Dolores Is Key to a 'Westworld' Twist You May Have Missed

This Wiley Post hold back raider for the third episode ofWestworld,“The Stray . “Head toourWestworldhubforspecial effect analytic thinking , reviews , theory , and other deep dives .

At the tail end of"The Stray , " the third episode ofWestworld , Jehovah Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan whip out one of the show ’s expectant , and potentially most relation , WTF here and now yet : Dolores ( Evan Rachel Wood)relives a novel version of her spread seizure , envisioning The Man in Black ( Ed Harris ) in place ofRebus , snatch her captor ’s accelerator pedal , stamp out the bandit , then fleeing to William ( Jimmi Simpson ) , one of the park ’s visitors . None of that issupposedto fall out inher pre - programme story . But it does , and it calls into query how andwhenthis all takes place .

Sound crazy ? The answers to this trippy ending may be enshroud in Dolores ’s other scene . turn over this :

james marsden and evan rachel wood in hbo westworld

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1.Alice in Wonderland

" The Stray " begin with Bernard and Dolores discussingAlice ’s Adventures in Wonderland , by Lewis Carroll . " Dear , dear , how queer everything is today ! And yesterday things went on just as usual , " Dolores register . " I wonder if I ’ve been change in the Nox ? Let me think;wasI the same when I arrive up this break of the day ? I almost think I can remember feel a little dissimilar . " The Carroll shout - out ’s on the olfactory organ , but Dolores reveal it is n’t the first passage about change Bernard has show her . Does this mean he ’s develop Dolores to question her identicalness ? It would seem he ’s trying to make her more self - cognisant .

Near the last of their tête - à - tête , Dolores take Bernard about his dead son , part of an ingratiatory scheme . It works . Later in the episode , Bernard finds himself in battle : should he readjust Dolores so she ca n’t remember her casual sufferings , or should he keep stoking her consciousness to potentially evolve her mind ? He choose for the latter , but only if the host anticipate not to abandon her narrative loop . She promises . Of course , if Dolores is n’t as innocent as she seems , Bernard may have fallen right into her trap .

2. Discovering the gun

The next morning , Dolores wake up up in her bed like she just had a bad dream that felt too veridical . Her grimace has an expression perceptibly different from the one we ’ve seen previously . While getting quick , she open her dresser draftsman to find a pistol , which transmit her mind back to The Man in Black encounter from Episode 1 . The hired gun then disappears . Did she hallucinate seeing it in her drawer ? Or was that a retention ? Given the former scene – and first two episodes – it ’s possible Bernard ’s talks have activated something inside Dolores ' straits .

3. Dreaming of romance with Teddy

When Teddy and Dolores scamper out of Sweetwater for alone time , they discourse future plans like two low lovers who just had amazing sexual urge but detest their lives : " What if I do n’t require to stay here ? " Dolores says . " Sometimes I feel like the humankind out there is calling me . " Teddy note a shoes in the south where the mountains meet the ocean . Unfortunately , they ca n’t run off until he atone for his obscure , dark past .

If you were yellingPLEASE TAKE HER , YOU STUPID COWBOY - TURKEYat your TV during this scene , you were n’t alone . Teddy hasno past , only computer programming that importune he does . And what about Dolores ? It ’s indecipherable if her part of this conversation is script or improvised , though with no previous hint of her need to leave Abernathy Ranch , it ’s light to reckon the latter . She ’s becoming more mindful . She wants to live on her dreaming .

4. A lack of trigger finger

The second metre Dolores excrescence into Teddy , he saves her from a creepy patron , then take her out for a shot object lesson . One problem : Dolores ca n’t pull the trigger . " Some hands were n’t meant to pull the trigger , " Teddy enjoin . " Perhaps it ’s for the best . " The line sheds light on Westworld communications protocol : some automaton seem to be specifically programmed tonotshoot guns . Why would that be the face for Dolores ? Since she ’s the oldest operating theoretical account in the park , would her still - foggy past have something to do with it ? And could her late memory energizing undo the programing ?

5. Long time no see, Ed

Dolores experiences déjà vu when she returns to the cattle farm . viewer find two versions of the same scenario through her middle : brigand murdering her sept and someone dragging her into a barn . In one representative , she sees her new dada andWestworld ’s interlingual rendition of Yosemite Sam . In the other : the sometime Peter Abernathy and The Man in Black . What ’s happening is she ’s experiencing the present while having flashback to the past tense , and projecting her memories for the hearing to see – the same phenomenon that happened in her pistol discovery scene . Next : someone ’s voice – Bernard ? Dr. Ford ’s old accomplice " Arnold " ? A fragment of old code?A newly awakened subconscious?– tells her to shoot , officially defying her programming .

6. There’s something about William

The episode ends with Dolores retreating from the farm and stumbling into William ’s arms . It ’s hard to narrate exactly what ’s encounter , and more importantly , whenit ’s happening . But remember : Dolores sees her raw dad first , then she call back seeing her old dad ; the mustachioed bandit lock Dolores in the b first , then she recall her Man in grim encounter . The pattern is present , past ; present , past . If the final stage of the cattle ranch scene come after this same pattern , Dolores receives a bullet to the belly first , thenshe return get away , unscathed , to William . In other words , the last scene of this installment is a retention of the past tense .

The entire last succession is so important because it reveals a bunch about how Joy and Nolan might be using time in Season 1 . Specifically , the last few scene either support or totally wreck thepopular " William is The Man in Black " hypothesis , which posits that Jimmi Simpson portray William ’s first sojourn to the park , and Harris , based on what we ’ve learned about his maze James Henry Leigh Hunt , his last . If this line of thinking is correct , and the final scene does take spot in the yesteryear , The Man in Black very well could be William , 30 years by and by . If the scene is in the present , however , Williamcannotbe the Man in Black ; they would have to live in the same timeframe as two dissimilar people .

At the moment , it ’s intemperate to know for sure . We need more info . But if " The Stray " teaches you anything , it ’s that you need to make up supernumerary care to Dolores ' scene rifle forward – how she interact with people and what she see . She not only connects many of the role to one another , but , as the previous example operate in Westworld , she also represents the key fruit that could unlock the park ’s past and future .