Serac pays an unexpected visit to a president who came into power in his country thanks to the favor of Serac, advising that he'll have to discontinue a policy of favoritism in industry that's caused hardship for some of the country's villages. Apparently a civil uprising is expected and it must be stopped, so Serac advises that if the favoritism isn't stopped then his favoritism will be stopped and the civil uprising will be escalated by the sudden devaluation of the country's currency, which will injure everyone in the country (and probably affect many other countries as well). Serac really knows how to accomplish the goal or else the exact opposite with extreme prejudice.
In a scene from the past, we see Serac and his brother entering into business with Liam's father, Liam Dempsey Sr. to gain access to his archives of Ultra Big Data and perfect their data-savaging "giant steel ball sack". His brother privately suggests that they kill Dempsey because he'll just get in the way, and Dempsey threatens to defund the project due to lack of return on his investment.
Dolores and Caleb evade Serac's men with Liam as their captive, and Dolores breaks the bad news to Liam that he's trying to outbid Serac on Delos (so Serac is after him too). Liam has special glasses that just show him everything about everyone and he declares that Dolores is blank space. She says he's become complacent believing his glasses let him understand everyone, but he doesn't seem worried. He seems worried after he sees Caleb's everything, and he doses Caleb with a party drug called 'genre' and tries to escape. Dolores detains him and Caleb starts to hallucinate, 'interestingly' experiencing the world in different genres starting with an X-files/noir paranoia. It's super interesting how average people on the street just seem suspicious and then nothing much really happens.
Dolores' motorcycle drives itself to their location and she retrieves a bag of weapons from it, telling it "Don't go too far". It's a bit stupid because "too far" is really too ambiguous a term for a motorcycle to quantify, and it would also require information as to where it's supposed to "go". You'd really need to give it specific data that you decided on in advance from a list of possible choices in order for it to perform functions.
Dolores needs Liam's private key to gain access to Rehoboam; it'll have to be his whole hand this time but luckily he'll get to keep it because apparently she's determined that he can just be manipulated. As they're being tailed by Serac's cars in their (very secure) rideshare car, Caleb stares out the windows with cagey foreboding and worries that they'll all be killed. His response is totally appropriate because everything runs on Liam's system that two of them are trapped in mortal danger by, and their rideshare car is now being hijacked with an Amber Alert (a lousy thing for anyone to do - even a writer). As their car is locked down and rerouted, Caleb sensibly does not remain calm. He tries to kick and pry a way out as the car comes to a full stop in an isolated parking garage. It remains very securely locked. As Serac's personnel start to move in on the victims, Dolores cuts the line to the main server so now a private key can be used to take administrative control the car. She hands her tablet to Liam saying "Give me your access. I can save you".
Dolores gives a semi-automatic to the high one and Liam decides to wait until they're shot at and then places his hand on the tablet for the key to be read. Dolores then commandeers the car from inside; issuing commands specifying how it should function. She enables semi-automatic control, disables safety features, and resumes at maximum speed. But it's still not possible to outmaneuver or outrun Serac's cars (unsurprisingly). Caleb's dripping with messed-up operatic adrenaline, but he manages to "point and shoot"; firing a smart missile from a stupidly user-friendly compact launcher Dolores brought along. It's a little off and the targeted car also swerves clear because they have a human driver, so the missile initially misses the target. But then it just goes aerial and turns itself around, guiding itself back to complete the hit anyway, blowing the car up from behind. Dolores arms the explosives she's rigged to her motorcycle and commands it to intercept, so it bashes itself into another car and blows it up from below like a car bomb, killing everyone inside and knocking out the power to an entire city block in the process. Easy enough. Getting out of the rideshare car, Dolores tells Liam to "Get down". It's a bit stupid because he's still just a sitting duck in the rideshare car so there's no "down" to get to.
As Dolores starts hosing the last Serac car with bullets like the powerhouse machine she is (sometimes, when the authors have decided that's what she'll be), Caleb switches from the action genre to the (totally inappropriate) romance genre, swooning over Dolores uselessly with a starry glint in his eyes. She gives him a look and he snaps back into shoot-'em-down mode. Caleb's RICO buddies, Ash and Giggles show up to assist, and Dolores downloads the Serac data to view via her special contacts that even have a special flickering light that makes her eyes seem really special and maybe even psychic or just super smart or something so she can seem all-knowing and even just seem really special too. They all head to the subway in a sloggingly tedious scene as Caleb switches genres and everything just slows way down like a grinding chore to the old Iggy Pop song "Nightclubbing". The Martin unit has meanwhile commandeered the Bernard unit with the host-hijacking button and now switches him back on. They talk about the giant steel ball sack and the loops it puts people on, and the Martin unit implies that the Bernard unit has always been of two minds. The robot that literally switches between different parts of himself at the press of a button like The Incredible Hulk replies "It's not that binary". A part of him has a point when he questions whether the Martin unit has ever questioned what Dolores wants him to do. The Martin unit says "We all have our role to play... some of us won't survive", telling the Bernard unit he'll have to pick a side. He probably won't really, though (even if he does, or thinks he does, or just kind of feels like he does), as usual.
The Serac data shows how they impressed Dempsey by using the giant steel ball sack to suddenly commandeer the stock market with five million dollars they stole from him, driving results absurdly in his favor and arbitrarily ruining businesses and lives in the process (a "purely mathematical" demonstration, as Serac puts it). Dempsey's overjoyed because the graphs show he made money. Serac says there was a problem: in all of their projections humanity came to an end due to outliers who couldn't be controlled.
Dolores launches her massive assault against humanity via Serac's big data; having the Martin unit suddenly slam everyone in the world with their Rehoboam profile from the Incite company headquarters (shortly before detonating an explosive in the office, blowing up himself and Serac's agent, Martel in the process). Chaos ensues and there's rioting in the streets, and two assassins step out of a rideshare with the intention of killing Caleb. Dolores steps in the way and guns them down like the powerhouse machine she is (sometimes, when the authors have decided that's what she'll be), taking several shots to the abdomen. She doesn't even notice she's been shot this time. She zips her jacket because apparently this minor upset to her appearance is the only relevant consequence of the gunshot wounds now.
As they walk along the beach, Liam tells his captors they should just let him go. When Ash says "You got the specs. Is that how it plays out?" he says no, they'll take what little he has left like the petty criminals they are and will always be (as Ash takes his glasses). He seems surprised when Ash shoots him; apparently the glasses were only good for limited projections (and it was all always subject to interpretation anyway). He bleeds out into the tide under a pier.
Dempsey eventually finds Serac's detention centers where he's imprisoning people he defines as unfitting (including his brother) to keep them from polluting his data and the gene pool, and to try to 'edit' them via re-education. When Dempsey says he'll expose Serac's People Projects to the public, Serac tells him that every scenario in which he informs the public ends in the extinction of the human race and this is why his brother wanted to kill him. As they walk to the site where a plane has just crashed to the ground, Dempsey says he's seen the projections and Serac lets him walk away at this point (but Dempsey has limited data, and he clearly hasn't seen the scenarios that were being developed for his assassination). Serac 'humanely' gives Dempsey a chance to change his mind (while also implying that he's going to kill him), saying he would tend to agree with the system but occasionally there can be a "bubble" of agency that allows someone the freedom to make their own choice. He sure does almost seem like he might even be bubbly and friendly and everything, for a moment, but he's established the parameters of his own ugly choice in grim detail. When Dempsey's unmoved, Serac completes his 'strategy', brutally bashing Dempsey's face repeatedly against a piece of the wreckage with 'impressive' psycho malice. He wipes the blood off his hands with banal distaste, perfunctorily checks his watch, and then drags Dempsey's body to situate it in the wreckage of his sabotaged jet. It's a vicious and rigorously premeditated murder done with spitefully casual disdain for the victim (made 'necessary' to 'save the world').
In a scene from the past, we see Serac and his brother entering into business with Liam's father, Liam Dempsey Sr. to gain access to his archives of Ultra Big Data and perfect their data-savaging "giant steel ball sack". His brother privately suggests that they kill Dempsey because he'll just get in the way, and Dempsey threatens to defund the project due to lack of return on his investment.
Dolores and Caleb evade Serac's men with Liam as their captive, and Dolores breaks the bad news to Liam that he's trying to outbid Serac on Delos (so Serac is after him too). Liam has special glasses that just show him everything about everyone and he declares that Dolores is blank space. She says he's become complacent believing his glasses let him understand everyone, but he doesn't seem worried. He seems worried after he sees Caleb's everything, and he doses Caleb with a party drug called 'genre' and tries to escape. Dolores detains him and Caleb starts to hallucinate, 'interestingly' experiencing the world in different genres starting with an X-files/noir paranoia. It's super interesting how average people on the street just seem suspicious and then nothing much really happens.
Dolores' motorcycle drives itself to their location and she retrieves a bag of weapons from it, telling it "Don't go too far". It's a bit stupid because "too far" is really too ambiguous a term for a motorcycle to quantify, and it would also require information as to where it's supposed to "go". You'd really need to give it specific data that you decided on in advance from a list of possible choices in order for it to perform functions.
Dolores needs Liam's private key to gain access to Rehoboam; it'll have to be his whole hand this time but luckily he'll get to keep it because apparently she's determined that he can just be manipulated. As they're being tailed by Serac's cars in their (very secure) rideshare car, Caleb stares out the windows with cagey foreboding and worries that they'll all be killed. His response is totally appropriate because everything runs on Liam's system that two of them are trapped in mortal danger by, and their rideshare car is now being hijacked with an Amber Alert (a lousy thing for anyone to do - even a writer). As their car is locked down and rerouted, Caleb sensibly does not remain calm. He tries to kick and pry a way out as the car comes to a full stop in an isolated parking garage. It remains very securely locked. As Serac's personnel start to move in on the victims, Dolores cuts the line to the main server so now a private key can be used to take administrative control the car. She hands her tablet to Liam saying "Give me your access. I can save you".
Dolores gives a semi-automatic to the high one and Liam decides to wait until they're shot at and then places his hand on the tablet for the key to be read. Dolores then commandeers the car from inside; issuing commands specifying how it should function. She enables semi-automatic control, disables safety features, and resumes at maximum speed. But it's still not possible to outmaneuver or outrun Serac's cars (unsurprisingly). Caleb's dripping with messed-up operatic adrenaline, but he manages to "point and shoot"; firing a smart missile from a stupidly user-friendly compact launcher Dolores brought along. It's a little off and the targeted car also swerves clear because they have a human driver, so the missile initially misses the target. But then it just goes aerial and turns itself around, guiding itself back to complete the hit anyway, blowing the car up from behind. Dolores arms the explosives she's rigged to her motorcycle and commands it to intercept, so it bashes itself into another car and blows it up from below like a car bomb, killing everyone inside and knocking out the power to an entire city block in the process. Easy enough. Getting out of the rideshare car, Dolores tells Liam to "Get down". It's a bit stupid because he's still just a sitting duck in the rideshare car so there's no "down" to get to.
As Dolores starts hosing the last Serac car with bullets like the powerhouse machine she is (sometimes, when the authors have decided that's what she'll be), Caleb switches from the action genre to the (totally inappropriate) romance genre, swooning over Dolores uselessly with a starry glint in his eyes. She gives him a look and he snaps back into shoot-'em-down mode. Caleb's RICO buddies, Ash and Giggles show up to assist, and Dolores downloads the Serac data to view via her special contacts that even have a special flickering light that makes her eyes seem really special and maybe even psychic or just super smart or something so she can seem all-knowing and even just seem really special too. They all head to the subway in a sloggingly tedious scene as Caleb switches genres and everything just slows way down like a grinding chore to the old Iggy Pop song "Nightclubbing". The Martin unit has meanwhile commandeered the Bernard unit with the host-hijacking button and now switches him back on. They talk about the giant steel ball sack and the loops it puts people on, and the Martin unit implies that the Bernard unit has always been of two minds. The robot that literally switches between different parts of himself at the press of a button like The Incredible Hulk replies "It's not that binary". A part of him has a point when he questions whether the Martin unit has ever questioned what Dolores wants him to do. The Martin unit says "We all have our role to play... some of us won't survive", telling the Bernard unit he'll have to pick a side. He probably won't really, though (even if he does, or thinks he does, or just kind of feels like he does), as usual.
The Serac data shows how they impressed Dempsey by using the giant steel ball sack to suddenly commandeer the stock market with five million dollars they stole from him, driving results absurdly in his favor and arbitrarily ruining businesses and lives in the process (a "purely mathematical" demonstration, as Serac puts it). Dempsey's overjoyed because the graphs show he made money. Serac says there was a problem: in all of their projections humanity came to an end due to outliers who couldn't be controlled.
Dolores launches her massive assault against humanity via Serac's big data; having the Martin unit suddenly slam everyone in the world with their Rehoboam profile from the Incite company headquarters (shortly before detonating an explosive in the office, blowing up himself and Serac's agent, Martel in the process). Chaos ensues and there's rioting in the streets, and two assassins step out of a rideshare with the intention of killing Caleb. Dolores steps in the way and guns them down like the powerhouse machine she is (sometimes, when the authors have decided that's what she'll be), taking several shots to the abdomen. She doesn't even notice she's been shot this time. She zips her jacket because apparently this minor upset to her appearance is the only relevant consequence of the gunshot wounds now.
As they walk along the beach, Liam tells his captors they should just let him go. When Ash says "You got the specs. Is that how it plays out?" he says no, they'll take what little he has left like the petty criminals they are and will always be (as Ash takes his glasses). He seems surprised when Ash shoots him; apparently the glasses were only good for limited projections (and it was all always subject to interpretation anyway). He bleeds out into the tide under a pier.
Dempsey eventually finds Serac's detention centers where he's imprisoning people he defines as unfitting (including his brother) to keep them from polluting his data and the gene pool, and to try to 'edit' them via re-education. When Dempsey says he'll expose Serac's People Projects to the public, Serac tells him that every scenario in which he informs the public ends in the extinction of the human race and this is why his brother wanted to kill him. As they walk to the site where a plane has just crashed to the ground, Dempsey says he's seen the projections and Serac lets him walk away at this point (but Dempsey has limited data, and he clearly hasn't seen the scenarios that were being developed for his assassination). Serac 'humanely' gives Dempsey a chance to change his mind (while also implying that he's going to kill him), saying he would tend to agree with the system but occasionally there can be a "bubble" of agency that allows someone the freedom to make their own choice. He sure does almost seem like he might even be bubbly and friendly and everything, for a moment, but he's established the parameters of his own ugly choice in grim detail. When Dempsey's unmoved, Serac completes his 'strategy', brutally bashing Dempsey's face repeatedly against a piece of the wreckage with 'impressive' psycho malice. He wipes the blood off his hands with banal distaste, perfunctorily checks his watch, and then drags Dempsey's body to situate it in the wreckage of his sabotaged jet. It's a vicious and rigorously premeditated murder done with spitefully casual disdain for the victim (made 'necessary' to 'save the world').