With only days to go before Westworld Season 3 arrives on HBO, viewers are in a pretty familiar place, in that we only have the vaguest clue of what the upcoming episodes will actually be about. It's almost a (Lisa) joy at this point, with anticipation butting heads with rampant curiosity while trying to remember all of the Season 2 details that will likely become relevant as the third season gets started. Westworld didn't make things any clearer with its recent trio of Season 3 trailers, either.
While waiting for showrunners Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy to unleash the beast with Westworld Season 3 (which is being dubbed The New World), let's take a deep dive into all the big questions those trailers inspired.
How Do Dolores And Caleb Meet, And Why Isn't He Way More Freaked Out?
Aaron Paul is one of a few new "human" characters being introduced in Westworld Season 3, but not that much is known about him, nor how he and Evan Rachel Wood's Dolores first meet. Whatever happened, I want to know how that first meet-cute-bot makes Caleb so enthused by Dolores that he isn't screaming to high heavens after seeing her tech-savvy skeleton without most of its skin. And is that a coffin, or some kind of shipping container?
Who Or What Is Vincent Cassel's Serac?
Portraying another new character, Vincent Cassel joins Westworld as the mysterious Serac. In one trailer, Serac welcomes Thandie Newton' Maeve into his luxurious "world," and then tasks her with finding Dolores and killing her. Then elsewhere, Serac is seen holding Caleb at gunpoint, presumably also with the intent to find Dolores. But why is he tracking Dolores? Did someone hire him, or is he the one with the personal vendetta? Also...he's human, right?
What Are Arnold's Plans With Westworld And/Or Dolores?
Now that Robert Ford's partner in artificial crime Arnold Weber will officially be out and about in Westworld Season 3, it will be interesting to see what his motivations are. The western-themed park was pretty much destroyed during the course of Season 2, so will his next step be to fix everything up and bring it back to its former glory, or will he raze it all and start over with a new park idea? Also, he's possibly a little vengeful for all the destruction, so should we expect Arnold to go hard after Dolores? Could it be that he's the one who puts Serac to the task of finding the self-sufficient host?
Does Maeve Actually Make It To The Real World?
Though perhaps not for the proper reasons, Westworld's Maeve has long wanted to defect from her host-ly ways in order to escape the park. It appears she gets to do just that in the trailers, only with a mission of death as opposed to one of reuniting with her daughter. But I'm not fully convinced that Maeve's outside-the-park moments are actually real and not a figment of her imagination.
What's So Important Inside The Man In Black's Mouth?
More than a few sci-fi shows have featured characters who were set up with tracking devices hidden in their teeth, which is the only kind of half-explanation I can think of for why a non-dentist would be using a scary AF tool to dig around in The Man in Black's mouth. Otherwise, what is happening here, as well as in the other moments with The Man In Black? Perhaps the bigger question here is whether or not the William we're seeing is the human version or the host version who appeared at the tail end of Season 2.
What Is Going Into Or Out Of Dolores' Body?
To be expected, a lot of moments in the Westworld trailer provoke questions that aren't anymore complicated than "WTF is this, though?" Case in point: Dolores appears to be going through some kind of painful blood-fluid extractions, unless she's actually having the fluids pumped into her. In any case, it seems like that process could be handled without tubes being jabbed into her chest and arms. Although I suppose the pain might be intentional...
Is Teddy's Core Inside Charlotte's Body?
At the end of Westworld Season 2, the human version of Tessa Thompson's Charlotte Hale was murdered by Dolores-as-Host-Charlotte, but we know that Dolores took the Charlotte form with her into the real world. In the episode just before that, viewers watched as James Marsden's Teddy killed himself after reaching sentience. Theories abound that Teddy's host core was one of the ones Dolores nabbed from the park, and after seeing the way Dolores and Charlotte laid together in the Comic-Con trailer last year, those theories multiplied. So is Teddy still alive, as it were, and will we see James Marsden at all?
What Happened To These Buildings?
Westworld Season 3 is said to be partially set in a futuristic Los Angeles, giving viewers our first big look at the "real" world. But what's up with that one skyscraper being overgrown with plant life? Is it another example of the dichotomy between the "living" and...the otherwise? Or is the aftermath from some kind of global event or disaster?
Is That Big Ball Connected To Incite?
Incite is the Westworld-derived company whose website is home to the show's hidden trailers. It's some kind of a data-mining company, which speaks heavily to the kinds of information that people are being tracked for within the Delos parks. But what is that big mysterious ball of lights, and how does it factor into Caleb and Dolores' stories?
How Will Nazi-Filled Italy Enter Westworld's Story?
With all the logical additions that were made for Westworld Season, one of the weirder elements was the debut of a park set in Italy during WWII, when Nazism was in full effect. Given the backlash to Amazon's polarizing Nazi-killing action drama Hunters, one might not have expected Westworld to hearken back to that terrible point in human history. I suppose it's meant to give the park visitors a chance to enter a military-centered narrative, but I can't imagine it'll be handled on the show with kid gloves and without offending anyone.
Okay, so I probably have a lot more questions that that, if we're being honest with ourselves. How long a time span does Season 3 cover? What in the world are NFL great Marshawn Lynch and rapper Kid Cudi going to get up to in their scenes? Will Anthony Hopkins' Robert Ford be back in some way? The inquiries just keep going, people, so stifle that flow by checking out the main Season 3 trailer below.
Find out the answer to some of these questions and more when Westworld debuts Season 3 on HBO on Sunday, March 15, at 9:00 p.m. ET. Check our Winter and Spring TV schedule to see what other shows are hitting the small screen around that time as well.
