CAs we expected, the second season of Severance which arrives Friday January 17 on Apple TV+! For those who had plunged from its beginnings, in January 2022, into the strange universe, halfway betweenThe Office and the films of David Lynch, in this masterful series, the suspense has lasted for three long years. In season 1, we discovered the dystopian universe, both retro (computers and cars from the 1980s, telephone booths, no internet) and totally futuristic imagined by Dan Erickson and brought to life by Ben Stiller.
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In this frozen world, an operation, “severance”, allows individuals who wish to be split into two. The subject becomes on the one hand a being totally dedicated to work (the “innie” in the language of the series, the one who is inside the office), and on the other someone who is only aware that of his private life (the “outie”). In the windowless offices of Lumon Industries where he works on strange number sequences, Mark S. (Adam Scott) has no memory of his existence outside the office… and in his personal life, he does not know at all what he does at work, or even who he meets there.
ALSO READ “Severance”: when work rhymes with half a brainFrom this fundamental separation, Severance questions our relationship to work and identity with delicious dark humor – the team-building or going-away scenes are particularly tasty.
Season 1 is structured by the rebellion of the “innies” who are Mark S. and his three colleagues Dylan (Zach Cherry), Helly (Britt Lower) and Irving (John Turturro) until the twist of the last episode, a finale unforgettable. The quartet regains consciousness for a few minutes outside the walls of Lumon Industries, while they are in their existence as “outies”, the first alteration to the perfect seal created by “severance”. So, what happens after this moment of rarely equaled dramatic intensity?
Double dose of mystery
In the first images of season 2, here is Mark S. in the corridors of Lumon Industries, more labyrinthine than ever – it seems that the offices have been transformed from top to bottom, but why? When he finally finds his office – a huge room in which four workstations are grouped together in a particularly painful proximity effect for each employee – he is amazed: there are three new faces who welcome him.
No more trace of Helly (for whom Mark S. has a budding love), Irving or Dylan, the accomplices of the attempted poker game in the finale of season 1. And these are not the balloons bearing his image brought by the new floor manager, Mr. Milchick (Tramell Tillman), who eases Mark's concerns, quite the contrary. The supervisor's smile and forced good humor never bode well.
This confusing start immediately signals that season 2 of Severance will push the cursor of weirdness even further. A lively little girl, Miss Wong, has joined the office management team and organizes activities.
Instead of having answers – what is really going on at Lumon Industries? Why had Mrs. Cobel (Patricia Arquette) insinuated herself into “outie” Mark’s life outside of the office? Is Gemma, Mark's wife, still alive and within the walls of the company? –, the spectator finds himself like the character (soon joined, we can be reassured, by his former favorite colleagues) facing new questions.
In episode 3, we find the mysterious little goats from season 1, grazing in a large sheltered meadow in the Lumon offices. Do the firm's activities have to do with cloning, and the quest for immortality? The disturbing figure of its founder Kier Eagan (which evokes the leader of Scientology L. Ron Hubbard) seems to suggest this.
You have to let yourself be carried away by the tandem of creators, Dan Erickson and Ben Stiller: they know what they are doing and skillfully balance suspense and progress in the story. We understand this in episode 4, a real tour de force, which takes the “innies” out of their eternal confinement to throw them into a landscape of snow-capped mountains for the duration of a sort of high-risk seminar. Out of their usual context, put in danger physically and no longer just psychologically, the four characters see their relationships strained to the point of tragedy… But shush! No spoilers here.
Actors at the top
More than ever, Severance is an opportunity to savor exceptional acting performances. The unusual love story that began in season 1 between two legends of independent cinema, Christopher Walken and John Turturro, takes an unexpected turn… Patricia Arquette, chilling with her long silver hair and metallic gaze, reveals an astonishing ability to roar. The excellent specialist in supporting roles Merritt Wever (seen notably in Unbelievable et Dopesick) moves in the role of the wife of Dylan, one of the main characters: she visits her husband within the walls of the company, so it is with her “innie” (who has no memory of 'her) that she establishes a dialogue… and little by little a moving relationship.
Because what emerges throughout the episodes, beyond the disturbing strangeness of the world of Severanceit is an original and profound vision of human relationships, the only thing which – in a universe stripped of all color and all sensual pleasure – gives value to the existence of the characters. Because they are deprived of everything and have no control over their destiny, “innies” have a form of innocence which clearly differentiates them from “outies”: Adam Scott excels at differentiating Mark S., a sweet dreamer who works at Lumon, by Mark Scout, the private, cynical and bitter man. He also makes us feel the purity of the feeling that pushes him towards Helly, whose dual nature is the most disturbing.
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Kangaroo of the day
Answer
Outside the office, Helly the pure, the one who so wishes to shake off the yoke of Lumon Industries, is Helena Egan, heir to the company's founder and terrible manipulator whose thirst for power seems infinite. Britt Lower also makes us feel the infinite nuances that separate these two faces of the same equally uncompromising woman. It is from her that the main tension of this season 2 comes from, and it is the great complexity of her story with Mark which means that – after the six episodes of season 2 shown to the press – we ask for more with even more impatience.
Severance – saison 2 (ten episodes), a new episode available every Friday from January 17. Season 1 (9 episodes) fully available. On Apple TV+.
