Welcome to #TransTuesday! It’s time to dive into one of the most ambitious topics I’ve tackled. This year I fell completely in love with a show on Apple TV, and at least part of that is due to THE UNINTENTIONAL (?) TRANS ALLEGORY OF SILO.
Someone recently called my trans allegory deep dives Tillyvision, and frankly I think that’s pretty dang great. WELCOME TO THE NEXT INSTALLMENT OF TILLYVISION, MY FRIENDS.
Before we go any further let me say this entire exploration is criticism and allowed by the WGA strike. This is a celebration of a show that meant a lot to me that was made by real human beings, incredibly talented writers and actors and directors and crew.
Support the people who make the media you love, because we writers shouldn’t have to have two or three side jobs to get by, and over 80% of actors make less than $26k a year. That’s barely a third of the annual cost of living in Los Angeles!
If you’d like to donate to help writers, actors, and crew get through the strike financially, please visit the Entertainment Community Fund.
Also I’m not sure everyone realizes what an undertaking these are, so a little info for you: not counting my first watch (which was just for entertainment/writerly reasons), the rewatch was ten episodes… that took two hours each to watch due to stopping to take notes.
So already that’s 20 hours. It then took me about 12 hours to convert those notes into readable form for release. So you’re looking at 32 hours of work. And then revising and tweaking and prep for the podcast versions all took another 5 hours.
And that’s all BEFORE posting the social media/text version and before recording the podcast version (which took another… 5-7 hours?). So that’s like… 45 hours of work?
What I’m saying is I really hope you appreciate these, because they are a massive undertaking and a huge time sink. Phew.
Before we dive in I’m going to warn you that there are gonna be TONS of spoilers, because I’m going to be talking about every episode from the entire first season. If you haven’t yet seen it and want to experience it on your own first, read no further!
Unlike my most well-known example of discussing trans allegories in media, The Matrix (those essays became a book, BEGIN TRANSMISSION: THE TRANS ALLEGORIES OF THE MATRIX… get your copy now!), I believe Silo’s allegory is unintentional. …maybe.
I will specifically be talking ONLY about the Silo show on Apple TV+. To the best of my knowledge, showrunner Graham Yost, the other writers on season one, and Hugh Howey, the author of the books the show is based on, are not trans. BUT!
As I like to remind you when talking about these things, there may be trans people involved who aren’t out yet or might not even know they’re trans yet. Which means the allegory could be them intentionally working through complicated gender feelings without realizing. BUT!
It’s also perfectly possible that there really are no trans people involved with it, yet it is still incredibly trans because as I like to remind you, trans stories are human stories, and we’re all more alike than not. This happens all the time!
If you’d like examples of other trans allegories in media, some intentional and some probably intentional but maybe not, see The INTENTIONAL TRANS ALLEGORY OF REAL GENIUS, part 1.
And THE UNINTENTIONAL (?) TRANS ALLEGORY OF THE LITTLE MERMAID‘S “PART OF YOUR WORLD.”
And THE UNINTENTIONAL (?) TRANS ALLEGORY OF THE TWILIGHT ZONE‘S “NERVOUS MAN IN A FOUR DOLLAR ROOM.”
Unlike the write-ups on The Matrix, Real Genius, and Nervous Man, I’m not going to use timestamps. I’m covering an entire season, ten episodes, and I felt it would just be too confusing.
The basic gist of my trans reading of the show is that people who are sent out to clean, and the Flamekeepers, are trans people. The society of the Silo is, conveniently, the society that we trans people are born into here in the real world.
Let’s look at some of the characters:
Juliette is a trans person waking up to their transness and the way the entire system of society is stacked against us, lies to us, oppresses us, and then figuring out what to do about it.
Billings is a stealth trans person, represented through his having and hiding “the Syndrome.” He has a condition of birth that will get you otherized by society and so he does everything he can to hide it.
Walk is a closeted trans person. She’s trans and knows it and is afraid of coming out because of how people will react.
Gloria is pseudo-closteted. She’s “not trans” but everyone suspects she is, even though she never transitioned. She spends her life trying to help others transition because she was never able to.
George is a trans person trying to learn about themselves, and why they never heard the word “transgender” before, and why are trans people so “new”? He uncovers the truth of our history and does what he can to make things better for those coming after.
Regina (and also Billings’ wife) are spouses or family of trans people, who lose some of the things trans people lose due to their association with us. They blame US for the ostracization they face rather than transphobic society, and place their grief over our needs.
Lukas is a trans person in denial. He has questions but his fear rules him and he’s forever an agent of the system. He feels he can only be who he’s told to be, and he’s a “pick me” who sells out his people in an effort to be “one of the good ones”.
Spirals are everywhere in the show, symbolizing bringing order from chaos. They’re the literal backbone of society, which you see in the central staircase (which draws allusions to the spine and even DNA in the opening credits). And they work incredibly well.
Because Bernard and most of the silo’s residents (transphobic society) THINK they’re preserving their society by trying to control and stamp out transness, and they see that as the order from the “chaos” of trans existence.
But we trans people are ones ACTUALLY bringing order from chaos, when we discover that it’s the world that’s broken and not us. And we fix that by choosing to transition. The spirals are actually ours, and they appropriated them, and dang that happens to us all the time.
Water is also really important, in the ways characters are terrified of it and yet also in awe of it. It symbolizes dysphoria, in the way I myself have described my own GENDER DYSPHORIA as being akin to drowning.
And you can even see in my INTERVIEW WITH MAYA DEANE, AUTHOR OF “WRATH GODDESS SING” how she wrote dysphoria in a similar way in that remarkable novel (which is also my favorite novel EVER). She writes about it as being trapped at the bottom of a well.
And if you think fearing the water/dysphoria makes sense but aren’t sure why someone would be in awe of it at the same time, let me hit you with this: dysphoria is horrific and terrible, but once you realize you have it… you KNOW that you’re trans. That knowledge brings answers.
There’s SO much more on this and it’s used in really brilliant ways. However, I do want to include a little disclaimer.
This allegory is… imperfect. It doesn’t work quite the way The Matrix or even Real Genius did, where trans creators were putting their lived experiences and feelings into their work with intent (be it conscious or subconscious).
Also, because the allegory is less “clean” (if you’ll forgive the word choice when talking about Silo), not everything that applies to the allegory for one character works for the other characters.
For example, the Syndrome is analogous to physical attributes you’re trying to hide so nobody knows you’re trans, but not everyone who represents different kinds of trans people or culture have the Syndrome. Make sense?
Anyway, there are big bits of transness all over, in many different ways that mean a lot to me. And it’s got fabulous things to say! So come along on this journey and let’s see what Silo has to say about trans existence. I think you’re gonna dig it. TIME TO SILO UP!
EPISODE 1
We can see right away this world is old. The entire aesthetic (which I LOVE) is really retro-futuristic. If you’ve watched the entire season, you know this is purposeful in-story.
There is more advanced technology available, but only to those at the top of the power structure. They’re intentionally holding the rest of society back and not allowing them to access it or to technologically advance. They only care about what benefits THEM.
Holston puts his badge on. He is in a position of authority, and he’s respected within the Silo as part of its power structure. He puts flowers in front of the mirror, adjusts the vent… as we learn later, both of these things are in prep for Juliette. We’ll talk more about them later.
I bring this up now because, given where he’s headed, I want you to understand that he’s doing this to PREPARE FOR THE FUTURE, for those coming up/out after him. It’s part of WHY he’s doing what he’s doing.
Holston: “We do not know why we are here, we do not know who built the silo. We do not know why everything outside the silo is as it is. We do not know when it will be safe to go outside. We only know that that day is not this day.”
We hear those lines several more times throughout the show. They speak to me of trans people not knowing why we’re trans, or why society hates us, or why it feels so dangerous to come out. And not knowing when it will ever change.
This is where something first sparked in my brain on my first watch, because… huh, yeah, that sure sounds like a description of someone early on in their transition journey, who maybe just discovered they’re trans and is terrified of what that means.
Holston misses his wife, who he lost. In allegory I don’t think these deaths from people being sent out are really deaths, but they’re symbolic of losing people due to refusing to accept them. When Allison came out (as trans), Holston shunned her along with all of society.
And so she was cast out (of the silo and thus out of society) for being different from everyone else, for wanting to know the truth (that trans is just how some people are and a totally fine and normal way to be), and he went along with it because that’s what society taught him to do.
Holston: “I should have done it three years ago, but I couldn’t listen.” Allison tried to tell him, we see it in the flashbacks. But HE COULDN’T LISTEN. And this is exactly what happens to so many trans people when we come out, even our SPOUSES can refuse to hear and understand.
Marnes: “You’re gonna say this to me after all we’ve been through?” “I don’t want you to say it. Please don’t say it.” Look how Marnes puts HIS feelings first, which is what so many cis people do when trans people come out.
How could you do this to ME, why aren’t you thinking about ME? Please don’t say you’re trans, if you don’t say it we can all pretend it’s not true and keep on living a lie and not rocking the boat, just like society wants. See the trans tuesday on CIS GRIEF for more on that.
In the flashback, we see Holston and Allison are waiting to get permission to reproduce. And this connects directly to trans people and the gender-affirming healthcare we need: hormone replacement therapy and surgeries.
And a lot of the time we still need PERMISSION FROM CIS PEOPLE to get those things. See the trans tuesday on TRANS KIDS AND THE INTAKE EXAM to learn how I had to “prove” my transness and that I’m a woman to a cis person before I could get transition care.
This is also about BODILY AUTONOMY and who has control over our bodies. And yes, in this story it’s about reproduction, but if the people who go out/the Flamekeepers are trans people in this reading (and they are, much more evidence to come)…
Then that fight for bodily autonomy becomes about us having the right to transition to our true selves because they’re OUR bodies and we have the RIGHT to the medical care we need, just as anyone with a uterus does for reproductive rights.
I’ve talked many times how the fight for abortion rights and the fight for trans rights are the exact same thing, btw. See the trans tuesday on TRANS RAGE for what it’s like when we’re completely forgotten about when people talk about these incredibly important topics.
And also see the trans tuesday on BODILY AUTONOMY to see what it’s like living a life where your body never feels like it’s yours or you have any control over it.
So this entire sequence about Allison and Holston trying to have a baby is just to show you they needed (cis) society’s PERMISSION to do what they wanted with their own bodies.
Next time we’re going to wrap up episode 1, because it goes way deeper. So deep, in fact, it will take all of part 2 just to finish the pilot episode! Subsequent episodes go faster, but the pilot lays SO much groundwork, there’s a LOT to discuss.
Tilly Bridges, end transmission.
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