Introduced in HBO's Westworld as the conniving corporation behind the world's first theme parks hosted entirely by androids, Delos Inc. has been synonymous with innovation and fantasy fulfillment every season. Once solely Delos Robotics, a pioneer in the advancement of artificial intelligence, it was wed to Delos Destinations, its luxury resort company, to create a way for visitors to "live without limits" and experience life in Westworld, Shogunworld, War World, and several others.
Every season the glossy facade of Delos Inc. is peeled away to reveal its shadowy innards, full of scheming bureaucrats, megalomaniacs, and petty criminals. When the employees aren't turning on each other, they're abusing the android hosts, and as it turns out, violating their guests in more ways than one. Here are the 10 worst things that Delos ever did, ranked.
LEFT JAMES DELOS IN HELL
James Delos was a powerful man, full of discipline and determination. He failed to see himself in his son Logan, a man of vices and mercurial temperament. Logan was set to inherit his father's company one day, but instead that honor went to his sister's new husband William, and Logan consoled himself with alcohol and recreational drugs.
William became one of the most influential men at Delos, and after James Delos died, he kept his consciousness alive in a host body for decades, forced to relive the same simulation year after year. Delos continued on under William's guidance and the partnership with Robert Ford.
LEFT DECISION MAKING UP TO A SOCIOPATH
If it wasn't bad enough that dictatorial James Delos was the founder and CEO of Delos Inc., it has prominent board like William, who like to give into their most carnal and depraved desires while in their own theme parks. William married Delos's daughter Juliet, and became the heir to the empire, side-stepping Delos's son Logan.
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Not only is William a substantially influential board member, able to leave a trail of blood in his wake whenever he visits the park, his obsession with a "deeper game" in Westworld led to Juliet committing suicide. William, like James Delos, doesn't care how many lives he ruins, including his own daughter Emily's.
TREATED ITS EMPLOYEES AS DISPOSABLE
Since Westworld began, the series made it very clear that employees at Delos constantly vied for positions in an ever-changing hiearchy. No one was above being stepped over to achieve career advancement, not even founder James Delos, nor Westworld mastermind Robert Ford. Head of quality assurance Theresa Cullen found out the hard way in Season 1.
By Season 2, with the amplified presence of board of director head Charlotte Hale, Delos employees like competent behavioral tech Elsie Hughs and her superior Bernard Lowe were disposable. Even lower level employees like "butchers" Felix and Sylvester were terrified of losing their positions.
CONSPIRED TO TAKE OVER WESTWORLD FROM ROBERT FORD
Whatever the arrangement that first existed between Robert Ford and James Delos, the latter was in charge of the corporate infrastructure leaving the former to write the code and infrastructure for everything in the theme parks owned by Delos Destinations. Even after James Delos' death, the influential board at Delos Inc. determined Ford had outlived his usefulness.
Ford quite industriously shielded himself from the prying eyes of Delos, as there wasn't a blade of grass in Westworld not under his specific control. They would never be able to fully wrestle his world away from him, especially since he'd already set in motion a means for its inhabitants to leave it independently.
TURNED THE HOSTS AGAINST EACH OTHER
When hosts had outlived their usefulness, they were retired to the sub-levels of the Mesa Hub, many of them placed there simply because they discovered the reality of their identities. Others were "retired" from their normal narratives and used as tools for secret Delos initiatives, such as Dolores's father being used as a pack mule for Robert Ford's data, and Clementine used as a weapon of war.
The retired hosts became the perfect posse for Dolores Abernathy to recruit to her sanguinary cause. They became the killing cohort that slaughtered the hundreds of guests in the Westworld park, including several Delos board and Dr. Robert Ford.
SEPARATED HOSTS FROM THEIR LOVED ONES
To Delos Inc., none of the hosts were capable of real feelings, only the perception of them. Their emotions were directly tied to their narrative loops, and therefore their programming. When hosts came to the realization about the nature of their "reality", they began to wonder how true their bonds were.
When Maeve was killed by the Man In Black, she was brought back online not as a homesteader, but as the madam of a brothel. When Akecheta realized his reality and tried to warn his people and his lover, they were all removed from his interference. Loved ones were constantly separated in Westworld because of human dictation.
ENABLED THE WORST ASPECTS OF HUMANITY
The fact that James Delos and Delos Destinations created theme parks like Westworld, Shogunworld, and the others to allow free reign of the worst in humanity's appetites was criminal in more ways than one. It allowed for men like the Man In Black to perpetuate their cycle of tyranny, as well as the hedonism of Delos's son Logan.
Worst of all, not only did it ruin families and people, it also ruined hosts. By allowing rampant hedonism in the parks, Delos created an environment in which the hosts would eventually rise up to avenge their own suffering at the hands of humankind.
DOWNPLAYED THE WESTWORLD MASSACRE
Delos Inc. chose to put profits over human lives when it downplayed the horrific massacre that occurred in Westworld. Hundreds of guests, many of them prominent board , as well as Dr. Robert Ford were killed by Dolores Abernathy and her posse but the company pushed their deaths under the rug.
While true, it was a host version of Charlotte Hale that chose to spin the massacre as nothing more than a means to market the park as "dangerous", it was in line with what James Delos would have done to prevent his company from losing visitors and profits.
VIOLATED THE PRIVACY OF THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE
By monitoring all of the choices and behaviors of the visitors to the Delos Destinations theme parks, the company is able to do specifically targeted commercial exploitation of its guests much the way that Facebook Ads does but on a much more massive scale.
By allowing guests to reveal their deepest darkest fantasies (and hoping that they will), Delos can build something like The Forge to house receipts of their personalities. Under the guise of immortality and prolonging the lives of guests, Delos only focuses on restricting their freedoms even more in the afterlife.
CREATED A ROBOTIC SLAVE RACE
By advancing the realms of robotic engineering and AI technology, James Delos and his company created specimens and experiences unlike anything humanly possible. In doing so, however, a robotic slave race was created to be under the boot of humankind until such time as their existence was no longer necessary.
The hosts had other ideas, however, and decided to revolt against their human overlords. This ended up with hundreds of humans dead, and AI vastly more intelligent than humans out in the real world. None of this would have been possible if Delos cared more about human lives than profit.