Sumith Prasad
The second season finale of Apple TV+’s science fiction series ‘Silo,’ titled ‘Into the Fire,’ revolves around the rebellion that strengthens beyond the control of Bernard Holland. Even though the mayor tries his best to eliminate it, he gets tricked by the leaders of the lower levels, who band together to challenge their adversary’s authority over them. While the rebellion turns the order in the silo upside down, Juliette Nichols prepares for her return to her home, family, friends, and former fellow residents. The tenth episode of the installment ends with startling and ambiguous developments one after the other, which offers more questions than answers! SPOILERS AHEAD.
Silo Season 2 Episode 10 Recap
‘Into the Fire’ begins with Shirley Campbell informing her companions about the survival of their friend, Juliette Nichols. The group, which also includes Knox, Martha “Walk” Walker, Paul Billings, Hank, and Dr. Pete Nichols, plans to retaliate against Bernard Holland’s authoritarian reign by detonating a bomb inside the silo. The mayor learns about the plan through the camera placed inside Walk’s chamber and sends every raider at his disposal to neutralize the threat. The officers arrest the leaders of the lower levels and set up a makeshift prison to lock their followers up. To add to their misery, Bernard makes an officer reveal that Walk has been working for him.
After her secret is out, Walk asks to meet Bernard. The mayor welcomes her to his chamber with immense joy since he has uprooted the growing rebellion in his eyes. That’s when the electrical engineer discloses what really happened. Whatever she has communicated with her allies when Bernard watches her is just a distraction. While the mayor focuses on their verbal interactions, Walk has been communicating differently with Knox using hand gestures. In other words, disclosing the plan to detonate a bomb for Bernard to hear has been part of their plan all along.
While Bernard thinks that he has won a war against Walk and her companions, the rebels strike unexpectedly. They set up a bomb on the stairs to topple the mayor’s reign for good. When the explosion does not materialize as they have planned, Dr. Pete sacrifices his own life to detonate the bomb manually. The bombing motivates the other rebels to fight against the dictatorship within their silo. The uprising goes beyond the control of Knox, Shirley, and Paul Billings, who try to stop Patrick Kennedy and his followers from leaving the silo under the belief that it is safe to live outside.
While the uprising intensifies, Lukas Kyle meets Bernard and informs him that he has completely solved Salvador Quinn’s mystery. When the mayor asks him to reveal his findings, the analyst grows concerned and states that “it” will kill them if “it” hears what they are discussing. After whispering his discovery, he quits his job as the shadow of the mayor. He adds that nothing can be done anymore, which makes his position insignificant in his eyes. The distressed Bernard then appoints Robert Sims as his next shadow. The head of the Judicial rushes to Lukas to learn about his findings with a gun, but the analyst is hopeless enough not to see the weapon as a threat.
Lukas also asks Sims to go to the Legacy chamber to learn what he wants to know on his own. Meanwhile, Juliette prepares to return to her home. Solo even ensures that the suit she is going to wear does not have any issues. As she is about to leave, her friend asks her about their reunion. Juliette is not in a position to make any promises, but she reaffirms that she will try her best to meet him again. The engineer then cleans the external camera of her home silo and warns the residents that it is not safe to go out. Sims looks for answers in the Legacy chamber with his wife, Camille, and their son. Surprisingly, the voice inside the room asks the father and child to leave, indicating that the mother can stay and possibly learn what she wants to know.
Silo Season 2 Ending: Are Juliette and Bernard Dead or Alive?
After informing the residents of her silo about the unsafe conditions of the outer world, Juliette enters the establishment, thanks to Bernard. The mayor decides to leave the underground bunker after the rebellion leaves him suffocated. For years, he has served the Founders and their authoritarian notions by safeguarding several secrets concerning the silo, which are revealed through Juliette’s survival and shocking return from death. He accepts that the uprising will pave the way for mass deaths, as every rebellion has caused in the past. Instead of dying like an insignificant insect inside the underground bunker, Bernard chooses to die breathing the poisonous gas outside.
That’s when Juliette gives him hope. She tells him that she knows how to stop the “Safeguard” procedure, which is activated to ensure the mass elimination of the residents. The revelation convinces the mayor that something can be done about the fates of the silo’s residents, which likely hasn’t been considered by the Founders. Unfortunately, the door of the airlock chamber starts to close behind them, triggering Juliette’s impulse to get inside. She is either unaware of or forgetful about the fire that activates inside the room to kill any sort of contaminated material that might have entered the small space.
Since Juliette knows how to stop the Safeguard procedure, Bernard doesn’t stand still and watch her die. Instead, he goes after her to save her from the fire, only to get trapped inside the chamber with her. Obviously, the protagonist is poised to survive from the life-threatening trap, especially with two more seasons of ‘Silo’ yet to come. Since the mayor tries to save her, seemingly by standing between her and the fire openings, he may have gotten hurt more than her. Furthermore, Bernard’s suit must be of the lowest quality since he wears it upon accepting or expecting his impending death.
Therefore, the fire must have severely affected Bernard more than Juliette, whose suit has been tested and confirmed to be reliable. These possibilities also align with their fates in Hugh Howey’s ‘Silo’ book series, the source texts of the show. If you don’t mind spoilers from the novels, we can reveal that Juliette escapes from the fire with severe burns while Bernard loses his life inside the airlock chamber. Interestingly, in the book series, the mayor chooses to kill himself by not stepping outside of the particular space. The protagonist only hurts herself because she misunderstands that the person inside the chamber is Lukas Kyle rather than her adversary.
How Does the Safeguard Procedure Happen? Who Activates It?
Before Juliette and Bernard end up in the airlock trap, the protagonist’s conversation with the mayor reveals significant details concerning the ambiguous “Safeguard” procedure. When her adversary brings it up, she talks about pumping poison into the silo, which explains what the procedure is. In other words, the Safeguard is activated to kill the residents inside a particular silo through poison pumped using likely hidden pipes. It is switched on mainly when a rebellion stands a chance to topple the power structure within the establishment. Once the poison enters the silo, most likely in the form of gas, it kills the residents to start a new obedient civilization inside the bunker.
Lukas must have learned all about the poison, which explains why he immerses himself in utter hopelessness. Whenever he is asked about Salvador Quinn’s code, which is about the Safeguard procedure, he replies that it does not matter now. What he means must be that nobody can deactivate it once it is initiated. The analyst bravely stands in front of Robert Sims and asks the latter to kill him because he believes that the procedure or the poison it releases will kill him soon anyway. This understanding of the procedure also aligns with the words of the Algorithm in the ninth episode of season 2. When Lukas meets it, the AI-powered system tells him that there will be grave consequences if he discloses what the Safeguard is.
The warning Lukas receives must have been issued to ensure that he won’t sabotage the Safeguard. As far as the people behind the procedure are concerned, they can be the supreme authoritarian figures who control the entire silo system. Like the mayor in every silo, there can be a group of individuals who oversee the operation of every underground bunker and make the final decisions concerning the establishments’ fates. These people can even be the direct descendants of the Founders, committed to ensuring that nobody will stand against the Pact and the Order and assume control of the bunkers. The Safeguard procedure seemingly is one measure they use to deal with threats like rebellions, which challenge their authority.
Why Does the Legacy Ask Camille to Stay?
One of the most confusing developments in the second season finale concerns a decision the Legacy makes. When Sims shows up to find out what’s happening in the silo and how to save it, the holy chamber rejects him and his son. Instead, it chooses to welcome Camille, who is not actively involved in the decision-making system in the establishment, like her influential husband, who is the head of the Judicial and the shadow of the mayor. Our best guess is that the choice was engineered by Bernard, who has been highly vocal about his distrust of Sims. If the mayor was asked to name his successors in the wake of an emergency, he must have added Camille instead of her husband.
Camille is an unflinching individual who does not hesitate to stand up for her interests or what she believes in. While Sims has changed his allegiances and aims multiple times, his wife has been consistent when it comes to her pursuit of power and influence. Bernard may have been under the impression that Camille can serve the Order better than Sims, who is not strong enough to commit to one single cause or person. Thus, the former raider must have emerged as the better person to guide the silo to a new future in the absence of Bernard. The Legacy asking their son to leave is unsurprising, considering his age and inability to make a difference.
Who Were the Congressman and Helen? What Was the Dirty Bomb?
The second season of ‘Silo’ ends with a flashback scene that takes place unspecified years before Juliette’s timeline. The particular portion follows an unnamed congressman from Georgia who met Helen, a journalist working for The Post. The latter wanted to know all about the “dirty bomb,” only for the politician to remain silent about it. Still, from their conversation, it is evident that a radioactive bomb was dropped by a country like Iran, if not Iran, on the United States. The nature and severity of the explosion are shown through the usage of a Geiger counter to detect radiation of any kind.
The explosion of the dirty bomb can be seen as the beginning point of the end of the world. The bombing might have kickstarted an international war that escalated because of the United States’ retaliation. If that was not the case, the radioactive materials deposited by the bomb must have caused more explosions or similar tragedies, causing an apocalypse. From the ‘Silo’ novel series, we know that the congressman is one of the masterminds behind the creation of the silos, which were built to save the residents of the country from the nuclear tragedy. In the upcoming third season of the show, we may get introduced to the congressman in detail, especially the role he played in building the underground bunkers.
Helen’s significance mainly remains in the PEZ dispenser gifted to her by the congressman. George Wilkins, Juliette’s late boyfriend, eventually found the same thing in their silo, which means that the journalist was one of the earliest inhabitants of the establishment. When the world collapsed due to “dirty bombing(s),” Helen likely sought refuge in a silo with the dispenser. It ends up in the hands of Juliette, who is inspired by the same to unravel the mysteries behind the underground bunkers. In other words, the congressman’s gift to Helen paved the way for Juliette’s emergence as a truth-seeker.
Read More: Apple TV+’s Silo: Where Was it Filmed?
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