Warning: this article contains major spoilers for the finale of Severance Season 2.
“They give us half a life and think we won’t fight for it.” These rousing words, uttered by Helly R (Britt Lower) in the closing act of Severance Season 2, do a pretty good job of summing up what this entire season of Apple TV+’s enigmatic drama have all been about. During the past 10 instalments, we’ve witnessed the Innies of the severed floor fight for the right to exist, despite having little to no control over how and when they get to do so. Gone is the Helly R of Season 1, who pleaded with her Outie to let her resign, going to the extent of trying to take her own life to find release from Lumon’s endless white corridors. Season 2 was all about the Innies trying to take back some power, and exert it over Lumon, their Outies, and anyone else that tried to keep them apart.
That power grab is most present in Season 2’s finale, ‘Cold Harbor’. After Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette) brought Mark (Adam Scott) and sister Devon (Jen Tullock) to a cabin under the cover of night, Mark and his Innie get to actually converse via a series of camcorder videos. Outie Mark is trying to convince Innie Mark to help him free wife Gemma (Dichen Lachman) from Lumon’s clutches, and take down the company for good; Innie Mark isn’t so sure, given his heart is with Helly, and Lumon being gone likely means that he, and all his friends, are gone too.
Innie Mark does get Gemma out in the end, smuggling her through a one-way side door after a series of events involving a marching band, an adorable baby goat and a bloody elevator death. But as Outie Gemma bangs on the door, screaming for her husband to come with her, Innie Mark turns and runs away with Hellie. Like an office-attire-wearing Bonnie and Clyde, drenched in red and white light, they sprint through the maze-like hallways towards… well, we’re not sure what.
It’s a satisfying end to an, at times, frustrating series. There have been major ups – Helly’s near-death experience during the gang’s ORTBO as Irving exposes her as actually being her Outie, Helena Eagan; Mr Milchick (Tramell Tillman) telling his superior to “Devour feculence”; a Keanu Reeves voice cameo; the thrill of Mark’s two consciousnesses starting to integrate.
There have also been major detours. Episode eight, ‘Sweet Vitriol’, followed Cobel as she faced some familial demons back in the derelict seaside town where she grew up – and whilst it (eventually) uncovered some interesting things about Lumon’s history and her part in developing severing, it was also glacially slow, asking a lot from the audience but giving them little reward. The preceding episode, ‘Chikhai Bardo’, which provided flashbacks to Mark and Gemma’s marriage as well as insight into what she’s been doing in Lumon all this time, was more meaty, and packed with heart – but raised more questions than it answered, questions that still haven’t been fully explained by the time the finale’s credits roll. Mark’s refinement work was creating multiple Innies for Gemma, each brought to life in different rooms – but why? To what end? What part of Kier Eagan’s agenda does this bring closer to fulfilment, exactly? We still don’t know.
The finale went balls-to-the-wall with emotion.
The Season 2 finale may have held a lot of cards extremely close to its chest, but if it was light on plot mechanics, it went balls-to-the-wall with emotion. Throughout the season, the complication that having an Innie introduces into your personal relationships was a compelling facet to Severance’s already fascinating concept. There are love triangles (or squares, or even pentagons) between Innies and Outies everywhere you look – both Dylans (Zach Cherry) and wife Gretchen (Merritt Wever); both Irvings (John Turturro), both Burts (Christopher Walken) and Burt’s husband Fields (John Noble); and, of course, both Marks, Helly, Helena Eagan, and Outie Gemma. Eastenders has got nothin’ on this tangled web of romance.
It’s that murky overlapping of affections, the question of whose life (and love) matters more, Innie or Outie, that drives this final episode. Once back on the severed floor, Mark and Helly have what they think is a goodbye, Helly convincing him that he might as well help save Gemma because they have no real future together anyway. At least that way, she says, he has a chance at living, through the reintegration Outie Mark promises. “I wanna live with you,” he replies. “I’m her, Mark,” she reminds him – she is, on the outside, Helena Eagan, the cause of so much of the Innies’ misery. He chooses her anyway. It’s ironic that Innie Mark’s final decision is to turn his back on the person whose supposed loss had led to him being created in the first place. Outie Mark gave him half a life – but it’s whole to him, and he’s going to fight for it.
So, where does Severance go from here? Season 2’s finale is a thrilling, tonal rollercoaster. There is murder, and tenderness, and Gwendoline Christie being a badass, and we get to see Mr Milchick dance again. It ends in the same climactic way as its first run, but with a very different kind of cliffhanger. Where Mark’s yell of “She’s alive!” made it clear that the next season would be about finding Gemma, what Season 3 (Apple confirmed a third outing just after the Season 2 finale) could hold is a little more unclear.
Mark S and Helly R are running away from their Outies, but what respite can they really expect to find within Lumon’s walls? Gemma finally has freedom, but what will she do with it? What does the completion of Cold Harbor mean, now that she’s gone? It all feels like the Severance team has written themselves into a bit of a corner, and we can only hope they’ve got a plan to get out of it. Much like the work of macrodata refinement, the work of Severance itself is mysterious and important. One thing’s for sure: we’ll definitely be tuning in to find out.