Westworld IX; 03.22.20 Divergence - Westeros.org

[.H.]

3 hours ago, unJon said:

re: EMP is it realistic that it would not destroy the data on Caleb’s thumb drive that includes Solomon’s revolution plan? I assume that thumb drive is intact still because reasons. 

Well, I am not a physicist, but my guess is that whatever that EMP was, it was non-nuclear.  Which means, it probably wasn't "very" powerful and probably pretty localized.  I'd think it was pretty specifically made to be powerful right at the localized spot of whatever the Solomon structure is.  Again, not a physicist, but I think it's "power" should follow the inverse square law, so it could drop off to non-dangerous levels fairly quickly, especially if the intervening walls are metal or reinforced.

Of course, the thumb drive itself is likely in a metal housing as well, as others have noted.  So, while Caleb sees the lights blink or whatever, that doesn't mean the effect was so pronounced to his local area, simply that power was interrupted.  I'd think, if you were smart, you'd have designed the EMP to hit Solomon and as little else as possible, since after the fact, you probably want other things in the facility to still work.  Also, you don't likely want to kill any living people there too, which speaks to deliberately limiting its power somewhat to only what would be necessary to take out Solomon.  And, might also speak to specifically shielding other parts of the facility.  If that Solomon structure was specifically built out of non-magnetic materials, as well, it's likely even something very low power would work.

Of course, this is all probably nonsense and it's just driven by pure narrative necessity.  But it doesn't seem all that implausible to me.

[unJon]

37 minutes ago, .H. said:

Well, I am not a physicist, but my guess is that whatever that EMP was, it was non-nuclear.  Which means, it probably wasn't "very" powerful and probably pretty localized.  I'd think it was pretty specifically made to be powerful right at the localized spot of whatever the Solomon structure is.  Again, not a physicist, but I think it's "power" should follow the inverse square law, so it could drop off to non-dangerous levels fairly quickly, especially if the intervening walls are metal or reinforced.

Of course, the thumb drive itself is likely in a metal housing as well, as others have noted.  So, while Caleb sees the lights blink or whatever, that doesn't mean the effect was so pronounced to his local area, simply that power was interrupted.  I'd think, if you were smart, you'd have designed the EMP to hit Solomon and as little else as possible, since after the fact, you probably want other things in the facility to still work.  Also, you don't likely want to kill any living people there too, which speaks to deliberately limiting its power somewhat to only what would be necessary to take out Solomon.  And, might also speak to specifically shielding other parts of the facility.  If that Solomon structure was specifically built out of non-magnetic materials, as well, it's likely even something very low power would work.

Of course, this is all probably nonsense and it's just driven by pure narrative necessity.  But it doesn't seem all that implausible to me.

Not implausible. And I’m not usually nit picky and I am. Dry much living this season. My only problem with the above is I thought Caleb was somewhere between Solomon and Delores. If that’s right (and I may be misremembering) the blast that hit the thumb drive should have been more powerful than the one that knocked out Delores and Maeve. 

[Kalbear]

31 minutes ago, unJon said:

Not implausible. And I’m not usually nit picky and I am. Dry much living this season. My only problem with the above is I thought Caleb was somewhere between Solomon and Delores. If that’s right (and I may be misremembering) the blast that hit the thumb drive should have been more powerful than the one that knocked out Delores and Maeve. 

No, he was in the room underneath and pretty far away. 

[unJon]

47 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

No, he was in the room underneath and pretty far away. 

Ah. Thank you. 

[karaddin]

Caleb was talking to Solomon while looking at the equipment that was holding Seracs brother in suspension as though that were Solomon, but Solomon is the big sphere back where they came in right next to where Dolores sets off the EMP basically.

Given the way Caleb was talking to it, I'm sure a lot of people thought the same thing - that Solomon was down there.

[Jeor]

I'm not convinced that Solomon is truly dead. The voice that speaks to Caleb at the end isn't Solomon's voice, but sounds like it could be some other AI or avatar that obviously knows what Solomon just did in giving Caleb the new plan ("I have some instructions for you" or something along those lines).

Given there were was that robot moving around inside the warehouse near Solomon, and the robot could be remotely controlled by Maeve...isn't there some way Solomon could have found a way to control the robot? Build himself another avatar somewhere that would be somehow protected by the EMP. After all, Solomon has known the EMP has been there for years so has had plenty of time to figure out a way around it.

And interesting that Serac's brother (if that indeed was him) is still potentially alive. I know there are some Internet theories flying around that Serac doesn't actually exist and is somehow a projection of his brother instead, although that makes my head hurt...

[Fragile Bird]

I just read one of those '15 things you may not have noticed' stories on the episode, and there were a couple of interesting comments.

A 'passed pawn' is a pawn in a chess game that has made it to the other side of the board and no longer has an enemy piece in front of it. I completely forgot that term. Caleb, I assume.

Earlier in the season it was mentioned Dolores has connections in Jakarta, Berlin, Los Angeles and San Francisco. Musashi-Dolores was in Jakarta. We have not seen a Dolores in Berlin. Maybe there's going to be a surprise next week.

When Bernard looks at the information on William on his tablet, and we saw information on Caleb before, William's 'registration number' (that U number) is the same as Caleb's, suggesting a link between them. Caleb also has another number on his page.

When Caleb is being 're-programmed' the woman keeps asking him who did this, until he starts saying Russians. He says he fought during the Russian civil war. In his flashback memories the building behind him had graffitti in Russian written all over it, but when he starts remembering, the graffitti was in English. And in one of the scenes where he was dressed as a soldier, in the background there are American flags and a hint it's the fourth of July. In the description of Caleb on the tablet, one of his roles has been 'domestic terrorism'. He may have been killing Americans, not Russians.

 

[karaddin]

I interpreted that as a lot of the "combat" he's seen was VR as we see him with the same goggles on as William did last week. I'm sure he's killed plenty of Americans though.

[Fragile Bird]

Actually, I think a lot, if not all, of his work has been done in the US, after which he got sent to the re-programming centre to alter his memories. I suspect he's never been to Russia, which is the reason we were shown the scene. I couldn't understand the purpose of showing it to us, so that would make sense.

And that reminds me, you remember how his mother never remembers who he is? Is she or is she not his mother? Caleb gave her one of the wafers he eats. The guy in this last episode that they kidnapped sees Caleb's buddy taking a wafer and says something about 'taking your pharmaceutical to make you forget'. No wonder his mother doesn't remember him. And from what Dolores said about Caleb being abandoned at the diner, I assume the woman was, in fact, Caleb's mother. I guess Caleb feeds them to her so she forgets what she's suffered.

[DMC]

I haven't read anything here - as a disclaimer - since the last episode.  What I HATE is the idea that we're getting two different timelines, and that that will fuck up the finale.  I think it's likely true.  Hard to make sense of everything otherwise.  And an EMP?  Really?  C'mon man.

[Jeor]

1 hour ago, DMC said:

I haven't read anything here - as a disclaimer - since the last episode.  What I HATE is the idea that we're getting two different timelines, and that that will fuck up the finale.  I think it's likely true.  Hard to make sense of everything otherwise.  And an EMP?  Really?  C'mon man.

Yeah, I began wondering about the timelines too. Unless there are two different mind-warping facilities, Caleb/Dolores/Maeve should have bumped into Stubbs/Bernard/William. The other solution is two different timelines.

[karaddin]

Oh I assumed those facilities are all over the place now, I had the impression that the one William was in was either in greater LA or regional outer areas, not hundreds of km away in another country.

The Mexican facility was where they developed the techniques and stored large numbers of them, once they perfected things it was moved into smaller local facilities.

What else in this episode suggested multiple timelines? I didn't get that vibe at all but I'm not so great at spotting that particular trick. I guess Caleb being one of the first to go through the treatment while only being 40ish?

[Jeor]

21 minutes ago, karaddin said:

Oh I assumed those facilities are all over the place now, I had the impression that the one William was in was either in greater LA or regional outer areas, not hundreds of km away in another country.

I missed it, but in reading Internet theories, there was a site (I forget which one it was) that suggested that in an earlier episode William was located in Mexico. Also, the idea that the computer thought William was dead could have been a hint that the guy we're seeing might be Host William in the future.

[unJon]

2 hours ago, Jeor said:

Yeah, I began wondering about the timelines too. Unless there are two different mind-warping facilities, Caleb/Dolores/Maeve should have bumped into Stubbs/Bernard/William. The other solution is two different timelines.

Pretty sure William was in a facility just outside of San Francisco and Delores was in Mexico. 

[Jeor]

10 minutes ago, unJon said:

Pretty sure William was in a facility just outside of San Francisco and Delores was in Mexico. 

Yeah that makes sense, I could be jumping at shadows. But they may pull the timeline trick again...

[DMC]

3 hours ago, Jeor said:

Yeah, I began wondering about the timelines too. Unless there are two different mind-warping facilities, Caleb/Dolores/Maeve should have bumped into Stubbs/Bernard/William. The other solution is two different timelines.

I don't think the episode itself suggests different timelines, for the most part.  Actually, once we get past the cold open, I think it's one of the most clearly linear episodes of the entire series.  Mainly because it mostly involves Caleb learning about his past with Dolores fending off Maeve, and the only B story we have is Bernard/Stubbs/William.

But, it's hard to make sense of the whole season.  How did Maeve coordinate with Charlotte-Dolores so quickly - and how is the latter, ya know, not crispy anymore?  If the Dolores' are coordinating, why's the Musashi one still sticking around the Yakuza hangout in the first place?  How is Caleb only now freaking out like Jessie, when he's been hit with like a litany of life-changing revelations for at least half the season?  The dude shoulda retreated to having 24/7 meth & pizza-hobo parties in his house/apartment episodes ago. 

Plus, yes, there's all the internety things I've read pointing out the inconsistencies throughout the season and that's probably influencing my perspective.  But, just generally, I have to admit either there's something going on or this season is really damn lazy writing.  Particularly for the Nolans/Joy.

[Corvinus85]

There are probably several facilities for reconditioning, unclear if there are more than one for storage of unfixable outliers, but clearly only one where Solomon was located.

[RumHam]

6 hours ago, karaddin said:

Oh I assumed those facilities are all over the place now, I had the impression that the one William was in was either in greater LA or regional outer areas, not hundreds of km away in another country.

I figured it was the same facility, and that's why they injected the tracker into his blood. To find the facility to get to Solomon. 

4 hours ago, DMC said:

How did Maeve coordinate with Charlotte-Dolores so quickly

I don't think she did? Maeve should hate her for crushing Hector's brain. 

4 hours ago, DMC said:

and how is the latter, ya know, not crispy anymore? 

The only thing I can figure is that those little hand-held skin repair tools are really effective. 

[Kalbear]

36 minutes ago, RumHam said:

I figured it was the same facility, and that's why they injected the tracker into his blood. To find the facility to get to Solomon. 

Nah. the facility that William ended up going to was in San Francisco or something. I thought it was Sonora as well, but it wasn't anywhere close by. They injected the protein because once it got scanned, it became a virus that infected the system. This is a pretty cool thing that I wish they'd geeked out more on, but we're already seeing using biological manipulation of databases to hack systems - the most recent one is using a manufactured DNA result uploaded into some of the ancestry systems that use DNA to track folks. Same principle here, except this was an actual biological bit of data, not a synthetic DNA transcription.

Anyway, they used that to hack into the facility in San Fran and find out where Solomon was, knowing that William would be taken to an outlier detention facility and thinking they were all hooked together, as Solomon was still running the reeducation system.

36 minutes ago, RumHam said:

I don't think she did? Maeve should hate her for crushing Hector's brain. 

Yeah, Charlotte is simply using Maeve's forces to root out the other Doloreses. She leaked the location of Musashi to them. She isn't coordinating with them at all. 

36 minutes ago, RumHam said:

The only thing I can figure is that those little hand-held skin repair tools are really effective. 

Charlotte was still pretty crispy, just not super crispy. You could see some of the damage.

[DMC]

11 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Yeah, Charlotte is simply using Maeve's forces to root out the other Doloreses. She leaked the location of Musashi to them. She isn't coordinating with them at all.

This suggests quite some negligence on Maeve's part.  I refuse to believe it!