Silo Season 2 Episode 3 Recap & Review

Silo Season 2 Episode 3 sees the lies beginning to unravel as we dive deeper into deception and explore its effects, and finally meet the man in the vault.

Episode 3 kicks off in Silo 17, where we learn the name of the man in the vault: Solo. He reveals to Juliette that what happened in his silo wasn’t anything forced, that everyone chose to leave. When Juliette asks why, she learns more than she could have ever imagined.

Solo tells her there are 50 silos total, and the reason his silo rebelled was because one of their own, their Head of IT Ron Tucker, went outside, refused to clean the window and instead wrote LIES in the dirt, then walked away. 

“Two days later,” he says, “the word LIES appeared on our screen,” and that’s when residents rebelled. “They went out because they thought it was safe” since they didn’t see Ron die. We then learn Solo was Tucker’s shadow, making it fair to presume that Tucker is the one who told Solo to lock himself inside the vault once he went out and never to open the door. Thanks to Bernard (Tim Robbins) back in Silo 18, we know Silo 17’s rebellion happened decades ago, so it appears Solo has been locked in that vault, all alone, for too many years.

In a flash, Juliette realizes the same fate faces her silo if she doesn’t do something to stop it, and that means going back, which she vows to do. She just needs another outside suit, which isn’t available, so she must make it herself. Solo comes in handy and helps her figure out a way to construct a new suit, but it entails her going to an area in Silo 17 that’s completely underwater. As she makes her way down to this area, she comes across graffiti on the wall that reads RON TUCKER LIVES. Little does she know, similar graffiti in relation to her survival is appearing in her silo; the rebellion has already begun. 

Back in Silo 18, police are cracking down, arresting anyone they believe responsible for the graffiti turning up in support of Juliette. According to their holy book/manual “The Order”, graffiti supports rebellion, and both support the person who was supposed to clean but didn’t. And since Juliette was from the mechanical department, police will stop at nothing to make an example out of them first. 

Bernard meets privately with Judge Meadows (Tanya Moodie) on how to handle this situation Juliette has created and further fans the flames of deception when he assures her Juliette requested to go outside after being caught with “a red-level relic” (a hard drive from before the rebellion) and tried to flee in guilt. Playing her part, Meadows does what she needs to do and reminds Bernard what “The Order” advises in the case of such an event: Blame mechanical and incite the rest of the silo against them. And that’s exactly what he does, with Sims’ (Common) help, which is how we learn that IT is in possession of and actively using on people that makes them forget, well, anything and everything IT wants them to forget from any point in time, thus placing full perspective control right into the wrong hands.

Despite his assurances, Meadows remains doubtful of Bernard’s story, knowing Juliette would’ve never requested to go outside. To uncover his lies, she enlists Sheriff Billings to do some investigating on the down low and find out what really happened the day in question. In his efforts, Billings suspects he’s being lied to after finding out that everyone who witnessed their confrontation backed up Bernard’s story but with hesitancy. He comes clean with Meadows and tells her he knows they’re all lying because as he walked Juliette out, she told him she did not ask to go outside, that Bernard was forcing this, thus confirming Judge Meadows’ suspicions, which she won’t discuss with Billings.

Down in mechanical, Shirley (Remmie Milner, of His Dark Materials) and her crew gear up to face off with police and get their people out of jail. As shouting ensues and pushback starts, the prisoner Sims manipulated with the promise of erasing a painful past throws a Molotov cocktail at police, inciting a full-on riot, wherein he is shot and killed, as is another member of mechanical. Chaos erupts and to all the residents of Silo 18, it looks like mechanical started it all, taking the heat off IT, just as Bernard intended. 

Our biggest moment of excitement in Episode 3 happens in Silo 17. The more Juliette tries to entice Solo to open the vault door, he clams up. The more she questions him as to why he won’t open the door, he retreats even further. As Juliette senses his fear and innocence, she backs off with the questions and realizes what’s written on the walls outside of the vault: WE WILL GET YOU SOONER OR LATER. 

We know Solo has been alone for some time, but here’s where we really start to see the effects of living that way and of the effects as lies begin to unravel. Solo makes Juliette some food and leaves it for her when she returns. When she thanks him, he tells her he didn’t feed her to be nice; he fed her to see if she really existed. He needed to know she wasn’t a hallucination. He is that confused and that afraid.

It doesn’t matter to Juliette, though. All she wants is to get back to her silo, and she’s going to do so with or without Solo’s help. She thanks him again for the food and leaves, piquing his interest in needing to know what the only human he’s come into contact with in decades is going to do. After she has walked far enough away, the unthinkable happens, and SOLO OPENS THE DOOR! 

Until this moment, we’ve only heard Solo’s voice and seen his frightened, wild child-like eyes. Now, in Episode 3, we finally meet the man in the vault: It’s Steve Zahn (The Righteous Gemstones)! I don’t know about you guys, but I adore Steve Zahn’s quirky, massive talent. He brings such intrigue and personality woven with tender moments of psychological weakness and trauma to this role in such a visceral way that will—if you’re a sap like me—leave you with a tear or two in your eye … or both of ‘em. It’s endearingly powerful to watch Solo and Juliette meet face to face, and then to see Solo move cautiously in awe of what he’s seeing and experiencing. 

Silo Episode 3 is pure magic, y’all. Stay tuned, because the lies are unraveling faster than a spool of thread and you’re gonna want to keep up.

Silo Season 2 Episode 3 is currently available to stream on Apple TV+, with new episodes dropping every Friday through mid-January. Read our recap & review of Silo Season 2 Episode 2!

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