Westworld: The shocking twists of “Generation Loss,” reviewed and explained

Bernard’s secret weapon

In retrospect, it shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that Westworld pulled a fast one on us with timelines once again. This was one of the things season 1 did so well, so it’s nice to see it come back in a cool way in season 4.

In short, all the events we saw with Caleb, Maeve, William, Charlotte, and Caleb’s family happened 23 years in the past. Which means that Bernard (Jeffrey Wright) is in the present; he wasn’t in the Sublime for seven years, he was in it for 30.

This puts the resistance fighters he and Stubbs (Luke Hemsworth) have been hanging around with into a new context. After Stubbs and the resistance leader (played by Daniel Wu) go off on their own with most of their forces, Bernard and C (Aurora Perrineau) set out to find the weapon. We discover that C has a personal motive for digging in this desert, and it’s not about whatever Bernard is helping her find.

Here come the next set of reveals: C is actually Caleb’s daughter Frankie, all grown up. The reason she’s insistent on digging in this desert is because it was where the roaring ’20s park used to be; specifically, it’s the construction site that Maeve blew up. Frankie never saw her father’s body, and believes if he truly died in the park there should be one buried in the desert somewhere.

Bernard reveals that he knows all this, and confirms that Caleb is dead. He does indeed find a body…but it’s not Caleb’s. It’s Maeve, the “weapon” he promised.

While shows like Stranger Things and The Boys have pulled their punches on shocker deaths, I have to admit I don’t particularly mind the way that Westworld handled Caleb and Maeve coming back years later in this episode. There’s a feeling that both of them lost their lives that day; no matter how Maeve comes back, or Caleb escapes Charlotte, too much time has passed for things to ever go back to how they were.

Christina’s blind date

Finally, we have to talk about Christina, who is back after not appearing at all in the preceding episode. Let’s establish something out of the gate: since Olympiad Entertainment is the building where Caleb was being tested during the episode’s climactic moments, that means everything we’ve seen with Christina is also likely taking place in this far future timeline (which will henceforth become the present).

Now that we know Charlotte basically controls the human population, the bigger picture surrounding Christina’s story makes more sense. Christina works for Olympiad, writing narratives for humans. And management is actively pushing for those narratives to be bloody, brutal, and to end in tragedy, presumably as revenge for the pain humans caused hosts over the years. Pretty grim.

But since that reveal came in the episode’s closing moments, it’s likely to have much bigger ramifications next week. This time around, Christina has been painting the tower in the middle of the night and is being set up for yet another blind date by her roommate Maya (Ariana DeBose) — who, coincidentally, has been having nightmares about being swarmed by flies. Christina is characteristically resistant, and if I’m being honest I was kind of with her. It was hard to feel too invested in this seemingly mundane plotline when the rest of the show is so intense.

But then we see who Christina’s date is and things start getting interesting fast. She drops her lipstick on the ground, and it rolls over to hit the foot of none other than Teddy (James Marsden), mirroring their loop from Westworld. The banter between Marsden and Wood is so natural and refreshing; their characters haven’t really had any good times together since season 1.

Despite the fact that Christina is seemingly oblivious about her connection to Dolores or Westworld, Teddy seems to remember them all. He tells Christina he used to be a “bounty hunter with a heart of gold,” and a few other lines that make it clear that while he’s not going to spill the beans to her, he knows exactly who she is and what they meant to each other.

This is a super-interesting development. In the season premiere we saw Teddy defend Dolores from the guy who was stalking her. Now we find out that he’s the same Teddy who used to exist in Westworld. Did Charlotte (who, let’s not forget, is a copy of Dolores) finally get a soft spot for her old self and rebuild Teddy and OG Dolores so that they can have that “happy ending” Christina is pining after?

We doubt it’s anything so simple; this is Westworld, after all. But after how crazy “Generation Loss” was, it’s a lot easier to be confident that the answer will be satisfying when it’s inevitably revealed.

Verdict

“Generation Loss” was easily the most mind-blowing episode of Westworld’s fourth season so far. This is the mid-season turning point; it wrapped up one leg of the story in spectacular fashion while laying groundwork for conflict ahead. Considering the sheer number of twists that were delivered in the show’s closing minutes, it’s a testament to how good the writing is that everything was conveyed as coherently as it was. It feels safe to say that Westworld is back in the game.

Episode Grade: A

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