Despite gifting (or burdening) its fans with 90-minute finale, Westworld‘s tenth and final episode of its inaugural season ignored just as many questions as it answered. That, or it heaped a whole new batch of brain teasers onto the backs of its theory-happy viewers and the writers whose job it is to keep them satisfied for a planned batch of at least four more full seasons. Either way, Westworld will have plenty to answer for once it returns some time in 2018. For example, what — if anything — the Man in Black’s precious maze was about.
(If you haven’t watched “The Bicameral Mind” yet, be weary of spoilers below.)
In a short interview with Entertainment Weekly Harris offered a postmortem on his character’s opinion with regards to the maze he so desperately sought. Turns out it was nothing more than a child’s toy used by Arnold (Jeffrey Wright) to metaphorically guide Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood) toward consciousness.
The Man in Black was understandably annoyed by this revelation, and as Harris admits in the interview, so was he:
What was your reaction to the maze being revealed to be a toy? I suspect it was not that much different than your character’s reaction.
Yeah. Basically: “What is this sh–? What is going on here?” Yeah. I gotta tell you, I’m still not quite clear on what the maze was supposed to have represented. But the fact that it didn’t really mean anything, or didn’t exist… I haven’t penetrated that. But I haven’t seen the finale yet.
Westworld‘s use of the maze as a conceptual (then, with the toy’s addition, literal) McGuffin does come off as a kind of cheap trick. Then again when the credits roll for “The Bicameral Mind,” Dolores has finally figured out whose voice she’s been hearing all this time. Meanwhile, the older William’s dream of a more realistic park in which the hosts fight back finally comes true.
So while Harris hasn’t penetrated that particular aspect of the story quite yet, it’s nice to know the 66-year-old actor is just as frustrated as the rest of us. Of course, he hasn’t actually watched the finale yet.
(Via Entertainment Weekly)
