'Westworld': Aaron Paul on Meeting Evan Rachel Wood's Dolores in Season 3 Premiere (Exclusive)

The sci-fi series returned to HBO on Sunday night -- with a vengeance Dolores would be proud of.

Westworld is back! 

The HBO series officially returned on Sunday night, after nearly two years -- and it came back with a vengeance Dolores (Evan Rachel Wood) would be proud of. 

The show's season three premiere introduced fans to the real world, outside of Delos' many parks. After destroying Westworld in the season two finale and escaping with a handful of pearls, Dolores revealed her new mission: taking down Incite, an organization which runs a massive data collection and analysis project (but secretly seems to halt humans' ability to actually have free will). 

Her journey to infiltrate the company from the inside put Dolores in danger... and crossed her path with a new character, Caleb (Aaron Paul). The episode ended with Dolores badly wounded after a battle with Incite henchmen, and seemingly relying on Caleb to get her the help she needs. 

Though he's new to the show, Caleb has real experience in the real world (and of the criminal variety), which could prove valuable to Dolores. While speaking with ET's Leanne Aguilera at the Westworld season three press day earlier this month, Paul opened up about his "dream come true" first scene opposite Wood -- and teased their team-up. 

HBO

"I am such a huge fan of Evan as a person, as an artist, and as Dolores, so to be able to go to work and zip on this character's skin and play opposite her is really truly, such a dream come true," Paul said of his reaction to filming that scene under the bridge with her. "I was so blessed with Breaking Bad -- I thought that was really capturing lightning in a bottle -- and I really feel like I am jumping into yet another magical show ... It's really such a blessing."

Paul was approached to join Westworld by co-creators Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy, who offered the actor a roadmap of how they saw his character entering the show. 

"When I sat down with Lisa and Jonah for the first time, when they came up to me and they had this idea -- they gave me just broad strokes of sort of who this guy is and gave me a little bit of his backstory and where he was going," Paul revealed. "They gave me broad strokes of this season and beyond." 

Fans got a taste of Caleb's complexity on the Westworld premiere, but as Paul promised, there's more to be discovered. 

"I mean, it's just a complicated, messy, fun, very dramatic role," he shared. "I'm always gravitating towards those sorts of roles, but that's just the type of thing that I love to sink my teeth into. They definitely gave me a lot of fun things to play with in this one." 

Westworld airs Sundays on HBO. See more of what to expect this season in the video below. 

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