From the ground up: 'Silo' digs deep into mysteries in season two

In season one of “Silo,” viewers were thrust into the saga of a dystopian society that finds 10,000 people living underground in mysterious circumstances.

However, no one knows when or why the silo was built, and those who try to find out face fatal consequences.

Graham Yost, series creator, said the first season ended with a dramatic cliffhanger as Juliette Nichols disappears from Silo 18, walking away alive, unlike the others who previously attempted to leave the sanctuary of the silo.

From the ground up: 'Silo' digs deep into mysteries in season two

“Two minutes after season one ended, we begin season two with Juliette walking between silos and coming upon dead bodies,” Yost said. “She follows them into this dead silo filled with corpses from a long time ago. We thought that was just a cool way to get going and also raise a question. This is a mystery series. It’s a series about many mysteries, and this is the latest: what happened to that other silo?”

The series is based on Hugh Howey’s New York Times bestselling “Silo” series. The second season began on Nov. 15 and a new episode is released each Friday through Jan. 17, 2025.

Yost said as the first season came to its conclusion, newly appointed sheriff, Juliette Nichols, played by Rebecca Ferguson, had defied the authoritarian leadership of the silo to investigate what she believed to be an unsolved murder. For her efforts, she was framed by the mayor, played by Tim Robbins and Robert Sims, played by Common for violating the silo’s cardinal rule: If you say you want to go outside to “clean,” there’s no taking it back.

Over time, everyone in the Silo has accepted that the cleaning ritual is a death sentence but as the residents watch Juliette walk away, it appears that she has miraculously survived.

It is in sharp contrast to everyone else who previously ventured out to clean, meeting their demise after stepping only a few feet into the outside world.

The population is mystified, elated and incredibly confused. There is now a growing contagion of doubt about everything they’ve been told, and it is not long before a rebellion breaks out, led by Juliette’s former colleagues from the mechanical sector, Knox, played by Shane McRae and Shirley, played by Remmie Milner, and organized by the reclusive engineering genius Walker, played by Harriet Walter.

In the new season, viewers find Juliette encountering bodies, and she follows them to another silo. She finally makes it to Silo 17 and enters through the airlock to discover a dilapidated and deserted interior. The water level in the foreign silo has risen to wipe some of the electricity – interestingly, the IT level still has power — but continued flooding will ultimately drown whatever is left of this shell of a former civilization.

At first, there appears to be no life inside but when she traces a noise to the IT level, she discovers a man named Solo, played by Steve Zahn who appears to be the structure’s lone survivor.

“Season two picks up literally minutes after the end of season one,” said Joanna Thapa, executive producer. “Juliette’s just left and this is the first time we’ve been outside. We hadn’t let the audience go out before as we wanted them to feel as immersed in this world as our characters. So the beginning of season two is like a silent film as Juliette steps out into a world that’s desolate and foreboding. Then she ventures into a totally empty silo.”

Meanwhile, at Juliette’s home silo, the uniqueness of her disappearance and the possible reasons for her apparent survival have begun to trigger a threat of insurgence.

“When she lives, that is the start of the rebellion,” Thapa said. “People start to question the truth about all they’ve been told.”

For Ferguson, one of the things she loves most about the show is how it reveals the unpredictability of human behavior.

“When we follow Juliette, she starts off being on quite a selfish road when it comes to figuring out who killed the person she loved,” Ferguson said. “This gradually escalates to the bigger picture of finding out the truth. And the truth is bigger than one person. That is the arc of the drama: mistrust in what had been an unquestioned authority spreads from one person to all. She takes the bullet for everyone. She gets sent out unjustly but mysteriously survives.”

The actress continued to explore Juliette’s backstory in depth this season, unpacking more of her character’s complex and painful past.

“What I like about playing Jules is she’s a person who is in control and doesn’t question much – until she starts to question everything,” Ferguson said. “She is riddled with trauma, despair and grief. She’s lost her mother, brother and her boyfriend. The trajectory of her emotional life is the unraveling of everything that’s been pushed down. When she’s sent out and arrives at Silo 17, she can’t control it anymore because there’s nothing she needs to control, nothing she can control. It’s basically pure survival.”