The finale of Severance season two causes me an aggressive exasperation that no show has achieved since. It felt half-baked, stitched together by the characters’ constant jumps to peculiar conclusions, and the final scene left me thoroughly mystified. What possessed them to make such bewildering choices? What future could possibly await them? The more I think it through, the more plot holes I find.
The show centers around the employees of Lumon Industries, who underwent a procedure — severance — that splits their consciousness into an Innie and an Outie. There is no overlap in memories or awareness. The Innie is activated when they step onto the Severance floor of Lumon, and the Outie returns once they leave, keeping the employees’ work life entirely secret. The main character Mark Scout’s Outie discovers that his thought-to-be-dead wife, Gemma, is actually trapped in Lumon’s offices, and seeks to save her with Innie Mark’s help.
The entire season, perhaps the entire show, is leading up to Gemma’s rescue, and in the final episode we seem poised to see it through. Then, at the very last moment, Innie Mark turns his back, opting to remain with his supposed girlfriend Helly R.
Supposed girlfriend. His love for Helly is positioned as a primary motivation in abandoning Gemma’s rescue, but I would argue that Helly and Innie Mark were nothing more than a fling. This is by far one of my greatest grievances with the show. Not until the final episode did it occur to me that the two are meant to be in love. Never was I invested in the pair, and as a result I didn’t particularly care whether they were separated at the end — not because of an indifference to the characters individually, but because as a couple they had no history. The final decision could have been gut wrenching — risking it all to rebel with the woman he loves, or saving the wife of another — but instead it fell utterly flat. Innie Mark chose a doomed crush over Gemma.
Now let us pretend for a moment that Innie Mark and Helly are a grand romance worth rooting for. Could this salvage the ending? I don’t think so. For one thing, Helly’s outie, named Helena, is the granddaughter of Lumon’s founder and devoutly loyal to the company. In an earlier episode, it’s revealed that for a brief time Helena was pretending to be Helly — which this apparent great love of hers, Innie Mark, didn’t notice by the way. It’s assured that it won’t happen again after an agitated response by the Innies, but how can they be sure? For all he knows, Innie Mark is abandoning Gemma for a Lumon spy.
Let’s now say this too is an irrelevant point, and we should take the enemy corporation at their word, that Helena will not return. Still, the conclusion would be deeply unsatisfying, in large part because of the absurdly frustrating conversation that brought it about.
By recording their words and passing in and out of a building that activates the Innie, both sides of Mark are able to converse. I think this scene is best described as two incompetent debaters abandoning their own interests and deftly evading any effective or productive argument. Outie Mark is unbelievably unprepared to answer his Innie’s rather predictable questions, and Innie Mark offers childish and perplexing objections while refusing to search for a solution.
Innie Mark fears, reasonably, that once Gemma is freed and Lumon is shut down for kidnapping her, there will be no reason for the Innies to be used, effectively ending their lives. It’s a valid concern, so much so that it’s astounding that Outie Mark and his co-conspirators failed to foresee it. Surely they could have come up with solutions beyond reintegration, an unproven surgery which they hope would combine both consciousnesses. They know of other places that activate the Innie — they’re conversing in one of them, could they not agree to return there? Outie Mark, after all, would owe him for his wife’s freedom. Instead, Outie Mark makes blunder after blunder, and Innie Mark is obstinate and childish. It’s infuriating to watch, and they reach no agreement.
Ultimately, Innie Mark is in a terrible position, and every option he has is complicated; but I think he chose the least reasonable of all. What rebellion can he lead against a company whose technology controls his very consciousness? He fears if he complies with Outie Mark he’ll lose out on a lifetime with Helly — which is likely true. Once Helly leaves the floor, it’s doubtful Helena will ever bring her back. But what does he expect to happen instead? That the two will live happily ever after at the Lumon office? I have no idea how he’ll support his decision.
Severance leaves us with Helly and Innie Mark running together through the halls of Lumon. Where are they going? They can’t leave the floor and they have no plan. It’s an empty and underwhelming scene.
I worry it’ll be explained in season three with a cheap shock, revealing a loophole or secret plan as if it had existed all along because the technology is fake and the writers can say whatever they want. Without any satisfying explanation as of yet, though, I can’t appreciate the finale.
The fact that I’m this invested in the show is really a testament to how much I loved it. The writers truly did a wonderful job crafting a fascinating story, the type that only leaves you wanting more. I will absolutely be watching season three and have faith that there’s a satisfying conclusion still to come. It is without a doubt the most irritating final episode I’ve ever endured, but I imagine it’s a far easier task for the creators to write such intricate problems, than to solve them.
‘Hater Friday’ runs on Fridays and centers around critiquing media or culture.
Rye Blizzard is a member of the Class of 2027 in the College of Arts and Sciences. She is a contributor for the Arts & Culture department and can be reached at rab538@cornell.edu.
