What happened to Innies prior to season 2
SPOILER ALERT: This story contains spoilers for Season 1 of “Severance,” streaming on Apple TV+.
A summary is available upon request.
“Severance” returns this Friday on Apple TV+, but it’s been almost three years since the first season of the sci-fi workplace thriller ended on a brutal cliffhanger.
So, before you head back to the office on January 17, here are some things to remember from season 1. If you need a refresher for just the final episode, skip to the end.
Innies and Outies
“Severance” follows Mark Scout (Adam Scott), a man who is outside the office mourning the loss of his wife Gemma – and who is completely unaware that he has a woman in the office. That’s because he works at the mysterious Lumon Industries and has undergone an experimental and controversial “fire procedure,” essentially splitting himself into two different people: his innie and his outie. When severed people enter the Lumon office, they have no memory of their lives outside of work. Likewise, outies know they work at Lumon, but they have no memory of their 9-5, including their coworkers. Outie Mark is depressed and spends most nights alone, in the dark. Innie Mark is a lot smarter and spends his days refining macro data (neither his innie nor his outie knows exactly what that means, other than sorting numbers into different boxes in a computer program). At the start of the series, Mark has been promoted to department head following the sudden departure of his colleague Petey. He teams up with Helly R. (Britt Lower), Irving B. (John Turturro), and Dylan G. (Zach Cherry) on the Severed Floor of Lumon, which is overseen by uncut managers Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette) and Seth Milchick (Tramell Tillman). Occasionally, the innies have therapeutic wellness sessions with Mrs. Casey (Dichen Lachman), who tells them facts about their outings.
Pete
One day after work, Outie Mark is approached by an unknown man named Petey (Yul Vazquez), who claims to have worked closely with him at Lumon. Petey reveals that he has undergone ‘reintegration’, an untested process intended to reverse the firing procedure, allowing him to merge his innie and outie and access both his work and personal memories. He tells Mark that Lumon is up to some shady things, and that a layoff is not what it seems. He gives Mark information he gathered in Lumon that opens his eyes to the company’s nefarious behavior. Petey is afraid he’s being watched, so for his own well-being, Mark takes Petey to his house to hide. He suffers serious side effects from the reintegration process, including debilitating headaches and hallucinations. He died of the disease halfway through the season.
Mrs. Cobel and Mrs. Selvig
Things start to get worrying when it’s revealed that Mrs. Cobel is also keeping an eye on Mark outside of work. Although Cobel is not divorced, she leads a double life outside of Lumon as Mrs. Selvig, Mark’s neighbor and his sister Devon’s (Jen Tullock) doula. After Petey dies, she sneaks into his funeral to secretly cut open his head and retrieve the discharge implant.
Helly’s struggle
The series starts on Helly’s first day at Lumon. Unlike her older colleagues Mark (who believes his work is meaningful), Irving (a scholar of Lumon’s rules and history), and Dylan (obsessed with acquiring corporate benefits), Helly wants out. In the first few episodes of the show, she continually tries to escape the office. She tries to send messages to her outing by writing words on her body, but they are intercepted by Lumon. She submits a formal resignation request, but her outie denies this. And she even tries to end her life by hanging herself in the elevator.
Another case for dismissal
Aside from being advertised to potential employees as a lifestyle choice (turn off your brain for half a day and never work!), the severance package is justified by Lumon claiming that its cut employees are handling highly classified information. It’s a way to ensure Lumon secrets stay within the confines of the office. But there are other uses for the dismissal procedure, as is the case with Gabby Arteta (Nora Dale), the wife of a pro-resignation senator, who used the dismissal technology to compartmentalize (and completely forget about) her pregnancy ).
Irving <3 Burt
Things get heated in the office when the Macrodata Refinement department crosses paths with another group of disengaged employees at Optics and Design. There are rules against fraternization with other departments, something Irving generally cares about. But instead he falls in love with Burt G. (Christopher Walken), who also appreciates the paintings that hang in the hallways of Lumon. The two strike up a strictly forbidden office romance, and suddenly Burt is “permanently retired” (i.e. his innie actually dies). This radicalizes Irving. Meanwhile, while working, he keeps having hallucinations of a black paint-like liquid dripping from the ceiling.
Explore Lumon
In the third episode, Mark discovers a floor plan of the office sketched by Petey, hidden behind a framed photo. As skepticism and curiosity increase among the young people, Mark and Helly set out to explore the long, white corridors of Lumon. They discover a room full of baby goats and a man in a lab coat who warns, “They’re not ready yet!” One of the other well-known places in Lumon is the Break Room, which breaks the minds and spirits of innies as they repeatedly read an apology script as punishment for misbehavior; Optics and Design, where Burt works; the administrative offices, where Mrs. Cobel and Mr. Milchick are stationed; and the Wellness Center, with Ms. Casey. There’s also the Perpetuity Wing, which serves as a Lumon museum of sorts. Separate from the Severed Floor is the Testing Floor, where it is implied that Lumon is conducting experiments on the innies and tinkering with their discharge chips. No character is seen entering the testing floor except Mrs. Casey.
The overtime contingency
Things take a sharp turn in episode 6, when Dylan’s innie suddenly wakes up at home, in his outer body. Innie Dylan had lost some sort of information card from the Optics and Design office, so Mr. Milchick came to his house after work to find out where he put it. This is possible thanks to the Overtime Contingency, an emergency process that allows innies to be awakened in the outside world. Innie Dylan’s world is turned upside down when a young child rushes into the room, hugs him and shouts, “Daddy!” shouts. Now that Innie Dylan knows he has a son at home, he can only concentrate on his work.
Reghabi and the underground resistance
Near the end of the season, Mark is led to Reghabi (Karen Aldridge), an ex-Lumon scientist who was integral to the creation of discharge technology but now leads an underground resistance against the company. She is the one who carried out the reintegration procedure with Petey. Mark meets Reghabi in the middle of the night in a dark building, where he is discovered by Doug Graner (Michael Cumpsty), head of security on the Severed Floor. To Mark’s horror, Reghabi kills Graner and gives Mark his full-access security card to take with him to the office. She promises him that his innie will know what to do with it.
Gemma = Mrs. Casey
One of the most stunning revelations of the series comes at the end of episode 7, when Mark is reinstating a photo of his deceased wife that he had previously torn up. As Outie Mark stares longingly at a photo of his wife Gemma, we recognize that same woman (who is said to have died in a car accident) as Lumon’s own Mrs. Casey. In the next episode, Mrs. Casey informs Innie Mark that she has been fired as welfare director. She is sent to the testing floor.
The Innie Rebellion
Armed with Graner’s security card, motivation from a self-help book discovered in the office, and a whole lot of anger, the Innies hatch a plot to activate the Overtime Contingency for themselves. The plan is for Dylan to stay behind and sneak into the security office so he can wake Mark, Helly and Irving in the outside world, where they can share the truth about Lumon. In the run-up to the great uprising, Helly and Mark share a kiss. Mrs. Cobel is fired due to her continued inability to control the innies. And Dylan is treated to the coveted “waffle party” perk, which involves a bizarre sexual performance in a replica of Lumon founder Kier Eagan’s home.
When the innies wake up in their outer bodies after Dylan initiates the Overtime Contingency, they find themselves in shocking situations. Mark is at a party at his sister’s house, where they read from the Innies’ favorite self-help book, written by her husband, Mark’s brother-in-law Ricken (Michael Chernus). He recognizes Mrs. Cobel at the party (although in this setting she is Mrs. Selvig).
Irving wakes up in his house, surrounded by dozens of black canvases all depicting the same scene – he has repeatedly painted the Test Floor hallway despite never consciously visiting it. In his house he finds a dog, military medals, and files containing information on former and current Lumon employees, including Burt’s home address.
Helly finds herself at the Eagan family gala, where she discovers her date is Helena Eagan, daughter of Lumon CEO Jame Eagan. She agreed to be separated as part of a PR campaign to portray the procedure as both safe and ethical.
Innie Mark tips Mrs. Cobel off about his identity by calling her Mrs. Cobel instead of Mrs. Selvig. Irving gets in the car and races to Burt’s house, only to discover that he is married to another man. Mark tells his sister Devon that he is currently in innie mode and that there are shady things going on at Lumon. She tells him about Gemma, the deceased woman from his outing. Helly is put on stage in front of the Lumon board and other gala attendees, where she reveals the truth about her family’s company: “We are prisoners!” And Mark finds a photo of him and Gemma, recognizing her as Mrs. Casey. He runs into the living room of his sister’s party and shouts, “She’s alive!” Immediately afterwards, Mr. Milchick breaks into the security office and tackles Dylan, shutting down the Overtime Contingency. The innies zap back to the outies. Season 1 goes black.
