The fourth installment of Silo commences with Juliette being summoned to the Mayor’s office, revolving around the unexpected demise of Ruth. Deputy Marnes, rattled by the news, converses with Bernard and Sims, suspecting that Ruth has been victimized by rat poison. Interestingly, Ruth wasn’t the intended target but Marnes, and if it hadn’t been for her drinking from his bottle, she could have been alive, a realization that leaves Marnes in anguish.
For the interim, Bernard assumes the role of the Mayor and consequently inducts Juliette as the Sheriff. After being introduced to her office, Juliette finds it challenging to navigate her responsibilities due to Sandy, her assistant’s, resistance, driven by prejudices against those residing in the bottom 50 levels. Despite the opposition, Juliette stands her ground and seeks access to files and the gun cabinet, which Sandy refuses until Juliette’s official induction. Juliette acquiesces but persists on procuring a single file – George Wilkins.
At this point, it is pretty clear that there is a lot of discrimination between classes within the Silo; Juliette is from mechanical and as such, is not seen worthy of taking up the mantlepiece of Sheriff. Furthermore, Juliette is already seen as out of place, she joined mechanical when her father was a doctor and as a result, has already kind of brought down her own social status. She’s resiliient, however, we’ll give her that.
As the new Sheriff, Juliette leverages her authority to insist on obtaining Wilkins’ file. Her own investigation leads her to “Holding 3”, a notorious area leading up to the surface. The narrative intertwines with flashbacks revealing more about Juliette’s past with her father. Her brother, Jacob, is depicted in poor health, and it is suggested that he, along with their mother, did not survive. Despite emotional turmoil, Juliette perseveres and engages in cleanup, encouraged by a friendly stranger to retain Jacob’s favorite toy.
A persistent motif in Juliette’s character is her penchant for repairing things. However, a minor mishap in preparing food triggers alarms, resulting in a confrontation with her father, who remarks, “Not everything can be fixed.”
In the lower 50 levels, Juliette acquaints herself with the labor-intensive duties, which include sorting recycling and enduring exhaustive hours for the betterment of the Silo. A counterfeit letter ultimately implicates her father, but he consents to her staying as long as she’s content.
Returning to the present, Juliette’s official oath-taking as Sheriff is presided over by Bernard. Subsequently, Sandy informs her of the non-existence of a George Wilkins file but mentions a file left by Holston for the new appointee, containing a handwritten note and a mysterious hint. Before she can delve into this, a situation involving Deputy Marnes assaulting Frankie in the market, suspecting him of Ruth’s poisoning, diverts her attention. This incident persuades Juliette to share her actions with Marnes, revealing her conversation with Holston about George’s death and her belief in the sheriff badge reading “truth”. In return for solving Ruth’s case, she asks Marnes to help uncover George’s killer, resulting in a fragile alliance.
Juliette’s previous experience in recycling enables her to foster relationships with the community, unlike Marnes or even Holston. Meanwhile, Marnes resorts to a punching bag in his apartment to release his pent-up anger.
In Martha’s lab, the camcorder Juliette tinkered with in the previous episode is fixed, but the outcome is left unseen. Back in her office, Juliette investigates a rattling noise from the vents mentioned by Bernard and discovers a key clue: a bag of documents linked to a rattling chain, which turns out to be the George Wilkins file. It’s unclear who hid the documents here, or why, but the documents are obviously important and something inside of them could be the clue to what happened within the Silo.
As the episode concludes, the narrative shifts to Deputy Marnes, who, in an inebriated state, considers but refrains from dropping his bottle into the Silo’s depths. On returning to his apartment, an unexpected encounter occurs as he’s held at gunpoint by an intruder.
Overall, this episode was a little slow, and we may argue that there was little plot development, but there were some interesting contrasts in the episode. One of our favourites is highlighting the key differences between Marnes and Juliette. Whilst he drinks to mask the pain of Ruth’s death, Juliette throws herself into her work in uncovering the reason behind Ruth’s death and investigating George.
You can watch the fourth episode of the series over on Apple TV; don’t forget, new episodes air every Friday.
