SEVERANCE – Season Two

When considered on a surface level, the titular medical procedure central to Severance is appealing: maintaining a work/life balance by simply not being conscious during working hours? For many employed in our current capitalistic hellscape, this sounds wonderful. But once you hold the idea to more scrutiny, it starts to unravel: what about the consciousness created to do all the work, your so-called ‘innie’? This other “you” is, in essence, now a prisoner of circumstance. All they know is their sterile workplace, comprised of endless corridors, fluorescent lights, and glowing computer screens… yet they’re not robots, no less whole as human beings than their ‘outies’. They have a range of emotions and their own needs and wants. How would you consider your innie’s existence?

In his usual flippantly vulgar fashion, Dylan (Zach Cherry) expresses just how serious getting fired is for one’s innie, telling Mark (Adam Scott) in Season 2’s premiere not to feel bad about having “killed” the people who’d been brought in to replace his team. Innie Mark is taken aback by Dylan’s comments. He hadn’t considered it that way; he’d begged Lumon’s board to bring back his friends, saying they “couldn’t just make them disappear.” Reframing it as death rather than absence is important: Severance is effectively forcing us to take the innies’ perspective rather than the perhaps more natural point of view of the outies.

At this point, I should say this: If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you should watch Season 1 and dive into Season 2 of Severance. Also, be warned: there are spoilers for the first season from this point on.

We’re back with the Macrodata Refinement (MDR) team for the show’s second season, which begins as an almost exact mirror of the first. The opening shot is a veritable technical feat of cinematic engineering, which shows Mark running down the endless hallways of Lumon’s severed floor. You might recall how Season 1 opened with a long sequence of Mark walking through the same hallways on his way to the MDR office, and it’s no coincidence, as co-creator and director Ben Stiller explains in the official show podcast.

He goes into the minute details of how the Season 2 opening shot was created, for all the curious nerds; I highly recommend listening to the podcast, which dissects each episode with Stiller and Scott, alongside a special guest. The similarities don’t end there: just like the two first episodes of Season 1 were framed from different perspectives (first through Helly’s freshly severed POV, and then from the rest of the team’s POV), Season 2 sets up the first episode, “Hello, Ms Cobel,” entirely from Innie Mark’s perspective, while episode 2, “Goodbye, Ms Selvig,” shows the outies’ experiences.

Stiller picks Severance up right where he left off, in the harrowing cliffhanger of the MDR team’s overtime contingency rebellion coming to an abrupt end. Innie Mark is back to work, being led to believe by the newly promoted floor manager, Mr Milchick (Tramell Tillman), that five months have elapsed since their stunt. While none of his original team members are present at first, they’re quickly brought back when it’s clear Mark won’t get back to work without them. While Dylan’s eager to hear what his colleagues have been up to while he held on fast to the security room’s switches, Irving (John Turturro) is heartbroken and ready to quit (which, if you’ve been paying attention, amounts to committing suicide), and Helly (Britt Lower) obfuscates the truth about her real identity as Lumon’s next-in-line corporate bitch Helena Eagan.

In reality, only a few days have passed, as we learn during the second episode. Ms Cobel (Patricia Arquette) is offered a new role as a reward for her efforts in alerting Lumon to the innies’ uprising but is insulted and decides to leave when she learns her former manager role has been offered to Milchick. To control the innies, Lumon manipulates them to believe their rebellion worked and brought about real change to the company. For some mysterious reason, Lumon management insists that Mark must come back to work on a file called ‘Cold Harbour,’ and Helena’s not particularly happy with the prospect of returning. Meanwhile, Mark’s sister Devon (Jen Tullock) wants to get to the bottom of Innie Mark’s final words—“She’s alive!”—before the overtime contingency was shut off, much to the irritation of Outie Mark, who is reluctant to consider his late wife Gemma (Dichen Lachman) could still be alive in Lumon’s underbelly. Gemma gets a lot more screen time in the second half of the season.

We get more time with the other refiners’ outies, letting Cherry, Turturro, and Lower stretch their acting skills even further, to the audience’s delight. Dylan is manipulated into compliance by being allowed marital visits with his wife Gretchen (Merrit Wever), and the back and forth between them is as sweet as it is sour, considering the limited freedoms of the innies. Outie Dylan is a disenchanted, tired dad, in contrast to his innie’s sass and sense of wonder. Outie Irving has similarly bittersweet moments meeting Outie Burt, who knows of their innies’ illicit romance. Finally, we get some screen time with Helena, Helly’s outie, whose intentions and allegiances are murky as she fixates on the romance her innie has struck with Innie Mark.

The new season also takes the time to delve deeper into Milchick and Cobel. The latter’s past is briefly explored later in the season, while Milchick’s character unveils more layers of humanity and complexity. His relationships with his new subordinate, Miss Huang (Sarah Bock), and with the board’s representative, Natalie (Sydney Cole Alexander), help viewers peek underneath the façade of this steadfast company man. Tillman is the show’s true star once again, portraying the subtle nuances of a POC climbing the corporate ladder and navigating the mazes of capitalism, patriarchy, and white supremacy.

On a lighter note, goat lovers may rejoice! Those endearing creatures are back, introducing a new department called Mammalian Nurturables and the foreboding employee leading it, Lorne (Gwendoline Christie). The show’s creators were surprised by the goats’ popularity, according to Stiller on the aforementioned Severance podcast, as he was asked about them often between seasons. Hopefully, the goats will be back next time, as a third season’s been confirmed, and Severance will be back sooner than the three years we waited last time.

Severance wasn’t a show you could ever consider to be fast-paced, and Season 2 isn’t any different. It’s a slow start, with two entire episodes focused on the aftermath of the first season, before a third sets the table for this new one, but the show picks up the pace by the fourth episode and offers some answers and many more questions. There are perils to entertaining a mystery box like Severance; some fans are already starting to feel the strain, while others who remain hooked are praying not to be disappointed when all is finally revealed. I’m still completely on board with Stiller and Dan Erickson’s vision, and I hope the end will be as satisfying as the trip the show has brought me on so far.

The show keeps up its signature sleek set design, thoughtful framing and cinematography, and eerie soundtrack, which made it a standout show. Cinematographer Jessica Lee Gagné also sits in the director’s chair for the first time for the incredible seventh episode, “Chikhai Bardo”, to impressive results. Ted Shapiro is back with his haunting theme tune, and we’re treated to a new opening credits sequence full of hints and references (I suggest waiting until after watching the full season before researching videos dissecting it).

It’s an ambitious show full of Easter eggs and obscure references exploring capitalism and corporate greed, our relationship to work, POC’s reality at work, identity, and the philosophy of self, freedom, cults, and mythology, to name just a few. The audience can (and does, in a flurry of fan theories and speculation online) draw many parallels with existing media and stories from Greek mythology, Marxism, and Hegelian philosophies, as well as classic film theory and history.

In the heyday of streaming and binge-watching, Severance brings back the excitement of compelling week-to-week television. The hype doesn’t relent, with a particularly active and unhinged Subreddit and tons of videos on social media being made after every episode. New meme formats and quotable phrases circulate almost weekly. Season 2 wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but I was delighted by each instalment and felt compelled by its various conundrums, especially regarding the innies’ freedom and right to existence. I can’t wait to see what Severance has in store for its third season.

USA | 2025 | 10 EPISODES | 16:9 HD | COLOUR | ENGLISH

Cast & Crew

writers: Dan Erickson, Mohamad El Masri, Wei-Ning Yu, Anna Quyang Moench, Megan Ritchie, Erin Wagoner, Mark Friedman, Adam Countee & K.C Perry.
directors: Ben Stiller, Sam Donovan, Uta Briesewitz & Jessica Lee Gagné.
starring: Adam Scott, Zach Cherry, Britt Lower, Tramell Tillman, Dichen Lachman, Patricia Arquette, John Turturro, Christopher Walken, Sarah Bock, Merritt Wever, Jen Tullock, Michael Chernus & Gwendoline Christie.