Severance season two – as mysterious and important as the first?

Severance season two begins in motion – a fitting start to a season delayed by the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike. After ending on a nail-biting cliffhanger and having to wait an agonising three years, season two finally arrived. For a while, Severance was television’s best-kept secret – a funny, mysterious, and utterly bizarre dive into the sinister world of Lumon Industries and the four employees of Macrodata Refinement (MDR). With the success of season two, it seems that the rest of the world has finally caught on.

We pick back up as Mark S (Adam Scott) resumes consciousness after the shutting down of the Overtime Contingency. In the time Mark’s ‘innie’ has been unconscious, there have been changes at Lumon. After MDR used the Overtime Contingency to reveal the mistreatment ‘innies’ face by allowing them into the outside world, Lumon has gone into PR mode, tucking away any outward signs of dissent and rebranding MDR as faces of ‘severance reform’. The ‘severed’ floor itself has had a rework too with Mr. Milchick (Tramell Tillman), the former deputy manager, now in charge. Things seem prepped for another productive quarter at Lumon!

However, armed with the information that former wellness counsellor Ms. Casey is actually his outie’s thought-to-be-dead wife, Gemma, Mark S and the fellow MDR workers set out on a mission to rescue her. Alongside this, the series explores the various fallouts from the Overtime Contingency activation. We follow Helly/Helena’s (Britt Lower) complex relationship with Lumon’s CEO and her father, Jame Eagan (Michael Sibbery), Dylan G’s (Zach Cherry) struggle with the knowledge of his outside married life, Irving’s (John Turturro) outer-world contact with retired severed worker Burt (Christopher Walken), and Harmony Cobel’s (Patricia Arquette) trajectory since being fired from Lumon.

These are nuanced, complex, frustrating, and loveable people, all played to perfection

Whilst significant time is devoted to these B-plots, the relationship between Mark and Gemma powers season two. For all the dark goings-on at Lumon, this season is about love in its many forms, thanks to the severance procedure. If, as Dylan muses in season one, “love transcends severance”, then season two is where this is dissected.

Alongside Mark and Gemma, the show explores Irving’s relationship with Burt, both inside and out of Lumon, Dylan and his wife Gretchen’s (Merritt Wever) marriage, and Mark and Helly’s burgeoning ‘innie’ romance. Due to the split between ‘innie’ and ‘outie’ consciousnesses, the various emotions both consciousnesses feel towards their partners and themselves is toyed with, producing consistently engaging, thought-provoking, and deeply emotional television.

The season’s seventh episode, ‘Chikhai Bardo’, is where these elements shine, showing the history of Mark and Gemma’s relationship as well as the current situations the two characters find themselves in. It is one of the most affecting episodes of television I have seen in a while, aided by the truly gorgeous visual style crafted by the episode’s director (and cinematographer for the show), Jessica Lee Gagné.

The reason this works so well is because of the show’s incredible characterisation. These are nuanced, complex, frustrating, and loveable people, all played to perfection. This is especially true of the four MDR workers, Mark, Dylan, Helly, and Irving, resulting in an ensemble impossible to not get emotionally invested in. Even smaller characters like Mark’s sister, Devon (Jen Hullock), former Lumon surgeon Reghabi (Karen Aldrige), Gretchen, and Miss Huang (Sarah Bock) are carefully and lovingly crafted.

In the realm of visuals, season two feels like it is reaching new heights

Everyone on the cast is doing career-best work, but Britt Lower and Tramell Tillman are on another level this season. Lower’s masterful attention to the differences between her ‘innie’ and ‘outie’ is mesmerising. There’s a particular scene in episode four, ‘Woe’s Hollow’, where wordless, Lower shifts from faux sympathy to cold indifference just through the hardening of her gaze. It is breathtaking.

As the unnervingly polite Mr. Milchick, Tramell Tillman benefits greatly from an increased role, able to encompass emotions ranging between terrifying, humorous, and sympathetic with ease. Tillman is so naturally charismatic that you often find yourself rooting for an antagonist. Additionally, more attention is paid to Lumon’s racial politics and Tillman excels in silently displaying his frustration and sadness with the company he has devoted his life to. If there’s any justice in the world, the pair will receive numerous accolades.

Yes, this season is mostly about love, but it is also a season of expansion. This happens both visually and story-wise. In the realm of visuals, season two feels like it is reaching new heights. Whilst season one was by no means poorly filmed, season two feels like the creative team have hit their stride, experimenting with different editing techniques, lighting, camera movements, and shots. The result is a beautiful-looking season of television as the camera sweeps over the icy expanses of Kier or barrels down the sleek corridors of the severed floor. If the visuals on screen aren’t already engrossing enough, season two is all about hooking viewers through deepening the show’s lore. Although never fully revealed, information regarding the Eagans, the severance procedure, and what MDR are actually doing, is provided over the season’s run, answering burning questions fans have had since the beginning.

This is top-tier television

However, with a season focusing on and providing viewers with more background, season two encounters some pacing issues along the way, particularly in the back half of the season. It begins at breakneck pace, ending its third episode with a status-quo-shattering decision that was sure to shake up the season. And yet, this does not ever really come to fruition and instead, the slowly developing plot is used as a teaser, often placed at the end of an episode to keep the viewer coming back. This isn’t helped by the fact that episodes seven and eight are essentially single-character episodes which cut up this already slow plot even more.

Episode seven provides both backstory and emotional stakes that pay off in the finale but eight, an episode focused on Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette), kills the pacing at the point when it should be ratcheting up. I can that see if someone were binging the show, this would be less of an issue, but when you’re watching week-by-week and having major plot revelations end on cliffhangers, there is nothing more frustrating than having to wait yet another week to see more development.

Fortunately, the show does recover for this with a truly spectacular final episode. If the previous episodes had turned down the heat, ‘Cold Harbor’ cranks things back up again. It’s an incredibly tough job to bring together a season with so many moving parts but Severance achieves it, answering series-long questions whilst also leaving just enough to keep the viewer hooked for season three. It is masterfully done, both emotionally satisfying and intensely stressful, ending on a divisive yet bold decision that has caused an outpouring of think pieces online already. Most importantly, it shows that Severance still has the magic that made its first season so good and ends season two on a triumphant note.

Whilst the season has some notable pacing issues, this is top-tier television, delivering gorgeously photographed and thematically rich plotlines with nuanced characters played by actors at the top of their game. Truly, if you’re not watching Severance, you’re missing out.