Westworld: Bernard's Host Murder & Teddy's Death Explained

Warning: Spoilers for Westworld Season 2's premiere.

Westworld Season 2's premiere was, unsurprisingly, full of new mysteries, but none quite as enticing as the shocking twist at the very end of the episode: two weeks on from Season 1's massacre, the hosts are all dead - at the hands of a malfunctioning/confused Bernard.

We've been waiting sixteen months to go back to Sweetwater, and while the return of Westworld was a pretty standard season opener, it didn't hold back in raising questions that will dominate the next ten weeks. What other park could a tiger come from? Why is Abernathy so important? Can Lee Sizemore get any more pathetic?

But the big mystery we're left with centers on Bernard. He's the real star of the episode, and serves as a window into what Season 2's big questions are going to be. First, though, we need to address how Westworld has changed since we last visited.

This Page: Westworld Has Made Some Big Changes In Season 2

Westworld Is Playing With Multiple Timelines Again

Westworld Season 1 Dolores William and Man in Black

Westworld Season 1's big trick was the multiple timeline twist. Throughout the season, we were actually watching events unfold in two different time periods: William, Dolores and Logan in the early days of the park; and everything else decades in the future, with Ed Harris' Man in Black really a grown-up version of Jimmi Simpson. It was a sprawling narrative conceit, one that many fans figured out well ahead of time (much to Jonathan Nolan's chagrin), and given the finale identity twist, most had assumed the show was done with this particular trick.

Not so. Season 2's premiere sees Westworld once again playing with multiple timelines. The bulk of the episode is dealing with the immediate aftermath of Ford's death, with a now conscious Dolores brutally killing human guests with a far less game Teddy, Maeve starting out on a mission to find her daughter, William getting lost in a new mystery - this time "The Door" - and Charlotte trying to get help from company Delos. However, that's all actually happening in "flashback" from two weeks later. Along with an opener with Arnold and Dolores, the episode main is bookmarked by Bernard waking up and being taken to Delos high command as they're hunting the remaining hosts, revealing ahead of time where all the plot threads end up (in a word, poorly).

Westworld Season 2 Has Changed How Hosts Work

Westworld Season 2 Trailer - Arnold and Dolores

Although there's a five-season plan for Westworld, Season 2 has made some adjustments to what's been seen before, specifically in reference to the hosts. In the premiere, we learn that while hosts have brain tissue, their minds are computerized; they're removed and mined for information by Delos both after the massacre and as a matter of course in Charlotte's secret bunker (to monitor guests). The brains are stored in a clear, viscous liquid, which leaks outside of the stable boy attacked by guests. It's also revealed that hosts are connected by a "mesh network"; they can subconsciously communicate with local hosts, which can be applied to create a wide-ranging net.

Biggest of all, though, is the suggestion that gaining consciousness doesn't just open up a host's mind, but somehow gifts them all their lost memories. We already saw this with Maeve in Season 1, but Dolores seems to have also gained full knowledge of her past, while we're led to believe Bernard can recall Arnold's conversations. This provides a striking distinction between these core three characters and the likes of Teddy, who seem to still be following their initial programming.

None of this contradicts what was seen before, but are all peculiar advancements to the mythos. And, considering they're all returned to multiple times, will surely become integral to the season going forward.

Westworld Has A New Sea

Westworld Season 2 Trailer - Delos Security

The exact location of Westworld was a hotly debated aspect in the first season, with theories ranging from it being underground to on another planet. The Season 2 premiere finally puts paid to a lot of that, with it clearly established that Westworld is on an island, along with at least six other parks.

However, the end of the episode confuses things right up again; there's a brand new body of water the size of sea that's not part of the currents plans. It's presumed to be part of Ford's terraforming from Season 1 which saw him completely redesign Westworld (also referenced by Sizemore to Maeve), but this takes it to an extreme level. The extent of Ford's new narrative is still unfolding, so it's unclear what purpose this has, although its use as a host graveyard implies that what's going on with Bernard is far more manipulated than we're led to believe.

What's Wrong With Bernard?

Before we go too deep into the future period, we need to look at Bernard in the past. When we remeet Jeffery Wright's character, he's in a very tricky situation; only recently woken up after his forced suicide, the host replica of park creator Arnold finds himself both hunted by his own kind and hiding out with humans who'd turn on him in a moment if they learned the truth. This is made all the worse by a seeming corruption in his programming which is causing him to shake uncontrollably - an immediate sign to the survivors he is not one of them.

He and Charlotte eventually find sanctuary in a secret Delos bunker she has hidden in the park - complete with white, host-lobotomizing robots - where they first try to call for help, then subsequently begin looking for Peter Abernathy - who Charlotte hid all of Westworld's key data in at the end of Season 1 - to return to the company so they'll send a rescue team. While using the host mesh network (a short-range communication between their brain modules that, cast wide, connects every robot in the park) to find Abernathy, Bernard's shakes reach fever pitch, with a computer readout saying complete corruption estimated to occur in 0.72 hours. He injects himself with some of the host ectoplasm while Charlotte changes, which seems to stable him. A stopgap solution, given how in the future timeline he's still shaking.

What's going on with Bernard? In Season 1, he was made to shoot himself, and while being repaired it was said the bullet had damaged his cortical shield, which is likely the cause here. The screen readout says "Critical Corruption", which confirms there's something wrong with his brain or the coding within it. But there's a darker possibility. Ford, who fully expected Dolores to kill him, had Bernard reanimated for a reason, so this may be an unfortunate part of it. Especially given what happens two weeks later...

Bernard's Host Murder Explained

Everything discussed so far is really just groundwork for the episode's big twist. Two weeks on, all the hosts - including Teddy - are found dead in Ford's new sea, and Bernard claims that he was the one who did it. This changes a lot of how we've viewed Westworld Season 2, with the overt multiple time periods creating a horrible sense of inevitability for all the robotic characters and Bernard.

It is, of course, unclear why he's done this. As he's finding himself stuck between being a host and human - and fighting mechanical problem to boot - the inference would be that he finds himself conflicted over Dolores and Maeve's emotional crusades; being already aware of hosts before discovering he too is one could present a psychological challenge too great. This is thematically backed up by the episode's repeated focus on what is "real", which seems to pivot around the three main hosts, and lines up with Teddy's own conflict over his lover's goals.

While there's a lot of speculation here, we do have some firm information from the episode to explore; after Arnold's talk with Dolores at the start, there were flashes of what happens to Bernard after the massacre. He's shown with Dolores in modern getup, a malfunctioning Abernathy, Dolores telling him "There is beauty in what we are" and him firing a gun in HQ before falling to his knees. This backs up the notion of some collusion and disagreement with Dolores, perhaps leading him to try and stop the resolution.

Given Ford reawakened him before his death, however, there's the possibility that it's related to the big mystery of "The Door". Little is know about this other than that it's a game made for William, but considered the creation of the sea there's clearly something bigger going on. One thing we can say with certainty about Westworld Season 2: it doesn't look good for Teddy.