S02.E07: Chikhai Bardo

[aghst]

Except the version of Gemma who attacked Dr. Mauer and tried to escape was Gemma, not Ms. Casey, who's the Innie.

But as soon as she ascended in the elevator trying to get out, she turned and was docile, obeying Milchick and turning back without being forced to go back.

Gemma knows she doesn't want to be there, has a life she wants to return to.

 

[AstridM]

No way in hell do I believe that Gemma voluntarily signed away her rights to Lumon and agreed to fake her death and lie to Mark about it. NOPE. 

[JenE4]

12 minutes ago, AstridM said:

No way in hell do I believe that Gemma voluntarily signed away her rights to Lumon and agreed to fake her death and lie to Mark about it. NOPE. 

She might have agreed to participate in experiments without knowing they were going to fake her death and hold her for years.

[Orff99]

This show did a remarkable job of portraying pregnancy loss and infertility. There is clearly personal experience in the writer's room.

Two things jumped out at me.

First, the doctor talking about what Gemma is "siring". That is an odd description for a woman, and even more so an infertile person. Men sire, women birth. And she doesn't seem to be pregnant in there. Perhaps the "siring" is providing her eggs, for others to birth - like the women in the innie birthing center. I sure hope that they're not being inseminated by Mark... as collected by Helena the one time... and maybe the second time. I'm not 100% sure we're back to Helly.

Second, Selvig being a Lumon soldier and her position in the "outie" world being lactation consultant. Her advice was sound. So maybe she provides that service to the women giving birth to what Gemma has "sired" - and maybe those women aren't breastfeeding, or there are children not being born from women, which means they would need replacement milk, and the best options are either formula or....

goat's milk. Truly. The best natural alternative to human milk, for human babies, is goat milk. It's nurturing.

Mammalians nurturable.

Maybe the nurturable mammals are not the goats, but the babies born from Gemma's eggs (and maybe others). The goats are raised for their milk to nurture the human babies.

We heard "they're not ready yet". Not the goats - the babies.

[seank941]

13 hours ago, Affogato said:

I was always taught that you cannot sign away your rights, as much as people would try to make you think you can.  You can disclose after an NDA, you just lose the benefits detailed in the contract. You cannot sign a contract to make yourself a slave. 
 

Are the outies signing their innies into slavery? If everyone has an in ie for dental work I suppose they won’t want to think about it

I don't know how the Severance legal system works, I'm just assuming they have slightly different laws based on things like the OTC. Either way, there are legal ways to harm outie Gemma as well. Mark definitely should've been fired by now, and I'm assuming they get some housing benefits as Lumon employees.

 

3 hours ago, Affogato said:

Yah. The innies do not have autonomy and choice. Helly, in particular, makes it clear. Her outie dresses her like a baby. She cannot quit. ( her outie can’t either, but she doesn’t know that.) severing creates a separate person. What are your responsibilities to that person? If you choose to quit they die. 

To be clear, I absolutely believe that innies are separate people. However if you are the type of person that doesn't, who cares about them?

Seeing Gemma's experiences, it actually brings up some new questions about the innie personality. If you only use your innie to go to the dentist or a few unpleasant tasks, what are they actually like? The MDR team works 8 hours a day for almost the entire year, and they are still basically teenagers. How long would it take for a normal person's innie to even become a child?

I'm also curious how the chip would work in a normal person. I actually like going to the dentist, and sometimes you need to answer questions while you are in the chair. I also know people who enjoy filling out Christmas cards, and corresponding with relatives, even if they are thank you cards. Are there settings for the severance chips?

[Affogato]

50 minutes ago, seank941 said:

I don't know how the Severance legal system works, I'm just assuming they have slightly different laws based on things like the OTC. Either way, there are legal ways to harm outie Gemma as well. Mark definitely should've been fired by now, and I'm assuming they get some housing benefits as Lumon employees.

 

To be clear, I absolutely believe that innies are separate people. However if you are the type of person that doesn't, who cares about them?

Seeing Gemma's experiences, it actually brings up some new questions about the innie personality. If you only use your innie to go to the dentist or a few unpleasant tasks, what are they actually like? The MDR team works 8 hours a day for almost the entire year, and they are still basically teenagers. How long would it take for a normal person's innie to even become a child?

I'm also curious how the chip would work in a normal person. I actually like going to the dentist, and sometimes you need to answer questions while you are in the chair. I also know people who enjoy filling out Christmas cards, and corresponding with relatives, even if they are thank you cards. Are there settings for the severance chips?

We saw Helly wake up. Panic. Fear. Anger. They would not be prepared for dental work. Detrimental in a plane crash. And it would be abusive even if never seen. So this has something to do with the balancing of the emotions, dread to frolic. The MDR team have fairly lmited experiences, too. 

[arc]

2 hours ago, Affogato said:

We saw Helly wake up. Panic. Fear. Anger. They would not be prepared for dental work.

The thank you cards experiment raises two issues. First, that innie isn’t a blank slate, because she would have to know personal details to write thank you cards. Secondly, Lumon must have just implanted a bunch of fake memories for that innie, because that’s a fake husband there and she’s writing cards for gifts she never actually received, and that’s well something beyond the mere memory editing they’ve shown so far.

If Lumon wants to commercialize severance for more than just the innie-outie 9-5 split that we’ve mostly seen (besides Gabby), they probably have plans to do something more advanced than the “outie is the original persona and innie is wiped clean of personal memories” scheme that rules on the severed floor.

[Starchild]

7 hours ago, aghst said:

Except the version of Gemma who attacked Dr. Mauer and tried to escape was Gemma, not Ms. Casey, who's the Innie.

But as soon as she ascended in the elevator trying to get out, she turned and was docile, obeying Milchick and turning back without being forced to go back.

Gemma knows she doesn't want to be there, has a life she wants to return to.

 

Oh yeah this hadn't occurred to me before.

When the outie descends in the elevator to the severed floor, they become the innie.

But when the innie descends even further down in the elevator to the testing floor, they become the outie again.

Interesting.

[FoundTime]

On 2/28/2025 at 7:06 PM, AheadofStraight said:

We just rewatched and one random thing I noticed. When she was doing the thank you notes she was using her left hand and her handwriting was abysmal and she is clearly not left-handed. No idea if that means anything lol 

Oh, I hadn't thought of it that way. I just figured that by the time you got to thank-you note #150, your handwriting would be pretty ragged 😅

[seank941]

I know this episode was about Gemma, but there have to other people down there too, right? The experiments are almost useless if you only have one test subject.  I guess they could test people one at a time, but they seem to be in a hurry.

This sort of brings up another question I was thinking of: are there any other companies with severance type of projects? I can't imagine other companies not trying to capitalize on such a profitable technology.

[AheadofStraight]

6 hours ago, FoundTime said:

Oh, I hadn't thought of it that way. I just figured that by the time you got to thank-you note #150, your handwriting would be pretty ragged 😅

Well, most likely you are the correct one lol! It just looked like my writing if I try to use my other hand. 

[jacehan]

I don't think it's clear that the Gemma was saw was her Outie. Considering we saw multiple personas in different rooms, couldn't it just be essentially Gemma S., her default innie, while switching to Ms. Casey on the severed floor is just another room persona?

[Affogato]

10 minutes ago, jacehan said:

I don't think it's clear that the Gemma was saw was her Outie. Considering we saw multiple personas in different rooms, couldn't it just be essentially Gemma S., her default innie, while switching to Ms. Casey on the severed floor is just another room persona?

It could be we are not seeing multiple personae. We are seeing severing of memories and negative feelings, but not a loss of what makes her an individual person.  The one in the hall is the same person. She has been told this is an experiment, but it goes on forever and she is tired of it. This contrasts with  Miss Casey, who is a severed person as we know them. 

Edited 6 hours ago by Affogato