Maintenance page workaround - can this be done?

that’s correct:

Container 1 = website & nginx
Container 2 = database and redis

(I think I have this right)

Container 1 stuff changes a lot

Container 2 stuff very seldom.

And you can update container 1 without updating container 2.

And even better, you can prepare a replacement for container 1 and then swap it over in a few seconds (the preparation is called “bootstrapping”)