Work-life balance will never be the same for you… EVER, when you see this part science fiction, comedy and intense thriller. There is bizarre fun to the whole enterprise. But it can also be headache-inducing trying to keep up with all the threads. Dan Erickson came up with the idea when he one day decided that he hated his job. He, along with directors Ben Stiller and Aoife Mccardle took the idea and are running with it, continuing a most curious environment and premise. The world inside Lumon is garish fluorescent light with mainly sterile white walls, while the Outie world is cold, dark and stark. There’s always snow on the ground.
Adam Scott (“Parks and Recreation”) stars as Mark, a deadpan, low level office manager. He certainly knows how to leave the office at work, mainly because he allowed his brain to be physically “severed” to separate his memories of work when he went home, and vice versa.
When Mark enters the building at work, he becomes an “innie” at Lumon Industries. And when he leaves, he becomes an “outie, that is, whoever he is before and after hours. All the “outie” knows about work is to show up.
Had to wait 3 years for Season 2 which picks up some months after the last episode of Season 1. In that finale, Helly (Britt Lower) and Mark briefly assume their Innie identities outside of Lumon Industries to warn about the abuse and treatment they’ve received inside the labyrinth of Lumon.
Without giving spoilers, it’s the response of Lumon to this challenge that sets up the conflict and tension of this second season. Helly and Mark are still working together inside Lumon trying to figure out what they’re really working at in MDR (Macrodata Refinement). It’s a good idea to re-watch some of the final Season 1 episodes to refresh memory of those events.
Watching this show is a lot of work in itself. You have to really concentrate to follow both the plot and time lines. It becomes a complicated pastiche as the characters reference themselves as different “Innie” or “Outie” people. The strange supervisory characters, especially ominous ones like Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette) and Mr. Milchick (Tramell Tillman) are given even more opportunity to cast their dark presence over their severed employees.
Milchick is especially menacing, presenting a bunch of balloons to Mark all imprinted with Mark’s face on them and greeting him with a cheerful “Welcome back Mark S, it’s been a minute.” Tillman continues to portray Milchick as the smiling, supposedly benevolent, manager, but he will do anything to stay in his boss’ good graces. Since their revolt in Season 1, Mark, Helly and teammates Dylan (Zach Cherry) and Irv (John Turturro) have received publicity outside the facility as “the face of severance reform.” Mark doesn’t trust Milchick for a minute. Leaving the balloons hanging mid-air he takes off running full speed through the maze of eternally long hallways in Lumon’s building.
The Production Design by Jeremy Hindle for all of the episodes, lends itself eerily presenting an oppressive, secretive environment for the characters inside the Lumon building. It’s stark boxy hallways and nearly empty rooms with 4 desks attached as a clusters so the “innies” can neither see nor interact with each other while they work.
Director Ben Stiller creates a truly epic follow shot of constant motion and changing angles in the extended scene that Adam Scott revealed took five months to shoot. He says they even had a wrap-party to celebrate when they finally finished that scene. The music created by composer Theodore Shapiro (Tropic Thunder, The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Bombshell) casts a creepy vibe as the characters wander through their day bumping into each other around the building.
Mark’s main concern is finding out what really happened to the pleasant “wellness counselor” Miss Casey (Dichen Lachlan) who he now recognizes as his “Outie’s” deceased wife, Gemma. It gets even crazier when Helly realizes that in the “Outie” world, she is Helena Eagan, the daughter of the Lumon CEO who has set up this work/life structure. Helly hates the dichotomy of good vs. bad and power vs. enslavement which is a constant push-pull element of creator/writer Dan Erickson’s scripts.
Lower’s Helly is given perhaps the greatest range of difference between her two conflicting personas. Zach Cherry as Dylan finds himself trapped between the two worlds and gives a sweet performance as he’s confronted with his duality. John Tuturro continues his fixation on Burt (Christopher Walken), the long-time Lumon artist and historian who mysteriously is no where to be found at the office.
Just when the story verges of running completely off the tracks Erickson puts something back into focus that keeps the story compelling. In this era of billionaires ascending into the public space and the continuing corporate intrusion into everyone’s lives, Severance is must see for both your Innie and Outie.
Apple TV+ 6 Episodes TV-MA
