The third season of Westworld took the show into uncharted territory, with Dolores and the other hosts finally out of the titular park and let loose on the real world, our world. As it ends up, the people of the future are just as oppressed and penned in as the hosts were back in the park, with systems of control regulating everything they do from behind the scenes. The season spent its time exploring what that meant for Dolores and company, and ended with several huge moves that promise a very different season 4.
Caution SPOILERS for Westworld season 3 follow.
The biggest twist of all may come at the very end of the season, in a stinger. Throughout the season, William (Ed Harris), the president of Delos, had been trying to get a handle on what he saw as hosts invading the human world, eventually vowing to kill every last one of them. But before he could get that plan going, he was killed, suddenly and violently, by a host version of himself, dressed as he used to be when he would wreck havoc in Westworld as the Man in Black.
Clearly, the show is setting up the Host in Black as a major villain in season 4, controlled by Halores (Tessa Thompson, playing a copy of Dolores Abernathy occupying a host body modeled after former Delos exec Charlotte Hale). By the end of season 3, Dolores seemed to have come around to the idea that maybe humans weren’t entirely bad, and didn’t deserve to be utterly wiped out. Halores isn’t as generous. And if she built the Host in Black, he isn’t either.
Earlier today, The Paley Center for Media hosted a roundtable discussion about Westworld with the cast and crew, and showrunner Jonathan Nolan teased where this all might be going. “I’m a big believer in being guided by irony,” he said. “ winds up becoming this thing that he’s controlled for so long. And on a visceral level, I just can’t wait to watch Ed kill everyone.”
Harris seemed pretty psyched about the idea, too. “I was happy to get back in my black suit,” he said. “I have no idea what they have planned for me, but we’ll see. I’m teamed with Tessa, I know. Hopefully, we can do some rightful damage somewhere.”
It certainly sounds like everyone is planning for a bloody fourth season, which sounds like it could be the show’s last, with the Host in Black serving as Halores’ personal enforcer. And I’d be down for that, although I was a little disappointed that we’ll no longer be watching the character we know. It seemed like they were building William up to play a major part in the fourth season only for him to go down before he could really get going.
But I’m sure I’ll be over that by the time Westworld season 4 gets here, which may be a while. The show took long breaks between seasons to begin with, and the coronavirus has likely slowed things down further.
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