I’ve been lukewarm, at best, on the past two seasons of AppleTV+’s post-apocalyptic thriller Silo. It’s a show with a lot of mythology, a lot of questions, and a shockingly high cast turnover rate. And it’s also a show that has been loathe to offer up any answers to the central questions of the series*, most of which start with the word “Why?” Season one was intriguing enough to keep my interest throughout – largely thanks to the performances of Rebecca Ferguson (as our central hero, Juliet) and Tim Robbins (as Bernard, Juliet’s antagonist who eventually gets the rest of Silo 18 to hate him just as much). Season two ended up more or less losing me, as the story split between Silo 18 (where a revolution was brewing consisting largely of characters I had little to no interest in, save Harriet Walter’s Martha) and Silo 17, which had Juliet interacting with the young survivors of a catastrophe that hinted at the idea of something or someone outside of the Silos controlling those within them should they step out of line. I was so bored for long stretches in season two that I almost didn’t bother coming back for season three. But that strange flashback that closed out season two, taking us back to a time before the Silos made me just curious enough to wonder what might be in store. And you know what? I’m actually glad I stuck it out. Because despite a very slow start, by the end of season three, I was chomping at the bit to see what a potential fourth season would bring.
*Silo is based on a book trilogy from Hugh Howey. While I understand the series isn’t an exact retelling of the books, I haven’t read them so I’m in the dark about what might still be happening and just why it is.
The third season of Silo once again splits the action into two distinct arcs: the “present day” in the Silos and the “past” (or, rather, sometime relatively around now – we don’t ever hear any years mentioned). The action in the Silo is more of the same in the grand scheme of things. Those in power – this time around, Camille (Alexandria Riley, making the most of her beefed up role) is our central Silo antagonist, heading IT and hewing closely to the whims of the AI-esque Algorithm – are continuing to try to exert their control over the remnants of the rebellion. And Juliet has survived her journey back from Silo 17 but doesn’t seem to remember anything about her life – throwing everyone for a loop as they try to make sense not only of how she survived but what she saw while she was outside. In the “past,” we follow Daniel (Ashley Zukerman), a junior Congressman, Helen (Jessica Henwick), a reporter, and Charlotte (Jessica Brown Findlay), a naval pilot and Daniel’s sister, as they get embroiled in some political machinations that may or may not be related to the creation of the Silos.
For much of the season, the story inches along in both arcs. Were the season a tight six episodes instead of ten, I think it would work a heck of a lot better than it does here – the early episodes are a true slog as we try to piece together just what is going on with Juliet and what is really happening at the Silo. The past arc is much easier to follow, although it also takes too long to get us to where we know it’s leading us to. But once it arrives at its climax? Oh boy, do things start to get fun and incredibly interesting. It’s rare that I say that I was happy to slog through nearly three seasons of a show to get to the payoff, but in this case, I absolutely was. Because the final stretch of this season is just spectacular across the board. And the set up for a potential fourth season? I would love to see what is to come.
That being said, the issues that plagued the previous two seasons of Silo remain. The writing is clunky, the secondary and tertiary characters remain shockingly underdeveloped, and a lot of the performances are pretty wooden (not to mention the host of Brits attempting to offer convincing American accents that are spotty at the best of times). And poor Common continues to be the weakest of the weak links in terms of performance – although that is mitigated somewhat by the series having Riley step more into the spotlight while Common’s Sims becomes less of a force and focus. And the show continues to rely on twists that even when explained don’t make total sense both with the story and with the execution – although most of the twists are telegraphed one way or another early on so most are expected by the time they are revealed.
Still, once I reached the final few episodes of the season, none of that mattered. The writing was tight. The performances were compelling. And the answers that were revealed made a ton of sense and set up some truly interesting possibilities for the future. The new characters from the past arc were more fleshed out than I expected after only a single season – something the Silo crew still haven’t managed to achieve in three – and on the whole, the story was really strong. The first half of season three is still a slog, but the payoff is well worth the journey.
The third season of Silo premieres on July 3 on AppleTV+. All ten episodes were provided for review.
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