Westworld, Explained

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King_Nakamura on August 28th, 2018 at 13:16 UTC »

Well I think I actually understand what happened now.

diggtrucks1025 on August 28th, 2018 at 13:41 UTC »

So, what you are saying, is that everyone is a highlander?

DancewithRance on August 28th, 2018 at 14:30 UTC »

Thing is, this is spread across 20+ hours of television. While the season 2 finale does reveal the cycle, the building blocks were already there.

Arnold (and Ford) build Dolores.

Arnold thinks she (and other hosts) are not only capable of sentience, but should not be used as a theme park attraction. Ford disagrees. Arnold programs Dolores to murder him and go crazy (park fatality without killing an actual guest)

Ford now mourns the loss of Arnold and begins to share his host empathy. Dolores spent the most time around Arnold and would know him best, so he uses her to help rebuild Arnold (changes his name to Bernard for mind game reasons and plot twists).

The rest is just explaining the cycle of Bernard v Dolores and how she did not program him to be exactly like Arnold, otherwise it would just end the same way. They are both trying to break out of a loop and ultimately end up "reviving" (easier way to digest) each other after their deaths in season 2.