WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Season 3, Episode 5 of Westworld, "Genre," which aired Sunday on HBO.
Westworld’s latest episode, “Genre,” finally pulled the curtain back on Engerraund Serac and his powerful artificial intelligence machine, Rehoboam. After “The Mother of Exiles” teased that Serac had been inspired to create the machine after the destruction of Paris, this episode takes multiple trips to the past to show how Serac and his brother created Rehoboam with financial help from Liam Dempsey Sr. and his tech company, Incite.
Thanks to these flashbacks, fans learn about the machine’s previous iterations, its original purpose and how it was finally proven to be a success. Now, the machine is what controls all of humanity to ensure another Paris doesn’t happen again. As a result, lives are dictated, and future outcomes foreseen and planned long in advance. However, for all its meticulous control, there are some things and some people Rehoboam simply can’t predict. These outliers don’t fit in Rehoboam and Serac’s vision of the world, so something else must be done to them.
Rehoboam is a machine that controls the entire world. Essentially, it compiles the data of every living human on Earth and establishes a path for each and every one of them, all in order to create a better, more prosperous world. The machine sees the past and present of all humans. and it extrapolates a future outcome for everyone. Jobs and promotions are only given if it benefits the future. If someone’s life is set to end in suicide, the machine will work to ensure that outcome, and waste no other resources trying to make this person’s life any better -- as seen in the case of Cal. To put it simply, everyone all over the world is being controlled by Rehoboam. Well, almost everyone.
In a flashback sequence, the machine’s co-creator, Engerraund Serac, explains that there are a small number of anomalies among humans that Rehoboam can’t dictate or control because the machine can’t see what these people might do next. These outliers are seen as variables and threats to Rehoboam’s elaborate tapestry. These people, given their dangerous nature, can’t be trusted to be out, roaming the streets and potentially endangering Serac’s vision of the world.
Therefore, these outliers are taken and locked up in a facility overseen by Serac. In fact, one of these people is his brother, and he doesn’t hesitate to lock him up as well. Therefore, the people who Rehoaboam can’t fit into its future are essentially taken off the board. Some of them may even be shipped off to war so that they might serve some sort of purpose they can’t deviate from. It’s a pretty dark revelation and one that only further paints Serac as the ultimate villain of Season 3.
Airing Sundays at 9 p.m. ET/PT on HBO, Westworld stars returning cast members Evan Rachel Wood, Thandie Newton, Ed Harris, Jeffrey Wright, Tessa Thompson, Luke Hemsworth, Simon Quarterman and Rodrigo Santoro, joined by series newcomers Aaron Paul, Vincent Cassel, Lena Waithe, Scott Mescudi, Marshawn Lynch, John Gallagher Jr., Michael Ealy and Tommy Flanagan.