Severance S2E2 "Goodbye, Mrs. Selvig"

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[00:01:21] My third question concerns your late wife, Gemma. What about her? In your intake interview, you cited her death as a primary motivator for severing. Do you remember what you said? No. You said since she died, every day feels like a year.

[00:01:53] That you felt like you were choking on her ghost. Do you still feel that way, Mr. Scout? The Mark I've come to know at Lumen is happy. He cares for people. And he's funny. He knows nothing of the pain I see in you right now.

[00:02:22] He's found love. Love? With who? The solace you have given him down there will make its way to you. It just takes time. I hope you'll give us that time, Mr. Scout. Hey everybody, welcome to our podcast.

[00:02:52] I'm Jason. And I'm Kara. And this be Wax Episodic. This episode, we're covering Severance Season 2, Episode 2, Goodbye Mrs. Selvig. Yeah, Mrs. Selvig, I don't think was in this one, right? Because Cobell dropped the act. She's long gone. She's like, you're an idiot, Mark. The kindly sort of dotty lactation specialist slash. Lactation fraud.

[00:03:24] She's gone. And saucy Ms. Cobell is the only one who remains. And scary. Yeah, the weirdly named harmony. There's a lot of disharmony there. Okay. Severance Season 2, Episode 2, Goodbye Mrs. Selvig. Blot summary says, following the overtime contingency, Milchick is tasked with damage control and fires both Irving and Dylan. Irving lies to Milchick about his whereabouts that night. Yeah.

[00:03:51] Helena, accompanied by Security Chief Mr. Drummond, meets with Cobell and offers her a promotion as a reward for her loyalty. But Cobell is insulted at not being offered her old job back. Helena films an apology video passing off her outburst at the gala as a result of intoxication. And non-lumen prescription drugs. Milchick attempts to convince Mark to return to work, but Mark decides to quit, much to the dismay of Devin, who's concerned that Gemma is alive.

[00:04:21] Dylan attempts to find a new job, but is discriminated against for being severed. For having been severed. Helena insists that Mark must return to work to finish his latest file, Cold Harbor. Milchick convinces him to return by offering him a hefty pay raise and promises that the happiness as any received will trickle back to him. Trickle down. Yeah. Happiness. Right.

[00:04:43] After hearing Mark's plea to the board, Milchick rehires Dylan and Irving while the board decides to send Helena back to work. Mark runs into Cobell while returning home and demands answers about Gemma, but she angrily drives off. Yeah, I'll say. She practically hits Mark. That part scared me. She just goes, ah! Rah! So what did you think?

[00:05:06] I predict you didn't like this one as much because I think the Audi world, which this was only Audi world, is drab and depressing and closer to real life can be. And the any world is more of an escape and it's more fun and funny. Yeah, that is almost exactly true. I liked it. Yes. Not as much as last week's episode. It's still funny in parts. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It's still great. Yeah, absolutely.

[00:05:34] It was an interesting companion piece. Yeah. And I looked to see if... I couldn't remember because honestly, it's been a year now. Did they drop episodes one and two at the same time? Because sometimes they do that. But they didn't. They didn't. I think it says that it was dropped a week apart. So, yeah.

[00:05:58] If I was doing the rewatch without actually podcasting about it, I would definitely have gone from episode one and straight into episode two so that I could get a better... Like, I think as a package, both episodes were great together. But yeah, I did miss the innies this episode. Sure. This one didn't really end on a cliffhanger making you immediately want to watch the next one. I mean, I love the show. I would watch it. But just...

[00:06:27] They don't always, I guess. I don't know. It kind of did because a look on Cobell's face when he says, what do you know about Gemma? Gemma. Yeah. And the look on her face and the beats and he's like, oh, shit. And then she's like, ah! Crackily kills him. That's kind of a cliffhanger. I guess so. A little bit? Yeah. I guess so. Kind of. Not as much as some of the other ones.

[00:06:51] Like when Helly said, the innies are being tortured at the end of the season finale. That's a pretty good cliffhanger. Well, shall we get into our points? Wait, I forgot to say what I thought. I like that we saw... Yeah. I thought it was fun to have an all-innie episode, then an all-outie episode. And I think it was good. Okay. Let's get into our points.

[00:07:22] How about I'll go first? Yes, please. Because I feel like I have more. Mark is special as my number one. He is. Yeah. Because it was interesting that they fired Dylan and Irving, but kept trying to convince him to come back and seemed to think they really needed him to finish this. You said it last week. Cold Harbor is the file that they're working on now. Yep. So why? We don't really know, right? We don't know why Irving isn't key and Dylan's not key, but Mark is key. Not yet.

[00:07:52] But I wonder if it's the same reason why Cobell has been spying on him. That everybody knows there's something about Mark, his ability to... I mean, he doesn't... It seems like Dylan is better at getting through the files faster than Mark unless I've missed something. So I feel like there's something we still don't know about why Mark is so crucial to all this.

[00:08:19] Well, I think that they keep implying that it has something to do with Gemma. Oh, really? Mm-hmm. How so? And I say that because when last episode, episode one, at the end, he's digging into the numbers and you see Gemma appear on the screen.

[00:09:09] Mm-hmm. Maybe you're right. Maybe there's something about the emotional, this hole that's in him that drives him somehow to interact with the numbers in a way. I mean, it's all so abstract and we don't even know what the hell we're talking about. I heard Ben Stiller on Conan O'Brien's podcast. I don't know when he was on. I think it might've been a while back, but anyway, I was watching it the other day and

[00:09:37] he, you know, when I first watched Severance, I thought it was sort of a commentary on work-life balance. But then when I started getting into it, I thought it was way more about just corporate malfeasance and how they treat us like tools and stuff. Yeah. But he, he was saying for him, it's a lot about just how they're, they're all going through the motions of doing this job. And some of them like Irving are really proud of it, but they don't really know what they're doing.

[00:10:05] And he said, you know, it's kind of like that for all of us, really. We don't know why we're here. We're just doing our best to try to make some meaning out of our lives, but we don't really know what it's all for. And I thought, oh yeah, that's true. You're right. That is a big old meadow way to look at life. Right. Yeah. I guess that's true. We don't really know why we're here. Some people think they know. They're wrong. No, I'm just kidding. They might be right. I'm just kidding. They might be right.

[00:10:31] Anybody, anybody on the earth who thinks they know what life is like, or life is about, you might be right. I mean, we know the answer, 42, but we just don't know the question. So anyways, more around Mark being special. Like in the episode when we saw Milchick, Helena and Drummond, this security officer slash enforcer guy in a conference room. And Milchick's telling him about the replacement workers that he got to come into MDR.

[00:11:01] And he said he had only 48 hours to pull it all together. So that now we know that he's a liar. Well, we knew that already, but he told any Mark five months had passed. I just want to keep reminding everyone whenever Milchick shows up what a liar he is. He is a stone cold liar. And, and then he said, hopefully they'll have some chemistry. And Helena said, we don't need chemistry. We need Mark S back to work long enough to complete cold Harbor.

[00:11:28] And then, um, later we see Milchick Drummond and Helena listening to when Mark yelled at the board through that speaker, which at first I thought, oh, were they listening live? But I don't think so. I think they were just listening to a recording. But, um, the point of showing that was just so to show that they know he really wants to see his friends again. And we know they want to keep him working on cold Harbor. So that's why Drummond says the board's going to give him what he wants. So he'll finish.

[00:11:53] So that's why they brought, we know that finishing cold Harbor is important to them, that Mark seems to be key in doing that, that they fired the others. So they, they're not key apparently, but now we know that they hired them back just to keep Mark happy. So he would keep working on it. Right. Right. I think he was, he was prepared to sort of do a, uh, lockout, um, and, and try to escape if they didn't bring his team back.

[00:12:22] He's in love with, with, uh, Hellie. He's in love with Hellie and he, and he, and he, and he, I mean, he wanted them back. Yeah. I think so. I think he, he loves, he loves Hellie and he loves in a friendship way. I know. And, and he also loves Dylan and Irving. They're his team. Yeah.

[00:12:46] And he's bonded with, they're the, honestly, they're the only people he has worked with ever. Yeah. Any Mark. Except for Cobell and Milchick who are assholes. So. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. They're his team. So he wants his team back, his family. It was funny. Yeah. I, I always, uh, I often talk about how when we're covering a show for a while and new people

[00:13:14] come on and a lot of the listeners are all, I don't care about them. Like, uh, we're one walking dead, you know, some, uh, five seasons in suddenly you get like Aaron or something. Oh, I wouldn't care about these new guys. And I'm like, it's similar to when I went to college and everybody was looking for their group. So everybody was really open to making friends and then you've got your clique. And then after that, you're not so open anymore.

[00:13:43] And, um, so that's kind of how it felt with these new people. When Mark comes in and go like, who are these people? I don't give a shit about you, even though they're perfectly fine. I don't want to get to know them. I mean, even though it's, it's, uh, some of the most amazing, uh, actors around, I'm like, okay, fine, fine. It was fun to see Mark W outside Lumen for a minute in this episode complaining that he relocated.

[00:14:12] I'd be mad too. Hell yeah. Yeah. Thanks Lumen. Fuck you Lumen. All right. He probably would like that band that Mark went to see. Exactly. And, oh, also, and, uh, Audi, uh, sorry, any Mark, um, wants his team back because now he knows that Gemma is, um, is Ms. Casey. Casey.

[00:14:40] He, yeah, he does. He doesn't really have a connection to her as Gemma, but he knows at least that. He knows that she's his wife. Is Audi's wife. Yeah. Yeah. That Devin did a good job explaining, we think, um, who she was to him and he loved her. She, she made him wonderful. And, um, yeah. So I think that's also part of why he wants his team back. He knows something big. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

[00:15:12] Well, what do you want to talk about next? Okay. So, um, let's talk more about, um, Milchick. Um, Milchick, uh, is, as you mentioned, it's really funny looking back on it. But when we first started to do this podcast, looking back on it, I was like, wow, Milchick is one of my favorite characters. He's so great. And honestly, I'm, I, he, the actor's amazing. He is. And, and Milchick is really fun. Anytime he's on the screen, he's fun.

[00:15:42] But he's fun kind of in a way because he's such a, like, a delightful sort of villain. He's a piece of shit. He, everything he does is to find out how to get people to do something that they shouldn't be doing and then leverage it with lies to get them to do it. And, and it really touches something in me because I, I'm always like noticing when people are charming, they get away with murder.

[00:16:10] And I think that's what he is because he's super charming. He's a great dancer. He's magnetic and I, I, he's a great actor and I never would want to take anything away from that. But when you just look at what he does, he so far hasn't done anything good. It's all bad. You know what I mean? That's what I think. Yeah. I mean. You're right. Yeah. Yeah. And, but she's not charming. No, that's true. She, yeah. Miss Selvig could be a little charming sometimes, but that's about it.

[00:16:38] Miss Selvig was, was more like the, the, um, terrible cookies and sort of, um, the kind Her jokes were kind of funny sometimes. They were, they were. Agreed. Anyway. Sorry. I didn't mean to get so intense about him, but I just. No, it's true. He's a stone cold. If you look at just what he does, there's nothing good that he does. And I think the worst thing he did this episode is, um, when he fired Dylan, he told him that

[00:17:04] the reason why is because his innie was an aggressor in a physical altercation at work. I would be mortified. I would be mortified to think that there's a version of me that would have like physically attacked somebody at, at my work and to not know why. And to think, oh my God, I got fired because I was, I physically attacked somebody. I would be mortified.

[00:17:29] Like that doing that to somebody like, um, uh, gaslighting them. That's, that's. Well, yeah. And not only that, what happened is Milchick attacked him. Yeah. That was the altercation. Right. It was a lie. It was a lie. Like doing that to Dylan and telling Dylan that, uh, making his Audi live with that information, which is a lie. That's bullshit, man. Yeah. And then, and while you're firing him and causing him not to be able to make a living anymore.

[00:17:58] That's definitely, that's like bad stuff, man. In the pro column, he does have very cool leather jacket and a motorcycle. True. And a great helmet. It's beautiful. And a great helmet. Yes, exactly. Um, he's also. Negan had a great smile too. Yeah. Negan did have a great smile. You're right. Um, and I think you mentioned it, uh, before we, we kind of now know that it has not been five months since the macro debt uprising.

[00:18:27] Um, so it's probably been less, much less time than that. Um, and now, so now we can be a little more impressed with Milchick's fake newspaper article because he only had a, like a day to put it together. You know, there's only so much copying and pasting that you can do in that short of time. Um, and, uh, also we now know that probably the innies didn't make any waves at all.

[00:18:56] Um, their little macro debt uprising didn't probably reach anybody. Um, you know, Heli did spin control. I'm sorry. Helena did spin control quickly and got the video out. Um, uh, the whole, like those sad little concessions to the innies that, um, Melchick, um, uh, dangled

[00:19:20] in front of Mark, you know, the treats you can leave, uh, the first day you can leave before five o'clock and then I'll, you know, no harm, no foul. Um, we're not going to surveil you. Although, you know, there's ways that's probably bullshit too. Um, just so he can complete cold Harbor. Um, it's, it's all very, um, yeah, it's all very gross.

[00:19:44] So, um, although I love him and I love his, um, fruit baskets featuring pineapple. Um, I think that, uh, Melchick is just, he really is, um, and he's also, you know, telling Mark, which is true that his innie has fallen in love, which is true, but that solace that you've given him will make its way to you. I mean. Yeah. Just give it time. It's been two years, I think.

[00:20:14] Yeah, exactly. So yeah, he, he like, yeah, that's he, I said he's a liar and he is, but sometimes he'll tell half truths. Yeah. Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly. Anyway, it is true that his innie seems happier and Adam Scott plays that brilliantly, but it's also, it's not guaranteed that that happiness is going to, um, propagate out to Mark. And in fact, the way I would look at it is, okay, you've been doing it two years.

[00:20:43] You still look just as pained as the day that Gemma died seemingly. So it seems like this strategy is actually not working at all, you know? Right. Right. And he had a best friend, uh, Petey. Petey was his best friend and he loved Petey. They had a whole, uh, a lovely friendship going. And, uh, he was really sad when Petey left. And, and, uh, so yeah, I, I, yeah.

[00:21:13] Yes. He's in love with Ellie, but he also really loved Petey. So I don't, it's not all roses and sunshines and rainbows. No. Yeah, exactly. Well, you kind of touched on it, but my next point is damage control. Yeah. And I just want to try to fix all the problems that we've had with this podcast. No, I don't know. Good luck, pal. I apologize. Everyone.

[00:21:39] No, um, that this episode is all about damage control after the innies got outside and caused trouble. And it's Lumen trying to put the toothpaste back into that tube, which they pretty much successfully do. As you said, um, Helena says, Natalie's talking with the media and she wants Milchick to find out everything that innies said while they were out just to find out if they caused any damage.

[00:22:02] And so he questions Irving and Irving just said, I was watching a movie and I guess Milchick just took that at face value. So Irving lied and we still don't know what Irving did because. We saw him pounding on Bert's door and then we saw any Irving pounding on the elevator, but you got to think Bert answered that door. So I feel like that's a part of his story. That's important. I'll get back to that later. And I, yes, exactly.

[00:22:30] Cause I think we know now that he did answer that door because we see Bert at the end. That's right. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Um, then, um, he fires Dylan. He doesn't question Dylan cause he knows Dylan was inside the whole time. Um, he goes, uh, Helena goes right in to talk to Ms. Cobell who's, she sees as another problem to solve. She thanks her for acting quickly because she did.

[00:22:56] She, she, as soon as she found out what happened, she called up Milchick, told him to go stop Dylan, which he did. And so if not for her, the Ennis plan may have succeeded better. Um, and Helena apologizes on behalf of herself, her father and the board and offers Cobell a promotion to special envoy for the shield of the Americas. Oh no, that's Christine. No, I'm sorry. Sorry. Sorry. It's the head of the severance advisory council.

[00:23:26] Yeah. Another bullshit made up position. And, uh, so, um, then, but she knows that she's like, you don't value me. You fear me. And I'm like, okay, why do they fear her? Because she's got the smart idea. She's the one who knew that the severance ship was faulty. She, uh, she's watching over Mark. He apparently is important. So maybe it's good to have somebody walking, watching over him. Now she's saying, okay, what we need to do is talk to Dylan and find out he got into the security room.

[00:23:55] And Helena's like, oh no, no, no. We have this other thing where we're going to stick you over in a corner and try to control and contain you. And I guess it's because she acted independently of Lumen's chain of command and they're afraid they can't control her. And she, I think she thinks that she's a better Kier Egan acolyte than they are and knows better than them. Maybe.

[00:24:17] I don't know, but it might be better for them to actually contain her by trying to be, to use her talents and be on her team. Don't you think? I don't know. I do. I do. And, uh, yeah, I do. Yeah. Cause it seems like, I mean, it's better for drama that they're at odds. Cause she's clearly like, she says, uh, I'll think on it or what did she say? Uh, I'll put some thought to it. Right.

[00:24:46] And Britt Lauer was great by the way of seeming sincere in this offer. And she, I love Britt Lauer's take on, um, when, um, Ms. Cobell says, you're afraid of me. And, uh, Helena, um, says we fear no one. Yeah. Just matter of factly. And, and, uh, but they do fear her.

[00:25:10] And, um, so I guess she'll figure out some angle to work the situation to her advantage. I don't remember what happens, but that's what I think she would do. And then last, uh, just back to the whole damage control thing. So Helena records the statement saying she quote made the poor decision to consume alcohol while on a non-lumen medication for an arm rash. For an arm rash. Okay. Okay. Well, doesn't Lumen have a medication for an arm rash?

[00:25:37] Um, and then she says she was only joking. And my first thought was, would people really buy that Helena was drunk and joking when she screamed out, you know, the, the, the innies are being tortured. But, um, she also says they commandeered or took control of all the footage taken by the guests. Right. So that means that video didn't get out. So that is much easier to believe that the only way people outside would hear about it

[00:26:05] is someone talking that was there talking about it. And if you don't see a video, as we've learned in the real world lately, then they'll make up bullshit and people believe it, even if you do see a video. But I think if the video, if it would have been a live streamed event, then things would have gone differently. Right. They didn't see her get tackled. Yeah. And they did when you just don't see the clear, it wasn't a joke the way she was saying it. Right. It was clearly panicked, you know?

[00:26:36] Yeah. Yeah. Intense and all that. If you just hear about it, then you could probably believe her when she said, oh, I was just joking at this thing or whatever. So anyway, that's all the damage control I could see. And I think it worked, right? Yeah. It's a little bit, like I said, anticlimactic after the season finale last season because they're kind of right back where they started. But there's still the propulsion of wanting to know what's up with Gemma and just still

[00:27:06] wanting to know what's happening with the whole Cold Harbor and what the hell they're doing at Lumen and all that. And Karen and I were just talking before this podcast about mystery box storytelling, which kind of has a bad taste in my mouth. But I got to admit, I'm curious to know what the hell's going on. And so I'll keep watching. But if it wasn't entertaining without all that, then I wouldn't care. You know?

[00:27:30] And have some like cool insights into the real world, corporate culture. I think the writing very much, I always admire shows that are written in a way where I feel like the writers understand human nature. For example, in this episode when I won't get into it too much because I don't want to

[00:27:54] go into a whole other point, but Mark is yelling at his sister for just dwelling on the fact that Gemma might be alive, right? I don't just, you think you are closer to her than me? And then when he's confronted, when he confronts Cobalt at the end, he's all, does this have something to do with Gemma? I just think that's such human nature that sometimes you, he doesn't want to open that

[00:28:21] wound again, but it did stay in his mind. You know? I mean, it's just, I don't know if you get where I'm coming from with this, but people contradict themselves sometimes in a way that really makes sense. Yes. Yeah. Yes, exactly. And maybe what Devin said sort of planted a seed of doubt in his mind. So yeah, yeah.

[00:28:46] Or Dylan, like Dylan, he's, when he finds out he's fired, when he gets fired, he says, what am I supposed to tell my wife? And we know he has a wife and three kids, so he's probably feeling pressured to support the family. And then when he fails at his interview, which we'll also get bored too, and then he talks to his wife on the phone, he's kind of short with her, right?

[00:29:10] And so we know, we just, I just know that sometimes when I want to live up to someone else's expectations and I'm not, that can come out as being mad at them, which doesn't make any logical sense, but it's human nature. Actually, I never do that, but I've heard other people do that. Uh-huh. Sure. Sure, pal. Anyway, I'm going on, rambling on a lot of different things, but it's your turn.

[00:29:38] Well, one other point about spin control is that they, to keep Mark happy, this is continuing on with spin control, to keep Mark happy and to keep him working, they hire back Irving, Dylan, and Helly. They spin it, because they have to explain somehow why this act of supreme transgression

[00:30:08] against Lumen, in which they all participated, why they have to somehow explain to these four why they would take them back after having committed such a heinous crime. And the way that they spin it is internally, so it's internal spin control too, the way they spin it is, oh, it was the Macrodad uprising, you did, your bravery, your courage, you know,

[00:30:36] has resulted in some real changes around here. And the changes are, you know, in this crazy claymation stop animation video that we've been able to, that's one thing, they made that video in record time, so bravo. Yeah. They must have a specialist or something. Right, exactly, exactly.

[00:31:00] So, they had to spin it internally too, not just externally, but internally. They had to explain why they would agree to hire back the team, and the reason they tell them is because, oh, you know what, your Macrodad uprising really did us a service. It led to us realizing that we needed to enact these meaningful reforms.

[00:31:28] We looked in the mirror and we didn't like what we saw. So, we made some changes. Yeah, that is a good point. And it just shows they're so good at spin on all levels. They're just so duplicitous all the time. And it makes you wonder, the big decision makers, are they ever honest, fully honest with anyone, you know? Are they like that with each other too? Right. Right. Exactly, exactly, exactly.

[00:31:59] What else? Okay. I want to talk about the new introduction to the show. Did you notice the new intro? Yeah. It was pretty cool. It was kind of freaky at points. It was. It was much, I think it was creepier than the first introduction. Featuring multiple Mark shaped balloons floating around, which is great because I thought that was sort of an homage to the balloons with the Mark face on them from last episode.

[00:32:29] um uh outie mark is wearing red um uh and uh he's um also standing um they have some uh some things about um maybe where it's going later on in the in the season um jimma's face transforms into hellie's face um they're yeah they're the same person oh

[00:32:57] with this show i wouldn't be surprised if they could figure that out right exactly exactly um my very favorite thing though was the baby crawling by that looked like maybe it had kira's face on it kira's head on a baby's body crawling by and um there's a cobell watching uh her face is a big white blank which is super cool yeah it was it was neat it was just a great introduction wasn't

[00:33:22] there like the little chip container in a brain but mark was inside the chip right or yes right like crawls out of one of his own pores or something like that it's gross and then he crawls out of back of his own head at the end yeah exactly oh so yeah yeah it's so um interesting i've never seen a show opening like that anywhere else before it kind

[00:33:52] reminds me of uh bill plimpton do you remember yeah like animator uh-huh enemies tv on mtv yeah like people a lot of morphing and warping and yes psychedelic and yeah also psychedelic yeah so if any listeners if you spot anything you think is significant in the opening let us know

[00:34:15] yeah would love to get your insights pretty cool okay let's see damage control um i kind of had a long point about mark no i'll do one about helena okay so her father jame egan comes in i guess right after any heli publicly blew the whistle on lumen and severance and said fetid moppet

[00:34:47] do you know what that means i do know what fetid moppet means yeah fetid means like um gross or smelly uh moppet is like a child yeah it's like an egan archaic way of saying very child yeah and i wasn't sure i wasn't sure if if jame egan was referring to heli or helena

[00:35:14] like if he was just like oh i think it wasn't fair i think he was uh scolding her you think so yeah i think that's i mean maybe i'm wrong but my take was uh what bullshit that wasn't her fault but he's still uncompassionate with her that's what she's dealing with a father who if you're not fully on board with lumen all the time even if it's not your fault you're going to be scolded for it

[00:35:42] something like that yeah even if it's a any that you can't control yeah even if it's out of your control it's still your fault somehow and then um you know she uh films her pr apology and when the camera turns off her expression changed and my take was that she looked kind of guilty and so i mean we don't get a lot of her yet so i'm sort of reading into it a lot but just from that exchange

[00:36:11] with her father i think she feels a lot of pressure to paint lumen in a good light and be a good lumen employee but maybe she's feeling guilty about deceiving people maybe i don't remember if that's true but that's just what it seems like right now and then later she's watching the video of mark and her flirting and she any hell he kisses him and she's clearly having emotional reaction to it she watches it again and i thought my first reaction

[00:36:41] was that she was disturbed by it when i watched this you know three years ago whatever it was four years ago but no i think um just from what little we've seen i think her father is cold and uncompassionate and we don't see a partner or anything so i think she doesn't have love in her life and she's longing for intimacy and connection and she's surprised at how much emotion she's feeling when she sees this kiss

[00:37:07] yeah and maybe she sees that her that her any can connect with people more than her audi can yeah and maybe she's like maybe i should do that since that's me get me some of that that adam scott cutie so uh what else okay i want to talk about some funny moments because there were some funny moments in this episode awesome that i really enjoyed um

[00:37:37] with rick and yeah rick and is fabulous i love him so much he every time he's on the screen i just want it to be more and more and more he's so wonderful i love that he um suggests um kobelvig as the right nomenclature and then she uses it later when they're in the diner she goes so what about kobelvig have you heard from her

[00:38:05] so great so great um i think it was really funny that um he keeps insisting that patten saved the baby and devin's like found the baby and he's like well you know save the baby means it seems more accurate and devin's like found and i let mark doesn't argue even though he's the one that found it because he's not the kind of guy he doesn't care

[00:38:29] so funny it's hilarious i and another friend of rick and's um rebecca who i love i love that he walks her to the door and she says don't punish the baby i'm like what yeah it's not his fault such a weirdo but that's please listeners say that to someone holding a baby and then report back to us what happens don't punish the baby don't punish the baby

[00:38:59] um i loved um everything by the way that uh kobel does i love her um patricia arquette's delivery of lines it just it just delights me every single time and um as she's arguing with mark um when she's packing her bag and leaving and um and uh she says you're back

[00:39:24] and uh she said um you know asked about did they lure him back and she said she says to mark did it involve a pineapple so funny and then she said like you're so easily swayed and i'm like yeah you're you're an asshole because you you're criticizing him for being a trusting person and yet you've been

[00:39:53] manipulating him this whole time yes well she's like you're easy to manipulate yeah yeah but i don't know it's just like you know i i hate that because yeah mark is wonderful and you know he's made himself vulnerable by putting his trust in this woman and she not only betrayed him but then criticizes him for it whatever well she lets her harmony is uh she's way more harmony kobelle than she ever was mrs selvik

[00:40:23] yeah um although mrs selvik remember mrs selvik at one point in the at the party when he says i'm thinking about leaving lumen and she's like go run go go so yeah and i mean even here as kobelle when she's like oh did a pineapple convince you to go back i think there's a part of her that's that would admire him if he had chosen to stick with it and leave you know even though she's trying

[00:40:49] to get him back now she's like have a spine man yeah yeah don't be taken in by this company i mean it's it is interesting that's complex that makes her more complex that she is sort of i think suggesting you know if you you were smart you would leave but yet she's still trying to get him to stay

[00:41:10] i guess i guess yeah well who knows if she's trying to get him to stay yeah yeah she's she's taking off points unknown um and this isn't funny it was just made me um happy because he's been in so many things that i love um the uh actor who plays mr drummond the security guard for helena and uh he is

[00:41:36] uh icelandic and he was in the secret life of walter middy he was in somebody somewhere which i loved i highly recommend everybody watch that he was also in eurovision song contest the story of fire saga yeah yeah ding dong you'll anyone who's seen it you'll remember um and his name is oh my god secret life of walter middy fabulous somebody somewhere a great series you really need to watch it

[00:42:03] and eurovision song contest the story of fire saga is so funny and he's in all three of those and they're great and he's wonderful his name is olaf olaf olaf darry olafson sorry if i'm if i'm screwing that up but fun little um fun little point is that he they did a close-up of his hand and on his um hand he had a tattoo that said frolic

[00:42:32] god knows what that means don't know it's one of the four tempers that he has the most trouble with maybe indeed um well i thought you were gonna mention when rickon said to mark you know i think that your worky was excited i have to say mark he really is a jewel because he kept complimenting him right and then he goes um then devin keeps bringing up you know i'm i'm not so sure that

[00:42:58] mark was talking about the baby and rickon goes when when he said she's alive and rickon said let's deal with what we know to be true all right mark's worky went to great lengths to awaken himself to alert us to abuses he was inspired by my book he found great meaning in it profundity he was just gonna keep going on about that part of it and not move on to anything else you know in the doorbell rang you're right he is so great

[00:43:28] okay let's talk about mark okay his story i think is all about the impact of his any saying she's alive um because right when we first see him yeah he's back outie mark at rickon's book reading looking at a picture of him and jemma smiling together on their wedding day right they'd like it and it's just interesting to see them close like that it's odd to me because we met them as two

[00:43:57] characters two different people really who don't yeah barely even know each other and then to see them as long time loving partners it's it's just such a weird thing to see yeah and sad kind of that they had that and it's gone now uh at least for now um then um rickon's like we can reschedule the reading to next month it's fine i just have to decide if i'm going to restart with chapter one very

[00:44:25] fixated on that but um then milchick arrives and we i thought he was going to fire mark because we are he i think we saw him fire irving and dylan by this point and but then he asks um you know what well he asked devin what any mark said to her yeah if i tell you you're gonna punish him for it milchick we have no punishments at lumen right bullshit and then but i'm glad devin

[00:44:52] devin's like me she's like doesn't buy any of his bullshit and calls him out on cobell committing what she calls lactation fraud and um and then um milchick tells uh mark that cobell's behavior is the source of mark any mark's distress which is another half truth there's so much more to it than

[00:45:16] just her but he wants to be able to milchick wants to be able to blame it all on this one person that we've taken care of it's solved don't worry about it and then i noticed that mark you know milchick one of the things that he wanted to do is find out what the any said and mark declined to tell him that he screamed she's alive that was good yeah that's right i don't think he trusts yeah mark was

[00:45:41] mark was very closed about it he didn't say much about it maybe took a cue from his sister um then devin wants to meet him at the diner at the same diner by the way where mark met peaty in season one pip's bar and grill yes then um she's she asks about cobel vigg and cobel vigg and um he's like i didn't want to hear it at all starts being kind of a dick right you think you're

[00:46:11] closer to yeah he's very he lashed out yeah very prickly and um you know i felt a little judgmental of that but also or just trying to figure it out i think it's just too painful for him to reopen that wound you know and he's right like yeah it was a bigger deal to him and that's why he doesn't want to go there yeah yeah and then um milchick brings fruit to his house and offers him 20 raise and says

[00:46:40] he'll investigate his indies claims what claims i don't even know what he's talking about there does any have claims i mean uh the claims that maybe he's inferring from what heli was able to get say oh okay well but that was a joke that was supposed to be a joke yeah see if i was mark and milchick said we'll investigate your indies claims i'd be like what claims but maybe we're

[00:47:08] forgetting something we could be um anyways then um he says he knows mark went to lumen hoping it would help him forget the pain of losing his wife we already talked about that but yeah who knows right i mean that's bullshit it doesn't work then um so i'm just talking about all the mark stuff so throughout the episode i liked that mark kept wanting to confront cobell he's looking over there and knocking on her door but she wasn't home and then finally he finds her at the door and i was kind of

[00:47:36] surprised she was there at all i figured she'd just be out of there you know yep she has to pack up her shrine right she threw shit everywhere um that but i like the way he handled it just the way anyone would you know like what the hell you were in my house he screamed what the fuck is this all about yeah i ate your shitty fucking cookies which i was very glad that he said that part and leapt in

[00:48:05] front of her moving car and yeah just the fact that he said um why did you do this what the fuck is this all about is exactly what we're saying so i like that yes and then he said do you know something about jemma and that um got her she you could tell by the look on her face that she does know all about it but right she's one of those people who's can be so very much of the wrong and yet

[00:48:35] somehow lash out at the victim that they're victims which she did and then he goes back to lumen and do you think like he went back to lumen because of anything that miltric said the rays i think i don't i think he goes back to lumen because i think it's just been confirmed to him that that he was

[00:49:00] referring to she's alive to jemma yeah i think that that's enough for him to figure out that it's clearly referring to jemma or even if there's a chance that it's referring to jemma he has to he has to go back yeah i think that's why i think so too i mean if there's any other possible reason i i think maybe what miltric said about how his annie's happy and maybe that could rub off on him but

[00:49:28] if i had to bet or guess i would say no it's what you just said that he thinks maybe it could lead him to answers with jemma yep yep yeah and it's a big maybe in his mind i'm sure he doesn't necessarily think she's actually alive but what if you know yeah yeah okay what else anything else okay for so i just have a couple more things that are just notes um the look of the show was really interesting uh the

[00:49:54] way that it most of it was lit uh it was lit from um the front with a kind of a black background and so that sort of had a floating head thing it was very very very dark so that it you were just seeing the actors um in the frame and uh nothing in the background the whole time almost the entire

[00:50:19] time wow no almost the whole time not the whole time but but close to it yeah yeah um because um yeah it was really really cool and there was another shot where um melchick was driving the motorcycle and you could and the it was sort of a drone shot where you were looking down on his lit motorcycle going across the landscape and it was going diagonally across the screen it was really

[00:50:46] really cool it was a really neat shot i liked how this whole um episode was yeah or when um helena's marching to talk to cobell yeah and you just see it right outside the building the window yeah and she's yeah she's sort of going across the office spaces i mean right this show has so much attention to the look of it which we've talked about a lot and you know that that takes a lot of time and artistic

[00:51:15] talent and everything yeah and it comes across just so beautifully and if they did that in a show where the writing was shitty it would not help at all but what makes it so wonderful with this show is the writing matches the level of quality of the visuals so it just works together beautifully you know like mad men that was like right i thought yes exactly exactly exactly another thing um is uh that was

[00:51:45] sort of fun um was the um the door factory scene with dylan um when he went on his interview at the door factory and um what sort of fun fact is that dan erickson came was working at a door factory where he came up with the idea of severance maybe this guy was based on his boss yeah exactly i love that

[00:52:06] he kind of looked like dylan um when you saw them they sort of match yeah yeah with a beard um and it was sad um that dylan got discriminated against because he's a severed employee that makes me yeah and it's just another thing that another bad thing that severed brought into these people's lives is that they're now looked down on for it yeah right exactly exactly um and also um

[00:52:36] the interviewer said that um this was really funny i forgot to mention this uh mentioned lumen makes their their doors in house fucking hubris i know it's so hilarious it's so funny to me how um people of every profession feel not everyone in every profession but every profession has people that feel pride in their work and the way they do things and then when they see other people's work

[00:53:05] they might judge it this isn't exactly related to what you just said but it's along the same lines you know like saying oh they do their own doors what pride or what fucking hubris but like i know when we've had handyman men here at the house they look at oh who did that who put that in because they should have done it this way yeah right exactly i know as a tech writer at apple i'd see i'd get inherit somebody else's manual and have to um add to it and i'd be like reworking it like god what are you

[00:53:35] what are you putting this here for why are you putting it that way it's every profession has that though every profession yeah it's so true oh and that last uh little note that i had was um uh i don't know if you noticed when irving goes to the payphone to call whoever he's calling um at a payphone which hardly exists anymore but it's

[00:54:00] severance which is an out of time so right exactly exactly it does not exist in time um he says uh my innie got the message yeah well let me go i have two points one on dylan and one so let's talk about dylan first um we've actually talked about most of what i had here but um i i liked that when he was going to his interview at the door company he was nervous and jazz artist moe's

[00:54:29] allison's young man's blues was playing well a young man ain't nothing in this world these days in the background yeah it was great and uh he i loved how the progression of the interview went because it looked like he was doing well and then he made that door prize joke and that did not land well and i'm like oh i've been there for sure and but then he was asked uh what finish on a door

[00:54:55] uh matt or semi-gloss or eggshell or some or eggshell or matt he came up with semi-gloss and the guy's oh that's great and he said he likes pocket doors which i had to look up do you know what that is yeah i have pocket doors in this house you know more about that stuff than me but it's a sliding door that disappears into the wall for people who don't know but i i was thinking why would a door prize joke be bad i think it's because a door prize is when you win something just for showing up so it

[00:55:21] maybe suggests that doors aren't special or something like that i don't know oh that's why he took offense and then he said he's just not a pun guy he found out he was severed yeah it could be he goes we need a certain kind of person here not a certain kind of two people what do you think this is a carpet factory that was good it was good so then um irving so irving lied and said he was watching barbara

[00:55:50] seville and instead of that he went to bert's and then milch fired him and then he called someone from the pay phone and someone drove up and i thought it was drummond i think they wanted us to think that spying on him but it was actually bert and um he said okay you're not picking up i get it i want you to know my innie got the message so who do you think that was and what was he talking about

[00:56:16] any idea no no idea i thought it could be one of two things what we know he's investigating lumen because we saw he'd made all those notes on people so maybe this is someone he's collaborating with and he's saying these paintings that i made are getting through or my innie woke up and saw the paintings in my place so now he knows or something like that i don't know yeah but it also feels like

[00:56:42] maybe he's calling bert and maybe my innie got the message would mean maybe he knows you're married and unavailable or something like that i don't know though it's that's why i say i think we need to um hopefully we'll flash back and see what happened when he was at bert's house and that'll clue us in i think we're gonna since we saw bert yeah

[00:57:05] bert and irving i love bert and ernie do you yeah they're great yeah what's not to like don't yeah exactly who's your favorite one ernie obviously right you know what yes of course because bert's kind of a curmudgeon and ernie's all sunshine but you know what um uh when uh

[00:57:32] when bert does a little dance we're talking sesame street folks not severance when bert does a little dance and sings a song called doing the pigeon look it up kids uh my heart my heart melted that's so funny i don't know that one well look it up all right link in the show notes if i remember put it in

[00:57:54] there okay time for some news i don't know if you know this but adam scott is starring in a new

[00:58:46] horror movie that's coming out right now i do know that of course i know that it's called hokum i'm not weird but yes i do know that i don't know every single thing he's doing at all times um it says the premise is an author travels to a remote part of ireland to spread the ashes of his disease deceased parents unaware that his rented accommodation could be haunted the premiered at south by southwest

[00:59:12] earliest year so there's been reviews it says an 80 on rotten tomatoes the review consensus says a classic haunted house story enriched with atmospheric folklore and perfectly timed shocks hokum further solidifies writer director damian mccarthy as a modern master of horror and i guess this guy mccarthy has directed some recent other horror movies caveat and oddity that are also well reviewed so hopefully it's good yeah and it's got santa cruz's own adam scott that's good enough right

[00:59:42] there um second we talked about liminal spaces last time and then i took nico and bodhi to see this japanese psychological horror movie exit eight which is one of the ones i mentioned it's it's a man trapped in an endless looping subway corridor it's based on a game they played so they wanted to see it um and it was pretty good and uh one thing that made it really special for us that i didn't realize

[01:00:10] when we were going to see it is we just spent a couple of weeks in japan and we were really familiar with the endlessly looping corridors of the tokyo subway stations it's like a city down there and so then we saw this movie and it had all all the same like you know the floor looked the same and the signage and everything so it's really fun to kind of revisit it wow it was good huh yeah i think if you're into

[01:00:37] that whole kind of a thing um the premise is he goes down into the subway uh and then he's walking and you know it's really crowded and he's walking down the hall and then he doesn't realize it but the crowd just kind of uh goes down and down and down until it's just him and then he turns a corner and turns another corner and he's back where he started and so he can't get out and then he finds out that

[01:01:03] if he sees uh anything different then he's supposed to turn around and go the other way that's how you play the game too and then all these weird creepy things start showing up and there's a man that keeps walking through the same man and so it's kind of creepy and weird you know oh it sounds great yeah it's pretty good and then uh next month comes back room so that's another one that's sort of like this may

[01:01:26] 29th yep and last so this is more news about other shows we cover um apparently alien earth is still one of the top 10 hulu streaming series it's been months since it aired so that's pretty cool and um noah holly the writer uh showrunner of that had an interview with deadline that had some interesting things it said that season two is going into production this summer at london's

[01:01:51] pinewood studios big famous studio i think they did like empire back there and and noah holly said we're getting close i did a stage walk today past the props and costumes things are being built it's always exciting to see it we had a great experience in thailand which is where season one was filmed but for a couple of reasons london is a better home for us long term so he's hoping that they can stay there for the rest of the series um as for further seasons he said it's my hope i have a place that i'm going but i don't know how long it will take me to get there assuming that the price

[01:02:21] of execution and the audience stays commensurate we could go for as long as we want if we nurture them these franchises can give back for a very long time he said the second season quote certainly expands on the premise of the first it's a bigger show more world building and i can't think of a better place for taking on that bigger challenge um he about peter dinklage's role in season two he said obviously this franchise has a lot of iconic roles in it i am i am for better or worse

[01:02:48] an ensemble writer who's never met a character i didn't like but he's got a major role and people are going to feel it's a worthy role for him and um he's also working on a show about the game far cry which i've never played so i don't really know but of course he's also the showrunner of fargo which is fantastic and they asked him when that show will return and he said those are conversations that are still ongoing where it could fit i hope to have an announcement about it soon it's great to

[01:03:17] see the enthusiasm is still there it is for me i love that show what the last season was the one that had um ted lasso yes woman yeah i forget her name yes yeah that was one of the best ones it was so good that stuck with me i want to watch that again yeah it was so good they're all good i think i they're all different stories each season is a different story with different actors

[01:03:44] but i've really enjoyed them all some more than others i just read a noah holly novel called before the fall and i have to recommend that too so if anyone wants something great to read he's just a wonderful writer so he's amazing i don't know how he has the time for all this stuff but i'm glad he does yeah me too me too all right let's get into listener feedback you want to go first okay yeah this

[01:04:13] one comes from wendy ann who writes i'm so glad they gave us this episode i was afraid we would never see the outie side of the after what a difference between heli's family and mark's family devin and rick and show real concern for both innie and outie mark while heli's father blames her completely and demeans her i love devin she's right on track this show has such attention to detail is beautiful even

[01:04:39] in the sharp angles of the office heli's outie is a smooth operator lumen and heli just try to buy off anyone in their in their way um harmony and mark i'm guessing that's not the last that we will see of harmony it will probably not be i didn't think another listener was right about irving working against lumen but he acted super cagey with milkshake so now i'm rethinking the door conversation with

[01:05:08] dylan was both hilarious and sad are you matt or semi-gloss that scene at the end with miss cobell and mark was so intense loved it mark is finally letting his doubts in the real villain of the show is uh rebecca don't don't punish the baby this isn't its fault someone needs to check this lady out and her lady and her birds out yes it's funny though

[01:05:37] her birds keep attacking her head she she said you said uh you didn't think another listener was right about irving working against lumen but i mean that's what i was saying last was it last episode yeah because we saw irving had all these notes about lumen and articles about their wrongdoing

[01:05:59] and yeah it just seems like the reason why he's trying to he's drawing these paintings of this hallway is to communicate with his inner self so i think it's pretty clear he's working against lumen yeah yeah for sure all right here's a call actually um wendy had another thing and i forgot to mention this in

[01:06:25] the main part of the notes but um it's a little bit spoilery so i put it in the spoiler section but i'll say there's something we're leaving out of the discussion that some first-time viewers might wonder how come you're not talking about this or speculating about it so maybe stick around just for the first part of the spoiler segment if you think you know and you want to hear about that i know that's a little bit vague but we'll just talk a little bit about that

[01:06:54] and then we'll maybe get into some other spoilery stuff but we'll warn you first so anyway before we do that let's finish the feedback here's a call from damien hey jason hey karen jason would be a helpful nomenclature um i love this episode uh what a perfect companion piece to episode one uh so satisfying but as usual

[01:07:19] still piling on the mysteries and unanswered questions uh these two opening episodes set up the whole season so well which is no easy feat after that epic finale of last season um we have a new bad guy mr frolic we have a now luminless miss kabelwig possibly off to do our own free range chicken running we will see uh we now know that lumen explicitly need marked complete harbor he's in

[01:07:49] another dimension mystery is now in play for both marks and we have milchik's magnificent helmet uh this was one of the most visually stunning episodes so far for me um some of the shots absolutely blew me away in this episode uh those exterior shots of the lumen building as heli walked the hallways uh that long shot of the boardroom table um and milchik taking off into the night

[01:08:15] like street hawk with pineapples um do you remember street hawk i do i loved it um it was below like airwolf which was my favorite yeah right uh but 10 year old me was obsessed with street hawk anyway uh i digress it's basically airwolf but with a motorcycle that doesn't mean anything to me oh airwolf come on no oh wow no all right all the listeners know

[01:08:44] what i'm talking about it's okay this episode was thrilling and it was dark but it wasn't mid season one dark it felt like it had more propulsion um it felt like both us and the characters have we're more empowered now um so it was like uh i don't know it was like a delicious dark um as usual i just feel like we're in expert hands as they set all this up and again i'm just

[01:09:11] like thankful they make stuff this good for us like how kind performance of the week uh brit lower yeah so we know and um and adore like heli so much obviously and it's only now we really get a close look at her reality uh her acting is so great the subtlety you know the subtleties in the

[01:09:38] the difference in her body language um she's like more uptight and restrained compared to the rebellious and free-spirited heli interesting yeah just like um adam scott with mark it's it's subtle but it's a whole different person yeah i'm pausing maybe you're gonna say what what i'm gonna say but that's i love that because it's like any heli is what helena would be if she didn't have

[01:10:06] whatever constraints are on her something like that you know yeah yeah amazing sneaky easter egg of the week um there's an aerial shot of dylan's cul-de-sac as milchick rides away after firing him and the center island of the road is covered in snow it's the exact shape of the lumen logo i never spot these things so i was quite proud of myself um quote of the week uh fetid muppet

[01:10:35] no explanation needed um i hope you talked about that bond movie on acid opening sequence too because it's magnificent um because i don't know it's a great way to describe it hopefully you did anyway love you two sorry for accidentally calling you cara for the last two calls karen uh hopefully you didn't notice with my uh i didn't my deep english mumbling voice anyway uh bye bye yeah she didn't notice but now that you've apologized she knows i'm retrogatively offended

[01:11:05] just kidding just kidding thank you that was great it didn't even occur to me that it should have occurred to me that all four of our mdr people are better versions of themselves i think their innies are better versions than their outies stay with me okay

[01:11:28] irving is an out um out of the closet and um it has love and has um been able to get love for himself uh i reckon we don't know enough about audi irving yet though yeah we know he's alone but i wouldn't judge him and say he's not as good yeah he has a dog but i think he's it's possible i think he just listens to a lot of metal and paints the same

[01:11:57] image over and over again loser and no no but just he seems a little freer inside i don't know maybe not maybe not and and dylan uh possibly um seems a little more carefree um mark he's definitely like seems at home inside like he's fulfilled yeah at mark uh definitely seems like a kind of a

[01:12:27] better version of himself i mean there's reasons there's like they all have and and heli they all both marks though but yeah outside mark can be a dick sometimes we we all they're all great but they all have like this weight like it makes you wonder yeah what your what you who you would be if you didn't have all the fucking baggage right and you didn't have the weight i tried to propose that we do the severed podcast where you get to talk to my other half sometimes and maybe you'd like

[01:12:57] him better no i i like where you're going with that yeah what what it would be like to just be a brand new version of yourself without any like you said baggage right i had any baggage yeah this version of me is maybe not afraid of heights and maybe you would be even more like positive and

[01:13:17] chipper probably probably yeah yeah there's no way to find out i mean you could do ecstasy that's sort of yeah hey people go to therapy for this yeah yeah exactly exactly all right thanks for calling don't do ecstasy everybody yeah thanks all right kids don't eat drugs rachel t edwards says such an

[01:13:42] awesome follow-up to last week's episode wow helena is the essence of quote corporate with a twist of sinister nothing she says is sincere she sweat she wears a facade 100 of the time and she also seems to have not tamed her malice her corporate facade can barely hide the malice she seems to feel for basically everyone or maybe for her life in general wow you really drew a lot i didn't get all that

[01:14:07] necessarily not that i don't think it's true but maybe that's why she's so fascinated by her any doing something spontaneous and romantic helena could never has never everything every word every moment is orchestrated for her when my husband next apologizes for something i'm going to respond with i welcome your contrition okay do it please do it tell us yes and report back please

[01:14:33] rick in attempting to be the voices of reason was amusing suggesting kobovig as a useful nomenclature which devin does in fact use later in the episode and thank god for devin i agree the actual voice of reason like come on mark we have to know for certain what you're in he meant there's no room for uncertainty here milchick riding him i agree milchick riding a motorcycle in the middle of winter is so badass and explains why he's cold as ice but really what a dick and so creepy there was a lot of creepy

[01:15:02] in this episode audi irving is so cool i'm desperate to see more of him yeah that's what i mean i i always i remember feeling like um what's his name john uh tuturo tuturo if he's like come on you guys i'm an a-list actor you better use me more yeah and i that's like i feel that anxiety watching this show like if you don't use him he's gonna leave but um i also just getting little of him kind of leaves me wanting more

[01:15:31] in a pleasant way if that makes any sense there are no small parts only small actors what is that from i don't know i don't even know that's the right quote it sounds right uh how old were you when you knew you love doors oh my gosh so cringe i thought dylan's interviewer was being sarcastic but he wasn't no he like she says he takes doors

[01:16:00] very seriously i believes dylan does too for a minute at least what do you think this is a carpet factory mr drummond terrifies me he uh how is he spying on mark and devon in pits following mark listening somehow and is the board just him i don't think so mark shift from being furious with devon for even suggesting jemma could be alive to reading the look on kovalvig's faces saying the

[01:16:25] same was almost too easy like he couldn't believe it and didn't want it to be true because he couldn't face it and could barely even think about her but getting a hint of possible unspoken confirmation from kovalvig was what he needed to change his mind i'm here for it make here guide your hand better than he guided milchicks rachel make here guide all of our hands better than he guided milchicks

[01:16:50] thanks rachel thank you rachel as always as always all right here's steve brown hello jason and karen this is steve and i'm watching episode two of season two of severance and uh uh helena helena helena egan just said let kirk guide your hand to mr milchick cobelvig would be a better way to

[01:17:13] reference uh this is crazy uh i love that opening cold open though with uh then editing between mr milchick going to see irving and devon and then seeing uh helena's statement uh recorded statement so i'm gonna i'm gonna stop now because i don't want to give anything away for later episodes but uh guys your coverage of episode one was just remarkable i loved it thank you all right so i just finished uh watching episode two and that wow that was intense that confrontation between mark

[01:17:42] and uh miss miss cobel there at the end when she honks the horn and just screams at him uh okay can't wait to hear you guys talk about this one um the reveal of dylan and irving's last names we got in this we see mark uh scout sees mark w mark white as he's being fired uh talking about uh gonna sue so all right can't wait here you guys talk about this one and uh i'll talk to you next week i didn't

[01:18:07] catch that i still know them as dylan g and irving b so i have to look that up apparently we got their last names yeah thank you um we did and i totally forgot to note that oh thanks steve but by the way um and one fun thing that another fun thing that i forgot to mention is that there was a wilhelm scream

[01:18:31] um when um covel uh cobel cobel cobel vick uh screams away when he mentioned that i was like oh yeah there's the wilhelm scream in there do you know what i'm talking about yes is that supposed to be mark jumping out of the way and mark's jumping out of the way and no that's not when mark jumps that way he doesn't scream it's the sound of the car pulling out with her kind of screaming she's like

[01:18:57] and she's and the car is pulling out it's not her scream it's the sound of the car sound of the car goes like that yeah it's a mix of the wilhelm scream interesting it's in there yeah i played it back i was like oh yeah you can totally hear that i read it somewhere um in like the the trivia of imdb and i'm like yeah there's there's the wilhelm scream i bet everyone knows what that is but just in case it's

[01:19:23] a scream that was in an old movie and for whatever reason filmmakers use it all the time when one of the stormtroopers in star wars gets shot and falls he goes ah it's the exact same thing every time yeah and our friend ben has a podcast named wilhelm by the way so he he likes it too oh that's true that's

[01:19:42] super cool that's neat it's a cute little easter egg yeah it's fun all right that is our show thanks so much for listening everybody thanks everybody next episode severance season two episode three

[01:20:08] who is alive if you want to write in or leave us a voice message about it you can send it to waffle party at podcastica.com or you can leave comments in our discord or facebook group and you can also chat with us and other listeners about severance or whatever else you're watching links in the show notes or if you want you can go to podcastica.com and see other shows that we do there's a whole bunch

[01:20:31] and we just hit episode 700 of the walking dead cast which i just renamed the walking dead cast yay congratulations wow that's a lot that's a lot you were on there for like 500 of them or something like that the first 5 000 yes i was and uh also uh i think i've mentioned this before but me and daphne and wendy are having a great time covering the testaments the sequel series to the handmaid's

[01:20:58] tale and that's been going i think we're the number one testaments podcast so that's really fun is it fun so far yeah it's interesting it's different it feels like a coming of age story but a twisted gilead version of a coming of age story it's different than the handmaid's tale it's not quite as disturbing you know it is disturbing though i can't wait to watch this i'm sort of building up um i don't subscribe currently i'm not a hulu subscriber it's gonna wait i'm gonna wait and

[01:21:27] then i'm just gonna get like a hulu wash over me nice we got all 10 episodes as screeners before it ever aired but we're just like we had to control ourselves and not watch ahead which is it's hard torture yeah no it's a good show though i think you're gonna like it i can't wait curious to know

[01:21:49] what you think all right that is our show thanks for listening all right let's move on to outie time before we get into the elevator we'll have only a lightly spoilery part which i mentioned earlier

[01:22:14] about this thing that i think some people who are watching for the first time might be wondering why we're not talking about so um hopefully we're not spoiling you on this uh if you just don't want to risk any spoilers you should probably stop listening but uh wendy also who wendy who wrote in before also said at the end i wrote this up last night but now after listening to the podcast i also

[01:22:38] have to say heli inside lumen is her outie right i just assumed this from the beginning of season two she's impersonating her any let me know if i'm totally off base and so i am only including this here where i've invited first time listeners to listen because i also suspected that when i first watched this but they haven't confirmed it it seems right and some reasons why i suspected it is because

[01:23:07] she fumbled around with a button to turn her computer on which was a clue like she should know where that thing is without even having to think about it um and then also at the end of this episode we see dylan irvin and helena go back to work and with dylan dylan and irving in the elevator you hear the two dings one when the elevator door opens and then one to indicate the switch to their innies

[01:23:32] but with helena there's just one ding right there's no any ding there's no any ding yeah i i have to admit i did not figure it out i don't i don't remember figuring it out okay i mean that's kind of why i don't want to talk about it in the main part of the podcast in case i'm too stupid no because i i would imagine most people aren't thinking about it you know yeah or at least a good amount of them at least one no i'm just kidding

[01:24:04] i see how it is because they i think they um you know they don't they haven't said it straight up so i don't think they're thinking that all the viewers know that i've figured it out yet yeah all right let's um let's go into the elevator so we can get to the other spoilers let's do

[01:24:32] so rachel also wrote yeah it's definitely hell enough from the start not heli and that makes me so angry she's detestable and i don't believe that she can even pretend to be uninhibited and spontaneous so i'm super curious to watch her again and see if it's really obvious now that i know yeah i mean i think from what i remember she just was all crushing on mark and we already saw that last

[01:24:59] uh last episode too so she does seem to be able to cut loose a little bit or something you know loosen up a little bit yeah i think we all do that in different contexts we feel more relaxed code switch yeah exactly uh yeah um also i have to say she pulls the wool over everybody's eyes pretty easily

[01:25:21] i mean irving suspects he's like a night gardener um you know her excuse doesn't push it he doesn't but you can tell he's like i don't understand also they i think they all were able to see that it was winter and um anybody who knows anything about gardening knows that you don't do much in the winter when it when it's when there's a couple of feet of snow on the ground um you're not out

[01:25:47] there gardening so it was a bad lie it was a very clumsy lie um but you bought it i mean i don't remember knowing i don't remember knowing uh maybe i was suspicious i don't recall even yeah suspicious but god i don't know david always picks things up way sooner than i do he probably knew right away jenny picks up things way faster than i do too a lot of times there are there are smarter halves

[01:26:17] um we also are wait let me think here so yeah i mean they sleep together and mark doesn't know nope so nope he doesn't yeah it is i mean then heli gets pissed about that yeah when she finds out which i don't blame her i mean if there's a if there's a doppelganger of me walking around sleeping

[01:26:45] with david i'd hope he would know yeah what if david showed up one night and he was like hi honey you ready for bed you're like all right let's go yeah heck yeah i am thought you'd never ask no um we do see mark and jim uh reconnect this season and um right and um

[01:27:09] as and be like intimate or at least know each other as husband and wife i can't actually remember i feel like we do in a flashback you mean we do in flashback we do see them in flashback because it has to do with inside yeah we we do see them in flashback and we do see how they met um we um we

[01:27:32] do see how they met we do see um that they're unless i'm unless that was last season but yeah um we also see how they really wanted a baby all right i guess i just don't remember a lot of it but that's okay because i'm gonna be surprised just like everyone else all right you vetted muppets we'll see you next time