WESTWORLD Discussion: 1.06 “The Adversary”

Last night's Westworld, "The Adversary", leaves us with much to discuss. Let's just get into it.

Bernard discovers that Ford is maintaining an old-school robot family off the books and in a distant corner of the park. It turns out this family was built by Ford's father, and the entire sequence left me with a number of questions which mainly served to shore up my ongoing suspicion that Ford will turn out to be far more sinister than he initially appeared. Also, the "turn the other cheek" moment reminded me of nothing so much as a moment in Spielberg's A.I. Nice touch.

Maeve emerged as this episode's MVP, and had quite the journey over the course of the hour, starting with her goading a Westworld patron into choking her to death (note: I want those hot takes on my desk by noon, internet) and ending with her having toured Westworld's behind-the-scenes area and blackmailing two "butchers" into raising all her stats. My reaction: Maeve is playing these guys like a fiddle and may end up leading the Great Robot Rebellion, whenever we get around to that.

Sizemore, crying into a series of margaritas next to a pool, encounters a woman (played by the great Tessa Thompson, who will surely benefit this series with her presence) who he initially believes to be a park guest, but who turns out to be his new boss-in-waiting. He also drunkenly pisses on Westworld's big-ass ... uh, what do we call that thing? It's like a partially holographic park map ... thing? Someone help me here. Anyway, Sizemore's testing his boundaries in a none-too-smart way and I predict bad things for his future.

Elsie, meanwhile, does some digging, and discovers that Theresa's been undertaking some amount of corporate espionage. If I'm being honest, I wasn't 100% clear on what was going on here - I knew the implications were bad and that we were told Theresa wasn't the only employee who's been up to no good - but as soon as Elsie hastily wrapped up that phone call with Bernard I knew she was in for it. To be fair, we don't see her get taken out, but come on: I doubt whoever (or whatever!) was in that basement with her had any intention of letting her go. 

For Westworld viewers with a taste for blood, Teddy and The Man In Black got a nice little subplot where - while en route to track down Wyatt and, hopefully, the fabled "Maze" at the center of the game - the pair were set upon by a crew of Union soldiers and very nearly killed. It was a fun twist, seeing Teddy survive an obviously fatal encounter, and oddly thrilling to see James Marsden hop aboard a wagon carrying a gattling gun so that he could mow down the soldiers he hadn't already bludgeoned to death. I need a gif of that pronto.

There's plenty more to discuss - including a delightful cameo in one of Westworld's lower/basement levels and two new Radiohead covers - but I don't wanna hog all the chatter. Let's hear what you guys thought in the comments below: did you miss Evan Rachel Wood this week as much as I did? That was who I thought it was in the basement, right? What'd you make of Teddy's story about the Maze, and how did it impact your premature fan theories? Sound off below!