Reviewer Rating: 3/5.0
3
In my review of The Silo Season 2 Episode 3, I lamented that a few episodes into the second season, the story was already starting to crawl.
Maybe I should keep my mouth shut, because The Silo Season 2 Episode 4 opens with a miserable ex-Machina laying out everything that the Machines have faced. It’s literally written on the wall for them to read.
Apparently, despite their many visits to this dark and uncharted area of the silo, no one read these massive messages written on the 100-foot by 100-foot walls and thought, “Gee, this sounds really bad.” “
It’s a true face-palming moment, a cringe-worthy flash of “what the hell…” Well, you know the rest.
It’s a “hey, let’s put on this show” occasion boiled down to “write the story on a wall where everyone can see it, but no one will actually read it until the right moment.”
While some moments harken back to the things that made “The Silo” a solid but slow series, other scenes are just too ridiculous to be immersed in. I’ll get to this later.
Much of Silo Season 2 featured the ever-present mystery of the outside world, and Silo 17 is at the heart of that. Juliet’s time there was unsettling, to say the least.
Her only companion is a boy, whose mind is also tortured by decades of loneliness. Every moment she spends with him is a study in passive anxiety, wondering when and if Solo will explode and become violent.
Sean McCrea’s balancing act between a kid and a gut-wrenching psychopath is as unconstrained as a balloon filled with half a PSI.
Juliet is the voice of reason, but she also has a lot on her plate. The journey to explore No. 17’s silos is neither easy nor safe. The place is half filled with water, and if you’re afraid of drowning, this episode might make you a little nauseous.
Readers know that beyond the borders, there is more going on, out of sight, out of sight…for now. Unfortunately, like the first three episodes of The Silo’s second season, the sense of progress is fleeting.
Back at Silo 18, Knox, Shirley, Kara, and Walker decide to board the silo and meet with Judge Meadows. Although this decision signals the beginning of the episode, they don’t reach their peak until the end of the episode.
Unfortunately, Judge Meadows is no longer in a position to receive company. To make matters worse, Judge Meadows is where things really fall apart.
In a previous scene, Bernard does something very scary, followed by a series of romantic gestures that seemed so out of place that I had to check to make sure my iPad hadn’t switched me to another show .
The level of untruth is truly terrible, and it’s hard to imagine putting anyone in Judge Meadow’s shoes and expecting them to behave in the same way.
It’s not over yet. What happened next was equally ridiculous. Robert Sims’s speech in The Lord of the Rings is as out of place as everything else and is the icing on the cake, a seemingly bizarre effort to speed up the plot in the most convenient way possible.
To make matters worse, it doesn’t take much time to sit down and think about a few minor modifications to get the boat back to normal. If an armchair TV critic can do so much, surely writers can do it too?
The remaining subplots are relatively short but effective. Robert Sims remains unhappy with Bernard’s decision to pass him over in the race for the IT director position.
Robert, Bernard and Juliet are the entertaining incarnations of all the great empire quotes.
“A great civilization can only be conquered from the outside by destroying itself from within.”
——Will Durant
Accessories. In this case, “outside” means the toxic world beyond the automatic flamethrowers of exterior vault doors and silo thresholds.
“Inside” is the conflict that arises between Sims and Bernard, despite both trying to silence Knox, Shirley, and the other “farmers” at Machine Company.
Judge Meadows is the unfortunate victim of Sims’ machinations and Bernard’s counterattacks. Destruction from within, indeed.
The power dynamic between Robert and his wife Camille is fascinating. Ultimately, she was as responsible as her husband Bernard and others for the internal collapse.
So far, Season 2 of The Silo has been almost entirely about conflicting dynamics. Even though things are moving slowly, it’s enjoyable to observe the political fluctuations and resulting reactions.
Unfortunately, this puts Juliet in trouble. Everything is progressing in Silo 17, but only if you measure in millimeters.
Sheriff Billings also likes to watch movies. In this case, as he investigates Cooper’s shooting and the origin of the Molotov cocktails in Episode 2, he begins to examine what it really means to be a Sheriff.
Despite his physical handicaps, he does a pretty good job at it, asking the right questions, identifying motivations, and arriving at logical conclusions, at least in part. The larger, growing conspiracy surrounding him is a little above the Sheriff’s pay grade.
The Silos Season 2 Episode 4 is not going to get anyone excited or have you jumping off the walls with anticipation. The mystery at the center of the silo is a giant black hole that sucks us back into it in every subsequent episode.
But the reality is that Juliet starts the episode looking for a fire suit. An hour later, she found it. Of course, mission accomplished, along with all this good stuff. But according to the rhythm of the play, she seems to be no closer to her ultimate goal.
Knox, Shirley, and company reach the upper level to speak with Judge Meadows, and the episode ends with them still there, their mission clearly unfinished.
This episode relies heavily on convenience and glaring plot holes. This is unfortunate because I really enjoyed The Silo and hope this isn’t a sign of a decline in the overall quality of the writing.
And, as exciting as some of the subplots in Silo 18 are, the first four episodes relegate the main protagonists to brief snippets of screen time. There are some big questions in “The Silo,” and season two looks as far from finding the answers as it did at the beginning of season one.
Why is the outside world dead? Why is IT viciously suppressing history? Who holds IT accountable? How will Juliet come back and what will she do when she returns?
If the heroine’s journey were measured in quarters of an inch, it would be a mile long, with only the first few inches behind her. Episode four covers another quarter, but in a questionable way.
Watch The Silo Season 2 Online
