discover who he is, separate from Arnold.
Aeden has the following eerie message to share regarding Bernard:
Bernard was created in Arnold’s image, but he’ll have to figure out what that means for his future.
Arnold was the one who made all of this possible. If only he could see us now…
Perhaps the park can help its hosts on their own journeys to self-discovery ― the same way it does for its human guests.
Maeve is definitely on a mission to find her fictional daughter.
Asking Aeden about Maeve yields the following reply:
Maeve is in the Mesa, her whereabouts are not your concern. The security panel is offline, so don’t bother trying to track her. [Finding her daughter] is Maeve’s narrative to play out.
By the finale, however, it seems as if Maeve’s uprising is still part of a pre-set narrative. Despite her assurances that she’s in control, Bernard was able to find her path of action listed out in her profile. If that were Ford’s doing (which seems likely) that would make Maeve’s whole revolt a diversion to sneak the decommissioned hosts out of cold storage ― not the result of her achieving consciousness. At least, not yet.
Before You Go
