Westworld is a very clever show. At times, it might be too clever for its own good, but although it can sometimes be difficult to follow the narrative, you always feel the writers have given every moment and twist serious thought. Nowhere is that more apparent than "Annees Folles." In two very crucial ways, the episode marks a return to familiar environments: Bernard emerges from the Sublime with a new mission, and Maeve finds herself essentially back where it all began in the first season, albeit with slightly different window dressing. I tend to really like when two plots mirror one another structurally, and Bernard's emergence into the real world and Maeve's return to a Delos theme park really scratch that itch for me. It's fun to watch the two of them as parallels, both armed with the knowledge of what exactly the other person is going to do before they do it. With Maeve, it's simply accessing her memories of Sweetwater; with Bernard, it's something different entirely, a kind of final synthesis of the work carried out by Rehoboam and Incite without all the kidnapping and mind control. Bernard was given a gift by Dolores, and in return, he's going to take up her mission and save humanity, even potentially at the cost of his own life. The duo worked very well for me last season, and their easy rapport hasn't gone away during the prolonged break between seasons; that's still a very fun pair, more so than the brooding Caleb and Maeve team up. Thandiwe Newton gives Maeve's tongue extra sharpness, and it's fun to watch her guide Caleb through Sweetwater's traps with a look of disdain, but we've seen a newbie thrust into Westworld before, and Delos cheaping out on story design and character motivations (a deliberate choice in Kevin Lau and Suzanne Wrubel's script) takes away some of that wide-eyed introductory magic. We've seen it before, even if Caleb hasn't, and like Maeve, we're a little over it. In the hands of director Hanelle M. Culpepper, the recreation of Sweetwater seen through jaded eyes works. Maeve lived this introduction thousands of times; it never changed, even if she did, so her sole mission is to avoid any of those interactions to keep Caleb from getting distracted by a fake scenario. The drift through the cityscape is appropriately busy and feels immense; it's no wonder Caleb can't stop gawking at everything going on around him - this feels fuller and richer than Sweetwater did on its best, busiest moments. The park visitor, obsessed with easter eggs, is a fun inversion of the Man in Black. He was willing to torture every host in the park to get to the secrets hidden by Ford; she merely seems to wander around openly talking about it until she somehow finds it. No doubt, it was set up by a Host posing as a guest, but for a brief moment, the panic is real for Maeve and Caleb.
Review of Années Folles
