Spoilers Severance (Apple TV)

One thing I’ve noticed is that the three unsevered Lumon employees whose job it is to monitor and manage the severed - Cobel, Graner, and Milchick - are interesting studies in ordinary oppressors and jailers. Their job is to discipline and control children, basically, because that’s what the severed are like - Mark is the good kid, Dylan is the territorial grumpy one, Irving is the sensitive one, Helly is the unhappy rebel who really doesn’t want to be there.

I don't think we actually know what's going on with those 3. Are they or are they not severed? Or something else maybe?
 

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I don't think we actually know what's going on with those 3. Are they or are they not severed? Or something else maybe?
It’s pretty clear they’re not severed, and Cobel at least is a devout Kier cultist in her private life.
 

So, finished it now.

Looks like most of our guesses were spot on. The one thing I didn’t expect was about Gemma - is she a prisoner, or is she actually brain dead and being activated for short periods as an experiment? That’ll be a kick in the teeth for Mark. She’s probably not a cultist since I don’t think she’d live in the testing wing all the time if she was.
 


We're back, baby.

Great mysterious first episode.

First off: Showing us the goats in the recap feels like Ben Stiller nudging us in the elbows: "Hey, this might actually be important and not just weird for its own sake."

I like the new MDR team and the hints that the Italian team member, Dante (?), dropped about what life is like at other locations were wild, if they were true. I expect that we will see them again in some fashion.

The new power structure at this Lumon Labs -- and that even Milchick isn't immune to Lumon either screwing with him or being ineffectual -- was interesting.

I've seen speculation that Miss Huang is Mark's kid, but that would require him and his wife to have been involved with Lumon for a very long time for that math to work. They got a good intense kid to play the character, though.

I've also seen lots of speculation that Hedy's outie is who got off that elevator, not her innie, which might explain some of her behavior. That said, not wanting to tell the rest of the team that she is personally behind some of their torment would explain the lies as well.

The redacted newspaper is almost certainly a forgery, just like "hey, we'll let your family visit you" is another way of manipulating innies.

The fact that it was so important to get the MDR team back to work is interesting. What are they doing?
 
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Finishing Season 1. I've enjoyed it a lot, its had a fun "LOST" feeling when LOST was actually good, and Hella's reveal as an Outside was awesome.

I will say that the Lumon management is COMICALLY inept at security...but I think that is a callout of corporate management in general, which yes can seem pretty comically bad at their jobs at time. But yeah I have to keep reminding myself of that as I watch otherwise its too easy to detract from the show.

My biggest disappointment was Milchik. When Milchik left the book and the Innies found it.... it never came up again. Milchik didn't even try to find it. I thought for certain it meant Milchik was secretly trying to help the Innies, a way to start spreading ideas and sow the seeds of revolution. And then....nope Milchik seems 100% Lumon....its just a plot hole they never shored up.

One thing I am struggling with on the plot. At the beginning I got the sense that Lumon was just some mega corp that controlled everything...and so the idea of the Innies just basically being in prison I could buy. But as the show goes on, we learn Lumon is still on shaky ground, they are having to run PR campaigns to even keep Severance going, for there is a real risk that government will shut it down. And so.....how in the holy hells has there been no inspectors to check in on the Innies well being? I mean for pete's sake, we have building inspectors, safety inspectors, food inspectors....government loves to inspect things!!! You cannot tell me no one thought "hey we are locking people away in a corporate building for 8 hours a day, and they won't have any memories of what happened.....maybe we should check in on their safety once in a while?"
hehe I guess everyone is just comically inept in this show:)
 

One thing I am struggling with on the plot. At the beginning I got the sense that Lumon was just some mega corp that controlled everything...and so the idea of the Innies just basically being in prison I could buy. But as the show goes on, we learn Lumon is still on shaky ground, they are having to run PR campaigns to even keep Severance going, for there is a real risk that government will shut it down. And so.....how in the holy hells has there been no inspectors to check in on the Innies well being?
Have you heard about all the damage SpaceX is doing to Texas wetlands? There's been no meaningful action there either.

It happens all the time.
 

Have you heard about all the damage SpaceX is doing to Texas wetlands? There's been no meaningful action there either.

It happens all the time.
huge difference between the environment (which people have a spotty record of caring about) and the people in your family or your neighbors etc. Or heck...yourself..... people are going to want some real assurances they aren't being abused or exploited at a time when they literally can't remember anything.

In real life, one person dies a E Coli nowadays and there is a massive recall and examination.

Heck early in the show that talk about a lady that might have gotten pregnant at work while under Severance. And there have been several instances of REAL injuries at work. Beyond the workplace comp complaints, people are going to want a formal investigation of what really happened to them when they get injured. That whole "oh I got a letter that I slipped on a stairwell while at work....oh well guess thats why I'm all banged up"..... in this litigious society, yeah right!

I just don't buy there would be apathy in that space.
 

Watched the first episode of S2. Some thoughts:
  • We’re definitely supposed to think Helly R has been replaced by Helena Eagan. Why, though - what’s the point now the whistle has been blown? Is it possible that the actual work is important in some way?
  • There’s a very distinct parallel drawn between severing and Heaven/Earth, or maybe the wheel of reincarnation - we’re sent down to Earth from Heaven with no memory of what came before or what comes after, this is the only world we know and we know nothing of our purpose, and once we leave here we die, even if we return to Heaven - this instance of us is dead forever. Dylan begging Irving not to die makes this very clear.
  • Miss Huang is a mystery because surely nobody would sever a 12-year-old and expect them to work as well. It’s far more likely that she’s like Ms Casey, a creation of Lumon who had no life before and no life after, except this time her outer appearance is more representative of her actual mental age. She’s therefore likely to be a clone of Gemma Scout, much as Ms Casey probably was.
  • Given that, I do wonder about the final flash of Gemma’s face on Mark’s screen as he works. Is that just a subliminal message to motivate Mark in his work, or does it mean something deeper?
  • My theory therefore - see point one, above - is that the work the team are doing is meaningful and important and, for some reason, they’re the only ones who can do it, or at least are best at it (maybe Mark W’s experience is representative - maybe nobody else makes quota). And that work is recompiling a dead human mind into a cloned body. Let’s say cloning is trivial - they’ve done it already twice with Gemma - but what’s the point of cloning a corpse if the person isn’t there? And what if you can recompile the persona but you need humans to do so instinctively rather than by brute force computing? Actual resurrection would be an endeavour worth any price. Especially for a corporate cult devoted to Kier the messiah.
 

Watched the second episode now, which is to establish that Lumon (as usual) lies all the time. It’s not been five months, there was no public revelation about severing. It’s all to keep Mark and the others working on Cold Harbor (AKA resurrect Gemma Scout according to my theory, of course Mark is the only one who can do it).

It did make me wonder if most of the Lumon employees are also clones and that’s why they’re so awkward and conditioned. Sure, they could just be cultists, but Ms Cobel in particular feels like a child rebelling, and that would explain her personal materials from last seasons - the real Ms Cobel has been dead for decades.
 

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