Severance

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The problem with mystery box storytelling is you can't tell if the writing is really clever or really dumb.

I hope there's a logical reason why people keep going to extreme lengths to try to seduce Mark S, like they think his extra-long telemores are essential to the program or something.
 
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I watched through the show and am pretty mixed on it. There's some interesting stuff going on but its very sloppy, like every time there's a neat idea there's something dumb or contrived to drag it down. Milchick leaving the book, Irving's gay adventure and him driving, "You're not a person", and Mark trying to talk to his sister for 30 minutes were the things that just stood out to me as really sloppy or the writers wanting to hit the audience over the head. In the shows favor though some of the staff really know how to approach the ideas of the mechanics of the world like Helly trying to quit, corporate religion, people getting messages in or out of the office, showing that they are just in office work purgatory where in their perception they step in and right out of the elevator, Dylan trying to get a job and stuff like that work really well. It really seems like an even split of competent and incompetent people behind it.
 
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I like the series so far, minus the gay part. But the way Milchick pronounced "Gråkappan" In the latest episode made me MATI.
 
A relative twisted my arm and had me come over to his house, covered in Obama posters, with an Obama 08 campaign coffee table book, and put on an episode of this show. I had to see it he said. The whole experience was hell.

Is this show worth giving a second attempt?
 
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I was hoping I would have something to say about the last episode so that I could have a reason to include this image, but it was a pretty nothing episode. One good scene (the final one). They put the payoff for "Hang in there" way too quickly, not even letting a full episode pass. Not really loving that Milchick might have a whole plot line about race relations within the company. If the Asian girl has no purpose and is some sort of red herring or they just wrote the character in because it was funny to have an Asian child I'm going to be annoyed.
hog cranking frog said:
Is this show worth giving a second attempt?
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Depends which part of it was hell for you. If I'm honest, I think this show is pretty overrated. There really isn't as much good TV as there was 15 years ago so it's still better than nothing. I'm convinced the writing is weak and they're sort of just making things up as they go along. I certainly wouldn't watch it with your weird relative who has a bunch of stuff in their house idolizing a former US president, but I like to avoid mentally ill people when I can.
 
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hog cranking frog said:
A relative twisted my arm and had me come over to his house, covered in Obama posters, with an Obama 08 campaign coffee table book, and put on an episode of this show. I had to see it he said. The whole experience was hell.

Is this show worth giving a second attempt?
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Did he put on a random season 1 episode? If so then yes the experience would be hell.
 
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It's pure kino. WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT BITCH HELENA UP TO.
 
It seems like Outie Burt is working with Lumon in order to discover what's up with Irving, and who he is working for. It seems like an interesting side-plot.
For some reason I expected a joke about homos not going to heaven during the dinner conversation, but I don't know what was I expecting for a modern day show.

Brutality said:
Wants mark to refine her macrodata some more :smug:
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It really feels like she is just thirsty after being tied down by her father for so long. And I actually hope that's the reason for her attitude, any sort of "master manipulator" shit would probably just come out as cringe.
 
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Hellen is intrigued that Helly is a freer version of herself. She would never act so impulsively. She is also a prisoner. So going down to pretend to be Helly allowed her to be more free. She could openly mock the story of the Egan masturbating on the forest. Sleeping with Mark was a way of trying to feel something genuine because she knows Mark's love for Helly is real. It's trying to feel that.

There's also the underlying suggestion of what might break through the Severance barrier and one of them being love. So does Hellen feel some of what Helly feels for Mark?

This is being further explored with the Dylan, he's outies wife and with Burt and Irving. Which of course I do think there's more going on with Burt. The 20 years slip of course was deliberate. As well as how nicely appointed the interior of their house was compared to the exterior.
 
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Terror Sandwich said:
It seems like Outie Burt is working with Lumon in order to discover what's up with Irving, and who he is working for. It seems like an interesting side-plot.
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I've gotten really hung up on why Radar isn't there/barking. I've rationalized them having all the keys as, they made copies of the severed employee's keys when they put them in the lockers.
 
PositiveMonk said:
I'm convinced the writing is weak and they're sort of just making things up as they go along
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I'm being more critical of things as it goes on and it does not seem like they know all the answers to things they have set up. The Kier religion stuff is the most interesting to me. Is this supposed to be a normal religion in their world (like Christianity, Islam etc.) or is it like Mormonism where it is a new world religion made into a cult? I don' think we will ever get a full view of the religion and it's place in the world, it's gonna be the setting like it being in the North East. I'm most interested in outie Irving, because he knows something about Lumon employees and has done some research into them. I think they are sidelining him with gay shit, so we forgot he was on some sort of mission on his own. He also has memory of the elevator that he draws. All in all I think the show is fine, Season 1 was so good because it was new and not much else was like it. Now I think they are gonna bleed this show as long as they can now that it's successful without having an end game in mind.
Fuckyoudad said:
The show needs Cobel back. Milchik is great too but sometimes you don't realize what you've got until it's gone. Last week's episode was easily the worst so far to me after the Lumon Retreat got so wild but this week's has it back on track. Best show I've seen in a long time.. please don't fuck it up.
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Yeah I agree, without Cobel, things just seem like things are spinning in place. She was a good force in season one to push the workers towards certain things. Milchik sees like the stand in for the office politics that go on with promotions.

Devs was another show with a mystery box concept, but you find out what it is at the end. One season show, not at all on par with the writing or style of severance, but you see from the beginning the writers knew what they were gonna end on. 6/10 show if you don't have much else to watch.
 
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The last episode with the faggot talking about he wishes he got cucked because innies deserve love and he hopes the buttsex his boyfriend had with a stranger was beautiful is really pushing the limits of my patience.

Season one was intresting at setting up its mystery box but season 2 has been completely aimless.

Every episode feels likes its perpetually edging you by pretending something will happen only for nothing to actually happen.
 
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Val Bach the Cobbler said:
The Kier religion stuff is the most interesting to me.
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From outside the story it's pretty obviously (to me anyway, it's weird this doesn't seem to come up much in discussion) a parody of Scientology and their reverence for LRH. A lot of stuff about how Lumon works seems really familiar if you have any knowledge of Scientology operations, particularly the Break Room with the Compunction Statement ritual representing the Sec Check Audit, but also more subtle stuff such as treating trivia like paperclip orientation and unauthorized postcard possession as major mission critical issues, because in this org all office regulations are the equivalent of Holy Writ and must be obeyed as such. Ms Huang resembles the Sea Org's use of underage Messengers to boss around the adult staff (that's how David Miscaviage got started BTW). Idk if Adam Scott as made-for-TV knockoff brand Tom Cruise is meant to be part of this or not.

But in the show I think it's something that non-employees don't really think about. I think Lumon is a Big Deal in the mind of the general public, kind of like a more established industrial age version of Google or Tesla in that it's a "celebrity company" that everyone loves or loves to hate and they have a lot of power and influence, but I don't think you'd be going to church to sing about Kier if you weren't already part of the Lumon Family. They probably downplay that stuff in front of the normies.

I don't think for example that Cobel just happened to go to a "Kierist" boarding school that anyone could attend, and then decide to join the company after graduation while a bunch of her peers went off and did other things. Her parents would have been important people in Lumon who got her an exclusive place specifically knowing it would put her on track to a good life serving Kier as an important member of his extended Family.

I think it's just meant to be a way of showing how employees are expected to devote themselves wholly to Lumon ethos and cause, in a way the general public doesn't really understand. In the context I can even see why the severance process would seem like a good thing to these people - you get to have this cool important job Clearing the Planet and you can spend 16 hours a day not having to kiss Lumon's ass and call it mana from heaven. Milchick possibly envies his severed staff because they "don't need to live with the knowledge" of what they've done to secure their roles in this company.
 
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Fuck me what an absolute borefest this show has become. I had a bad feeling from quite early on in its run that they no had idea where they're going with it and that' s proven to be the case. I legitimately don't have any idea what any of the characters' motivations are or why you're supposed to care anymore. They just set things up for there to be no pay off and go off on crazy tangent episodes like this latest one. Patricia Arquette's character has barely featured this season and suddenly she gets an entire episode dedicated to her and you're supposed to care about any of the stuff she's doing? I guess I'll keep watching til the end since there's just two episodes left but I'd be amazed if they somehow rescued it from here.
 
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MilkThePig said:
Fuck me what an absolute borefest this show has become. I had a bad feeling from quite early on in its run that they no had idea where they're going with it and that' s proven to be the case. I legitimately don't have any idea what any of the characters' motivations are or why you're supposed to care anymore. They just set things up for there to be no pay off and go off on crazy tangent episodes like this latest one. Patricia Arquette's character has barely featured this season and suddenly she gets an entire episode dedicated to her and you're supposed to care about any of the stuff she's doing? I guess I'll keep watching til the end since there's just two episodes left but I'd be amazed if they somehow rescued it from here.
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Ya, I feel like this could have gone better with parts of it cut in between the season instead of just one episode. I was pretty disappointed. It's iffy but I am still enjoying the season I just really not a fan of how they decided to cut it up.
 
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