Worrying today's episode could take spoilers for the finale of sever and season two, Cold Cold Harbor. Hello, what it is? Jason GETSPSI and I'm Rosey Night and welcome back to x Ray Vision of the podcast where we dive p Dear, Raver Jones, Movies, Collin's Above, Culture, coverany You from Myra podcast where we're bringing you three episodes a week every Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, plus news on the weekends.
In today's episode, we are talking about Subern's finale, Cold Harbor. Did you find out what Cold Opera is?
I don't know.
It's up for debate, but we'll be debating it. We're gonna recap the finale, We're gonna talk about off theories, We're gonna talk about where it leads us in the newly an out season three. And also, remember, guys, programming notes, if you want to be involved in book club, if you haven't done it yet, it feels too much of a big lift. We are doing a single issue for
our next book Club. It is Thunderbolts Issue one by Kat Buziak and Mark Bagley, and you are going to be shocked and surprised when you read that comic So remember, get it from Marvel Unlimited, get it from your local library, get it from your local comic shop. That's going to be our next book.
Club Severance, Season two, episode ten, the finale, we pick up right after the events of episode nine. We are at the Berthing Cabin. Rosie Cobel is confronting any Mark about Cold Harbor?
Did you finish it? Did you finish it? Cold Harbor?
And he hasn't finished it, meaning Jemma is still alive. Cobel is relieved. Any Mark then admits that, oh, we know where the elevator is. Because Cobel is kind of explaining, Okay, there's gonna be this elevator going down and it's this dark elevator at the end of this twisty set of hallways. He said, oh yeah, yeah, we know about it from Irving's drawings. Meanwhile, in Mdr Helly is at her workstation. When who should walk in but her Audie's father, James Joe Biden asked raspy, weak voice, he.
Said, he says, oh, what a funny speech you get.
The other event the other night, did I drink a lot?
Oh? So cross at you throw a dinner candy so mad, and then he comes and closed and he says, you know what, my daughter, you're audi.
I don't really love her.
Oh my god, dude, seriously, this is like my worst nightmare because I'm like, you know what, Dad's they never been doing a lot for me. And imagine this. Imagine if your dad's talking to like a fake budgeon of you that was just made to be inside a shop. And then he's telling that person, He's like, I don't love that outside door. I you know you're bad because you I can control you can't leave, Like come on, man.
Like I don't I don't love her, and he says that. He then says very creepily, as has been suggested over the course of many episodes episode Others in the Shadows, which is like, okay, a bad person, and he says that the reason he doesn't love his daughter Helena anymore is she no longer reflects here. She thought he thought he saw cure in her, but then now as she
grew up, he doesn't. And then Helly he comes in closer, and Helly like picks up a and she's like ready to fucking like she's going John wa like fucking Jason Board like like in the jugular with the points, probably just the ball pen. She probably should have done it, and he he goes, that's here. I see it in you.
I see here in you. And I think the implication for season three, and something we've discussed in this as we've covered this, is he might be thinking, let's bust out Helene, let's bust out helly R, turn her into the Audi, because I see here in her, and let just that's my daughter. Now we'll put Helena elsewhere and just won't ever turn her on again, and that's gonna be Maybe you're maybe your INNI is now your Audi. WHOA, Maybe that's what he's thinking about.
I do think as well, because I like, and I'll just go like your kind of idea that helly R is the real Helena, right, that's like her prime personality.
And I think there's something incredibly bleak and incredibly severance about the idea that he can basically just decide which version of her he wants, and we actually have no idea how many times she has been severed, how many versions of her there bra When he talked about birthing others in the shadows, obviously we know he's been doing his weird like buffing cabin shit.
But I was also like to different, we can only imagine this sexual assault.
Happening like sexual assault happening in the cabin.
Back in the cabin, the negotiation between any Mark and the conspirators Kobel, Audie, Mark, and Devin begins. Cobell tells any Mark that you're gonna need to here's the plan. You're gonna go down to MDR. Then you're gonna look for the elevator. You're gonna go down. You're gonna go to the test floor, where you'll become your audi. Audie Mark will take it over from there. He will get
Gemma Gemma. He will get Gemma on the elevator, at which point you will take back over right and she will be miss Casey and then you're going to get her to the stairwell and you will both escape. Okay, how does that sound? And any Mark is like that sounds pretty good. What happens to me? And then Devon is like listen, And then I think if they're I don't want to lay all the blame for this at
the feet of Devon. I think this is a Cobel plot which I will lay I agree, but like Devin and Audi, Mark will handle this conversation in exactly the wrong way, and Devin says exactly the wrong thing. She says, well, you know, when Jemma is rescued, we can end Lumen, which Adie Mark receives as I'm dead. So you want me to die?
Unastoundable.
You want me to give my life to save the wife of my Audi, who I don't know is and all my friends are gonna die, like is so? Is that what you're saying? And so this proves to be a pretty a pretty huge point of contention. So then Audie Mark takes over and they play him a recording of Audie Mark, and Audie Mark, for his part, I think, does not realize how insanely condescending he is sounding.
Oh he's so. I was like I was watching this shit, and I was like, I would not be doing it, like I would say, buck OUTI Mark like he is the kind I think. Something that's really interesting here is kind of the the supremacy issues that we run into here, of the idea of like who is the prime personality, who is the real person that that we that kind of has the definitive choice over what's going on in severance,
whether it's any other aUI, whether it's a collaboration. And look, Jason, you got to tell them what you would do, because you're right.
Well let's get there. Let's so basically it goes back and forth, and it goes very poorly for Audie Mark, right, any Mark doesn't want to do it.
There's he doesn't have the juice, he can't lie outing.
Well, here's the issue. It's like the ego death card, right, yeah, you're not arguing with Audie Mark's problem is he thinks that he's arguing with this like more simplistic, naive, more childlike version of himself, when in fact, he's arguing with himself just as smart, just as driven, just as like dedicated to the things that he cares about as Audi Mark is. And so here's what I listen, here's I
think Cobel personally. If I have a theory, it's that Kobel wants to tear down Lumen and make as much chaos as possible. And because of that, she didn't really like she knows a lot obviously about the Severn's process. And I think she and she deals with several people all the time innies and outies. She should have coached both Devin and Mark. Okay, here's what we have to say that because who's lied until the it needs more than fucking Cobell.
Literally, because the only way.
To get the only way to get any Mark to do this is to lie.
You have you have to lie to him. You have to be like, we can both exist.
You gotta yeah, and you're not gonna die. Reintegration, this was your idea. Hey, what you might have seen the flashes Audi Mark says like of the reintegration, Yeah, it's a cool process. We're gonna get to both be together as the same person. I would have said, oh uh, they're gonna split usup. We're gonna be changing.
They know how to get people up. They know that it's gonna l us off.
And you're gonna be yours and you're gonna do your own thing fully planning to get my wife back and then never turn the son of a bitch on ever again.
Also as well, you know what else I think is like and that's not Jason's moral judgment. That's just Jason's correct judgment of how Autemoc would have had to play this. But like I also think I I love the writing in this because suddenly you know this whole time you've kind of been told to like root for out a mock. But then you do realize in this interaction like he is no better than anyone else who thinks an any is less than himself, you know. And I think they
do such a good job, such a heartbreaking job. And you see this is the moment where he deeply fucks up when he says, I hear that you're in love with someone too, like.
Helene, and I'm like, bro not heleneying of course, when when Helena comes to Mark at the Chinese restaurant and purposely gets his wife's wrong wife's name wrong.
Yeah, And in that moment you just see like any marks like, oh, this guy doesn't give up because like he's like he doesn't care about me, He's not interested in anything to do with my life. I also do think he makes a good point, which is essentially like, well, why haven't you done this before? Like why don't didn't you care about my interior life before? And now it's
just about saving your wife. And they literally are in a situation where Alimark is showing you can communicate with your any like you can do it, Like he could have shown this interest before he could, but he didn't because now it's about saving Gemma and that's what he cares about. And honestly, I am a saved Gema. I'm on the save Gema standpoint. I do. I found this episode very hard to watch, but yeah, it in this mode.
Autie Mark sucks so much as I mean, this is a show about I think systems and not this is it's about the effect of systems on people. And this is a system that sets people up to be antagonists. And no matter how much you want to cooperate, and no matter how much you believe you have shared interests that would create a space through which you could cooperate, you can't because you're on this side and you're on the other.
That's a fantastic point.
Personally, And you know, I think that there is obviously innies are oppressed, and there's just a lot of philosophical ways to think about this. Like I think any person who was dealing who was dealing with what Audi Mark was dealing with, would think, I'm gonna lie to this fucking inny and then I'm gonna kill him as soon as I get my wife back, which I desperately need to do. And I don't believe that it's possible as an AUDI to think of a piece of yourself as
a person. I think that there is probably some kind ofsophical barrier that would not let you do that. While if you step back, I think it's clear that the Inneyes are people. There are a lot of There's just
so many. I mean I said this previously. I think that there is like a space to think about innis and audis in the language of choice, meaning by which I mean to say, if I choose with my body to create another consciousness that's a version of me inside my body, then I can also kill that consciousness because it's me and I created it in my body, and I created it, and I created it. No, you know, no face, no case, as they say, there's no body, there's no client, it's me.
And there's no weapon because you're just handing it off. No.
I don't agree with that fully, but I think that that's an argument that wants me.
I think it's a very interesting philosophical argument. And I have to say as well, like watching this show has made me consider like when I used to work in I used to work in a bar that was part of a cinema, and I would work there and then we would go to other places afterwards and we would work behind bars and do like contract bartending. And when I think about it, I'm like, wow, that Rosie was really going through it just so Rosie at home could just like lay in her bed and pay her rent.
And I'm like, wait a minute, this is actually far more of a direct line to the kind of way we experience work in an analogous sense than it is like some crazy fictional idea. Like I actually think that when you start breaking up the way that your life works, especially if you have to work in like a service job, you almost do live outside of your experiences at work.
And a lot of times, I have to be honest, being out e Rosie laying in the bed, it wasn't great because I was tired and I was hungover, and I wasn't getting the experiences of you know that Mark gets with this disconnection. So I just think this show, I think that is the true success so this show, because I think we do need to talk about like the success of the finale and whether it works for people,
whether it doesn't. But I think the true success of the show is it really does capture these conversations about work and workers and systems and corporations and how we kind of split our lives up to exist within them. But then obviously in this case, it adds like a physical element to it and an emotional element that I think we really get into as our Ema kind of showcases his his kind of lack of respect or his lack of a plan.
But again, I lay this again at Cobel's feet, who gave them absolutely no guidance on how to talk to any's twenty minute autie. Mark is in a severely emotional state, as you would expect obvious, and I don't think he's in any state to carry on a negotiation with Why did he have a script or something?
And I feel like she could have written him a script.
So the negotiation goes terribly, goes off the rails. Cobell is like, tap me in, I'll deal with it, which should have been the first thing. Cobel goes in and is like, here's what's going on. The MDR numbers are windows into Jemma's mind. You've been severing her lots of times, like each each time you finish a location that is a version of herself that you've created that's severed, and he's like, oh my god, I severed her twenty four times.
He's like, yeah, that's fucking crazy. And then Cobel says gives him some like hard medicine and says, listen, forget the helly shit.
She's an ain't gonna happen.
It's never going to happen, which she's probably right, but I don't know if this is the correct tactic to take either. Definitely not, because any Mark fully rejects us and says, listen, I'm not talking anymore. The next thing I want to see is the Severn floor, and we cut immediately to the Severn floor and he's there. Anie Mark is staring at a brand new mural in the classic cure style, which I would describe as like nineteenth century,
like Antebellum. It looks like something either that it like a style that you would do a mural of, like John Brown in or something in the Denver Airport. And it shows Mark compleating cold at his desk, completing Cold Harbor in front of like the waterfall by the orp Bow, and all the employees are there, and the board is standing at the top of the waterfall looking on and Helly comes out. They embrace. They go to MDR where they find like a animatronic jame Egan, like from the
Hall of Presidents. Yes, and he's holding your card and they open the car and it's a card from Miltchik that announces, Hey, congratulations, party in your honor. As soon as you're done with Cold Harbor, Mark gets to work. He and Helly start talking about everything that's going on. Helly is like, oh my god, it was so weird, Like jame Egan was down here talking about what a special day it was and something's happening, and Mark's like, yeah, I know what it is because of this out of
the cabin. Meanwhile, Miltchik goes to see Dylan because Audi Dylan is like, I'll let you quit, but like we need to have a talk first. So basically filled out a whole questionnaire that inny Dylan is going to have to deal with and read. So Miltchik presents him with it and basically it says like, Hey, I'm mad at you for fucking my wife, but also like I'm glad that this more confident and loving an empathic part of me exists, and so if you want to quit and
your existence, that's fine with me. But like I'm also like down to keep going.
With very emotionally mature response from aUI Dylan in a way that out Emarch and Inimac are struggling to be this episode, I loved this reveal for Dylan. I thought it was actually very kind and very in character, and I love the line where he's basically like, I hope that one day she sees me like how she saw you. I thought that was great, and then that obviously inspires Dylan to kind of go on the journey he goes on for the rest of this episode.
Yeah, we go down to the test floor where Jemma is presented with her outfit for the day, and it's the outfit she was wearing when she last left the house and last saw Mark, and she was linking to this fake party that she was going to. You can tell that she recognizes it. Helly basically tells Mark at MDR that, oh, yeah, you should reintegrate. You should do that and then and then you should like be with
your wife. And then he's like, what I want to be with you and Helly's like, you know, I am suggesting basically that the Helena version is not the true version.
She's like, I am me Dad, Like I am I am her.
And then they have this really cute talk about where they go if they could be together. They settled on the equator, which it's unclear if they.
Know, I don't know what it is that like, is it a building, is it a continent? Is it a building so big you'd confuse it with a continent, Like it's very clear that they have no idea what's going on outside of living.
Then there's this interesting moment where Helly and Mark both complete the file, like she shares it with him, like she puts his hand over his as he's moving the
numbers around. Does this mean that she can also feel the emotions from the numbers or unclear, but Mark finishes with Helly's hand on his wonderful the Chicago Bulls theme plays and the animatronic Jam comes alive and introduces the floor manager, mister Milchick, and then they have like this kind of roast, this very corporate roast battle that you can tell is awkward emotionally because both Milchick and Jame animatronic Jame are taking it a a little too seriously,
like they're really throwing haymakers at each other, and it and it culminates in Milchik basically calling here like a short bit. He's like, you about that, your animate your animatronic version is six inches taller than you, and so what about that, shorty. And then there's just like a very tepid applause, and.
Then nobody's doing nobody's doing candlef that anymore. And also then Jaime calls him, He's like, okay, seth.
At which point Milchick announces that it's time for some of the employees down here on the severed wing that we have never seen in the choreography and Merriment department to come in and celebrate Mark's achievement. And it's a marching, full marching band, which Miltchick then leads in marching band celebrations.
As you know, Helena and Mark look on very very confused. Meanwhile, down on the test floor, Gemma is taken a cold harbor, which is her having to disassemble the crib a crib and I guess feel like no grief or emotion at all. She's a complete new produce. She doesn't know who she is in there, She just knows she has to disassemble this.
I want to say this is we were right for Jason, because you did basically call it early on that the that the concept of what Severance was doing was essentially like eternal sunshine of the spotless mind, Like they want to live a pain They want to create a world where life is painless, where you don't have to remember anything, and a big part like.
So Jamee and the Cures can just have their pick of sexual assault victim.
Basically, I'm assuming that the idea is like other rich people could sever their employees do whatever they want to them. And I mean, this is a question we'll talk about later, but I'm also interested, like do you have to have an emotional connection to the person us evering on that floor, Like that's why I want to know It's.
Like, that's why the that's why the Helena handover Mark's hand thing is interesting to me. But I think that is the suggestion, right and which leads We'll have more conversation about this later, but I personally think that I don't I'm not sure that Dylan and Helly were doing anything. I think they were just there.
Do you think they were just that as pop of Marks like.
I think they were doing placebo stuff. Yeah, to keep Mark drilled down on this very important project, that's trust. So while Gemma is disassembling the crib, Jame is like in a little wink.
Cloth so much. She's my I hate him so.
Much watching her like on video link and very excited, and he's loving it.
He thinks he's done it. It's happening.
So while this is happening, we all so learn because uh, because a Drummond goes to meet with Lorne, they take a delivery of a goat, we learn that basically it seems like, rather than being repositories of a consciousness or you know, a kind of like brain USB drive, the goats, it seems, are really just a part of a religious ritual.
And this particular goat that Lauren is bringing a meal is about to get sacrificed by Drummond and then apparently buried and probably cremated alongside Gemma's remains.
Yeah, I so they suggest that seems like what's gonna happen. I also wonder if it's like a throwback to when they were originally doing animal testing, and they kill the animals at the end, So now they kill the humans at the end, which is what they meant about cold tap. Although I do I feel like, I don't know if Jane would really let them kill Gemma the way he feels about how I feel like he'd probably just want to keep us seven down there forever. I don't know if he's planning to give her all.
Oh, I think maur certainly wants that, but I think, yeah, it's it certainly seems like they were ready ing. I mean, yeah, Drummond was saying here like this goat will will be you know, buried with a what do you say? Valued woman? Yeah, yeah, which was very like weird terminology. Lauren is very upset over how many goats she's having to give up, like all the time, so leading us to believe that this is a regular occurrence that's happening. Mark manages to slip
away from the choreography and merriment party. Helly and Dylan keep Milchick locked in the bathroom with like a vending machine. I love that Dylan in both finales, his very very important role is basically like a body block.
Milk Chick with yeah, I know, and then he gets that. But it's like big, like fuck you moment, which I think is a really big moment for Dylan, which I love.
So Mark gets down to the test floor, he becomes Audi Mark. He and Drummond fight outside the Goat ritual room. Drummond is like gonna kill Martin. He's strangling in death when Louren comes out and puts the little air pistol to his head and his stun gun stun gun thing and basically takes him prisoner for Mark. Mark takes Drummond down in the testing elevator and he's like, listen, I'm
about to become my Audi. So like when that happens, and as he's saying that, like the severance chip engages, he becomes Audie Mark and in the in the you know, in that moment of being between consciousnesses, he squeezes the trigger and shoots a Drummond in the neck and is now covered in Drummond's blood and is very confused about what you do.
That's such a good scene because I kind of like it's so brutal and grotesque, and I've seen the the fandoms especially there's a great twilight account I follow. She's hilarious. She just wrote a book called Why We Love and Hate Twilight, and she was sharing some really good stuff about like how American Psycho coded this version of Marcus. When he's covered in all the blood, he's wearing the shirt, he's kind of running around these clean holes. Yeah, it's
a really great moment. I'm also fuck Drummond, so I'm happy that happened. Great, great news for me personally.
Upstairs, Helly makes a big speech to the Marching band, saying essentially like, help us defeat Milchick because we know about the app Yeah we lost. You must have Yeah you must have lost people too, Like they just disappear and they don't tell you what happens, and like the audis want everything and we don't know anything. And the only way to like stop that from happening is we got to defeat this guy. Mark uses Drummond's blood to get into Cold Harbor, which is a very I didn't.
I know, I'm dumb, but I didn't. I didn't realize that that would be the solution to the problem. And I was like, oh, that was smart.
I know. I was also like, if he doesn't need that, and then it's just any blood. Were talking about bad Blas again, guys, which by the way, is not rolled out this episode. I just need to say, though my personal theory is much smaller. I'll talk about it afta.
He goes, he goes to Gema. Jemma of course does.
Know who he is, but the rich doctor Maua loves. He's like so fucking happy watching it. He's like, yeah, she doesn't remember kill him, Like he's not bothered.
There's something, whether it's I don't know what it is, but she She eventually goes with him, despite maurs please over the and when she gets outside of the room, she turns back into Gemma and we get the long awaited reunion.
It's wonderful, man, the emotional face acting that these two do when they realize, like, oh it's so good and I was so happy and then I was so sad.
So then Milchick escapes the bathroom, and this is the moment that Dylan and the Marching Band get to basically tell him to fuck off and they have a conflict, which I would imagine appears off screen. Then yeah, will open up on when we whenever season three.
Because.
I know mister milchick. He is obviously a conflicted character, but one of the best characters we've had on TV for a while, brilliant pformances. That man is a good dancer. I would love to see him wonderful fucking some people shut up in an action sequence. I believe he could do it, but I also will protect any Dylan with my life, so I don't want him to be hut in that process.
Mark and Jemma run for the Ellen. They have to move, you know, they have to kick the body of Drumm and that out of the way as maur is chasing him. They get on. They go up. Gemma turns into miss Casey, Mark turns into any Mark, and Miss Casey's like, what's going on? Any Mark's like, we have to get to the surface. He takes her the stairs. She goes through, becomes Gemma again, is looking at her husband, who she does not know's severed but I guess might suspect, but still like, is like, what's.
In this moment? Was just saved by him? So it's probably not. She's probably not like suddenly thinking like, well maybe he's saved severa do you know, Like she's this is a horrific ending. It fucking broke my heart, and I think it's so so well done.
I think it's very earned, but very heartbreaking. Any Mark hesitates at the door because he suspects, and I think in fact knows that if he walks out that door, he's probably never He's dead, that's the end of him. And he turns and he sees Helly, who has been confers firmed through interviews with witht Lower that it's that this is Helly are not Helen.
At least at least as much as we know, because you know what.
There are theories, but I'm but I'm working.
Under the I think he's saying the truth. She believes it's hell Yah.
I think it's more emotionally satisfying and it makes more sense for me.
Absolutely would suck if they pulled that rock.
Out that it's Helly are so because it needs to
be a choice. So Mark looks back, he sees her, and they lock eyes, and he decides, like, Okay, so here's here's the choice that any Markets left with death and the death of his friends, or run around with the woman I love in this maze for a few more hours minutes, And so they they lock Hands as mel Tourmas the Windmills of My Mind, the theme song to the original Uh Thomas Crown Affair A Wonder for a Heist movie plays and they go running and that's it. That's the end of So we got a free.
We got it. In the background, you see like Gemma just screaming, Mark, Mark, we got to go back to our life. And it's this kind of horror movie through the glass pane in the door and the red lights are baby like. It's so so heartbreaking. And then there's a great interview I think it was with Indie Wire where they're asking about the freeze frame and Ben Stilla says, yeah, it's kind of this like combo.
It feels very French.
Yeah, yeah yeah. And also as well, he was like, it's kind of a combo of like that moment from the Graduate where you like then get that moment and you're kind of like, oh wait, but now I've done this, like that of my life look like. And then Invasion of the Body snatches, which is obviously like a huge seventies, huge,
huge influence on this show. And and I think that that freeze frame is like so right, yeah, I mean yeah, I'm interested to hear Jason like, I guess we should probably go to a break.
Yeah, let's sever for a moment, and then when we come back, we will tap in super producer Joel.
We'll talk about.
Everything from season two. Yeah, and we're back, and we'd like to welcome super producer Joel to the conversation to discuss.
Any Joel or out Joel.
I want to say today's addy Joel as I'm in an entirely new city, uh only kind of working.
So, how Joe, I did the finale work for you? Joe out?
How'd you feel about it?
Okay? I have very mixed feelings about the finale, so pacing wise, I think is my biggest issue. I feel like we kept coming back to military trying to break out of this room withouting my understanding of why he's so desperate to get out or even what it's like for him to face all of those people, And I thought this would be a free time without doing much work.
I think they could have given him a lot more like he's the bolt out of the room choice I really feel with him as an actor, being like I have to give myself something to do.
He had some wonderful like moments like that, like his entrance when Jame animatronic Jame introduces him and he comes into music, hard cuts, the running out of the room with Dylan, the dance obviously, and this kind of idea of both expressing his blackness in this corporate space and also the fact that this corporate structure is like, here's this little space where you can be black. Yes, there's all.
These other black people to do it.
I too was like, I mean, it's it's it's an episode that's seventy five minutes that kind of like not a lot happens because there's so much action in running around. But and I agree with you, it felt like, oh, look, Miltchik's still there, still donkey kicking the the defending machine.
Looking through I would also say as well, like I think that where we leave this season, I would I think, you know what Mark Helly, I know what happened. They made a choice, So so like I would watch season three about Miltchik, like I want to know how he
got down that. I think, I think there is space to expand the interior world of Severance because I agree, I thought for me, the emotional hit of the ending and how heartbreaking that was and how much it impacted me tells me that this is a really great, well done episode. Oh yeah, and I did get something from it. But I also do have certain like feelings about whether
they the mystery of Cold Harbor. Did it take over like the show so much that it took away kind of the impact of what Cold Harbor is, or is it like telling us more about Lumen, which is kind of my theory which I came away from this episode with, especially the stuff with Milchik and the Jam animatronic and then also the way that people were like respond the Kere animatronic and then the way people like Jam were
like responding when Cold Harbor didn't work. I was like, wait, this is not a historical moment, Like no one outside of this company cares. That is cult language about what they want this to be. And I think my biggest takeaway from this is like, actually, we don't really know much about how Severance is perceived outside. All we know is from other people who are connected to it, so
all of that could be lies. And I think I'm now more of the belief that this is like a really small, interior rich people cult shit that they are doing that maybe doesn't actually have that much impact outside and is more this strange social ecosystem that they have created to exploit workers to you know, potentially maybe breakthrough with a new kind of painkiller idea and emotional painkiller.
But I think my biggest takeaway was like I started to feel like, oh, I'm seeing the cracks in Lumen and this idea of them being some all powerful corporation and actually this is like a weird cult that a rich family runs out of like a fucking strip mare looking office. Like that's kind of and I was like, I was like, it's so bleak, but I think it makes more sense because like why would mark severing twenty five people be a historical moment for anyone outside of it?
But okay, so, like I think historical has always meant for Lumen, and Lumen is good at creating lore for their company. It's like a key element of Lumen. And I think that's like that why is this oil painting? How long has this oil painting been done? When do they commission this? You know what I mean? Like this is a lore they've been setting up. I think that's why they do.
They have painters on the Sabad floor, Like, are there any painting's face worked?
Yeah?
Yeah, it was.
They were all like taking care of the paintings and stuff, and so I think there's yeah, And so I just think they're very good at crafting lore and that's what they were trying to do with Mark. I do still think they're a major corporation. I also do think they're cultish. I think to Jason's earlier point, this is the show about systems, which is why I think for me, a lot of this was pinging on like, oh, this is
a commentary on slavery. I do think it's a little bit larger than just slavery, like you know what I mean. But it is about systems and how you conform and then how you survive within them. And with that in mind, I thought breaking open the system and the opening with the two Marks talking to each other on camera, that really really worked for me. And I think if you've been feeling lost about the personhood of Innis, you know, and if you've been feeling lost about like, well, how
could this possibly end? Like this gives you some really sharp context to both how Audi Mark is conceding. He's like, oh, we'll just like be together, like we'll just share our body, which I think is a lot of people's like fast track. It's like, oh, well, if we're all equal, we just share, it'll be fine, Like don't worry any markets, Like yeah, there's a lot of stipulations that we can't be equal. We can never be equal. I don't have as long
a life as you. I can't share your body and an outside I don't really know you're gonna have all of the advantages against me, And so for that, I think that's a really great way to like sort of leave us hanging and plug us back in. I didn't get all Irving, which is gonna make me incredible. I just can't how am I supposed to breathe or relax.
He might be off the show. I mean I might be gone.
It was giving me that it was in retrospect. It was giving me he's coming back for the.
Sun said, leads me to believe that it's very possible he is not.
I don't want to Irving. This is so devastating to me. I really hope that's not the case. I love John to touro, but also whatever he does an extra show will be great. But I think overall, to me, I think one of the big things I really wanted out of the show was that I wanted some answers. And then it's the end of season two, we know they're trying to go with another one. We needed the Lord to expand I got. Personally, I feel like I got that.
I I feel like I understand Cold Harbor without having full knowledge of it, and to say that is like we we caught the Cold Harbor on the box, so we know this has been the plan for a very long time. And the shock I felt when they opened the room and it was just the crib, and then when they asked her to dismantle it, I literally started crying. I was like, this is so sad to remove from someone.
As much as this memory is painful, it's also treasured and you start to be like and also for her to do the answer, I don't know who I am right and be treated so secondary and other. I was like, this is the horror that I think Mark is thinking every and he is experiencing. You're completely foreign to yourself, You're completely alienated, you are facing trauma you can't begin to understand. But that is clearly still so in the body,
even if she's able to do the task. She's like, she feels like depressed, Like it's like half energy, it's low. It's not the Gemo we have fallen in love with. Over the course of like two hours, and then this ending, guys, oh my god, oh oh.
I was dying like that ship brooke me.
I thought it was perfectly, perfectly devastating and very early like I.
Never got Honestly, I never got on a season three. It would have been fine.
I thought it would have been. I thought it's a great place to end it if there was no season three. And I also thought, obviously I want Audi, Mark and and Gemma to be together. But I also felt like it would not make sense for any Mark to go out that door and agree agree like, because essentially they were asking him go die and all your friends die.
And his interactions did not without a Mark would not have convinced me to go out there either. So I think they did a great job where it's like any Mark does not have to sacrifice himself or be some hero for some version of himself and some person he doesn't know. And I also thought it was interesting that, like in an interview with Rolling Stone, that Jemma's incredible
actress Deacon Lockman. She kind of says that she actually feels like the whole point of Cold Harbor is this idea of like taking that painful memory and like testing
if the severance barrier holds. But then she also kind of connects it to like she feels like they were Cobell was sort of doing that to Mark in the wellness center, and how like the candle from the basement that Miss Casey likes, she's constantly like testing to see the box barrier is holding, and underneath their kind of testing to see if Jemma's barrier is holding when they expose her to things from her outy self. So she feels like Cold Harbor is definitively like attempting to remove
human's pain and grief kind of entirely. And I thought that was such a great insight and that kind of duality of like what Marquess has actually been through, even if we didn't realize we weren't seeing it that way, in the same way we see it on the testing floor. I thought that was like a really great callback.
What so, Joe, what did you think of the ending?
Well?
How did it your thoughts?
I think one thing we know about Mark from the very beginning is like he views his teammates as family. And so if we know that about Anie Mark, there was never any other way for it to end.
There was no Yeah, even if it wasn't a romance, You're right, he would have always gone back.
Yeah, And I think it's like, so it's but it's also hard because we also know, like what it's done really well, if they set up everybody's ultimate stakes so perfectly, Like we know that Mark's only thing is he's just wanted to not feel the pain of Gemma, and so to get close to her and to know that all you have to do is stif through that fucking doors, we could have his wife back and they just found each other. And we know Jemma's biggest fear is that
Mark has moved on. It's just the one the faith that she's been able to hold onto downstairs.
I don't believe, and she doesn't know, he said.
Exactly. In hindsight, I think she will know. I think she will like sit when she is, she'll call Devon. But also I think as well, like once you're out of the chaotic horror of that literal like horror movie situation. I think it would come to you quite quickly like, oh, he's probably severed. But in that moment, all she sees is him leaving with fucking Helena eating just moments after they have, you know, had that connection and that kiss and that like we're going to get out of here.
And also it's so horrific, because isn't that everyone's dream who is trapped in a horrific situation, is that somebody who loves you would come and save you, even if she hasn't been able to think that because she is constantly severed. She got to experience that for like one second, and then they turn it on its head and do something that makes absolute emotional sense for any Mark. But that is I thought it was just such a shocking and emotionally like true and horrifying ending.
Joelle, I must ask you what is so personally? I feel like the you know, the negotiating between the negotiation between Audie Mark and any Mark and his allies went terribly.
I Devin bungled it almost from the first and Mark continued bungling it all the way down them Devin saying like, oh yeah, this will and lumin the wrong thing to say I but I also feel like there's a world in which Cobell, who works with severed people, who created the process and has worked with countless severed people, should have like talked them through his conversation before, Like he she should have been like, you gotta lie to these motherfuckers. I'm like, I put the morality aside.
Lie to your inny.
Tell him that reintegration will create another person and he'll be his own person. He's gonna get to be with Helly forever like that, and that's how it's gonna work. Do not tell him the fucking truth, and that's.
How much we're gonna end your life.
Basically, try to do not try to do not try to connect with him on an emotional level. Do not try to connect with his life. He's gonna see that as inauthentic. You need to fucking lie to him right now because now is not in this five minute conversation is not the time to like, uh create this bond that should have existed between you two. That's how I feel. That said, how would you have approached a negotiation between your Audie cell in it with a with a goal of saving someone dear to use life?
Okay, so to thinks first, I would say, you'll have a lot more faith in harmony than I. That woman does not know how to talk to people. That's not a skill she was gifted with. She could have changed anyone to talk to she doesn't know. Probably is really she only has their shared experience and too harmony. Asking them to leave is sus as hell? Why if you're anti Luhmann, I can't understand why these two people who are helping you can't stay, Like why Devin can't stick around and hear this.
Truth that seems suspicious.
I think my sense is just the feeling like that he's being ganged up on, which I kind of get because he's feeling like I never have the full picture. And yeah, and there's shadowy people that I can't perceive that are always like manipulating me, and I don't know what they're intentions.
Audi March I think it was the belly of the beast without all of the information, and he could have easily had that information and if she had decided to tell them another time. So I'm really sess of harmony right now. I still am not quite sure what her is. But for me, oh man, I'm different than Mark. I think because one, I think I could be very real about like, hey, man, like the person you're in love with inside, Uh, she's like untouchable. I'm outside like we're
really at an impas here. I doubt they're going to keep sending her down there anyway. It sounds like this was a temp thing, projects finished and wrapped. So I'm not trying.
Say already you're already You're like, no, no, no, I'm not.
I'm trying to tell you if you want your out, here's okay. Here's the deal I make. If you want Helly, I would have gotten her name right. If you want Helly, yes, definitely, then here's what we'll do. We have to get out so we can go back in. And by this I mean if you can bring Gemma out, if we can merge into one.
Person, bring HELLI and I'll either bring.
Helly out with you or if she doesn't come with you, I will storm. Gemma's gonna be mad. We should have enough evidence to go after Lum and I will go back and I will get you over. Oh gee, Helly like this lady knows how to sever people. Sure she could just tap into your brainch of or she created it, but we got the whole ken here. We just need a plan. If you will be patient with us and
work with us, you know we've got you. And if you okay, how do I get Because I think the thing that would have really helped any Mark is a guarantee of some kind that we're not going to delete you. Yes, And so I think you would need to take something or someone you can't take harmony. Could you get Devin in there on like the side staircase and be like, listen, this is like this my most treasured person. I would take my brother, this is the person I love most.
In the world.
Probably couldn't even get her on the ground. It's a challenge.
It's just a matter of face, you know what. Okay, So second approach, Second approach, I'm just gonna listen to you. I'm gonna play the listening card. I would say, you tell me your needs. I'm not gonna try.
To see you.
Let's take some time to hear what your needs are, what you would like to see, how you'd like this operation to go, give you a lot.
Of That's the way I would go. And then with that information of what might what any Mark wants, I would then set about lying to him about that he's gonna be a lie and kill his I don't think, I truly don't think there's any way to get Audie Mark out and Gemma out without telling him everything he needs to hear that you're going to be a full person, that reintegration is not going to erase you, that you're gonna be with Helly. Are those things true or even achievable? Fuck?
No they are not. But none of those But without those things you're not getting out period.
The thing that makes me laugh as well is like they didn't know about the stack case, So I'm like, why don't.
You just around him and just fucking Jason told him.
I might just say just be like, hey man, you know what that staircase when you step through it become any, You become your any of the outside. It's like the OTC again, it's.
Like switch the process, so like you're actually gonna be yourself because they.
Knew he had to go through that door. I feel like they could have lied Tim better about the door and like being some kind of thing, But the truth is none of that would have helped because they're both in such an emotionally chaotic.
And like this is why it's so fascinating that exactly because you because the idea doesn't really like come into it in the way that they are living.
Through it, but it's very easy.
And also like bomb chair any First of all, this process should never exist, yes, like if if it's other technologically feasible, it should never do it. Because of this, scientists don't do it. The I like, the conversation around are any people is so multifaceted that I can't it just thinking about it here in this space as an audience member, Like in that world, it must have been very very very toward like the debate around it, because
like is it okay? So if I, like, let's say I get concussed and I don't quite remember everything about my life in that moment when I'm concussed, am I a different guy? And so should I then not treat the concussion to become myself again? Because like, is that is that oppressing this other concusted personal There's so many cats.
Yeah, I was thinking about the autonomy the whole time, like this is my body guy's earlier point, like I created this person if on the lines of like I'm an individual who believes in abortion, rights is this is this the thing of like, hey listen, I I don't want to do this anymore. I have a right to live every day to bullet, I have a right to say.
I know this right and it's my body.
I think what Dylan has done, like the audi Dylan has fully seen And this is the other thing I was sort of pinging against for the whole you so far, It's like there's a level of like self respect conversation that's happening too, Like this is still you like and that's the yeah. And I was really thinking about Helly today too. So Helena. Helena refers to innis as animals at one point.
And they talk about them being leashed and stuff like that.
There's the world.
Sort of racism and othering and all of that. But if you consider her behavior and her father's behavior and how similar they are to innis, they like like as when they're first severed, they're emotionless. They're trying their hard is not they're not EMOTIONALSS. They're trying to suppress their emotions. They're trying not to feel anything in their natural day to day lives. Every time we see Helena, we see
her a lot alone. She does that cool thing in the bathroom, Like she's constantly alone, and even if she's.
With people, you're trying to a like feeling.
Yeah, And so I find it really intriguing that this thing that they have such hate and detest for it and think of as lower, that they're mirroring, and which loves me right back into this idea of self hate. Like it's just it's so.
Even even even as like, oh, I don't.
Like my daughter, but in you, in you, I see the daughter you wanted. But you think like that is just so.
Crazy.
As much as this is.
About it's I also really think it's about like the corruption of hate and the way that that whether it's self hate, whether it's hate of a situation, whether it's hate of other people, like the way that keeps looping and permeating throughout is so fascinating for a mystery box show to end it season two here, I think it's just I really like the choices they made. They don't
give you enough answers. That's fine, you don't want all the answers anyway, you think you do, you feel like you do, You don't you want to have everybody.
I a little further, I don't even say. I think that a lot of the things that we're expecting answers on are kind of they're empty boxes. They're they're not like actually like the goats, for instance, we thought there was going to be this whole other thing. It's really just like a ritual probably rooted in the roots of the company and the family.
In the century fish.
Yeah, as many people in our discord have called them a cult, which I think is essentially true. And I think a lot of the stuff is you know, I think about the weir having been a part of like
various startups. There's these weird like cultural handoffs that happen where it's like you have like these four people that started a company and like they had like this lingo where they would call like let's say, they like would all have coffee together and like when they were starting a company and talk about like issues in the company,
and they called it like Java time. And so when as the company expands, they create, Hey, something we do here is called Java time, and and like and the weirdness of that when you try to level it up to other people who weren't people. And I think a lot of the weirdness that we see in the company, where it's the animatronic Jame or the weird Lingo or
the fucking weird foods and the pineapples. Is just that it's stuff that had meaning earlier to a smaller group of people that then they decided, oh well, workers are like family question Mark air quotes, right, and therefore as part of this family, they're going to take part in this culture, and they've lost touch with whatever that originally meant.
So now it's just weird stuff. So I think a lot of the things that happen in the show is kind of purposefully inscrutable, weird stuff that meant something earlier that doesn't.
Mean anything anymore.
Yeah, okay, so going into season we know season three got announced, great news for us. This was one of the biggest questions in the discord. I know first off, A specifically was like, hey, where do we go? Like what is season three? What is left to go? Like, so, what are you guys before we end? Like what are you guys biggest season three feelings? Is it gonna go? And tell? Bring up being back? Joel said, bring him back?
I think for season three I need I would very much like to get I started talked about this last week, we're constant seeing these movements of like liberation or or at least rebellion. I want to see like and we've seen the departments slowly grow closer together. I want to see a unified rebellion of the innies. I want I want a little drummer boy from the marching band, like Oh, I want like playing raids on the upstairs. I want chip like manipulation from the doc because like the nurse
seems to be, Like the nurse is just chaotic. I really wouldn't need more of her.
I just it's spell is so good. Also, I would say I like that idea, Joel. I was some think that's truth us. But I made a good point, which was kind of like you can only have like an inny sit in for a few days, Like there's only they're only gonna let that happen. What I would love to see is kind of your classic I think now, like you said, I feel like the outer world. I do stand with the idea that I think lumin actually has less impact than we maybe thought on the outer world.
But I think the interior world of lumin, of the building, of the corridors, of the rooms of the floors of the departments is huge and we still haven't explored it. I would love to see a rebellion that kind of takes your classic like martial arts movie rules from Bruce Lee to movies like The Raid. I would love to see them kind of fight their way up Yah law By or whatever the rebellion is. So then we get to see all these different spaces. We maybe get to
learn a bit more about the law. Maybe we don't. And I'm yeah, I'm very interested because I feel like Helly and Mark s have actually I feel like they just have like a really this is a good ending for them, honestly. Like so I'm more interested now in the rest of the people in the Sabbath floor I want to know about. I mean choreography and merriment that to me is like sucks.
Were all the people of color that were Yeah.
Exactly, and not just that, but imagine that you take something that is for people a liberatory thing, playing music that has a cultural resonance, but then you trap someone in having to do that twenty four hours a day and losing any kind of connection to what it means outside of your life. I think that is like has so much potential to explore some of the themes they learn on the outside.
And that's the thing. Were they able to filter that thing exactly.
Like I think's and I think that the kind of notion of a rebellion or uprising that fights its way through the different spaces in Lumen and in this building is really interesting. Also, I love a big swing, So I'm like, if they want to white lotus this shit and suddenly there's we're in with miss Wag and we're in a different like country and maybe you know our beloved and complex Seth Miltchik, maybe he is your kind of Natasha Rothwell or Jennifer Coolidge who maybe gets to
travel between these worlds. I think they could do anything, because I do think generally they have managed to make an emotionally satisfying ending that would just be talked about for you know, I think a lot about Watchmen, like letting the season of Watchmen finish after one season has done so much for keeping it in the public consciousness,
keeping the conversations around it going. And I think that there's a version where finishing this story about this group of severed people is It wouldn't be a terrible thing, but I would love to see Gemma, you know, I think I think if we another obvious route that I think is more likely than the one I just set forth is like you put Gemma in the leading role and it's about her trying to go and get Mark back. I think that's a great inversion, and probably.
The police say that Season three, sadly is going to have to be the one where we finally deal with that question, which is why don't you just call the fucking police.
That is actually I think adds to my notion of like Lumin doesn't have that much impact, but a rich family that basically owns like a small town or.
See the news, you call the police.
That's what we need to know.
They I mean, with Jemma out now, you can't actually put a lit.
Scientology.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, I know. My worst I think my worst version would be like you know, we've all talked about Devon as an op and actually but she could also just be dumb. But like my worst version would be like a shock you know, season opener, where like Jemma gets out of Lumin and just gets like
shot in the head by Devin or something. So they're like, well, now it's not out so we can keep it a secret, like I need Gemma to have if she if we're following the same characters next season, I need Jemma to be a lead, and I need to know more about her. I want to know about her perception of her relationship with Mark. I want to know. I want to have the chance to see that. And they love an inversion in this show. Like the beginning of the season, Mark's
running around, you know, inside the corridors. At the end we have him running away. I think that there's a chance that we get to switch to Jemma's perspective. But Jason, you're right, like they got to call someone. They got to call like Dateline or some shit, Like somebody has got to investigate this.
Uh, It'll be interesting to see how it evolves from there, because you got to figure the story about Lumen has got to blow up from here. I do agree that I think the any revolution continues, but how much further can it go if the government or somebody pulls the plug on it. I think any Mark and Helly's run through the maze, I would imagine it's going to be a lot of Season three, And I think that as hinted at by Jame. I think we're going to see the thing where Jame is like, you know what flip
helly are and my daughter. I want my daughter to be Helly R. And I want so like, let's flip her and have her be the pro consciousness because that's so hard but makes.
So much sense because its very much analogous to the kind of way that women were, you know, in prison for having babies outside of wedlock or because they their husbands were abusive and they didn't like it like that. I think there's like a lot of interesting historical kind of analogies.
I think that there, And to put even like a sharper point on it, I think that there's something really ominous about a guy who is attracted is maybe the wrong word, but like intrigued by someone who resists him.
Yeah, of course, and tell that is.
The thing that he Oh, I see hearing you when you object violently to what I want. I think that's he is an armist character. So I think, like, you know, bringing him more into the story I think is probably necessary for a season three, Like let's really he probably wants to get our real he's our villain off the cold failed to.
I think so. I think it's easy.
I also liked a lot of our people. A lot of the folks in our discord were like, I like the fact that James just kind of a fucking idiot. Yeah, just like he's just like a NEPO son who didn't create anything at all. His dad, his grandfather created the company, his underling that he was managing, created the groundbreaking technology that the company is now known for, and he's just there doing weird shit in the backfucking corners of the
fucking company. I can't wait for seasons. It's very very excited. What an incredible season this has been and really fun to talk about.
Definitely. I also want to ask Ben Stilla, if you're listening, Ben, I know you definitely are, like how much did how
much did you enjoy the Jordan Peele movie Us? Because when I was rewatching, I was thinking about how so much of this is like the tevit and the rights of the tenet and having to live on the ground, and I'm just like, I would love to know if that was like an influence on this, because I especially think once we start to think about switching people out, it very much reflects that I thinks Run comp two. Oh yeah, yeah, that makes so much.
I mean, the film history all over this show is I mean, it was just really it's light to kind of dive in and make all of these pair.
So yeah, let's come back and the lead up to season three, let's dig into some of those and just kind of talk about movies to watch if you love severance.
In the next few episodes of X ray Vision, we're diving into Darted, Evil Born Again one O five and one O six, and next week we talk about the news coming out of Nintendo Direct. That's it for this episode.
Next for listening. Bye.
X ray Vision is hosted by Jason Sepsion and Rosie Knight and is a production of iHeart Podcast.
Our executive producers are Joel Monique and Aaron Kortman.
Our supervising producer is Abu Safar.
Our producers are Common Laurent, Dean Jonathan and Bay Wack.
Our theme song is by Brian Vasquez, with alternate theme songs by Aaron Kaufman.
Special thanks to Soul Rubin, Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman, and Heidi our discord moderator.