On Friday, January 17, the second season of the post-apocalyptic dystopia «Silo» concluded on Apple TV+, based on a series of novels by American writer Hugh Howey. The first season of the show received high ratings from viewers and critics and rightfully entered the top best series of 2023 according to many media, including ITC.UA. In this review, we will determine whether the authors managed to make the sequel at least not worse than its predecessor and whether it will make viewers want to wait for the following seasons, which are supposed to fully conclude the story.
Genre science fiction drama, post-apocalyptic, dystopia
Showrunner Graham Yost
Starring Rebecca Ferguson, Common, Tim Robbins, Iain Glen, Harriet Walter, Shane McRae, Remy Milner, Claire Perkins, Billy Postlethwaite, Steve Zahn
Premiere Apple TV+
Release Year 2024
Website IMDb, official site
After Juliette Nichols left the walls of her bunker, she was faced with a grim scene. Heading to a neighboring underground shelter, she sees an area strewn with dead bodies. Upon entering the neglected and somewhat flooded facility, it seems empty at first glance. However, Juliette soon finds the sole survivor who has barricaded himself in a locked hideout. He calls himself Solo and behaves a bit oddly.
Meanwhile, a rebellion is brewing in Juliette’s native concrete structure, particularly at the mechanical level, which Mayor Bernard Holland tries to prevent by hook or by crook. The situation gradually escalates as the hanging questions demand immediate answers. Thus, the fate of the entire bunker depends on the upcoming events.
If you belong to the cohort of viewers who complained about the slow pace of the first season’s narrative, then the second one will be a real endurance test for you, as here this factor is maximized. The second season really marks time without much plot development, with all the most interesting things reserved for the finale and subsequent seasons — that’s essentially the whole review of the long-awaited continuation of the show.
If the first season seemed promising, intriguing, and offered a relatively stable suspense, then in the second, all this has significantly diminished — viewers are shamelessly marinated over 9 episodes, to finally squeeze the intrigue in the tenth and thus provide a powerful incentive to watch the next season. So you will definitely want to keep watching. You won’t be able to refuse the show in the middle of a party. You will need «Silo» even more. But is it worth it?
Much of the story is devoted to endless dialogues, which can hardly be called critically important for the development of the story and even less so captivating, monotonous darting through dark corridors, or clarifying relationships, including those of secondary characters. The average 45-50 minute runtime covers too little quality eventfulness. We are offered a plot in which mostly nothing (important, fateful) happens. Even the much-suffering Juliette, who was the foundational character in the first season, appears on screen not so often.
The unfortunate thing is that Juliette’s story is served very sparingly and fragmentarily, to the extent that the creators throw us small snippets, minute crumbs of her unfortunate wanderings, which quickly pass against the slow narrative about the hardships of the main bunker.
The screen flickers with many various characters. New ones appear, but they are of little benefit. Steve Zahn was instructed to portray an adult child, and he excels at this task, displaying maturity only when the scriptwriters require it. The local mad Katniss Everdeen with a bow and arrows tends to finish off every passerby, but ultimately receives a moral lecture and finally calms down. It’s also surprising that people are pierced with arrows, and in the next episode, they walk around painlessly as if nothing happened.
The season finale, as usual in current flagship shows (and this approach of «Silo» reminds one of the recent continuation of «Squid Game»), cuts off mid-sentence and even offers a preliminary hint at a backstory that should unfold in the next season. Although the events here look truly exciting, such tempting endings seem like mockery and start to irritate. Sorry, showrunners and screenwriters, but you shouldn’t torment your audience like this. So we wait another year and a half to get answers.
The second season does not have the same impact as the previous one because its authors categorically do not hurry to amaze, but instead drag on the audience and mark time in one place. The story needs a good wringing out. It seems it has become too stifling in this bunker, so everyone involved clearly needs some fresh air.