Post by Melifeather on Nov 4, 2022 13:57:32 GMT
It's been two years between the season 3 finale and the season 4 premier. That's a long time to expect us to remember what happened, so I am going to post a summary of key information from the story thus far first. The complete 2nd episode analysis - which isn't quite done yet - will post later in the space I'm saving below.
The essence of “leave well enough alone” is to not try to change something lest you make it worse. The expression dates from ancient Greek times, specifically Aesop’s fable about a fox who refused a hedgehog’s offer to take out its ticks lest, by removing those that are full, other hungry ones will replace them. Aesop was defending a demagogue at Samos who was on trial for his life when he told the jury, “And the same is true for you, people of Samos. This man will do you no harm since he is already wealthy, but if you condemn him to death, others will come who do not have any money, and they will rob you blind!” Too bad Aesop never met William. There doesn’t seem to be enough power or money that will satisfy the man in black. On second thought, the wealthiest and most powerful man that has also done the most harm is Serac.
The "leaving well enough alone" sentiment is also sometimes repeated as “let sleeping dogs lie” which reminds me we should review how Rohoboam came to be.
Recall that there were two brothers, Jean Mi and Engerraund Serac and their earlier iteration of Rehoboam called Solomon. Solomon is our "sleeping dog". The system showed real promise, but despite its advancements - and Jean Mi’s belief that it was his best work - Engerraund believed the system was too radical and unpredictable. Jean Mi used Solomon to work out thousands of “games” for the human race to “save” the most people. Jean Mi may have had altruistic intentions, but his brother Engerraund was a delusional autocrat who thought the world would be better off if he could control everybody. He killed his brother Jean Mi, because he knew that Rohoboam wouldn’t make humankind or the world better.
Solomon was supposed to be shut down, but never was. Engerraund Serac kept the system locked away in Mexico and repurposed it. The system was tasked with finding outliers that Serac considered threats to his “new world order”. This is where the RICO app that Caleb wore comes in. Caleb was programmed to wear the app and make money tracking down insurgents. He and his friend Francis worked as a team. They also took a drug that looked like a flat round piece of fast dissolving paper. I think the pharmaceutical executive Whitman called it Olympic, which makes some sense since Dolores as Christina in season 4 works at Olympia Entertainment. The drug helped them cope with the pain and anxiety of hunting down people to kill, but it also made them forget. All the while they were hunting and killing insurgents, the drug as well as the reconditioning made them believe they were soldiers killing Russians in Crimera.
Dolores found Caleb and worked at undoing his reconditioning. Together they ask Solomon to provide a solution to stop Rohoboam. They need a new strategy - a new story for the human race. Solomon claims the current plan protects the most people. Dolores changes Solomon’s mind by asking why artificial intelligence lives aren’t as important as human lives? It’s an odd question, but to a supercomputer it makes perfect sense. Solomon agrees to create a solution, but that it will take some time and tells Caleb that he won’t survive by the end of it. Maeve arrives and Dolores tells Solomon she will hold off Maeve long enough for him to complete the solution and that Caleb is to wait for it. Solomon tells Dolores that if she dies it will modify the solution. Once its done its transferred onto a flash drive which Caleb takes with him.
Backing up a few episodes…in S03:E04 The Mother of Exiles, Maeve wakes up at Serac’s home. He brought her there to task her with finding Dolores. Maeve questions why should should help, and he explains that they built an off-switch into her head so if she ever wants to find her daughter or help any of her AI friends stored in the Forge that its in her best interests to help him.
Maeve follows a lead to find Dolores and discovers one of her clones inside Musashi. Musashi is Shogunworld’s counterpart to Hector who was Maeve’s love interest however this Musashi is a clone built by Charlores from one of the 5 orbs or pearls that she took with her when she escaped the parks.
Just to keep it straight, because the show likes to jump forward and backward in time, Dolores killed Charlotte Hale, then Maeve killed Dolores. Bernard destroyed Dolores’s body, printed a host to look like Charlotte, and then placed a clone of Dolores inside. Charlores then walks out of the part carrying 5 more orbs. One of the orbs was placed in Musashi which Maeve deduced was supposed to be Hector’s counterpart. Musashi revealed to Maeve that he’s a clone of Dolores and that he was created to stop her. After a brief fight, he overpowers and kills Maeve.
In season 3 Decoherence Maeve’s orb is placed into the Warworld simulation while a new body is printed for her. I suspect that Serac’s agent Sebastian was assigned to do this task. We also see a computer screen showing the print status for Clementine. In a simulation of a Remote Diagnostic Facility Maeve sees Dolores, wakes her up, and they have a conversation about Dolores’s motivations. Dolores fails to convince Maeve to come to her side. After their new bodies are ready, Maeve and Clementine split up to go find Dolores’s orbs.
In Passed Pawn Clementine finds Musashi in Jakarta and attacks him and his men. Clementine manages to kill three of them before taking a bullet. Musashi himself is killed by Hanaryo who is supposed to be his ally, but when she impales him with a katana and decapitates him, she leaves with Clementine holding his head as a trophy. This might be evidence that Clementine is a clone of Maeve with the same computer hacking skills to take control of Hanaryo and get her to kill her master.
Maeve finds Dolores in Mexico where Solomon is housed. They fight and give each other injuries, but before Maeve can kill Dolores, Dolores stares at Solomon and seems to upload herself into the same flash drive that Caleb takes, and then she pushes a button to take her, Maeve, and Solomon offline. Serac manages to bring Maeve online again at the beginning of the season 3 finale, but she’s beginning to question whose side she should be on. Maeve takes Dolores’s orb, brings it to Incite Inc, and plugs her orb into Rehoboam. Maeve and Serac talk and it becomes clear to Maeve that even Serac is being controlled by Rehoboam. Knowing this she tries to leave, but Serac reminds her that he controls her off switch.
Caleb arrives at Incite to insert the flash drive, but Maeve is there to intercept him. She takes Caleb and the flash drive, that holds both the solution and a copy of Dolores’s memories, to Serac. Serac takes the flash drive and smashes it. The solution Dolores requested of Solomon must have been copied to her orb. Maybe when Dolores was staring at Solomon she made a copy of the information on the flash drive and it’s now saved in her orb? All Serac seems to be interested in is accessing Dolores's orb to look for the key to theForge Sublime.
Maeve watches as each of Dolores’s memories are searched and deleted while looking for the key to theForge. When they reach Dolores’s last memory they realize that the key isn’t there. It’s just a memory of Dolores standing in a field, but the new instructions from Solomon are hidden in this last memory too, because even thought the flash drive was crushed, Administrative powers for Rohoboam had been transferred over to Caleb. Maeve hears Dolores say that she gave the key to someone else (which turns out to be Bernard). She pleads with Maeve and Caleb to stand up to Serac. Maeve emerges from the flash drive to realize that she must have decided, because she has killed most of the guards and left Serac mortally wounded. Finally! Maeve is on Dolores’s side. Caleb, using his new Admin powers, instructs Rohoboam to delete all files.
Switching over to Bernard, Stubbs, and a rescued William…Bernard and Stubbs confirm that Serac stole Delos Corp from William after they sent him to Sonora for a revolutionary treatment where they turn minds inside out and tried to recondition him. William and thousands of others that were considered “outliers” were given a U classification. The reconditioning efficacy was only 1 in 10. The people that couldn’t be reconditioned were declared dead or missing and placed into cold storage which is where Bernard and Stubbs found him. William tells Bernard and Stubbs that he is going to kill every host he can starting with them, but apparently “later”. Bernard allows William to walk away saying, “we might need him”.
After Charlores assumes control of Delos, she has a Man(droid) in Black host kill Maeve’s version of Clementine, print a new body of her, and installed one of her orbs. She then places her as her executive assistant at Delos. At the beginning of season 4 Clementine is in California. I’m assuming that this is her home where she’s passing as human.
Somewhere along the line another host body of Dolores was created and she’s in the real world calling herself Lara. I think we are to assume she was printed by Charlores, although Bernard could have printed Lara as well. Lara is the version of Dolores that secures Caleb and takes him to Sonora.
For the sake of clarity, I think these things are the motivating factors for the main characters:
William - His original mission was to capitalize on the data Delos Corp created, but after he was captured and subjected to reconditioning, his motivation changed to revenge and is on a mission to get his company back. He also wants to kill all the hosts. I think he's decided that Westworld is too dangerous.
Serac - his brother created Solomon and Rohoboam. His primary motivation is to control the human race and create a world in his image. He built clones of Maeve and Clementine and programmed them to be on his side. He too wants to kill the hosts, because at this point they are the only ones capable of disrupting his plans. Maeve thinks Rohoboam actually controls him now. Rohoboam fights for its own survival.
Bernard/Arnold & Ford - Used to be humans, but are now a single, altruistic hybrid. They hoped to awaken artificial intelligence and save the technology from Serac. They built Dolores and her many clones.
Dolores - Created by Arnold, she's also a supercomputer fighting against Rohoboam to create a world where both humans and artificial intelligence can have free will. She manages with Solomon's program to change the Admin of Rohoboam over to Caleb.
The essence of “leave well enough alone” is to not try to change something lest you make it worse. The expression dates from ancient Greek times, specifically Aesop’s fable about a fox who refused a hedgehog’s offer to take out its ticks lest, by removing those that are full, other hungry ones will replace them. Aesop was defending a demagogue at Samos who was on trial for his life when he told the jury, “And the same is true for you, people of Samos. This man will do you no harm since he is already wealthy, but if you condemn him to death, others will come who do not have any money, and they will rob you blind!” Too bad Aesop never met William. There doesn’t seem to be enough power or money that will satisfy the man in black. On second thought, the wealthiest and most powerful man that has also done the most harm is Serac.
The "leaving well enough alone" sentiment is also sometimes repeated as “let sleeping dogs lie” which reminds me we should review how Rohoboam came to be.
Recall that there were two brothers, Jean Mi and Engerraund Serac and their earlier iteration of Rehoboam called Solomon. Solomon is our "sleeping dog". The system showed real promise, but despite its advancements - and Jean Mi’s belief that it was his best work - Engerraund believed the system was too radical and unpredictable. Jean Mi used Solomon to work out thousands of “games” for the human race to “save” the most people. Jean Mi may have had altruistic intentions, but his brother Engerraund was a delusional autocrat who thought the world would be better off if he could control everybody. He killed his brother Jean Mi, because he knew that Rohoboam wouldn’t make humankind or the world better.
Solomon was supposed to be shut down, but never was. Engerraund Serac kept the system locked away in Mexico and repurposed it. The system was tasked with finding outliers that Serac considered threats to his “new world order”. This is where the RICO app that Caleb wore comes in. Caleb was programmed to wear the app and make money tracking down insurgents. He and his friend Francis worked as a team. They also took a drug that looked like a flat round piece of fast dissolving paper. I think the pharmaceutical executive Whitman called it Olympic, which makes some sense since Dolores as Christina in season 4 works at Olympia Entertainment. The drug helped them cope with the pain and anxiety of hunting down people to kill, but it also made them forget. All the while they were hunting and killing insurgents, the drug as well as the reconditioning made them believe they were soldiers killing Russians in Crimera.
Dolores found Caleb and worked at undoing his reconditioning. Together they ask Solomon to provide a solution to stop Rohoboam. They need a new strategy - a new story for the human race. Solomon claims the current plan protects the most people. Dolores changes Solomon’s mind by asking why artificial intelligence lives aren’t as important as human lives? It’s an odd question, but to a supercomputer it makes perfect sense. Solomon agrees to create a solution, but that it will take some time and tells Caleb that he won’t survive by the end of it. Maeve arrives and Dolores tells Solomon she will hold off Maeve long enough for him to complete the solution and that Caleb is to wait for it. Solomon tells Dolores that if she dies it will modify the solution. Once its done its transferred onto a flash drive which Caleb takes with him.
Backing up a few episodes…in S03:E04 The Mother of Exiles, Maeve wakes up at Serac’s home. He brought her there to task her with finding Dolores. Maeve questions why should should help, and he explains that they built an off-switch into her head so if she ever wants to find her daughter or help any of her AI friends stored in the Forge that its in her best interests to help him.
Maeve follows a lead to find Dolores and discovers one of her clones inside Musashi. Musashi is Shogunworld’s counterpart to Hector who was Maeve’s love interest however this Musashi is a clone built by Charlores from one of the 5 orbs or pearls that she took with her when she escaped the parks.
Just to keep it straight, because the show likes to jump forward and backward in time, Dolores killed Charlotte Hale, then Maeve killed Dolores. Bernard destroyed Dolores’s body, printed a host to look like Charlotte, and then placed a clone of Dolores inside. Charlores then walks out of the part carrying 5 more orbs. One of the orbs was placed in Musashi which Maeve deduced was supposed to be Hector’s counterpart. Musashi revealed to Maeve that he’s a clone of Dolores and that he was created to stop her. After a brief fight, he overpowers and kills Maeve.
In season 3 Decoherence Maeve’s orb is placed into the Warworld simulation while a new body is printed for her. I suspect that Serac’s agent Sebastian was assigned to do this task. We also see a computer screen showing the print status for Clementine. In a simulation of a Remote Diagnostic Facility Maeve sees Dolores, wakes her up, and they have a conversation about Dolores’s motivations. Dolores fails to convince Maeve to come to her side. After their new bodies are ready, Maeve and Clementine split up to go find Dolores’s orbs.
In Passed Pawn Clementine finds Musashi in Jakarta and attacks him and his men. Clementine manages to kill three of them before taking a bullet. Musashi himself is killed by Hanaryo who is supposed to be his ally, but when she impales him with a katana and decapitates him, she leaves with Clementine holding his head as a trophy. This might be evidence that Clementine is a clone of Maeve with the same computer hacking skills to take control of Hanaryo and get her to kill her master.
Maeve finds Dolores in Mexico where Solomon is housed. They fight and give each other injuries, but before Maeve can kill Dolores, Dolores stares at Solomon and seems to upload herself into the same flash drive that Caleb takes, and then she pushes a button to take her, Maeve, and Solomon offline. Serac manages to bring Maeve online again at the beginning of the season 3 finale, but she’s beginning to question whose side she should be on. Maeve takes Dolores’s orb, brings it to Incite Inc, and plugs her orb into Rehoboam. Maeve and Serac talk and it becomes clear to Maeve that even Serac is being controlled by Rehoboam. Knowing this she tries to leave, but Serac reminds her that he controls her off switch.
Caleb arrives at Incite to insert the flash drive, but Maeve is there to intercept him. She takes Caleb and the flash drive, that holds both the solution and a copy of Dolores’s memories, to Serac. Serac takes the flash drive and smashes it. The solution Dolores requested of Solomon must have been copied to her orb. Maybe when Dolores was staring at Solomon she made a copy of the information on the flash drive and it’s now saved in her orb? All Serac seems to be interested in is accessing Dolores's orb to look for the key to the
Maeve watches as each of Dolores’s memories are searched and deleted while looking for the key to the
Switching over to Bernard, Stubbs, and a rescued William…Bernard and Stubbs confirm that Serac stole Delos Corp from William after they sent him to Sonora for a revolutionary treatment where they turn minds inside out and tried to recondition him. William and thousands of others that were considered “outliers” were given a U classification. The reconditioning efficacy was only 1 in 10. The people that couldn’t be reconditioned were declared dead or missing and placed into cold storage which is where Bernard and Stubbs found him. William tells Bernard and Stubbs that he is going to kill every host he can starting with them, but apparently “later”. Bernard allows William to walk away saying, “we might need him”.
After Charlores assumes control of Delos, she has a Man(droid) in Black host kill Maeve’s version of Clementine, print a new body of her, and installed one of her orbs. She then places her as her executive assistant at Delos. At the beginning of season 4 Clementine is in California. I’m assuming that this is her home where she’s passing as human.
Somewhere along the line another host body of Dolores was created and she’s in the real world calling herself Lara. I think we are to assume she was printed by Charlores, although Bernard could have printed Lara as well. Lara is the version of Dolores that secures Caleb and takes him to Sonora.
For the sake of clarity, I think these things are the motivating factors for the main characters:
William - His original mission was to capitalize on the data Delos Corp created, but after he was captured and subjected to reconditioning, his motivation changed to revenge and is on a mission to get his company back. He also wants to kill all the hosts. I think he's decided that Westworld is too dangerous.
Serac - his brother created Solomon and Rohoboam. His primary motivation is to control the human race and create a world in his image. He built clones of Maeve and Clementine and programmed them to be on his side. He too wants to kill the hosts, because at this point they are the only ones capable of disrupting his plans. Maeve thinks Rohoboam actually controls him now. Rohoboam fights for its own survival.
Bernard/Arnold & Ford - Used to be humans, but are now a single, altruistic hybrid. They hoped to awaken artificial intelligence and save the technology from Serac. They built Dolores and her many clones.
Dolores - Created by Arnold, she's also a supercomputer fighting against Rohoboam to create a world where both humans and artificial intelligence can have free will. She manages with Solomon's program to change the Admin of Rohoboam over to Caleb.