If last week’s Westworld was the most mind-blowing episode ever, this week gave us a straightforward tale. But Episode Five, titled “Akane No Mai,” did touch on a lingering mystery from the season premiere. Namely, how has Maeve become so powerful?
Maeve
It all begins in Shogun World, a more violent form of entertainment for guests who found Westworld “to tame.” We also learn that Sizemore copied the same stories he used for Westworld for the narratives he wrote for Shogun World. We soon discover that Maeve, Hector, and Armistice have doppelgängers in this new park. They’re even pulling off the same Mariposa heist storyline from Season 1, all to a Shoganized version of the Rolling Stone’s Paint It Black!
The Maeve equivalent is a geisha named Akane who is trying to protect a younger geisha she views like a daughter. Needless to say, Maeve can relate. Especially when it comes to protecting Akane’s daughter against the Shogun who wants to take her for himself.
But enough of the set-up. When Maeve tries to control the Shogun hosts it doesn’t work. Later, Sizemore explains why her “vocal voodoo” failed her. She was speaking the wrong language. Maeve, it turns out, is consciously fluent in dozens of languages, including Japanese. So there’s a solution to the problem.
The next time she tries to control the hosts speaking in Japanese, it works. But things get dicey when she finds herself unable to speak during a ninja attack. That’s when Maeve goes full-Neo, like in The Matrix. She starts hearing voices and begins to command the hosts with her mind. It’s as if she can tap into the wireless network that Bernard spoke of in Episode One. The network that connects all the hosts. Maeve is now operating in god-mode, controlling the hosts with her thoughts. And by the episode’s end, she tells Sizemore: “I found a new voice. Now we use it.”
Last season, Ford could control the hosts with his mind—though query how he, as a human, could tap into their network? Somehow, Maeve has inherited that same power. This gift had to come from Ford, but why did he give it to Maeve? And how does it fit into whatever game Ford may now be playing on Westworld?
Delores
We know one thing: Ford did not give Delores the same power. Rather, Delores—in full Wyatt mode—is controlling the hosts through violence and intimidation. That is, unless you are Teddy. He wants nothing to do with Delores’ uprising. Instead, he’d rather ride away with her into the sunset to a place where they can’t be found. Let’s just say, Delores is not good with this.
“These past few days,” she tells Teddy, “I’ve seen you so clearly, and I’ve seen you’re not gonna make it.” She warns him that a swarm is about to descend upon them. “And if we’re gonna survive, some of us will have to burn.” She can’t control Teddy like Maeve can control the hosts. So Delores has her goons hold him while the tech they’ve captured uses a tablet to alter Teddy’s personality.
“I wish there was another way, Teddy,” Delores says. “But where we’re about to go is no place for a man like you.”
She goes through with it, even after the tech warns her that he’s not sure Teddy will hold together with changes this extreme. “To grow,” she says, “we all need to suffer.”
We know Ford wanted Delores to achieve consciousness and begin the uprising, but I find it curious that he did not imbue his chosen leader with the same power he must have bestowed in Maeve. Also, Ford set Delores on the path to take the fight to humanity. But why then would he create Maeve with the power to stop her? This is one of the show’s biggest mysteries, and at the midpoint of Season 2, we have very few clues to solve it. Of course, there are still five more episodes to go.
Next Week
As for next eipsode, I’ll be taking a brief hiatus on the blog. But I promise to be back with a new post following Episode Seven of Westworld (and I’ll comment on Episode Six too). You see, I need to stop by the Leonine City for a little research on the last book in the trilogy that began with Enoch’s Device …