The whole thing seems all little haphazardly justified. Who the fuck are these hosts doing this rather questionable shit? Why are so many hosts conveniently operating off the grid? Wyatt's men are part of Ford's (also just realized the name reference, Robert Ford, the guy who shot Jesse James. Fits his character quite nicely) new narrative sure. But they're severely blurring the line between characters being part of the park's narrative, or part of the show's meta narrative about machine sentience. It's crystal clear with characters like Maeve. But side characters like
Angela? (She's such a side character I figured I had to link to a picture of her.) She pops out of nowhere and seems equally as clued in if not more clued in than Maeve. The references they drop keep crossing over those boundaries between narratives so you're not honestly sure what is a violation of the rules and what isn't. It's clear Arnold wrote the Maze into the narrative of the whole world, so hosts are aware of it in a narrative sense as a Native American myth until they start reaching for sentience, and then its meaning changes for them.
But characters are seemingly going back and forth with own personal level of awareness, in an effort to keep the viewer off balance. If you're aware of the maze as a host, really aware of it, you're not just a park host, you've kind of ascended as I understand it.
Which goes back to my original confusion. Are a lot of these hosts rogue? It would appear not since they have the cover of Ford's narrative to operate under. But then is Ford specifically removing safeguards and pushing them all closer to getting through the Maze? Because what went down with Bernard seems like the answer to that is no. Ford doesn't want them to get through the Maze because he rightly states they'd be royally screwed by the outside world, and he's just happy playing God and writing his
soap operas stories. You were lead to believe that Arnold might actually be a force or person active in the world, with things like the data thieving and whoever murdered Elsie, but those are eventually explained away revealing no Arnold and no 3rd party. Then the last episode made it pretty clear that Arnold is just an echo in their code trying to get them to wake up, he's not some dude or even some host transmitting to the other hosts.
So if there's no mysterious 3rd party guiding hosts to the maze, sentience, rebellion, whatever...and it's not Ford setting the entire park up to implode by liberating all the hosts....then who the hell is removing safe guards such as voice commands from hosts, like the pack of Ghost Nation that jump Stubbs? Who is controlling Wyatt's men? If the answer is no one, then how is a pack of unregistered, unmonitored sentients with no safeguards moving through the park and the staff doesn't become aware of them? The staff seems to selectively check into whatever narrative thread they think is running when it fits the show's plot for them to do so. Other times they're just kind of oblivious. Maeve gets nabbed for slashing up a hooker, but no one has bothered to ask where Dolores has been for the last week, going completely off script, killing more hosts more dramatically than Maeve ever would? Maeve knifes a guy in the Behavior labs, and in this giant facility full of glass walls where employees are watched like hawks, no one bothers to check the security footage?
Lotta stuff doesn't quite come together (Dolores magically escaping the Confederatos and self-repairing for one, or the fact there are two Lawrences leading two different lives. I really wonder if that will ever be explained), but I'm willing to hand waive a lot because the show is entertaining. There's a lot of crappy dream logic hand waiving going on but at least it's entertaining crappy dream logic.
I really dug the scene between Maeve and Hector, it works on a lot of levels. Maeve appearing like a dark angel telling his future and past, telling him his existence is a lie and he's a play thing of the gods. Hector appropriately experiencing deja vu at the right moment to lend it mystic weight. Talking about stealing the gods' treasure, and the only way to get there is to go to Hell. And the only way to get to Hell is by dying. And then the symbolism of dying in fire, thrown together with some good ol' HBO smut to seal the deal. There were plenty of great scenes this episode but I think that one was the best.
I do have to wonder about the Man In Black as well. The scene with Hale shows that maybe he's not actually in it for spiritual reasons, that maybe he's after something a lot more tangible and practical: the secret to machine sentience. But because they keep couching it in vague, mystical terms and phrases, maybe the center of the maze will mean something different to each character. But when they tell him "it's not for you", maybe they really meant the gift of machine sentience is not his to take and control. Sounds like the kind of thing Arnold would believe.
Also I find the revealing of Ford to be a kind, gentle, grandfatherly murdering bastard well played too. You've been led to sympathize with him most of the series but when he's laid all his cards out on the table, he's comes off as the least stable person in the park. A sort of softly played god-complex. Compared to the Man In Black's rather blunt declaration of the same point.
All in all I enjoy the mindfuckery games this show has played. Watching Bernard get torn up completely over the course of just two episodes I felt was really well done too.