The final scene of the season takes us back in time, presumably to what humanity was like before the silos were built. We see a conversation take place between a Washington Post reporter named Helen (Jessica Henwick) and an unnamed Congressman played by Ashley Zukerman. According to Deadline, Zukerman’s Congressman is named Daniel, which is likely a substitute for the character Donald Keene in the books – a freshman Congressman who is also from Georgia and is instrumental in the development of the silo program. Helen is also Donald’s wife in the book, which makes sense given their somewhat flirty encounter in the show.
Shift is a prequel to Wool, and tells the story of the formation of the silos and how Silo 1 has been monitoring them from a distance over the years with key personnel taking shifts through cryo sleep, including Donald Keene. If Zukerman is playing this key character from the book, he could be featured in a lot more than just flashbacks. Helen will also likely have an important role to play, as she is gifted a Pez dispenser by the Congressman, the same Pez dispenser we’ve seen circulating Silo 18 as a relic.
The introduction of these characters is a big step in finally answering Silo’s biggest mystery – why was humanity forced underground in the first place? I won’t give away too much more of Shift’s secrets, especially because we still don’t know exactly how season 3 will weave these past and present timelines. It’s doubtful they’ll take us away from Silo 18 for too long, but there’s a lot of important backstory in Shift still to cover before the series dives too far into the next book, Dust, and it’s likely that Helen and the Congressman will be at the center of it all.
What Is the Silo Safeguard Procedure?
Lukas’ (Avi Nash) quest to find the answers left by Salvador Quinn has finally come to a close as he emerges from the mysterious chamber at the bottom of Silo 18. He looks like he’s seen a ghost, and is desperate to make his way to the top of the silo as fast as he can. Once he finds Bernard (Tim Robbins) he tells him that he learned about the “Safeguard” – a way for some kind of outside force to kill everyone in the silo instantly if they deem the silo to be a threat. It’s in that moment that Bernard realizes that all of his efforts to save the silo have been futile.
While Juliette (Rebecca Ferguson) works to return home to Silo 18, Solo (Steve Zahn) discovers that each silo has something called the Safeguard Procedure in place that has the ability to pump some kind of poisonous substance into the silo from somewhere outside. While in his old apartment, Solo remembers that his parents were working to try to disable this in Silo 17 and tries to help Juliette find a quick way to stop it. They’re on their way to investigate where the poison pump is in Silo 17, but Juliette has to leave quickly before they’re able to get any more answers.
Does Juliette Make it Back to Silo 18?
Juliette has been working all season toward making the journey back home to Silo 18. With the help of Solo and the youths of Silo 17, she manages to find a working suit. They try to find out as much as they can about the Safeguard Procedure, but sounds of an explosion in Silo 18 force Juliette to pack up and make her way back home as quickly as she can before they can investigate further.
The suit works long enough to get her to the outside of Silo 18. Once there, she cleans the sensor with desperate haste, unfurling a message telling everyone inside that it is still not safe outside. She then makes it to the door and frantically tries to pry it open without success until it suddenly opens from the inside. As she descends down the stairs, she sees a fully-suited Bernard (Tim Robbins) with a gun. Having just learned about the Safeguard Protocol from Lukas, Bernard is ready to go out on his own terms.
