Severance season 2 is back, and while it ends on a somewhat heartwarming not with the team back together and working in sync again (as heartwarming as being stuck in an absurdist office can be), is the team really back together?
Almost immediately, fans began hopping on a theory that the Helly that has returned to work is not in fact Helly, the former innie, but rather Helena Eagan, her alter-ego, hardass corporate outie, daughter of CEO Jame Eagan, who was severed to show that even an Eagan can undergo the “safe” procedure and put their money where their mouth is.
There are three possible things going on here:
- Helly is actually Helly, she’s just acting weird because she learned that she’s really an Eagan and does not want to share that with the team, which is why she makes up a story about where she woke up on the outside instead of what she uncovered, and her big rant at the event.
- Or Helly is Helena, sent down to spy on the group when her innie remains locked up somewhere. But this is supposed to be an open question and cause the kind of debates among the fanbase that we’re seeing now.
- Or, Helly is Helena but this is something the audience is supposed to figure out pretty quickly with her definitely odd behavior, not just the lying about her outie, but she just…doesn’t really seem like herself, particularly when she offers to stay just to help Mark find and free his wife (“your outie bought the ring” feels more like Helena phrase than Helly).
My money is on option three. I do think that viewers are supposed to figure out pretty quickly that Helly is Helena, and have that knowledge when the other workers don’t. Giving audience information that the characters don’t have is always a storytelling risk, but pretty much everything about Severance is a storytelling risk.
Of course, other mysteries remain. Where is Mark’s wife? Who is this new child supervisor and why is she there? And of course the overall question, what exactly are the workers at Lumon truly doing there, and when will they find out?
If I had to guess, I don’t think Severance is saving the Helly/Helena reveal as some grand, season-ending plot turn. Either we or the characters will get confirmation pretty soon that Helly is not who she says she is, but probably in a few more episodes. I haven’t seen screeners, so this is just a theory, but I would be surprised if it didn’t pan out.
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