Apple TV’s Servant
2×02 “Spaceman”
Directed by Julia Ducournau
Written by Nina Braddock & Tony Basgallop

* For a recap & review of 2×01, click here.
* For a recap & review of 2×03, click here.
Julian wakes up in Leanne’s former room, looking at the hole in the wall. He then hears the water running in the shower nearby. He shuts that off, only to hear a child crying. He sees his sister’s watching old home videos of Jericho. Dorothy’s worried the child isn’t being cared for properly, now in the hands of the cult. She sees Leanne on her home video, cradling Jericho and laughing with the child. A doorbell interrupts them: a new package. Inside this package is a tiny spaceman’s suit. It’s actually a gift Julian had ordered for the baptism. Dorothy doesn’t dig the gift, though probably just because she’s entirely out of whack from everything going on around her. Plus she hasn’t eaten in days.

While Sean is making nice breakfast foods for his wife when Julian wants to talk about a “ransom note.” They’re doing whatever they can to keep Dorothy from figuring anything out, instead of, y’know, actually trying to find a baby that’s been stolen by an insane group of cultists. Upstairs, Dorothy tortures herself psychologically by watching creepy videos of May and her cult worshippers, like one of a cult member flagellating himself for May and the others, over and over. Then she gets a phone call from the studio. She has to co-anchor the six-o’clock news to replace a colleague. Julian tries talking her out of it. But Dorothy wants to do it, if only for Jericho, hoping he’s somewhere out there watching. When Dorothy’s out of the house, Sean and Julian get talking with Roscoe, wondering where he’s been for days upon days. Roscoe seems to not know what day it is, either. He’s not feeling well in general. Then Julian discovers something on Roscoe’s phone—audio of Leanne talking to Roscoe, who’s crying. Roscoe can’t remember anything, but Julian thinks he’s lying. Did the cult brainwash him? Sean suggests they use Natalie to help unlock Roscoe’s hidden thoughts.
That afternoon, Natalie does her best to hypnotise Roscoe and get to the truth. It doesn’t take long before Roscoe’s under hypnosis, then Sean asks him where he was with the cult. Roscoe says he was brought to a dark room. His hands were tied. He says he smelled something “rotten.” He mumbles a while, then says: “He‘s behind the door.” Roscoe says people were on his knees, bleeding. He heard the baby crying. He talks about eyes being taken out. Even Julian’s unsettled by all this, and Sean’s left speechless.

Upstairs, Dorothy’s on the news and she talks to the viewers as if talking to a baby. Downstairs, Julian tries to act like he doesn’t believe what Roscoe said, on top of more of his bullshit. He decides to work on the ransom note instead. Natalie wonders why Julian’s bothering to do anything if he doesn’t care about the baby; he claims it’s for Dorothy. That’s not it, though. Julian explains he “always wanted to go into space.” This comment, combined with the spaceman suit gift, suggests that though Julian doesn’t have his own kids, he probably liked having a nephew in his life. On top of that, he’s grappling with existential things, like whether there’s anything after death. Not easy.

Sean catches a final moment with Dorothy on the news. She talks about “missing teenagers” in conjunction with Leanne, asking for anybody with information on her whereabouts. She also adds a “night night” in case Jericho can hear her. Oh, lord, is this ever getting messy. At home, Sean says Dorothy did “what any good mother would do,” supporting her regardless. When Dorothy takes a shower, Sean gets a call from none other than Leanne, who’s wondering why Sean hasn’t told his wife the truth. At the very same time, the water starts cutting out, and the basement begins splitting open, a dark liquid oozing up from beneath.
And so the plot thickens!