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[Mariolee]

That is absolutely the best way to make what is a glaringly obvious fan theory (Bernard = Host) and still execute it perfectly even without the surprise.

So let me summarize all of the theories that are in play right now brought up in this thread in terms of Bernard:

1. Bernard is Arnold. That is the reason why this picture is off center. Explained by reddit user ndotny:

"Now that we know the guy standing next to Ford in the photograph from Ep. 3 was probably an early design host that Arnold made (which Bernard came across in the latest ep.), a theory I've had for a while about the photo seems more likely....
I'm thinking that Bernard as others have suggested IS a host modeled after/uploaded from Arnold himself ...

so when Bernard was shown the photograph, what he was actually looking at was a picture of three people: (from left to right) they were Ford (Hopkins), the early host (tall guy who attacked Bernard), and Arnold (Jeffrey Wright!). But because what he was seeing wouldn't/didn't make sense to Bernard, the photo we're shown (from Bernard's POV) is just the off-centered images of Ford and the tall host ... and a blank space where someone else was standing on the right.

Just like Dolores, Bernard's seeing himself in the image as Arnold wouldn't have made sense to his programming -- and therefore "doesn't look like anything." A blank spot in the photo."

2. Bernard Lowe may be an anagram of Arnold's full name if Arnold's last name is "Weber".

3. The scenes where Bernard is talking to Delores are actually Arnold talking to Delores. This is supported by the fact that this is the same room that we discovered in this latest episode except that it's empty instead of having the machines to produce more hosts. We also see that Bernard is talking to Delores while she's fully clothed which is at odds with how he talks to other hosts as they are naked. We know Arnold had a different approach to talking to hosts, so keeping their clothes on may be an indication of that. At the same time in this flashback, "Bernard" talks to Delores about the maze, something we know that only Ford and Arnold (and MIB) know.

From More_Badass:

3.5) Arnold would treat the hosts differently, hence the scenes where Bernard is talking to a clothed Dolores. Ford makes a point of enforcing to Bernard that the hosts aren't real and don't need to be covered up, as in keeping him from moving toward Arnold's mindset

4) Arnold's life was marred by personal tragedy, aka "Bernard''s son dying

5) "You mustn't make Arnold's mistake"
"Why would I?"

Anything else I missed?

 

[sangreal]

What's Ford's endgame though...

He just wants to tell his stories man

 

[Einchy]

HEY REMEMBER WHEN I SAID THIS SHOW WAS DISHONEST?

I wish I was wrong!!!!

Lol.

That's enough, Duckroll. Mustn't get yourself worked up.

 

[XAL]

I wonder what Ford's ultimate goal is now that we see what he is capable of.

I think he's been snatching Delos employees (possibly even guests - remember that DNA left behind is property of the park/Delos...) and making copies of them and putting them out into the world to do his bidding.

 

[Woo-Fu]

"What door?"

massive lightbulb going on across the world.

 

[Einchy]

"What door?"

massive lightbulb going on across the world.

The music queue there was great.

 

[More_Badass]

That is absolutely the best way to make what is a glaringly obvious fan theory (Bernard = Host) and still execute it perfectly even without the surprise.

So let me summarize all of the theories that are in play right now brought up in this thread in terms of Bernard:

1. Bernard is Arnold. That is the reason why this picture is off center. Explained by reddit user ndotny:

"Now that we know the guy standing next to Ford in the photograph from Ep. 3 was probably an early design host that Arnold made (which Bernard came across in the latest ep.), a theory I've had for a while about the photo seems more likely....
I'm thinking that Bernard as others have suggested IS a host modeled after/uploaded from Arnold himself ...

so when Bernard was shown the photograph, what he was actually looking at was a picture of three people: (from left to right) they were Ford (Hopkins), the early host (tall guy who attacked Bernard), and Arnold (Jeffrey Wright!). But because what he was seeing wouldn't/didn't make sense to Bernard, the photo we're shown (from Bernard's POV) is just the off-centered images of Ford and the tall host ... and a blank space where someone else was standing on the right.

Just like Dolores, Bernard's seeing himself in the image as Arnold wouldn't have made sense to his programming -- and therefore "doesn't look like anything." A blank spot in the photo."

2. Bernard Lowe may be an anagram of Arnold's full name if Arnold's last name is "Weber".

3. The scenes where Bernard is talking to Delores are actually Arnold talking to Delores. This is supported by the fact that this is the same room that we discovered in this latest episode except that it's empty instead of having the machines to produce more hosts. We also see that Bernard is talking to Delores while she's fully clothed which is at odds with how he talks to other hosts as they are naked. We know Arnold had a different approach to talking to hosts, so keeping their clothes on may be an indication of that.

Anything I missed?

A bit more

2) "You mustn't make Arnold's mistake"
"Why would I?"

3) Arnold would treat the hosts differently, hence the scenes where Bernard is talking to a clothed Dolores. Ford makes a point of enforcing to Bernard that the hosts aren't real and don't need to be covered up, as in keeping him from moving toward Arnold's mindset

4) Arnold's life was marred by personal tragedy, aka "Bernard''s son dying

 

[Vulcano's assistant]

If Bernard is based on Arnold, then what begs the question is whether any of Bernard's memories are in part Arnold's, and Arnold had a son that died. That could be a motive for creating hosts, or the reason he went away.

 

[duckroll]

Honestly, I don't think I liked this episode much at all. There were a lot of scenes with a whole lot of nothing in them. The corporate plot seems like it was just injected into the narrative started last week, I don't find it interesting or well written so far, and the Bernard reveal is just lol. I know it was foreshadowed, I know it's plausible, but it's still pretty stupid. There was some nice tension in the last scenes because Hopkins is fucking god-tier though, and the "what door" and "that doesn't seem anything to me" lines were pretty good, but at this point I just want the "reveals" to be over with so we can get to stuff moving forward. Maeve's "plan" totally stalled this week she went from going "I wanna make some changes" last week to "I wanna make some changes" this week. Padding is a pet peeve of mine in writing and this week was just filled with it. Everything was framed around the big reveal at the end and I think the rest of the episode suffered for it.

 

[Matty77]

HEY REMEMBER WHEN I SAID THIS SHOW WAS DISHONEST?

I wish I was wrong!!!!

Lol.

No need for you to apologize and your the last person who anyone should question, you have been preaching truth since the beginning.

 

[Mariolee]

Rewatching the end scene, and when Bernard enters in there is literally no door on the wall. However, when the camera pans back in the same continous shot a door is suddenly there. Switching perspectives in the same shot was something I definitely didn't notice the first time.

Good shit.

A bit more

For sure will add.

 

[Tom Nook Sawyer]

Honestly, I don't think I liked this episode much at all. There were a lot of scenes with a whole lot of nothing in them. The corporate plot seems like it was just injected into the narrative started last week, I don't find it interesting or well written so far, and the Bernard reveal is just lol. I know it was foreshadowed, I know it's plausible, but it's still pretty stupid. There was some nice tension in the last scenes because Hopkins is fucking god-tier though, and the "what door" and "that doesn't seem anything to me" lines were pretty good, but at this point I just want the "reveals" to be over with so we can get to stuff moving forward. Maeve's "plan" totally stalled this week she went from going "I wanna make some changes" last week to "I wanna make some changes" this week. Padding is a pet peeve of mine in writing and this week was just filled with it. Everything was framed around the big reveal at the end and I think the rest of the episode suffered for it.

Part of the problem is they just essentially wiped out two "human" and somewhat likable characters that really mattered--in a show already short on them.

 

[MiamiWesker]

What an episode!!!! But damn it I am afraid of this place. Clearly all the theories are going to come true, I need to stop reading this thread.

 

[duckroll]

Interesting production side note - This is definitely the first of the episodes made after the shutdown. Ed Brubaker's name is gone from the supervising producers list. He was on ep2-6 which is the block of episodes he and a few other writers worked on, and he probably didn't stay on after the shutdown because he had other commitments.

 

[MiamiWesker]

Oh and that horse escape with the chaingun, that was uncharted levels of a setpiece. RDR2 needs that.

 

[Dreadnought]

Interesting production side note - This is definitely the first of the episodes made after the shutdown. Ed Brubaker's name is gone from the supervising producers list. He was on ep2-6 which is the block of episodes he and a few other writers worked on, and he probably didn't stay on after the shutdown because he had other commitments.

What shutdown?

 

[KarmaCow]

Part of the problem is they just essentially wiped out two "human" and somewhat likable characters that really mattered--in a show already short on them.

Bernard and Ford were (is?) the only likeable human characters. Everyone else feels like a cartoon in comparison, and that's despite Anthony Hopkins just revelling in his godlike character.

I doubt this is end of Bernard's development too. I'm sure Arnold will peek through him more explicitly.

 

[duckroll]

Some other casual observations:

- Did some of the scenes feel really cheap to anyone else? Some of the stuff like when William moved between trains, and the final encounter with the minigun and the corpse explosion.... I dunno it seemed like the budget was strained. The backgrounds felt really fake for some reason.

- William says he loves to read. That Westworld seems like a "book" to him. He wants to know what it "means". Does anyone still doubt William = MiB?

- I love how they showed "DOLORES" PROTOTYPE so clearly (btw people, it's official now, LEARN2SPELL!), but didn't show the name at the bottom of Bernard's host design. Lolz.

What shutdown?

After filming episode 6 they shut down production for months because they didn't have scripts for 7-10 finalized yet and they needed the time to sit down and finish writing the season before shooting again.

 

[Burt]

Gotta wonder what Dumbass 2 meant exactly when he said "The skin on your back"

Oh god the door not being there then being there so good

 

[EloquentM]

The

Spoiler

William-Lawrence and the MiB-Lawrence interactions are much cooler now

not really a spoiler but more theory stuff

 

[Dreadnought]

After filming episode 6 they shut down production for months because they didn't have scripts for 7-10 finalized yet and they needed the time to sit down and finish writing the season before shooting again.

Wow that seems rough. I heard this show was in development hell back in 2013 and it was way behind schedule

 

[FStop7]

Bernarnold is now his name.

 

[More_Badass]

Now we know how Ford seemed to appear from nowhere when Bernard found the host family. He literally couldn't see where Ford had emerged from

 

[Shanlei91]

Saw the Bernard twist coming a mile away but as soon as he said "what door?" I still got the chills. That scene was so well done.

 

[More_Badass]

Saw the Bernard twist coming a mile away but as soon as he said "what door?" I still got the chills. That scene was so well done.

It's all in the execution. Execution can make anything excel.

 

[duckroll]

Wow that seems rough. I heard this show was in development hell back in 2013 and it was way behind schedule

The show basically bad 3 stages of production. First they wrote and shot the pilot, which is used as the first episode in this season. The rest of the series only started production like a year later, and they had other writers helping them out. After finishing episode 6, they took the break mentioned for a few months to plan out the rest of the season. So in terms of production it's like

Ep1 -> Ep2-6 -> Ep7-10

Between those gaps, I'm sure various ideas would have been introduced/changed/evolved/solidified and then they probably went back at the end of it all to edit stuff to retroactively support the final ideas they decided on.

 

[SlimySnake]

Does no one at the company recognize Arnold? Isn't there a photo of him on the internet somewhere? Did he have a Facebook?

It just seems weird to me that a robot can masquerade as a dead guy who conveniently cannot be identified.

They are all hosts. Every last one of them.

 

[Mariolee]

After filming episode 6 they shut down production for months because they didn't have scripts for 7-10 finalized yet and they needed the time to sit down and finish writing the season before shooting again.

I hope it was worth it.

 

[duckroll]

Next week's episode is directed by Stephen Williams, a big time alumni of Lost. He directed 26 episodes from season 1 to 5, and is probably directed the most episodes of the series next to Jack Bender. Could be exciting!

 

[Ferrio]

So what do we think the deal with Elsie is? Did Theresa just abduct under some personal leave bs or is something more going on?

 

[Jarmel]

Next week's episode is directed by Stephen Williams, a big time alumni of Lost. He directed 26 episodes from season 1 to 5, and is probably directed the most episodes of the series next to Jack Bender. Could be exciting!

Episode 8 is supposed to be the big reveal episode according to Nolan.

 

[duckroll]

Episode 8 is supposed to be the big reveal episode according to Nolan.

I think every episode in 7-10 is going to be a "big reveal episode", they didn't shut down production for nothing! Episode 9 is Michelle MacLaren btw. <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3 <3

 

[Jarmel]

So what do we think the deal with Elsie is? Did Theresa just abduct under some personal leave bs or is something more going on?

somebody was being built on the table

 

[Dreadnought]

https://youtube.com/watch?v=vmOXlt83jtI

I think the Paint it Black scene in episode 1 was so masterfully done. I love how the guests react to the shooting with excitement because it's exactly how the viewers are reacting to the scene.

 

[Ferrio]

somebody was being built on the table

So a host Theresa and Elsie? Ford is ruthless if that's true.

 

[Jarmel]

So a host Theresa and Elsie? Ford is ruthless if that's true.

Spoiler

Theresa is shown in the morgue in the preview so a host of her is unlikely.

 

[KingKong]

Can we talk about how stupid Maeve's storyline is, because it's really stupid

 

[Tom Nook Sawyer]

Next week's episode is directed by Stephen Williams, a big time alumni of Lost. He directed 26 episodes from season 1 to 5, and is probably directed the most episodes of the series next to Jack Bender. Could be exciting!

Welp, you just dehyped me.

My biggest worry is Westworld turning into another Lost

Can we talk about how stupid Maeve's storyline is, because it's really stupid

They're totally dropping the ball with how they've handled her story the last few eps

 

[Cornballer]

Reviews:
- Onion A|V Club
- Sepinwall
- Washington Post
- IndieWire
- Rolling Stone
- The New Yorker
- NY Times on the series so far

Interviews and other content:
- Onion A|V Club interview with Jeffrey Wright
- Thrillist interview with ERW
- TVLine interview with Jimmi Simpson
- NY Mag: Our Biggest Questions After Westworld, Episode 7

Videos:
- Promo for next week’s episode (please spoiler tag any discussion)

 

[Sho_Nuff82]

So does Ford have the building bugged because he knew about the blood sacrifice line

I think people need to start believing him when he says he built the entire place. He could have nanobots, hidden hosts, or faux-deactivated hosts following or eavesdropping everyone on the staff at all times.

Within those walls, he is God.

Can we talk about how stupid Maeve's storyline is, because it's really stupid

And yes, I think when you get to the point where the hosts are threatening your life and are an obvious threat to the outside world and other guests, the thought of maybe losing your job for calling security on them goes out the window. It would be more believable if one of the techs was truly sympathetic to her cause (like ex machina) or if she was more subtle in her demands while plotting a secret escape. Do they really think they can mask one of the more popular hosts of the first "hub" just disappearing into thin air?

 

[kai3345]

Yeah, Maev's story has gone from the most interesting to the most boring rather quickly.

 

[DashReindeer]

Interesting production side note - This is definitely the first of the episodes made after the shutdown. Ed Brubaker's name is gone from the supervising producers list. He was on ep2-6 which is the block of episodes he and a few other writers worked on, and he probably didn't stay on after the shutdown because he had other commitments.

I did not realize Brubaker was involved in this series. Sad that he left. I definitely want to see him involved in more tv and movie pilots. He's probably the most talented writer in comics right now (at least when it comes to crime/suspense/noir stories). I'd kill for a Sleeper series.

 

[SwiftDeath]

Honestly, I don't think I liked this episode much at all. There were a lot of scenes with a whole lot of nothing in them. The corporate plot seems like it was just injected into the narrative started last week, I don't find it interesting or well written so far, and the Bernard reveal is just lol. I know it was foreshadowed, I know it's plausible, but it's still pretty stupid.

Corporate plot has been foreshadowed since the pilot episode I believe with the interaction between Theresa and the British Narrative director regarding corporates intent with the park

I do agree that large portions of this episode really added nothing substantive to the story. Train, Ghost Nation, Confederados were all fairly pointless. Train scene had terrible background when William moved between cars

----

Bernard now confuses me somewhat though. I had suspected him to be a host created by Ford for a while but do we believe he's made in the image of Arnold?

My theory was and still is that there is a unchained copy of Arnold's subconscious somewhere in the park slowly changing the hosts to his own goals after Ford released the reverie code that was likely a leftover from Arnold's original code that Ford never allowed in until now because he thought it might be too dangerous. The theory regarding clothed delores and Bernard/Arnold would suggest that as Ford created Bernard, Ford is the one pulling all the strings, all the host changes etc. and Ford's own words state as much but I don't believe that. I still believe Arnold is loose in the park, maybe within Delores, maybe within every original or older host. And that this version of Arnold is either beyond Ford's reach (as he may not understand the code or cannot separate it from the hosts) or that his love for his friend stops him from killing the virtual him.

It would be incredibly boring if all of this is simply Ford's handiwork imo.

 

[ctothej]

As soon as I saw the episode title I knew we were about to find out Bernard's a host, but I loved the reveal anyway.

 

[Makai]

I know why the butchers are doing that shit


...they're hosts

 

[PHOENIXZERO]

I imagine everyone saw Bernard being a "host" coming from a mile away right? It seemed fairly telegraphed, they pretty much hammered it home at the start of the episode.

 

[HawkeyeIC]

Yeah, Maev's story has gone from the most interesting to the most boring rather quickly.

Her plot got too far in front of the rest and they had to stall, it seems.

 

[metalslimer]

The butchers are definitely hosts

The question is what is Fords endgame with Maeve

 

[Will the Thrill]

6) A potential name anagram. Bernard Lowe = Arnold Weber?

I can live with everything but the anagram if this all turns out to be true, seriously, they felt the need to do an anagram? lol (If this is true but it is looking likely). TBH I was kind of hoping the show wasn't gonna devolve into "People you thought were Human are ACTUALLY ROBOTS TOO OMG"

Seriously, if they've got like 6 seasons of this planned, they are bound to pull another shocker like that out of thin air for a surprise if they are doing it here. "OMG remember bernard in season one!? Well OMG this person was also secretly a robot tooooooo"

Spoiler

I'm still in it for a possible Paranoid Android cover this season, pls it would be hilarious at this rate, and i even actually enjoyed the Motion Picture soundtrack one.

 

[duckroll]

So those chats between Bernard and Dolores. Still Bernard? His host form getting too curious? Secret flashbacks of Arnold? Or was it all in Dolores' head?