Signal Horizon

See Beyond

Servant Season 3 Episode 2 Hive Theories And Everything You Might Have Missed

Servant Season 3 Episode 2 proves there is fear even in the mundane and threats can come from anywhere.

Servant Season 3 Episode 2
Courtesy of Apple TV +

As I watched Servant Season 3 Episode 2, I was reminded of my days as a mother with infants. There is so much constant noise. People are constantly buzzing around telling you want to do, how to feel, and what you’re doing wrong. It can be exhausting navigating your instincts with respecting advice. Yet, this is the place Leanne and Dorothy find themselves as they try to forge new ground, even with threats looming everywhere.

Dorothy, who has always had one foot in a fantasy land of her own making, invited a prestigious Society Hill Mommy and Me group over to be wowed by her beautiful house and Sean’s delectable meals. It’s unimportant that Leanne has severe PTSD or that she might actually be right about a religious cult of dangerous believers who walked right into her house, took her baby, and tried to kill them just months ago.

Absent-minded Sean is too busy to see the forest for the trees, and pleasing Dorothy has been his mission since the tragedy that was Jericho Prime’s death. Guilt is a powerful motivator, and even though he seems to have regained his zest for life, he is still catering and coddling Dorothy.

Only Julian, who is clearer-minded now that he is sober, realizes that they are in danger with or without a killer cult coming for them. Leanne is unhinged. It’s not her fault, but that doesn’t change the facts. If the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away, The Turners are in real trouble. If Leanne feels betrayed, Jericho might be ripped away from them again.

Leanne is terrified of everyone, and everything, excluding her, found family with Julian and the Turners. Every noise, every bump, and every innocent delivery is suspect. She knows firsthand what the cult is capable of. But unfortunately, her fear cripples her ability to think rationally. Like the boy who cried wolf, if she screams for help too many times when there isn’t any danger, her pleas eventually be ignored. She may be struggling, but I doubt she’s wrong. The Church of Lesser Saints is out there somewhere waiting.

A costly surveillance system has been set up that monitors everything, lending yet another voyeuristic feel to Servant Season 3 overall. Everything from the tight framing of shots to sliding camerawork feels like we are watching something we shouldn’t be and will be punished for it. Leanne’s to camera declaration that she isn’t running is another smart choice to put us in the shoes of those watching and planning for an attack.

After Leanne is scared one too many times during the group meeting, a sudden swarm of bees runs everyone out of the Turner’s house. Here are all the biggest takeaways and a few new theories from Servant Season 3 Episode 2.

Cults come in many forms

Servant Season 3 Episode 2 was an excellent example of what the series does so well. It was migraine-inducingly tense and simultaneously absurdly funny. It’s like if Ace Ventura Pet Detective was a horror movie. But, as with most comedy, the humor comes from reality. Mommy and Me groups can be excellent sources of education and support for parents and babies, but they can also be social nightmares. The kind of nasty places where parents judge each other against their ideals of perfection and no one walks away feeling secure. Leanne is right. Dorothy is doing this group for herself more than Jericho because her need to be fawned over is stronger than her parental instincts.

The Church of Lesser Saints may be adapting

The church knows Leanne has their playbook. She endured an entire childhood of floggings, rules, and servitude. They want her and the baby back at any cost. What if the new crop of cult members sent to retrieve Leanne and Jericho have made adjustments? They may have changed how they punish themselves, knowing she would be looking for back scarring. With this thought in mind, Leanne could still be right about both the mom crawling around under her bed and Mr. Smiley, whose facade slips just before everyone finds Leanne holding him at scissor-point. Uncle George isn’t a rocket scientist, but Aunt Josephine seemed very bright. I’m sure there are others who make decisions who are wily tacticians.

Was Mr. Smiley a cult member? Was the woman in Leanne’s room? We don’t actually see the pacifier under the bed, and she does put her hand in her pocket. Both interactions with Leanne are certainly odd, but they are viewed through her perspective, putting everything in question. His back is scar-free, but what if the Church has become more intelligent about where and how they punish themselves? If that’s the case, everyone is suspect.

servant Season 3 Episode 2
Courtesy of Apple TV +

Watch the babies in Servant Season 3 Episode 2

It could be nothing, but considering everything we hear and see is from an outsider looking in at Leanne, the babies’ reactions to Mr. Smiley may be important. A large number of the babies cry during his introductory song. That’s not entirely unusual, but considering the mom in Leanne’s room and Jericho were two of the babies not crying, it is interesting. What if those two babies, because of their connection with the church, aren’t afraid of Mr. Smiley, but the other babies sense something sinister about the entertainer?

The ambulance that took Jericho was seen by the neighborhood

It has been questioned how Jericho’s death was kept secret for a while. The police and ambulance had to have been seen by someone. In Servant Season 3 Episode 2, we get some answers. At least two neighbors saw the ambulance on the day Jericho died. Somehow the police and the family covered up his death, but they couldn’t make the event disappear. Dorothy is beginning to remember but is fighting it. She started last season. It shouldn’t take too many more pushes and interrogations for her to remember what happened. It’s also possible those two women were cult members who knew details about her life.

Dorothy really is a reporter

Despite the lapse in recordings in the study, Dorothy is a reporter, and several of the moms mention seeing her work. They ask her about being a local celebrity and her investigative work. This isn’t something that Sean and Julian have concocted to make her feel like nothing ever happened. The same woman who talked about her reporting asked about the ambulance. This could all be an elaborate ruse if she is a cult member.

Who made the hive fall in Servant Season 3 Episode 2?

There are only three possibilities. It’s doubtful the cult made the bee swarm, so that’s not an option. The first viable option is the simplest. The surveillance workman dislodged a large hive, and it fell right before dessert. It could have been a coincidence. Anyone who watches Servant knows, though, that coincidences don’t happen in this world.

The second option is the same power that Leanne seemed to have last week manifested this week in a swarm attack. She was feeling vulnerable and attacked and lashed out with a beehive. Bees were on her mind because of the buzzing song Mr. Smiley sang at the beginning. It would explain why Sean wasn’t stung.

A final and possibly most intriguing thought is Jericho did it. Leanne may be channeling his thoughts and drawing what Jericho thought with the birds in the last episode. Hearing the buzz song and sensing Leanne’s distress, he could have used a power we didn’t realize he had and caused a swarm. We know those reborn are supposed to have powers, and assuming he is the real Jericho, he should have powers too. He almost smiles as everyone runs out of the house, and it is interesting to note that when Dorothy makes her toast, she puts him down when every other parent holds their baby and their glass. Could Jericho be an angry child?

One last weird thing. Neither Sean nor Dorthy grabbed Jericho and took him away from the bees. Why weren’t they worried about him getting stung? We know Sean wasn’t stung. I wonder if anyone was or just a scare tactic to get everyone out of the house. It seems unlikely that no one got stung at all.

Leanne is being tested or is deranged

In this theory, Leanne is the only person who matters. She is an angel who is being tested for service. Everyone else in the story is a tool in the test. They may exist in the real world, but their purpose in the story is only to give Leanne something to react to. If she is intended to be a servant of God, then everything we see is part of that test. She could be a Satan-like angel falling from grace by choosing freedom instead of service.

Someone or something evil may be going on in this house. There is what appears to be a pentagram in Sean’s kitchen, and she was anointed with blood this week. There has also been attention to Julian’s gold ring that could indicate their family is involved with a cult of their own. It could be a family secret they are unaware of, and something Leanne has to protect them from. The hole in the basement is a literal gateway to Hell.

It’s also possible that Leanne did not die in the fire but became unstable after her childhood trauma and has concocted all of this to make sense of what happened. She saw Dorothy on television, and this is her fantasy world of what could be. Because she mainly knew pain and abuse as a child that creeps in with the cult. It would also explain why there is a gap in the news recordings. If Leanne did not have access to Dorothy’s news footage during those years, they would be absent from her fantasy and absent from the archived footage in the study.

Dorothy is in a mental institution

In this theory, Leanne is the only person who matters. She is in a mental institution and everything we see is happening in her head. Everyone else may be dead from some terrible accident like a fire or carbon monoxide poisoning stemming from the mysterious bubbling hole in the basement. They could all be alive as well as visiting her in the institution. In her deranged state, she confuses reality with their visit into a pocket reality where she is living at him with Sean, Leanne, and the baby. Everything we see is her process to remember what happened and regain her sanity.

Sean has a honeycomb and bee tattoo

Sean has a tattoo that corresponds to the attack. We haven’t seen all of his tattoos, but what if each one is symbolic of something that happens. Anything is possible, and the tattoos could also be parts of reality seeping into Dorothy’s delusion.

There is a lot to unpack in the seemingly innocuous Servant Season 3 Episode 2. Find all our Servant coverage here.