Severance Season 2 is now over, but there are a fair amount of fans who feel as though only their innie must understand what the season was even about. The second season of Severance left more than a few fans scratching their heads, as the atmospheric tone and overall sense of weirdness seemed to take precedence over pacing and creating thrilling episodic experiences. In that sense, some people came away from Severance Season 2 either struggling to get through the entire thing or struggling to find the kind of payoff that others proclaim is there.
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To be fair, Severance did answer a lot of questions in Season 2 – but it didn’t tend to make those answers obvious or easy to connect with. We already have a breakdown of all the unanswered questions Severance has to address in Season 3; here, we’ll dig into the larger topic of what story Season 2 was telling (or at least attempting to).
Severance Season 1 introduced the entire premise and lore of the cult-like Lumon corporation and its cutting-edge biotech research, including the “severed floor.” We met the team at Micro Data Refinement and learned how their fractured existence – one persona that only exists while at work (innie), and their “normal” persona reserved for outside life (outie) – created dark in-between spaces festering with lies. The larger “story” of the first season turned to be one that questioned whether or not a modern psychological concept like “compartmentalization” was actually just self-deception by another name. The Season 1 finale drove that point home through the character of “Helly R.” (Britt Lower), as MDR’s most rebellious member had to come face-to-face with the reality that she is actually Helena Eagan, daughter of Lumon’s owner and the main proponent of the severed floor and its research.
That nice, tight, twisted, ride to a final game-changing shift in perspective helped Severance catch on through word of mouth; it also set some pretty big expectations for what Severance Season 2 would be – especially after a three-year wait for the second season’s arrival.
What Was Severance Season 2 Even About?
To sum it all up in a single set of terms: If Severance Season 1 explored the theme of “self-deception,” then it can be said that Severance Season 2 takes that theme and evolves it into “self-conflict.”
Going back to the Season 2 Premiere after seeing the Finale: It’s evident from the start that showrunners Ben Stiller and Dan Erickson establish a much more complicated set of relationships at work. Season 1 largely left viewers believing that a character’s outie and innie were united in the tragic circumstance of living half-lives. Season 2 quickly establishes that it’s a more complicated relationship than that: Adam Scott’s Mark S. (the prime example) has to discover throughout the season that his innie and outie both have lives and connections to others they care about (Gemma, Helly) and that those are not mutual goals, but rather a conflict that neither version of Mark is willing to risk conceding through “re-integration” of both halves into one whole. Hence, the Season 2 Finale ends with Mark having to make a choice about which version of himself gets to have the life goal he wants and chooses his innie’s life with Helly – despite the obvious impermanence of that existence and connection.
This theme of self-conflict can be traced back through every single one of the major character arcs in Severence Season 2. Dylan G. (Zach Cherry) ends up in (the weirdest) romantic triangle between his innie, his outie, and his wife Gretchen (Merritt Wever); Irving (John Turturro) tried to put aside his outie’s true mission of exposing Lumon and the severed floor but ultimately couldn’t ignore his investigative nature to the point that his innie exposed Helena Eagan masquerading as Helly, and paid the ultimate price. Helly’s story of self-conflict requires little explanation, as it went so far as to provide two of Severance‘s steamiest (and only) love scenes, which only further boggle the mind when you consider them.
Even secondary characters like Seth Milchick (Tramell Tillman), Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette), and Ms. Huang (Sarah Bock), fit neatly under the thematic umbrella of self-conflict. Millchick arguably had the most understated yet impactful arc, with all the socio-political implications of his complicated character conveyed in a single unnerving portrait. Millchick tries to be the ‘higher being’ that Kier and Lumon require of him, but by the end, when trapped, he shows he still very much has some ‘beast’ inside of him. Cobel (arguably the weakest and most extraneous storyline in Season 2) also had to confront her own duality, questioning whether she is now still the loyal acolyte of Kier’s teachings or finally ready to independently be the brilliant and capable woman the Eagan family recruited and exploited. Even poor Ms. Huang ended up getting a harsh lesson about denying her childhood in favor of success and advancement, and how painful the loss of that innocence can be (RIP ring game).
[RELATED: Is Severance Ending With Season 3?]
All in all, Severance Season 2 was a slow-burn and deeper dive into who these characters are (across their full spectrum of existence), in order to payoff a finale where many (if not all) of these characters are set for some kind of internal and/or external civil war in Season 3. Like so many sophomore seasons of TV (see: Game of Thrones, Invincible) it will inevitably (and fairly) be criticized for feeling slower or more “boring,” but hopefully the slog will have been worth it – foundational building for the next chapter of the story to deliver fulfilling drama and conflict that will pull us all back to the edge of our seats, instead of having us ponder our way into a nap.
Severance Season 1 and 2 are streaming on Apple TV+.
