Tag: Explore

Severance

Who Is Alive?

Season 2

Episode 3

Editor’s Rating

5 stars

*****

Photo: Apple TV+

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What transcends the severance barrier? As we move forward into season two of Severance, this question appears to be emerging as a primary motivator of the narrative. We know that certain physical skills like driving a car (Irv), tying a baller knot (Dylan), or drawing (both Helly and Irv) pass through. Basic knowledge, like the names of the states and concepts related to general culture, is also retained. But what do the Innies retain that Lumon might not want them to retain? Lumon might be able to scrape a person’s memories, but can it scrape their deepest experiences, like love, core childhood bonds, and shame? Given what we see when Mark begins the reintegration process this week, the answer to that question is no. And this might make Lumon nervous.

The overarching theme of this episode lies in the (literally) cold open. Cobel’s car sits on the edge of a desolate roadway, a thin layer of snow covering the barren landscape. There are serious Fargo vibes here. A big truck passes, honking and waking her up. She briefly glances at the breathing tube we saw on her shrine — it’s sitting like a beloved passenger in her front seat — and then pops on the song “Love Spreads” by the Stone Roses before heading on her way toward a town called Salt’s Neck. While this song is a controversial retelling of the Passion of Christ (with Christ as a Black woman, akin to the situation with the Milchick-Kier mash-up paintings we see later in the episode), the title also aptly summarizes the ideas present in this episode: Love, it spreads. And it certainly defies severance. While the idea of love transcending the severance chip is not new, it takes firm root in this episode as a key to unlocking some of the show’s mysteries.

The majority of the characters in this episode not only make moves motivated by love, but they also engage in pointed moments of physical contact. And these organic instances of affectionate touch punctuate the idea that while Lumon can sever a mind, it cannot do the same to our bodies’ physical memories. Severance seems to be making the argument that love can’t be contained by memories; it’s something that we carry in every fiber of our being and that cannot be erased — at least not by Lumon.

As the team gears up to search for Ms. Casey in the Innie world, Dylan insists that he wants to stay and work on his file. He doesn’t tell everyone else the truth, keeping the family visitation suite a secret, but they buy his excuse. The rest of the group heads off on their separate missions, leaving Dylan alone so Miss Huang can come collect him without suspicion.

I have to admit that I initially thought that the family visitation suite was bullshit, an empty promise from Milchick to get Dylan to stay at Lumon. But here it is. And Merritt Wever is there as Gretchen, his wife. Wever is an eminently talented actress, always bringing a quiet and thoughtful strength to her roles, and I squealed with excitement when I saw her waiting for Dylan. At first, I was sure she was a Lumon plant, but later we see her interact with Outie Dylan and their three children in the real world. The juxtaposition between how she treats the Innie and Outie versions of her husband delivers a dose of sad reality.

In the outside world, Gretchen is harried and overstimulated, frustrated that she has to treat her husband like a fourth child. As she hustles out the door, reminding Dylan of everything he needs to do while she works a night shift, we get a brief glimpse of a uniform beneath her winter coat. (It looks like she might be a cop?) Inside Lumon, Gretchen is beguiled by the Innie version of her husband. As she leaves, she gives him a warm hug good-bye and says, “I love you.” She claims it’s a habit, but it feels more like she’s trying to connect with a different part of Dylan, one she believes she lost a long time ago.

As Irv arrives at O&D, he sees the painting entitled “The Courtship of Kier and Imogene,” which is another subtle nod to love, especially love in the workplace. Irv gets a sweet moment with Felicia (Claudia Robinson) as she tenderly squeezes his hand while they talk about Burt. At one point, Irv shows Felicia his sketches of Burt in his notebook. She flips through, spying his drawing of the black hallway. She furrows her brow, asking, “How do you know about the exports hall?” A long time ago, O&D used to do deliveries there but no longer. At Irv’s request, Felicia draws him a map.

Elsewhere in the Lumon maze, Mark and Helly search for the goats. They return to the location where they found the single goat man last quarter and spot a small opening that recalls the hallway on the 7 ½ floor in Being John Malkovich. Mark doesn’t hesitate to crawl through, emerging into a giant room with verdant rolling hills and goats as far as the eye can see. The visual clash of serene pastoral meeting sterile corporate is remarkable. But other than the spectacularly surreal setting and the presence of a fantastically unhinged Gwendoline Christie, the goat experience fell a little flat for me.

The goat sequence brought up more — way, way more — questions about the goats and the Innies that tend to them. Does that space actually expand somehow as the goats get older? Where were these 11 or so other people when Helly and Mark found the OG goat man last quarter? That wasn’t that long ago! But I digress. Helly acts very stilted as she throws herself into asking the intimidating goat herders (who call themselves Mammalian Nurturables) about Ms. Casey, and they do end up answering her question, but there’s not really any new information here. Now, I’m not someone who is looking for concrete answers when it comes to the entire world of Severance, but I’m also not a fan of mystery boxes being opened just to reveal five more mystery boxes. Based on snippets from the trailer, I think we might be revisiting the goat world at some point again this season, and I do hope that we get a bit more in the near future.

In the outside world, we get a perplexing storyline with Milchick that addresses the idea of love from a religious angle. We know that Milchick seems to be fully devoted to the teachings of Kier Eagan. So when Natalie presents him with a gift from the board meant to commemorate his ascendance to manager of the severed floor — a portfolio of the paintings from the Kier cycle but each featuring Milchick as Kier — his reaction is curious. “Oh my,” he whispers in bewilderment as he flips through the artwork. Me, too, because basically, it’s Kier in blackface.

The board signals Natalie to tell him that she received the same gift when she was promoted and found it meaningful. Milchick starts to agree when Natalie tells him that the board has ended the call. Her face does a disconcerting twitch, eventually curving up into an unconvincing smile. This facial tic recalls an iconic scene from Jordan Peele’s Get Out. Coupled with this week’s overt visual reference to the mind passage in Being John Malkovich, the moment left me wondering if Natalie might have a passenger in her brain. Does she even need that earpiece to talk to the board?!

In addition to learning that the board remains terrible at giving gifts, we also find out that Cobel is intimidated by it. Even though she’s clearly traveled far from home in the cold open, she decides to return to Lumon to confront Helena. It’s the ultimate showdown between a nepo baby and a woman who pulled herself up by her bootstraps. Helena offers Cobel the chance to speak to the board, and at first it looks like she’s going to take it. In an uncomfortably tense walk through the parking lot, Cobel follows Helena, only to get spooked and run away before she reaches the front of the building.

The information that Cobel has on reintegration feels important here. Lumon is aware that she wants to talk to the company about it, but it also wants to keep its head in the sand. We don’t know Cobel’s exact motive yet, but we do know that she’s invested in the idea of the reintegration process being effective. Remember: She still has Petey’s severance chip, and she claims that she has evidence that the procedure worked on him … Well, before his brain basically exploded. And seeing as Mark watched his buddy collapse on the pavement in front of a mini-mart, it’s sort of shocking that he agrees to the process so quickly when the opportunity is offered to him.

Having reconciled with Devon, Mark works on creating a light box with the message “Who is alive?” so he can stare at it and retain the afterimage as he travels down the elevator in the mornings. He’s testing out the box when Dr. Reghabi (Karen Aldridge) knocks on his car door. The good doctor points out all the reasons why his current plan is a bad idea, encourages him to reintegrate so he can get information in and out of Lumon, and then tells him that she saw Gemma alive the last time she was in the building. Oddly enough, Mark doesn’t press Reghabi for more specific information about Gemma — if I were Mark, I’d have so many questions! — but instead he immediately agrees to the severance procedure.

It’s been a while since the show has touched on the idea of reintegration — the last (and only) time we saw Reghabi was for a brief scene back in episode seven — so this development feels like it happens lightning fast. One second, we’re in Mark’s car, and the next, we’re in his basement and Reghabi is hooking up him and his bright-red sweater to some machines. Has Mark seen the Severance intro? It’s so nice of him to dress the part!

Reghabi starts asking Mark questions, and the process begins. Emotionally and visually arresting, the sequence begins to show us how the Innie and Outie consciousness can be merged. When the doctor asks Mark about his mother’s eye color, there’s a funny beat where he can’t exactly recall, but then he does. It’s worth remembering that this is the very question that triggered Helly to get incredibly upset in her initial orientation. For some reason, this moment with Mark was the first time I thought about the existence of Helena Eagan’s mother. We’ve never once heard about her, and the likely lack of a mother figure in her life feels crucial.

As for Mark, his waves begin to join when Reghabi asks about his love for his mother. Love spreads, right? Seeing the waves move, the doctor seizes upon the moment, asking Mark other questions that trigger deep-seated feelings of shame and regret that seem to also transcend the severance barrier. Then she asks a question about time: “What year is it?” Innie Mark pops out for a second, stammering, “You mean what quarter?” Reghabi brings it home by asking, “What is your first memory?”

Mark’s consciousness begins to shift violently. His mind is blanketed in confusion, and we’re treated to a glorious montage of Mark waking up on the conference-room table, his Innie and Outie worlds colliding in a frantic jumble. Punctuated by a fabulous needle drop, the scene is a total rush. “Eminence Front” by the Who plays us out as the episode leaves us (and Mark) reeling with possibility.

It’s time for my staggered exit, so I’m going to go grab the elevator. Until next time …

• It feels worth noting that Reghabi tracks five brain waves — delta, theta, alpha, beta, gamma — and that the refiners are sorting numbers into five different boxes. Each box must have a certain ratio of the four tempers inside it. They’re totally programming Franken-severance chips, right?

• Speaking of Reghabi, “I’m better at it now” is not a very reassuring thing to hear from your brain surgeon.

• Looking for a refresher on all the reintegration stuff that happened in season one? Here are the key moments to revisit: In season one, Petey starts showing signs of reintegration sickness in the second half of episode two and continues to do so throughout episode three. Reghabi shows up toward the end of episode seven. You could hypothetically also watch all the scenes with Petey’s daughter, June (episodes four and six), but we’re hoping that Mark’s outcome will be something other than death, so let’s not go there just yet.

• Natalie gets a bunch of screen time this week. In addition to delivering the Kier blackface portfolio to Milchick, she also pays a visit to Ricken to discuss turning “The You You Are” into an Innie best-seller. And now I desperately want to see Ricken giving an inspirational speech to the Innies somehow.