“Tame in me the tempers four, that I may serve thee evermore. Place in me the values nine, that I may feel thy touch divine.” ~ Ms. Cobel’s prayer, Severance Season 1
It’s been a long wait for those of us who watched Severance when it first aired back in 2021. A long and arduous wait. The first season ended on one of the most edge-of-your-seat cliffhangers I’ve ever seen in a TV show, and then three years passed. I watched the first season three times during those three years, and each time I came to the end I wanted to shout at my television. You can’t end here!
Virtually no spoilers follow, so read on without fear. I’ll be reviewing/recapping each individual episode as they stream, so be sure to follow me here on this blog, as well as on Twitter, Instagram, Bluesky or Facebook. I can’t wait to chat with you all about this incredible show, which is back with vengeance in Season 2.
Sequels are hard and often disappointing. There are the rare exceptions, when a sequel is somehow even better. Empire Strikes Back, Paddington 2, Road Warrior. Far more often, they leave us disappointed. A story is dragged out too long for its own good, or it’s a cheap money-grab.
I’ve now watched all ten episodes of the second season of Severance, and while I think the first season was overall better, Season 2 stands on its own feet. We’re introduced to more of the lives of each character—severed and unsevered—as well as the inner workings of Lumon, and at least some of the company’s diabolical intentions. There are many mysteries left unsolved by the end, but plenty of revelations as well.
MDR Blue(s)
Visually, Season 2 is even more striking than the first. One thing I noticed early on was the color blue. Blue is everywhere. Blue against white. Blue on black. The blue balloons in the picture above. The deep blue of an office wall. Blue eyes, blue ties. Helly R. is wearing blue dresses now, exclusively:
Yes, she wore blue in Season 1 as well, but she also wore green and yellow. Now, it is all blue all the time. Relentless blue. This is just one visual touch that fascinates me, one detail among so many that I find myself puzzling over, rolling around my brain like an azure marble. When the blue suits and dresses come off and our heroes don black coats, it is as if the world has been robbed of all color, until fire appears. Then it is the contrast we feel, the sudden warmth.
The details are so striking. The symmetry of houses and streets. The light beyond a window. Somehow, Ben Stiller and the rest of the creative team have taken every stunning visual aspect of Season 1 and honed it into an artform. They undo the mundane not by making it extraordinary, but by framing it so perfectly. Every shot is artistry. The result is a season that’s more claustrophobic and frightening, but also more stunning and gorgeous to look at with both big establishing shots of this strange, cold world, endlessly wrapped in winter, and smaller more intimate shots that invite us to lean in and take a closer look.
There’s a sense of menace that grows as the season builds, creeping low under everything like the shadows fog casts. The way a character’s face is lit from behind by fire like a devil. A smile that once felt charming, now sinister. The thrumming bass undercurrent, rising like some dread unknown beneath it all.
The music was one of the highlights of the first season, and yet somehow it’s taken on new life here. Still the familiar melodies, but now an added sense of urgency. Frolic and woe threading through every note. Dread and malice in every stanza.
Of course, all these production elements aside, it’s the story and characters that make Severance so special. We pick up where the first Season left off, though I won’t tell you how long it’s been or share any details of what anyone is up to.
Mark (Adam Scott) and his fellow Macrodata Refinement workers return. Helly (Britt Lower) and Irving (John Turturro) and Dylan (Zach Cherry) of course, but also Mr. Milkchick (Tramell Tillman) and Ms. Cobel (Patricia Arquette) who now finds herself at war with herself and her loyalty to Lumon. We learn more about the work they do, which becomes perhaps a little less mysterious in the process. And we learn more about the numbers, which become a little more scary.
Mark’s sister, Devon (Jen Tullock) grows increasingly suspicious of Lumon after the events of Season 1, while her husband Ricken (Michael Chernus) finds himself tempted by the company’s flattery and appeals to his ego. Where Ricken sees benevolence and opportunity, Devon sees only wiles and trickery. Several new cast members join the fray, including Gwendoline Christie (of Game Of Thrones fame). Others, like Alexa (Nikki M. James) are nowhere to be seen.
The fallout of Season 1’s shocking finale is addressed fairly early on and, of course, new conflict arises. New twists and turns, many of which I didn’t see coming, slide into frame. Much of the season obviously has to do with Gemma/Ms. Casey (Dichen Lachman) though it’s remarkable how miserly the show’s writers are willing to be with their cast, leaving some pretty big characters almost entirely on the sidelines for much of the first half of the season.
What I can say is that we begin to see more of these characters’ lives outside of the Severed Floor. Other than Mark, we only really glimpsed anyone’s “Outie” toward the very end of Season 1, and only from their “Innie’s” perspective. That changes significantly here. And as we learn more about each of these people, we find ourselves questioning what we thought we knew about them and how that makes us feel. This is an emotional journey audiences take alongside the characters themselves, both Innie and Outie.
More Vision, Less Cheer
The second season is certainly grander in scope than the first. We learn more about Lumon’s history as well as its global reach and influence. The severed employees go beyond the familiar hallways of their fluorescent dungeon, and we visit locations beyond the snowy hamlet of Kier. It’s also, at times, significantly weirder.
Season 1 could be taught in school as a test-case in finely-tuned rising tension. The last three episodes of that season slowly ratcheted up the intensity with a series of close calls and brilliant revelations, not to mention a daring scheme abruptly cut short. I white-knuckled the last two episodes, perched dangerously on the edge of my seat. The opening episodes were slower-paced. It took time to heat up.
In Season 2, we’re are off to the races from the start, bobbing and weaving in some truly wild directions, and some pretty crazy twists and turns. In many ways, it’s a thrilling ride. But it never quite hits the high notes of its predecessor.
If I had to sum it up in one phrase, this would be it: Season 2 is not as tightly crafted. This is most apparent in the second half, when a couple of the episodes felt a little bottle-ish, disrupting the rhythm of the season as a whole. I’m not sure if this will play better week-to-week instead of in a binge (I watched all ten screeners over the course of three or four days) but I admit I was a little thrown off by the decision to put two episodes in a row that felt very out-of-place with the rest of the season, grinding its momentum to a halt.
I may feel differently on a second watch. At least one of these episodes ends with a big revelation that I wasn’t particularly fond of—a choice that felt somewhat after-the-fact, used to expand one character’s story in a way that I don’t really find plausible, that felt perhaps lacked the narrative probity of the first season, or felt a little tacked-on. The other bottle episode gave us a lot of backstory, but never revealed the most important details the backstory was exploring. Both left me feeling unsatisfied.
Likewise, the final episode’s admittedly crazy ending didn’t hit quite as hard as Season 1’s gripping finale (how could it?) Things certainly didn’t go the way I expected, which I’m happy about, and I was left with complicated feelings. But it doesn’t stick the landing with quite the same verve. I think a great deal rests on where the story goes in Season 3. Plenty of questions remain unanswered and some new ones have cropped up. How these are resolved going forward will certainly affect how I ultimately regard Season 2.
Finally, while the season has many funny moments filled with wit—the line “devour feculence” is uttered, need I say more—it never quite reaches the comic heights of Season 1, much to its detriment. In its attempt to make everything bigger and more bizarre and give the characters more obvious purpose and drive, a smidgeon of the humanity that made the first season so resonant is lost.
There was a deceptive simplicity to the first season and a bit of a meandering nimbleness to it that, ironically, gave the story more focus and allowed its quirks to shine through. With more of a “quest” in Season 2—for lack of a better term—and more dire stakes bedeviling our protagonists, not to mention so many plotlines to juggle, this season is never quite as balanced and tightly-woven as the first.
Still, these complaints aside, it’s an extraordinary season of TV. Severance is without peer in the modern television landscape and that remains true in its sophomore outing. I’m not disappointed the way I was with Arcane’s second season, even if it’s not quite as perfect as Season 1.
Between its compelling and mysterious story, quirky and complex characters and gorgeous production values, sound design and cinematography, Severance stands head and shoulders above nearly all the competition. Only a few other shows come close, in my humblest opinion—and my humility knows no bounds—some on my Best Shows Of 2024 list, others like Andor’s second season coming soon. I now begin the long, arduous wait for Season 3.
Look for individual episodic recaps, some fan-theory posts and a final, spoiler-filled season 2 review when the season ends here on this blog in the coming weeks (subscribe!) and check the links below if you’d like to follow me and join in the fun. Severance Season 2 premieres on Apple TV Friday, January 17th at 12am PT with new episodes landing each Friday for a total of ten, one more than Season 1. There will be much for us to discuss and lots of fan-theories to bat around! I’ll be watching each episode at least twice, I can tell you that.
Are you a Severance fan? What are you hoping for in Season 2? Let me know on Twitter, Instagram, Bluesky or Facebook. Also be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel and follow me here on this blog. Sign up for my newsletter for more reviews and commentary on entertainment and cultu
