'Westworld' recap: 'Vanishing Point'

Oh, William. You monster.

They promised us some kind of dark twist in the penultimate twist of Westworld. They weren’t kidding about the dark part.

Episode nine — entitled “Vanishing Point” — of this season of Westworld takes the characters we’ve been following all season and drives them into deeper, darker holes. No one is walking away from this one with their hands clean.

Let’s start with the Man in Black because he’s the primary focus this time around.

Last we saw him, Emily had taken him away from Ghost Nation, only after promising she would dish out a punishment that’s much, much worse.

Turns out that was a bluff on her part — only kind of, because William winds up suffering pretty heavily.

While addressing her father’s wounds, Emily starts talking about her late mother. She committed suicide some time ago and it has haunted Emily ever since.

Emily also has learned some of her father’s secrets. She knows about the whole Delos project and, after she gets him talking, knows that they’re trying to make host replicas of every guest who’s visited the park.

Emily, presumably, still thinks this is pretty sick but she also can’t help herself. If they’re making replicas of everyone, that means they can probably make one of her mother — and she can finally ask her why she did what she did.

Throughout this whole episode, we’re also getting flashbacks to William’s wife Juliet, played by Sela Ward, and her untimely death. At first, we think she’s just an alcoholic who was unhappy with the decisions her younger self-made.

As it goes on though, we realize it’s much, much darker than that. Believing Juliet has passed out, William sits by her bedside one night and reveals his true self — he’s a monster. He doesn’t love her. He doesn’t love anything in this world.

“Everything you fear is true.”

Juliet heard it all. She also manages to get her hands on William’s profile card and, after plugging it into a nearby computer, confirms that everything he said is true. She sees all his acts of cruelty — including the moment when he dragged Dolores into the barn during the very first Westworld episode.

It’s too much for her to bear. She doesn’t leave without one last parting gift — she places William’s profile card in a music box meant for Emily, which she’ll later uncover years later.

William didn’t know about that last part. Meaning, when Emily reveals she learned all this, he has no idea how. Which can only lead to one explanation in his mind — this must be another one of Ford’s games.

Completely delirious and nearing the brink of insanity, William shoots his daughter in cold blood. He doesn’t realize his mistake until he kneels down next to her to confirm the kill, only to see his membership card lying in his hand.

Now, he’s the one who can’t bear it. He puts a gun to his head with full intent to pull the trigger, before he stops. Instead, he takes out a knife and starts burying it into his arm. That’s the last we see of him here.

The implication is that William has one last source of hope to hold on to — maybe he’s a host and this was all part of his programming. The only way to check, of course, is to strip away all the layers of his skin (a repeated metaphor in this episode).

We don’t actually get that answer in this week’s episode, but something tells me he’s still human. Revealing he’s a host would just provide a scapegoat for his problems — this seems like something he’s going to have to really live with.

Elsewhere in Westworld, Dolores and Teddy are still making their big break for the valley beyond. After a run-in with the now fan-favorite Ghost Nation (never thought I’d type that phrase), they’re the only two who are actually left in their squad.

And soon, it comes down to only one. Teddy has another moment of realization when he sees a member of Ghost Nation running away and he again decides to spare him. This isn’t him. This is just something Dolores turned him into.

He confronts her about it later, saying he can’t do it anymore. He pulls out a gun, making us all think he’s going to shoot Dolores for a minute, but no. In the end, he’s still a romantic. Instead, he turns it on himself and fires.

Boom. Down goes Teddy.

Then we have Bernard, Elsie and a brief check-in with Maeve.

With Ford now in his head, Bernard pays Maeve a visit — despite her still lying on a table, practically dead. Ford insists on it though because, given all her powers and whatnot, he wants to give her a message.

That message more or less says ‘you’ve always been so independent, you were always my favorite (even though I thought Dolores was his favorite?) and now is the time for you to do what you need to do.’

Who knows what that means but, whatever the implications are, she better figure it out quick because Charlotte has figured out how to transfer Maeve’s mind-controlling abilities into other hosts.

Clementine, under Charlotte’s control of course, now has this power — which we see play out in a very Kingsman-like sequence in which a group of hosts is forced to primally battle to the death.

After delving the message, Bernard meets back up with Elsie and the two set off to try and beat Dolores to the valley beyond.

They don’t make it that far. After making a quick ammo stop, Ford reappears and tells Bernard that now is the time to kill Elsie. She’s only going to turn on him later, so why not save the trouble and make it quick and painless now?

Bernard, to his credit, fights off Ford. He says he won’t do it and then begins hacking into his own programming to try and erase Ford from his mind.

Seemingly, at least for the time being, it works. Only thing is Bernard isn’t so sure of that, and now he’s not so sure if it’s a good idea for him to be around Elsie.

So, he basically decides to abandon her. Elsie doesn’t fully understand and is pretty pissed off, but Bernard thinks he’s doing the right thing here. He then heads off, alone, to the valley beyond.

There’s only one episode left, in which all these things will likely come to a head. We’re finally going to see what the valley beyond is and whether or not William finds a way to redeem himself.

Watch the finale of Westworld tonight on HBO and be sure to check out some of our other Westworld recaps by clicking here.