Severance - Season 1

[BetterButter]

 

[krankydoodle]

This is off to a promising start. The characters are interesting, the mystery is intriguing, and there's enough humor to mix things up a bit. I especially liked Adam Scott's scenes with his sister and seeing Patricia Arquette in what looks like a meaty role.

The show also looks great, though the maze-like hallways, too close for comfort desk arrangement, and the office building in the middle of a massive parking lot are bringing back grim memories from my time working at a big pharma company.

[arc]

The very first thing I noticed in the parking lot shot was how few of the cars in the Lumon parking lot are SUVs. I wonder if that was a deliberate choice and maybe done with CGI. In the last couple of years of real life, I feel like most parking lots I see are 50% SUVs.

The dolly-zoom in the elevator, if that's what it was, was eerie.

There's probably something to be said about how the 20th century Modernism aesthetic is adopted by a certain kind of disconnected-in-limbo sci-fi. From the Helvetica title logo to every inch of the Lumon building and offices to the hilariously 1970s-looking computers. Meanwhile, Adam Scott's suit could fit better. I'm sure it's a deliberate choice to give him a dumpy-looking fit. Speaking of the computers, that's a weird choice considering we saw Mark drop a modern-looking smartphone in his locker.

The "data refinement" is so fascinatingly weird.

So in a sense this is "work-life balance" taken to an extreme, such that the "outie" never experiences having done any work and the "innie" does not experience outside life, but then Mark's outside life is rather more controlled by Lumon than he thinks. His boss lives next door to him and it seems like she's not severed. Also he lives in Lumon housing to begin with.

Also, the sinister vibes of this show are already so intense. The "break" room, the wellness session, the black ooze of the title sequence showing up in Irv's nightmare, the fact that Milchick and Cobel and Graner are in some kind of ad-hoc meeting about Mark's sudden sick day, Petey's reintegration sickness symptoms: all great.

It slipped my notice at first, but Cobel (aka Selvig) told an anecdote about her mother while inside. Did Mark not notice, or do they accept that the bosses can be whole while working on the severed floor?

Edited February 20, 2022 by arc

[chocolatine]

I'm not sure if I like it yet, but I really want to know what this "data cleaning" task is all about, and what Lumon's recruiting process looks like. Also, if Outie-Mark knows that his condo community is corporate housing, he must know that his neighbor also works at Lumon, even if he doesn't know in what capacity, and he must suspect that her confusion about the trash collection schedule is an act, no? When he first talked on the phone with her it sounded like he was talking to an elderly woman, possibly in cognitive decline, not someone who's in her 50s. Surely it must have crossed his mind that there could be non-severed Lumon higher-ups living in that community to spy on the severed employees, which is also why it was very risky of him to let Petey stay at his place.

Mark's brother-in-law seems very kooky with his non-food dinner and his theory that children are traumatized by changing beds. His sister seems very "normal" so I don't understand why she indulges this idiocy.

I hope Mark doesn't fall in love with Helly, that would be too trite.

[arc]

1 hour ago, chocolatine said:

Mark's brother-in-law seems very kooky with his non-food dinner

This is maybe where the show had one too many ideas. Was this intended to mean that a nearly food-less life is possible in the outside world? Mark also doesn’t seem to eat at home, only drink, and then on his date he only drank too. Meanwhile, the innies do have lunches and snacks?

Then again, Mark’s sister made him a sandwich and Mrs Selvig brought over some cookies.

1 hour ago, chocolatine said:

I really want to know what this "data cleaning" task is all about

I want to know why the data is “fully encoded” (or did they say “encrypted”?) given that the severance process theoretically already provides an unbeatable level of security for the data. Would the raw data be too horrifying for the innies? Given the level of brain science Lumon is capable of, couldn’t they also have excised any conscience from the innies if that was the case?

So far, this show reminds me of Duncan Jones’ “Moon”: (spoilers for that movie)

Spoiler

a somewhat mundane yet sci-fi work environment but with some hidden horrifying exploitation of the worker which is gradually revealed.

 

Edited February 21, 2022 by arc

[overtherainbow]

I'm so intrigued by the show so far. I want to know what Lumen is hiding and what the numbers mean! Why are the severed employees punished by being taken to a breakroom and berated? What led to them to do the procedure in the first place? Promise of a better salary and moving up the corporate latter? What happened to Petey? 

It's very similar to Homecoming on amazon- labryinth-like, creepy atmosphere, mind games, sinister corporation. The tech reminds me a bit of Maniac on netflix - very dated but it's also unclear exactly when it takes place. A bizarre retro-futuristic mix of past and present. Anyway, it's about time they blended horror with corporate satire. I look forward to seeing where this goes.

[Ceindreadh]

13 hours ago, arc said:

This is maybe where the show had one too many ideas. Was this intended to mean that a nearly food-less life is possible in the outside world? Mark also doesn’t seem to eat at home, only drink, and then on his date he only drank too. Meanwhile, the innies do have lunches and snacks?

Then again, Mark’s sister made him a sandwich and Mrs Selvig brought over some cookies.

 

 

 

I think the food-less dinner was just a one off.  So instead of inviting people over and feeding them, they just invited people over and talked without the distraction of food. 

[Avabelle]

On 2/21/2022 at 5:36 AM, chocolatine said:

Mark's brother-in-law seems very kooky with his non-food dinner

Some would say kooky, I’d say cheap.

 

[arc]

On rewatch, I noticed Cobel's mother "was an atheist" while Selvig's mother "was a Catholic".

[CarpeFelis]

I kept thinking everyone who reads the compunction statement was mispronouncing wizened (which would be the wrong word), but apparently wisened is also a word. Never heard it before.

ETA: It’s so weird that they have these ‘80s style computers and are doing such odd tasks on them, that it makes me wonder if they’re not really working at all. What if it’s an experiment and the workers are the subjects? It might help explain why they’re not allowed to leave. And why there’s at least one person (Cobel/Selvig) present who isn’t severed, who’s monitoring the experiment.

Edited February 25, 2022 by CarpeFelis

[arc]

I'm a little surprised the message split across two forearms wouldn't have passed the code detectors. I'm also surprised the code detectors can detect stuff that's been swallowed. Also, I don’t truly believe outie Helly rejected her innie’s resignation request.

Why didn't Lumon put a tracker in the severance device? A GPS thing or even just a bluetooth beacon? For that matter, given that they gave Cobel/Selvig a key to Mark's place, why isn't Mark's place actually wired up with bugs? Hell, if they had a cloud-connected door camera or a Lumon-brand smart speaker, they wouldn't even need secret bugs.

How did Irv become such a true believer in just three years? It's not brainwashing, or else Dylan would be more similarly reverent about the whole corporate mission.

Cobel is such a toxic and abusive boss. I felt bad for feeling bad for her when her own bosses gave her some of her own medicine.

This severance process is a really fascinating metaphor for work and adopting a different persona at work, but taken literally, it would be super duper illegal if only for how it enables horrific workplace abuse that has no recourse because the outies can't know about it. The news debate that Mark watched even touched on how some other company "went severed" and someone got pregnant and didn't even know any details about it because it was her innie who had sex. (And on a very basic practical level, what about evacuation procedures in case of fire? How would outies know not to go back inside?)

It strikes me now that the board’s representative reprimanded Cobel for even suggesting that reintegration was possible as they knew it to be an impossibility. That strongly suggests Cobel and Milchick were never initially severed and later reintegrated, but that they’ve always been whole.

3 hours ago, CarpeFelis said:

I kept thinking everyone who reads the compunction statement was mispronouncing wizened (which would be the wrong word), but apparently wisened is also a word. Never heard it before.

I can't say I understand what's going on with it, but not only does closed captioning render it as "wizened", but the text of the compunction statement also uses "wizened", as seen (in reverse) on the projection in the break room.

Edited February 25, 2022 by arc

[CarpeFelis]

14 hours ago, arc said:

I'm a little surprised the message split across two forearms wouldn't have passed the code detectors. I'm also surprised the code detectors can detect stuff that's been swallowed. Also, I don’t truly believe outie Helly rejected her innie’s resignation request.

I can't say I understand what's going on with it, but not only does closed captioning render it as "wizened", but the text of the compunction statement also uses "wizened", as seen (in reverse) on the projection in the break room.

I seriously doubt the outies ever get to see any resignation requests! The company’s outrageous efforts to make sure innies never get to resign or even leave early for the day, combined with the mazelike halls, no maps allowed, and the “break” room conditioning have me convinced this is all a psychological experiment. I almost wonder if Helly’s outie has not been shown to us yet because it will be a big surprise when we find out about her, like maybe she’s a Lumon executive (security, maybe?) who’s put herself there to test the system.

Not surprised they spelled it “wizened”, but I missed it because I was knitting while watching. Why on earth would the characters mispronounce it then? I get the impression from context that they actually mean the hands of those who have been made wiser.  But then again, maybe they mean the by-now mummified hands of all those previous CEOs… (sorry, couldn’t resist).

[overtherainbow]

I'm definitely getting the feeling they're not really workers in an office at all, but are in fact test subjects in a lab - it would certainly explain the purpose of the severance procedure, to keep the environment as controlled as possible, not to mention the dimly lit sanitized maze of halls. The "numbers" and how they react to them are like the test itself but what exactly they mean is still unclear. 

The chip might may them more susceptible to subliminal messages and probably erases more than just their memories of work, making them easier to control and manipulate. So much creepy psychological manipulation in this episode too. Lumen gives Scientology a run for its money.

 

[arc]

15 hours ago, arc said:

That strongly suggests Cobel and Milchick were never initially severed and later reintegrated, but that they’ve always been whole.

I had a followup thought: maybe Cobel and Milchick were severed initially but are now so loyal that their “innie” is in control 24/7, inside or outside. 

[MerBearStare]

17 hours ago, arc said:

For that matter, given that they gave Cobel/Selvig a key to Mark's place, why isn't Mark's place actually wired up with bugs?

At one point during this week's episode there was a shot that lingered on Mark's turned-off TV, so I wondered if that was bugged or somehow used/will be used to spy on him.

This show's aesthetics are so good that I worried the story itself would be bad, but so far I'm loving it. Patricia Arquette is perfect as the boss who is both predator and, after seeing the scene with the board call, I'm thinking prey. And there's just enough humor for the show not to be 100% bleak. His brother-in-law's book 😂😂😂

[QQQQ]

This feels like Ender's Game plus Office Space multiplied by the Church of Scientology.

[chocolatine]

When Cobel/Selvig was snooping around Marks's house and going through the box with his dead wife's crafts, did anyone else get the sense that she'd had some connection to her? Mark said his wife had died in a car accident, so maybe Cobel/Selvig was somehow involved and recruited Mark to Lumon out of guilt (because she genuinely believes that not thinking about his wife for eight hours a day is helpful for him)?

If Helly can't get any written messages out, maybe her strategy is to keep injuring herself so that her outie eventually catches on that the job is not safe.

I agree with several posters here that this seems more like an experiment than a real job, but between the protesters in the last episode and the TV news segment, Lumon seems too high-profile and involve too many people to just be an experiment.

On 2/25/2022 at 3:48 AM, arc said:

Cobel is such a toxic and abusive boss. I felt bad for feeling bad for her when her own bosses gave her some of her own medicine.

I thought this part was very true to life. Toxic bosses aren't created in a vacuum, they're the result of a toxic company culture.

[oldCJ]

On 2/27/2022 at 2:54 AM, QQQQ said:

This feels like Ender's Game plus Office Space multiplied by the Church of Scientology.

Spot on. I am glad someone else is getting an Ender’s Game vibe from it. But now I am thinking how Office Space should have had waffle parties…

[arc]

Analogously to The Good Place, I feel like the four people in Macrodata Refinement were chosen because of their incompatibility. Dylan and Irv have clearly bought in to Lumon, but in totally opposite ways: Dylan doesn’t believe in the work or the company but loves the incentives and the status they bring. Irv derives his sense of self-worth from venerating the company. Each thinks the other is deluded.

and then similarly, Helly’s own desire to escape has forced the previously more apathetic Mark into opposing her and thus becoming more of a Lumon man.

(if this theory is sound, I haven’t quite figured out how the old Petey/Mark dynamic used to play out and to what purpose.)

On 2/26/2022 at 9:28 PM, chocolatine said:

If Helly can't get any written messages out, maybe her strategy is to keep injuring herself so that her outie eventually catches on that the job is not safe.

She could just cut all her hair off. It’ll grow back eventually and meanwhile it’s not something they can hide from her outie. (And presumably, like Mark, she has outside friends and family that would notice if the company kept her inside for months straight.)

Edited March 1, 2022 by arc

[Ceindreadh]

47 minutes ago, arc said:

She could just cut all her hair off. It’ll grow back eventually and meanwhile it’s not something they can hide from her outie. (And presumably, like Mark, she has outside friends and family that would notice if the company kept her inside for months straight.)

 

If Helly cut her hair off, she'd probably just find a note on her car telling her that she caught her hair in some equipment and it had to be cut to free her.  There'd probably be a gift card for a local hairdresser as well so she could get it tidied up. 

[arc]

Man, there are so many ways to abuse the secrecy wall of severance. =(

[Kiddvideo]

I have to think Helly’s outie is part of Lumon’s evil management like Schwarzenegger in “Total Recall.” The implant prevents her from remembering the scary numbers, but her outie is fully briefed on whatever Lumon is doing. I wonder why the therapist used Mark’s dead wife’s Christmas candle during their session. Does their subsconsciousness still exist? Do Helly and Irv and the other guy live in the same complex as Mark — why is he so central that the boss has been assigned to personally monitor his outie?

I read next week’s episode description under the thumbnail, and Apple revealed a spoiler.

Overall, I’m still iffy on the show. I’m not rooting for anyone.

[arc]

I think it was a big mistake by Helly's outie (and Lumon management, who obviously approved the reply video) to threaten Helly. But we did get confirmation that Helly's outie did get the earlier resignation request and this one. Also, the reply video directly confirms that Cobel can communicate with the outside world! How are the MDR proles not more concerned about that???

The cultiness of Lumon is cranked up to eleven this episode. Even just from the outside, this is clearly not a company to join.

Now that the MDR drones explained it, I think Petey's map with houses supports my earlier theory that Cobel and Milchick are permanent "innies".

Cobel must be a brain surgeon to drill into Petey's skull and not worry her drill would destroy the severance chip. Or lucky.

24 minutes ago, Kiddvideo said:

I have to think Helly’s outie is part of Lumon’s evil management like Schwarzenegger in “Total Recall.” The implant prevents her from remembering the scary numbers, but her outie is fully briefed on whatever Lumon is doing

But then why would she even be severed at all? And her misadventures with the staircase door in ep 2 sure seem like a normal new employee.

Optics & Design has a vast, vast lab behind its nominal facilities, and seemingly none of that has anything to do with O&D's purported purpose of cycling art or making graphic design products for internal use.

I wonder if Helly's suicide attempt succeeded. There's a good chance the guard upstairs found her and saved her. Was that her plan? She could have tried a quicker, less reversible technique like electrocution if she wanted a permanent death. (Which, as Mark said earlier, would be functionally the same to innie Helly as just resigning.)

BTW, my revised theory about the break room's prescribed apology using "wizened"/"wisened" is that Lumon's founder Kier Eagan was not infallible but Lumon is corporately incapable of explicitly acknowledging that. Though I noticed earlier that the handbook nook in the MDR office has three spaces for appendices, so someone had to revise or change stuff.

The actress playing Petey's daughter really looks like Emma Stone.

[Kiddvideo]

1 hour ago, arc said:

But then why would she even be severed at all? And her misadventures with the staircase door in ep 2 sure seem like a normal new employee.

The same reason as Total Recall: They need someone with genuine reactions.

[Avabelle]

This is just boring. For all the big names they have there’s nothing interesting about any of the characters bar maybe Helly. 

[Johnny Dollar]

Since Helly’s innie despises being there and has no memory of her life as an outie, it seems that suicide would be the perfect solution. It’s not like the innie has family or friends that she would miss if she was dead. Although it seems like to easy of an answer, so I doubt that she’s really dead. 

[overtherainbow]

So I guess this episode confirmed that the implant really is irreversible.

The others must have their outies spied on too without knowing it but I guess Irving and Dylan aren't as central to whatever they're doing? Killing Helly off is definitely too easy, I don't believe they'll let her hang herself. She's far too valuable, they'll lock her in that breakroom and brainwash her some more. 

I was wondering what happens when an outie decides to just stop going to work though. Does the chip eventually begin to malfunction/destruct, which was what happened to Petey?

I did hear it's pretty slow in the middle but the ending has a big payoff. But so far I'm enjoying every episode. 

Edited March 5, 2022 by overtherainbow

[arc]

I only realized when I read it on another forum: if Helly had killed herself on the severed floor, that'd just be it, but by hanging herself in the elevator, she gets to dip out on most of the actual hanging and leave it to her outie who'll wake up in there.

[xander874]

I am really curious about Irv and Dylan’s outie life. I can totally see Irv being closeted but having a wife and kids and denying it to himself. But his innie has no societal issues so he is okay with it. Although I’m not sure Christopher walken would be my first choice. 
 

I had hoped that Cobel was severed too. I think that would have been interesting but I guess it’s not to be  

[Kirbyrun]

I'm so interested in the Christopher Walken character (as well as the other woman in O&D, who is older, too). The severance process seems relatively recent, and yet Walken seems like he's been working at Lumon forEVER. But assuming the process IS recent -- would someone at retirement age decide, "My work-life balance is out of whack -- let me do this newfangled procedure to fill my days."

To be clear, I don't think this is a story problem -- I am absolutely FASCINATED by the narrative possibilities!

13 hours ago, xander874 said:

 

I am really curious about Irv and Dylan’s outie life.

 

Ditto! I've been wondering if we'll see outies other than Mark or if they'll save those for a second season.

[arc]

I was rewatching a bit of ep 1, and in the part where Petey accosts Mark in the restaurant, Mark asked him why Petey didn't just file a complaint:

Quote

Mark: So, what, you were unhappy at work and instead of lodging a complaint, you --

Petey: No. I tried that at first. So did you. 

So this implies that Helly isn't an outlier in kind, only in degree. She's just early in the process for newly severed employees. I can see why they'd all initially react like Helly -- it is a hellish experience, no pun intended.

One wonders what would have happened to the MDR department if Petey hadn't reintegrated. (BTW, it wasn't spontaneous -- he said he had help "bypassing the implant".) Would they have put a fifth employee into MDR? Or did they not even recruit Helly and/or open up a position for her until Petey escaped?

[BaskingsharkGTX]

On 3/9/2022 at 12:21 AM, arc said:

Would they have put a fifth employee into MDR? Or did they not even recruit Helly and/or open up a position for her until Petey escaped?

She probably wouldn't have joined the team. She got hired to replace Mark when he got promoted to Petey's role so if Petey hadn't reintegrated there wouldn't have been a job opening.

[arc]

32 minutes ago, BaskingsharkGTX said:

She probably wouldn't have joined the team. She got hired to replace Mark when he got promoted to Petey's role so if Petey hadn't reintegrated there wouldn't have been a job opening.

I think so too, but that pushes it more towards “weird secret experiment” rather than “real job”. The entire severed floor is way too big for the number of people working there. MDR itself is way too big a room for four people.

But meanwhile they had Helly starting the same day Petey didn’t show up. In the first episode, Mark and Dylan chat about how Petey had the sniffles yesterday. She had to have accepted the offer before he escaped/fully reintegrated.

Actually, on rewatch, Irv mentions that the last woman in MDR was “Carol”, who was followed by Dylan. Suggests that MDR is always only four people. (Also, weird that Irv has seen at least two positions turn over if he’s only been there three years, like I vaguely remember him saying.)

Edited March 10, 2022 by arc

[BaskingsharkGTX]

8 hours ago, arc said:

I think so too, but that pushes it more towards “weird secret experiment” rather than “real job”. The entire severed floor is way too big for the number of people working there. MDR itself is way too big a room for four people.

 

Not to sounds too corporate, lol, but Lumon may have budgeted extra space for future expansion of the team as necessary or they may simply have excess space due t reorganization. Or there may be a more sinister reason for the size of the team vs the space they have...

They could have a waiting list of people who've signed up to be severed so could parachute Helly right in. 

I hope these are real jobs. I think the science experiment idea is a bit of a cop out. Also, the anti-severance activists Mark and his date encountered talking about mission creep/corporations forcing severance on people, plus the news debate Mark watched part of on TV seems to indicate that Lumon is indeed an entity which produces stuff and an actual business.

 

[Kirbyrun]

6 hours ago, BaskingsharkGTX said:

I hope these are real jobs. I think the science experiment idea is a bit of a cop out.

I'm thinking these two don't have to be mutually exclusive. Lumon could be a corporation that does real work (much or some of it with severed workers) and also be running some kind of (sinister or not) R&D with severed workers, too.

I have to admit that a part of me hopes that the ultimate reveal turns out to be something very unexpected, and not yet another "dark conspiracy with nefarious ends." 

[Mr. R0b0t]

Great, now I'm going to be hearing bleating goats in my nightmares.  

[Mrs Shibbles]

1 hour ago, Mr. R0b0t said:

Great, now I'm going to be hearing bleating goats in my nightmares.  

That was terrifying!

[arc]

Ricken's "do you really want me to explain [about hanging the kelp]?" is the most self-aware he's ever been. I hope the rich lady in the birthing mansion next door to Devon's isn't connected to Lumon, though I suspect this isn't the kind of show to spend a few minutes on a completely random character.

The "266" thing Cobel alluded to sounds like it's some kind of remote procedure the bosses can perform on the worker drones. It's probably why Irv had another black goo dream.

Which BTW means the last time he had to have a wellness session was all their fault -- he didn't fall asleep on the job, they 266'ed him. And then they chose to send him to a wellness session instead of the break room, which implies they either wanted him to run into Burt or they are catastrophically incompetent. Probably the former, but maybe they just didn't want quite as close of a relationship as Irv and Burt have quickly established.

That O&D coup painting was very unsettling. That there's an opposing version ("The MDR Calamity") is bonkers. I guess in retrospect I was wrong to worry Burt was gonna gleefully and remorselessly disembowel Irv, but even so Irv's genuinely innocent grin at being introduced to the O&D crew is hilarious.

The O&D room really is enormous. Seven* people seems maybe too small for such a room. (MDR is also oversized relative to its staffing, but there's only four desks in there. O&D has a gazillion weird machines. If the lines E and F are in the middle of the room, then there's A-J for ten lines, each of which has at least 18 stalls, possibly way more, with 2-3 machines per stall. (* actually, there are seven non-Burt staffers this time, so eight. At least.)

It has struck me that such a miniature dystopian system as the severed floor couldn't possibly also just let the MDR drones run amuck, so it was good to see at the end that Cobel was watching it all and knew some of it. Does that also mean she and Milchick allowed Mark to find or at least keep Ricken's book?

[Kiddvideo]

At some point in this episode I decided this was a morality play about the severe schisms in society whether it be race, religion, nationality, or political affiliation. The two different pictures were propaganda and false flags meant to incite fear and hate. Dylan and Irv show the extremes while Helly and Mark are fighting to break through the hatred with Mark representing people who have found change after leaning toward an extreme.

Harmony is the public face of power, but the unseen/unheard Board represent the Murdoch- and Koch-types (and their liberal counter-parts.) I haven’t figured out Devon and Rickon unless they represent the liberal faction?

I might be wrong about the people’s specific roles. I haven’t thought about it that much, and I’m not the show’s biggest fan.

Edited March 11, 2022 by Kiddvideo
Got my characters’ names mixed up.

[bobbyjoe]

Quote

Great, now I'm going to be hearing bleating goats in my nightmares

Do you still hear the goats, Clarice?

[chocolatine]

On 3/11/2022 at 4:16 AM, Kiddvideo said:

At some point in this episode I decided this was a morality play about the severe schisms in society whether it be race, religion, nationality, or political affiliation. The two different pictures were propaganda and false flags meant to incite fear and hate.

Yeah, the two different versions of the painting had a very Orwellian, "Ministry of Truth" vibe about them. But also, the significance of the badge colors reminded me of working at Amazon. FTE Amazon employees have blue badges, and contractors have white ones. There have never any physical altercations between the groups that I know of, but being a "blue badge" confers a kind of privilege, of which "white badges" are resentful.

I'd like to see more of the outside world. In the few snippets that we've seen everything seems pretty normal, but I think there must be something terrible going on for so many people to want to "sever" for eight hours a day. I'm thinking of the dystopian Margaret Atwood novel, The Heart Goes Last, where the world has gotten so bad that people voluntarily commit to a program where they spend half of their time in prison in order to be able to spend the other half in safety and comfort.

The baby goats freaked me out. Their bleating didn't sound natural to me. It's like they've been genetically engineered to bleat louder than normal goats.

Edited March 12, 2022 by chocolatine

[Avabelle]

I think I’m out.. I just don’t get it or what’s supposed to be happening. I feel like nothing has happened since it started. It’s just depressing.

[overtherainbow]

19 hours ago, chocolatine said:

Yeah, the two different versions of the painting had a very Orwellian, "Ministry of Truth" vibe about them. But also, the significance of the badge colors reminded me of working at Amazon. FTE Amazon employees have blue badges, and contractors have white ones. There have never any physical altercations between the groups that I know of, but being a "blue badge" confers a kind of privilege, of which "white badges" are resentful.

I'd like to see more of the outside world. In the few snippets that we've seen everything seems pretty normal, but I think there must be something terrible going on for so many people to want to "sever" for eight hours a day. I'm thinking of the dystopian Margaret Atwood novel, The Heart Goes Last, where the world has gotten so bad that people voluntarily commit to a program where they spend half of their time in prison in order to be able to spend the other half in safety and comfort.

The baby goats freaked me out. Their bleating didn't sound natural to me. It's like they've been genetically engineered to bleat louder than normal goats.

The paintings were like Dante's Inferno but with office workers. 

I had the same thought about the goats. I'm not sure I want to know what they're doing with them.

[Ceindreadh]

On 3/11/2022 at 7:00 AM, arc said:

 

The "266" thing Cobel alluded to sounds like it's some kind of remote procedure the bosses can perform on the worker drones. It's probably why Irv had another black goo dream.

Which BTW means the last time he had to have a wellness session was all their fault -- he didn't fall asleep on the job, they 266'ed him. And then they chose to send him to a wellness session instead of the break room, which implies they either wanted him to run into Burt or they are catastrophically incompetent. Probably the former, but maybe they just didn't want quite as close of a relationship as Irv and Burt have quickly established.

That O&D coup painting was very unsettling. That there's an opposing version ("The MDR Calamity") is bonkers. I guess in retrospect I was wrong to worry Burt was gonna gleefully and remorselessly disembowel Irv, but even so Irv's genuinely innocent grin at being introduced to the O&D crew is hilarious.

 

I took it that the '266' thing was Milchik deliberately sending the pictures to be printed at the copier Irv was using so it would put the wind up him regarding O&D.  There's no way Milchik accidentally selected the wrong printer just as Irv happened to be there. 

(although I could be totally wrong about that, because I'm sure most people with multiple printer options have selected the wrong one at least once!)

[Johnny Dollar]

How bizarre would it be if Ricken’s Book of Corny Platitudes becomes some kind of bible for the severed employees. A company full of employees spouting that nonsense would be the ultimate revenge. 

[Lokiberry]

10 hours ago, Johnny Dollar said:

How bizarre would it be if Ricken’s Book of Corny Platitudes becomes some kind of bible for the severed employees. A company full of employees spouting that nonsense would be the ultimate revenge. 

It's basically heresy. It may be eyeroll inducing, but it teaches the importance and value of the individual, which is in direct opposition to the company attitude that everyone must be subservient to the GodKing Family of Keir. Ricken's book might start a revolution and he'll never know even about it. 

[HelloooKitty]

Is it 9 episodes total?

[arc]

56 minutes ago, HelloooKitty said:

Is it 9 episodes total?

Yes, nine for this season. Apple hasn't announced a renewal, but the series creators reportedly do have ideas for a second season if they get it.

OK, on to episode 6!

Well. Cobel is definitely fully brainwashed into the cult.

Was Gabby severed? She seems completely different on the outside away from the birthing cabins, and it must be important that her son is now named Bradley when she said she'd be naming him William.

"most linguists agree ["camaraderie"] comes from the Latin "camera", which means "a device used to take a photograph."" Wow, Ricken is dumb. Obviously the ancient Romans didn't have devices that took photographs. I looked it up and camaraderie derives from comrade, which does ultimately come from the Latin "camera", meaning a "vaulted room" probably via someone who would be one's partner in said room. (Our modern camera comes from "camera obscura" (dark room), which gradually became actual photograph taking machines.)

"Part time innies" is a huge tell. Cobel is not even a little bit cautious about revealing stuff to Mark. Remember, back in the first episode she told him on the inside about her mother, and it was established that regular innies like Mark and Helly don't even remember what their mothers looked like.

Contrary to my speculation from last week's ep, the back room of O&D is not ten rows wide. It appears to be just two rows wide. I cannot imagine why they were labeled E and F.

So Gabby's (Gabriela's) husband is actually Senator Angelo Arteta, who Lumon was the lead (campaign) donor for two years ago. Oh, but later the news articles clarify he's a state Senator. And he was a lead Senator for legalizing severance.

Hah, I knew things were going to be creepy when the show felt like it was going out of its way to make the lactation consultant reveal a big moment, and then IT'S SELVIG/COBEL!!! AHHHHHHHH!!! That lullaby she's singing to the baby is the same cult hymn she sang in the MDR room, right?

I'm also amused at how any moment without the baby's actual face is clearly an inanimate doll because very young and small babies do not take well to long shoots and multiple takes.

HOLY SHIT LUMON CAN REACTIVATE SEVERANCE REMOTELY AT WILL. What a charmingly old tech on/off switch though. Dylan is going to be super duper thrown the next time he's at work.

I never got an evil vibe from Alexa before now but something about kissing Mark in that moment, just as he was telling her about Petey, felt off.

Looks like Graner's gonna intercept Mark and Reghabi in the university. Yikes.

[questionfear]

Severance actually already got greenlit for a season 2: https://cancelledsoontv.com/severance-renewed-for-season-2-by-apple-tv/

Every week there's at least one moment that I would never have seen coming. Last week was goats, this week was definitely Cobel singing Egan hymns to the MDR crew. Arquette is killing it. 

[arc]

I downloaded it and am reading it now.