FAN THEORY CORNER

Evidence in favor of the idea that William is a younger version of the Man in Black and his scenes take place 30 years before the rest of the series:

* As Dolores travels through the wilderness with William and Logan, there doesn't seem to be a window for her latest conversation with Bernard.

* The Man in Black is identified by another guest as the famous head of a charitable foundation, which seems like the kind of thing William might aspire to be one day, and you can imagine William spending the decades learning to channel his worst impulses into his visits to the park while being a saint out in the real world.

* Logan keeps trying to frame the whole park to William as a game, which is how the Man in Black views it.

* Logan expresses a desire for their company to increase its stake in the park, while Ford complains to Theresa that he and Arnold shouldn't have sold out to the people of Delos, who never truly understood what they were buying.

Evidence against the idea:

* Dolores still has Rebus's gun, which means she crossed paths with William and Logan after escaping the massacre at the ranch, during which we saw her have a memory of the Man in Black.

* Stubbs, a character we know exists in the contemporary storyline, is told that Dolores is glitching and wandering far afield of her usual route, and he sends personnel to intercept her and bring her in for maintenance, after which we see a man try to take her away from the Mexican village, only to back off in the presence of William (a staff member not wanting to interfere with a guest's storyline?).

Ways to dispute various bits of evidence:

* The Bernard/Dolores conversations could be what's out of sync with the narrative, rather than the Dolores/William scenes.

* The Man in Black being a good guy in the real world proves little; it just fits the theory.

* Logan is far from the only guest to frame the park in gaming terms.

* We don't know that William and Logan are part of Delos; their company could, in fact, be minority owners looking to expand their interest.

* We appeared to see Dolores go through multiple iterations of the massacre, including one where she gets shot in the stomach and one where she doesn't. So it's possible the memory flash came in the present, while the one she escaped was 30 years ago.

* Stubbs could be a robot himself? And/or this is more misdirection, and the security chief from 30 years ago also sent someone to intercept Dolores when she moved too far off her loop?

This week, the evidence seems weighted more against the theory than for it, but I look forward to a few hundred comments arguing strongly one way or the other.

(Also, one way the show could easily disprove the theory in the coming weeks: have William run into either Hector or Armistice, since the Man makes note that he has never met them before — him by choice, her by happenstance.)

Read more at http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/review-the-westworld-robots-search-for-answers-in-dissonance-theory#WYMoRhP62O5W9QA6.99