The romantic entanglement between innies Mark S. (Adam Scott) a Helly R. (Britt Lower) is sure to have an effect on their outies, and season two as a whole. Photo: Apple TV+
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If the image of Adam Scott frantically screaming “SHE’S ALIIIIVE!” in the ending moments of Severance’s first-season finale is seared into the trauma center of your brain, you are very much not alone. It’s been almost three years (!) since Seth Milchick tackled Dylan G. and cut the Overtime Contingency short, and the fate of our sweet, naïve innies has been hanging in the balance ever since, taking up space in our minds and hearts.
Thankfully, the wait is almost over. Apple TV+ is finally bringing Severance back on January 17, and it’s time to ready those melon parties. (Or waffle parties; I’m not here to shame your kink.) But it’s been so very long and the mythology of this show is so very dense that you’d be forgiven for forgetting some things. A rewatch of the first season would be a fun way to jog your memory but also inefficient — you’ve got a busy schedule and might not have time for all that! So we are here to help reintegrate your severed brains and get you ready for season two with a character-by-character breakdown of what you need to remember (and what we still don’t know) about what our innies, outies, and mysterious corporate entity–slash–cult got up to last season. It’s time for your staggered entrance into Lumon, folks. Grab that blue key card and let’s go.
What We Know: Mark’s outie is a hot mess. After the tragic death of his beloved wife, Gemma, two years prior, Mark decided to go through the severance procedure in order to give his grieving brain a break for eight hours a day. Outie Mark has a small support network that consists of his sister Devon, his brother-in-law Ricken, and his newborn niece, Eleanor. He’s also attracted the personal attention of Lumon bigwig Harmony Cobel, who installed herself in a condo next door to his while posing as a daffy New Age woman named Mrs. Selvig.
On the innie side, Mark S. is fiercely loyal to his friends, Irving B., Dylan G., and Helly R. He has struck up a flirtation with Helly, and, while he is good at his job, he hasn’t really drunk the Lumon Kool-Aid when it comes to the worship of Kier (more on all that below). Mark’s innie and outie personas have developed a (warranted) skepticism about the severance process and the inner workings of Lumon. Early on in season one, outie Mark was tipped off by his work buddy Petey (Yul Vazquez) about the sketchiness within Lumon, but then Petey died due to reintegration sickness. The woman who was attempting to reintegrate Petey is named Reghabi (Karen Aldridge), who, as we learned through an interaction with Mark and a bit of exposition from Cobel, was integral in creating the severance procedure but, for some reason, has soured on the process and has since started an underground resistance. In episode seven, outie Mark goes looking for Reghabi and witnesses her murder the security guard for the severed floor. Mark hasn’t seen her since then, but it was at her instruction that he slipped the guard’s key card into his innie’s pocket, giving Dylan G. access to the security office to trigger the Overtime Contingency.
What We Don’t Know: While we’re on the topic of the Overtime Contingency, one of the big questions on everyone’s mind for season two is whether Mark will figure out that his innie was referring to Gemma when he screamed “SHE’S ALIVE!” at the abrupt conclusion of his visit to the real world. Gemma is alive in Lumon … somewhere. Can the innies save her?
Mark might have more to be concerned about than just his (un)dead wife. Somehow, Mark is very important to Lumon; this is one of the low-key mysteries of the series. In a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it moment in the premiere, we find out that his innie was presented with a crystal cube with his face on it because he’s “special.” Turns out this floating head was awarded to him for quickly refining his first file, titled “Allentown.” (For more on this, check out this Reddit thread.) Mark S. seems to be a very gifted refiner and, despite Lumon’s claim that it values everything equally, he seems to be at the top of its list.
What We Know: Since we’re already on the topic of Mark’s not-so-dead wife, let’s get into it. By all accounts, Gemma was a kind, beautiful soul whose life seemed to be cut short by a tragic car accident approximately two years ago. However, she popped up in season one on the severed floor as a wellness counselor named Ms. Casey. Hmmm.
Despite Milchick’s protests, Harmony Cobel insisted on testing Mark S. and Ms. Casey’s possible recognition of one another, going so far as to introduce a scented green-and-red candle from their home into one of their wellness sessions. The two never overtly recognized each other, but at times it felt like there was an emotional connection between them. Once Cobel decided that Ms. Casey was no longer of use, Milchick sent her back down to “testing” in a creepy elevator that took her farther into the bowels of the Lumon building.
What We Don’t Know: It is unclear whether Lumon staged Gemma’s death or just absconded with her mostly dead body and reanimated her. Anything is possible here, but Lumon has many different locations, and it decided to put Ms. Casey on the same severed floor as Mark S. This seems relevant. Also, does she live in the Lumon basement now? Is she the human equivalent of a Westworld host? Just thinking about what Lumon is doing to that poor woman gives me goosebumps.
What We Know: There’s surely a severed love triangle on the horizon for Ms. Casey, Mark S., and Helly R., right? And all three are bringing heaps of baggage to the table. Aside from the wild romantic-entanglement angle, Helly’s true identity will certainly put a wrinkle in this situation. When Helly visited the outside world, she found out who she really is: none other than Helena Eagan, the heir apparent to Lumon.
Aside from her lineage, we actually don’t know much about Helena. The one time we’ve really seen her in action is when she recorded a callous and cruel message to Helly, telling her that she “is not a person.” We also know that she has an incredibly creepy father, Jame, the eighth and current Lumon CEO. At the Eagan family gala in the finale, we saw him follow her into the bathroom, briefly talk about her innie’s suicide attempt, mention a mysterious thing he calls a “revolving,” and then leave. However, we do know that innies retain the spirit of their outies, and we’ve seen that Helly R. isn’t one to take orders or follow others blindly. What that means for Helena’s involvement now that she’s been co-opted by her “not-a-person” innie is anyone’s guess.
What We Don’t Know: See above. We don’t know much, but we know we adore Helly and kind of hate Helena. Is it possible for Helly to just take over permanently?
What We Know: We have yet to see Dylan’s outie in action. From Milchick’s Overtime Contingency visit to his home, we know that he has three kids, including an adorable son who can count to 100 really fast, and a house with a closet in it. And that’s pretty much it. As for innie Dylan, we know that he covets all the random Lumon perks, he is loyal to his friends, he is suspicious of outsiders, and he thinks page 197 slaps.
What We Don’t Know: Since we haven’t seen Dylan’s outie, we don’t know why his innie exists. We don’t know much about his home situation — does he have a spouse or partner? Does he actually do muscle shows? — or his motivations to work on the severed floor. Here’s hoping we find out more about him in season two.
What We Know: Irving is an enigma. His outie seems to be on some sort of mission to research severed employees at Lumon, while his innie is (was?) a devout Kier acolyte. Coincidentally, so is his paramour Burt G. (Christopher Walken), who abruptly “retired” from his severed job at Lumon after some heavy flirtation with Irv. When we last left Irving, he was screaming on Burt’s doorstep in the real world, so it’s safe to say that we’ll be revisiting that relationship.
Irving’s outie is also tortured by visions of a long, foreboding black hallway with an elevator, the red arrow ominously pointing down, farther into the building. Oddly, this is the same terrifying hallway we saw Milchick walk Gemma/Ms. Casey down when she was sent back to the testing floor. It feels like the innies will have to traverse this hallway at some point in season two, and I’m terrified for them.
What We Don’t Know: Why and how does Irving know about that hallway? Has his brain been rebooted more than once? Is he an undercover spy somehow? What will happen to good boi Radar if something happens to Irv? Won’t somebody think of Radar?! Oh! And, on the romantic front, will Irv and Burt ever get to see each other again? As a self-identified Burving shipper, I’m rooting for those two.
What We Know: We’ve reached the un-severed (or at least we think) portion of our character breakdown. Devon is a supportive sister, and Ricken respects Mark but does occasionally give him a hard time for engaging in the severance process. However, Devon’s suspicions about severance and the Lumon agenda may become important. Her interaction with Gabrielle Arteta, the wife of severance activist and senator Angelo Arteta, revealed that Gabrielle may have used the severance process to “outsource” some or all of her recent pregnancy and birth experience. This was already on Devon’s mind when her brother’s innie decided to crash her husband’s book party, and now she has even more of a reason to be suspicious.
What We Don’t Know: As a character, Devon feels like an open book, but how far will she go in trying to reveal the truth about severance? Also, let’s just put all the cards on the table: Ricken’s devoted following feels a bit odd, right? Why on earth is he so popular and famous for writing complete drivel? Is something going on with him? (PSA: There are some truly fascinating theories out there, shout-out to Reddit!)
What We Know: Harmony Cobel is unstable as a three-legged table. She is a devout follower of Kier, and it feels like she has been since she was a child. In a shrine in her home, we’ve seen lots of imagery surrounding the illness of an older woman named Charlotte Cobel — perhaps her mother — as well as visual references to Harmony possibly spending part of her childhood at the Myrtle Eagan School for Girls. However, as an employee of Lumon, Harmony seems to have serious doubts about the severance process as well as Mark’s involvement in the company. Her experimentation on Mark S. and Ms. Casey suggests that she’s looking for cracks in the severance procedure, and her plea to Mark to “get away from them” as she hugs him in the finale is also telling. Cobel knows that something potentially harmful is going on at Lumon, but she’s still protective of it as an entity. These are contradictions that hurt the brain.
What We Don’t Know: Aside from the visual references on Harmony’s shrine to Kier, we don’t have much information about her history with Lumon or the Eagan family. Severance hasn’t featured any flashbacks yet, but it feels like one might be warranted to explain Harmony’s involvement in Lumon/Kier worship. In addition, we know that Harmony was fired by the board, but then she did try to stop Helly R. from addressing the crowd at the Eagan family gala. Will her efforts be rewarded? Or does a darker fate await her?
What We Know: Throughout season one, Milchick was basically Cobel’s henchman. He mentally tortured the severed employees in the break room, but he also brought them perks like melon parties and music-dance experiences. (That last one didn’t go so well.) Milchick seems to be all in on the Kier worship side of things, and he truly believes that what Lumon is doing — inasmuch as he understands it — is important.
What We Don’t Know: Anything about Milchick’s life outside of Lumon. We can guess that he is not severed, as we have seen him in the real world — a.k.a. Dylan’s closet — but given everything we don’t know about the severance process, it feels possible that his brain has been altered by Lumon in some way. Or maybe he’s just in too deep with his Kier worship. His tempers don’t exactly seem to be tamed, but we’ll see.
What We Know: The Eagans, particularly Kier Eagan, loom large over the world of Severance. The town that Irving’s outie lives in is literally called Kier. (It’s on a piece of his mail.) One of the restaurants in town is Pip’s, named after Pip Eagan, and there’s a girls’ school somewhere named after Myrtle Eagan, Lumon’s first female CEO. Lumon itself is apparently allowed to operate without much oversight from city or state governments. The severance procedure is being questioned on a larger scale (see: multiple news segments on severance featuring Lumon’s PR woman, Natalie), but Lumon also has senators such as Angelo Arteta in its pocket to ensure that it can continue what it’s doing without interference.
Inside of Lumon, the Kier lore is deep. We’ve never really seen what goes on in the unsevered floors, but there is a monstrous portrait-in-relief of Kier in the Lumon lobby, so there’s got to be a bit of worship-adjacent thinking going on there. On the severed floors, the Perpetuity Wing is an absolutely wild thing that exists, along with a full-scale replica of Kier Eagan’s home. The handbook for severed employees (the only thing that they’re allowed to read) is basically a Kier Bible, and the hallways are littered with paintings depicting Kier’s godlike accomplishments. Kier’s whole philosophy revolves around taming the four tempers (woe, frolic, dread, and malice) using the nine virtues. When typed out like that, it all feels like culty nonsense, but we have seen the refiners dumping blocks of numbers into bins coded with bars indicating the four tempers (WO, FR, DE, MA), so there’s certainly something to it all.
What We Don’t Know: Oh, so much. There are lots of questions about what, exactly, is going on within Lumon. Questions such as: What do the scary numbers represent and what are the macrodata refiners actually refining? What’s up with the goats? What on earth are those ideographic cards for in the Optics and Design Department?
All of those questions are certainly tantalizing, but the core mystery of the series is in the title: severance. Why do the Eagans want every person in the world to have a severance chip when they so clearly have nothing but derision and hatred for innies? (See: Helena’s claim that Helly isn’t a person. See also: Jame Eagan’s terrible scowl when he talks about Helena’s innie.) Why, exactly, is severance so important to the Eagan family? And what happens when they find out that severance might actually be a reversible process? May Kier help us all.
