Warning: Full spoilers follow for Silo seasons 1 and 2.
We’re trudging back to the future in the next installment of AppleTV Plus’ sci-fi mystery saga, Silo season 2, after last season’s 2023 finale saw Juliette Nichols (Rebecca Ferguson) exiled to the outside of Silo 18 and into the ravaged, post-apocalyptic world of the 26th century where she experiences a severe dose of reality before striding into the distance where dozens of other underground silos exist.
Based on the best-selling trilogy of dystopian novels by author Hugh Howey and created by veteran Hollywood luminary Graham Yost (Speed, Broken Arrow, Justified, Band of Brothers), Silo offers a harrowing look at life inside a 144-level bunker housing what appears to be the last vestiges of humanity following some unexplained toxic calamity befalling our fragile planet.
Silo’s ten-episode first season debuted on AppleTV Plus on May 5, 2023, with a starry cast consisting of Tim Robbins (Bernard Holland ), Will Patton (Deputy Marnes), Chinaza Uche (Paul Billings), Common (Robert Sims), Harriet Walter (Martha Walker), and David Oyelowo (Holston Becker).
No one’s ever seen someone walk out of sight and that starts to spin up talk of rebellion
Silo showrunner Graham Yost
Now as the highly-anticipated sophomore outing arrives (the new season will debut on Friday, November 15) carrying more questions and myriad mysteries of exactly what happened to the Earth and who built the vast network of doomsday bunkers, TechRadar spoke with esteemed executive producer and showrunner Graham Yost to hear what’s all to come after last year’s shocking cliffhanger.
“It went back to when we were first breaking season one, which is we knew pretty quickly how we wanted to start it, and how we wanted to end it,” Yost explains to TechRadar. “We wanted to have Juliette going out and going over the hill and everyone freaking out and then see that she sees there’s more silos. We thought that was a cool way to end season one.
“Then when we got back in the writers’ room for season 2 we thought okay, we’re going to have a split story. We’re going to have Juliette’s adventures in this dead silo with a bowl full of bodies and what the hell happened. So there’s a big mystery there. And we thought it might be cool to just spend season two’s first episode with Juliette and then jump to the second episode and be back in her home silo, Silo 18, and see the effect that Juliette had on that silo. No one’s ever seen someone walk out of sight and that starts to spin up talk of rebellion. That was fun.”
Delving deeper into the Silo saga mythology
One of my favorite moments in season one is when Juliette is being marched upstairs in manacles and she can’t get the water bottle to her mouth. Bernard holds it for her
Silo showrunner Graham Yost
Yost personally penned The Engineer, the premiere episode of this fresh 10-chapter offering, which kicks off with a distant flashback to a bloody rebellion in a neighboring subterranean silo.
“It was a fun episode to write,” he recalls. “There was other stuff in there and we just trimmed it back and trimmed it back. I said to Apple, ‘the script is now 31 pages, are you okay with a 30-minute episode?’ Then director Michael Dinner, who I worked with all the years on Justified, said that the script was going to be more than 30 minutes and it’s going to be a full episode. Then Frank Golan, who I’ve worked with for 20 years, wrote episode number two.”
Rebecca Ferguson and Tim Robbins deliver remarkable performances in Silo and as the series delves deeper into its mythology, they’re able to push the boundaries of their character arcs.
“Well, in the first season Bernard is kind of in control of things and we see a little humanity in him,” notes Yost. “We understand he’s not just this mustache-twirling bad guy. One of my favorite moments in season one is when Juliette is being marched upstairs in manacles and she can’t get the water bottle to her mouth. Bernard holds it for her. There’s the great scene Frank Golan wrote in season one’s finale where they’re just sitting together in the cell having a talk. There’s a little glint in his eye when she says something he doesn’t know. So that gets into what happens in season two, which is Bernard starts to pull at some threads about things he doesn’t know. And I’ll say that it has a huge effect on his life. He’s not just this monolithic antagonist.
“And for Juliette, she’s alone. Rebecca was not feeling well and not by my side at the premiere, but if she had been I would have said, ‘yeah I loved her in episode one because Juliette didn’t say anything.’ But she does, but not a lot. Michael Dinner kept texting me during filming to say, ‘man, she’s amazing, just watch her eyes.’ She goes through the experiences she goes through.”
Building a bunker of creativity
BAFTA-winning and Emmy-nominated composer Atli Örvarsson delivers the haunting music for Silo and provides aural cohesion and menacing Islandic soundscape to the prestige production.
“Atli Örvarsson is someone I got introduced to through Morten Tyldum, who was the director on the first three episodes of the first season,” says Yost. “Morten and I agreed right from the jump that there’s something slightly melancholy about life in the silo. And that frankly a Scandinavian approach to that would be good. Morten is Norwegian. Rebecca is Swedish. I’m half-Norwegian. And Atli is Icelandic. Then he wrote the main title theme and I thought he’s perfect for this show.
“Michael Dinner had never worked with him and he kept texting me from the final mix and said ‘Oh, man he nailed it. He nailed it even better this time.’ Michael and I went up to Glasgow to see Atli conducting the Scottish National Symphony. Strings for an hour or two, then brass and percussion stuff, filling out the score. It was fun to watch him work and he’s just a great guy.”
Juliette has no interest in being a hero. She’s an engineer just trying to solve a problem and yet you know she’s someone you want to watch
Silo showrunner Graham Yost
For Yost, it was Hugh Howey’s dynamic writing that initially compelled him to come aboard the ambitious Apple TV Plus project several years ago, a decision he considers most fortuitous considering it’s now one of the best Apple TV Plus shows.
“It’s the fact that he built this world so carefully and fully and that we could just jump in and do it,” Yost adds. “He’s been incredibly supportive of changes we’ve made and was very much involved in the slight re-think and focus. But what he really built was Juliette. And she’s a great character. Juliette has no interest in being a hero. She’s an engineer just trying to solve a problem and yet you know she’s someone you want to watch. Then you get Rebecca Ferguson and that’s Juliette. There’s hope in her because she just won’t stop. I love that attitude.
“And that’s one of the things season two is about. This rebellion builds because of what she did, even though they’re pretty damn sure she’s dead. But they pick up the torch for Juliette and you start seeing graffiti popping up in the second episode. ‘Juliette Lives.’ So on we go. I’m very proud of the season and we think it ends well.”