They say history is written by the victors. And often times it’s written in blood. The second season of Apple TV+’s hit sci-fi series Silo has been inching toward a rebellion, and the latest episode featured a shocking death that will set up the biggest conflict the series has ever seen.
From the first minutes of the second season we knew chaos was coming. We saw how a rebellion erupted in a separate Silo—Silo 17—resulting in people defiantly venturing to the outside world only to be killed by the noxious air. Since then, we’ve seen Juliette Nichols (Rebecca Ferguson) walk through what could be the future for Silo 18, the Silo she left: dead bodies strewn outside, “Lies” scrawled across the monitor the Silo people use to see the outside world, and darkness.
Ever since the people of Silo 18 watched Juliette become the first person to successfully walk outside and survive at the end of the first season, the Silo’s mayor, Bernard Holland (Tim Robbins), has been using every manipulative tactic at his disposal to prevent an uprising among people who have been told their entire lives that life outside the Silo isn’t safe. He’s arrested individuals for painting Juliette’s initials on the walls as a sign of reverence, lied about her using new tape his team developed to block the poisonous air from entering her suit, hired actors to publicly challenge him so he can dismiss their opinions as ramblings compared to his deceitful proclamations of hope, and coerced Judge Mary Meadows (Tanya Moodie) into supporting his lies to pacify the people with false promises of this new tape ushering in a new day.
What he did in episode four might be both his most dastardly deception and his most effective one.
What happened to Judge Mary Meadows?
After Bernard’s brooding enforcer Robert Sims (Common) questions Judge Meadows’ fidelity to the lie, he attempts to remove her from her place of influence with Bernard by having people call for her impeachment. While he simply wanted her sidelined, Bernard saw a more vile opportunity to both silence her and distract people from looking for the truth about the Silo.
Meadows only went along with Bernard’s plan in exchange for a suit designed to keep her safe when she exits the Silo, a promise he dangled in front of her until the end. Under the guise of a friendly dinner before handing her over her suit, Bernard poisoned the food she ate in an effort to “unite the Silo.” How her death would help accomplish that wasn’t clear until he offered Knox (Shane McRae) and Shirley (Remmie Milner), the two people leading the silent rebellion against Bernard, the chance to come see Judge Meadows. When they arrive in her office to see her dead with a knife in her chest, they quickly realize they’ve been set up to be pinned as the murderers of the Silo’s judge.
Soon after, Sims incited a manhunt for the accused killers, telling an angry mob that the two had killed Meadows for refusing to open the Silo’s air lock, and proclaiming it the duty of every Silo member to find them. That’s one way to bring people together.
With Juliette trying to assemble a suit so she can get back to Silo 18 and stop a rebellion that would lead to the deaths of its residents, the embers of fiery hatred have already been stoked, and there might not be much time left to prevent the inevitable.