Although Dan Erickson’s “Severance” is rife with cynicism and corporate humor, it differs drastically from a workplace satire. “Severance” is ultimately a work of science fiction. The show grants insight into the depths of human psychology and emotion.
The workplace of “Severance,” biotech corporation Lumon, is a strange backdrop. The Lumon employees have all undergone an experimental procedure that creates two distinct consciousnesses: one that’s deprived of memories and active only on the “severed floor” of company headquarters and one on the outside.
The first episode of season one begins with Britt Lower’s Helly R. arriving at the severed workplace. She reacts to the “severance” procedure more intensely than the other employees. Helly vehemently resists her job at Lumon, going to such lengths as trying to kill herself to send a message to her “outie.” Helly’s discontent and angst eventually compels her colleagues to action. She forms a close friendship with Mark S., played by Adam Scott, whose outie also becomes skeptical of Lumon’s activities. The four “innies” utilize an “overtime contingency” within the severed floor, switching into their innie selves while in their outside lives. One by one, the characters make the startling discovery that their outside lives are far different than they imagined.
When the second season begins, the innies have returned to their positions on the severed floor. Their boss Mr. Milchik presents a fabricated version of their uprising. He tells the innies it was a highly publicized event that brought the world’s attention to the need for “severance” reform. Lumon quickly contains the damage, and the outside world remains oblivious to the plight of the innies.
Regardless, the outies don’t gain any inertia to dismantle Lumon and advocate for “severed” people. The only outie spurred to action is Mark, who discovers that his “dead” wife was still alive at the end of season one. He is emboldened to recover her from Lumon — unconcerned with the desires of his innie, furthering the rift between them.
The second season spends some time exploring the emotional implications of the “severance” procedure through the lenses of the outies, who in some capacity are all affected by the contact established in season one. Although Mark and Irving have a few dramatic moments, the actions of the innies remain largely stagnant as they focus on building their lives and relationships within Lumon.
However, the second season focuses largely on the innies’ emotional development and realization of their agency. Helly and Mark’s blossoming romance, which culminates in some exploratory office sex; Irving’s heartbreak. The innies are no longer interested in freeing themselves, but exploring and growing their identities on Lumon’s severed floor.
I appreciate the ambitious goals of the show’s writers, their integration of both intimate character studies and an exciting plot. However, striking a balance between these two disparate types of storytelling is ultimately a difficult task, and the writers seem to struggle at times to create a conventionally thrilling plot while exploring the psychological nuances of the “severance” premise and characters.
For example, the former office manager Mrs. Cobel had an entire episode of pure exposition dedicated to her. Even if the aim of the episode was to enhance the worldbuilding of the show, displaying another corner of Lumon’s massive enterprise, it just felt like a rote restatement of previously established information about both Lumon and Mrs. Cobel. In a twist, Mrs. Cobel is revealed as the inventor of the “severance” procedure. I felt that this didn’t advance the plot in any tangible way — it only offered an explanation as to why she knew so much about the procedure itself and how to manipulate it.
The primary dramatic movement of the second season relies almost exclusively on Mark’s outie. After reluctantly rejoining his place of work, he eventually manages to contact his innie to formulate a plan to recover his wife from her confinement. Though he eventually concedes, the final scene shows Mark’s innie retreat back with Helly into the “severed floor,” his home and source of life.
I found the conclusion to the second season of “Severance” to be a fascinating union of the overarching storyline of Mark’s outie and its conflict with the agency and emotional development of the “severed” characters. This collision of plot points creates an interesting dynamic that leaves much to be explored in the later seasons: how the desires of the innie and outie will reconcile with one another and the thematic implications of such a resolution.
“Severance” is ultimately about the overwhelming human tendency to construct meaning and identity in any circumstance. The main struggle of the series has been the innies finding their identity and attempting to retain it. Lumon was at the center of this conflict in the first season — but in the second, the show centers around the conflicting feelings between each innie and their outie, raising deeper questions about what it means to be human.
