March 12, 2025 • 47 mins
Severance takes a dark turn with its latest episode, leaving the hosts and producer Joelle Monique to ask themselves what is Severance really about? But as promised, we’re sticking with this show until the mystery is solved! And we have some theories, too! All this and more, after a recap and episode discussion with your hosts Jason and Rosie!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Warning today's episode Today spoilers for episode two eight of
Severance Sweet Vitriol. If you have not watched that, watch
it come back here you warning. Hello, my name is
(00:27):
Jason Concepcion and I'm rosday Night and welcome back to
Excervader of the podcast where we dive deep in your
favorite shows, movies, comics and pop culture coming from our
podcast or we're bringing you three episodes week every Tuesday, Wednesday,
and Thursday on Saturday.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
In today's episode, we are recapping and discussing the raw,
the sad, and depressing new episode of Severance Sweet Vitriol, which.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Is currently on Apple TV Plus. We will be recapping
the episode. Then we're gonna fall up on our theory
corner and see where that's at. Maybe let's get to.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
It, okay. Episode two eight Sweet Vitriol, directed by Benjamin Stiller,
written oh by series creator Dan Erickson, Adam County, and
Casey Perry. This is a Kobel bottle and a little
bottle of ether for all you fans of Cobel out
(01:26):
and also the shortest run time of the season, and
I think almost of the series I need to go
and look back, but just over thirty five minutes, Cobell
is driving what I assume to be north.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
It feels like somewhere north, especially.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
In the North Ish, to a desolate coastal town called
salts Neck. It will turn out that this is her hometown.
On the way, Devin is like blowing up her phone,
but Cobel is just gonna.
Speaker 4 (01:57):
Leave her on read.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
She pulls up to the town and is brushing her
teeth and she's just looking around. And we get our
first look at this husk of a town where as
we will see, everyone who lives there is somehow attached
to the illicit ether trade. They are either huff in
the stuff out of a rag or as with Cobel's
(02:23):
former coworker Hampton, selling it. So she pulls up to
this diner, the Drippy Pot Cafe. Incredibly, the manager Hampton
is her old colleague aka former child laborer, alongside Harmony
Cobell at the Lumen Plant, which is on the outskirts
of town back.
Speaker 5 (02:42):
In the day.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
There is clearly something happened between them. Because clearly there's
something between them I seen as something like almost anger,
but just under the surface. Yes, Cobell says, wow, the
town looks like shit doesn't look anything like I remember
remembered it and Hampton, and one of my favorite parts
of this episode is this little spiel that Hampton gives,
(03:07):
which is he basically goes into the corporate jargony reasons
that the town now looks like absolute fucking shit, and
it's clear that he's like regurgitating this corporate pr speaks
story that was given to the inhabitants of the town
when Luman pulled out, She's like, can we go to
the factory to go discuss some things? So they go
there out by the factory, Cold Harbor question mark, Yeah,
(03:30):
the entire town mark Cold Harbor.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
They definitely want us to think that because it's literally
icy cold, coupled by the ocean, webs can come and go.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
So yes, they have an annoyingly cryptic conversation out here.
And I will say this was the one. This is
the This is not a bad episode, although I've seen
it as semi divisive, and.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
I think it's a little divisive. I think it widened well,
we'll talk about mobile. I think it widens the wild
of severance that is very different to what the peak
of the show has been. So I'm I'm not surprised
that it got people.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yes, but this is very This is an episode is
very dependent on those kind of maybe like the lowest
value cryptic conversations that Severance is known for, where two
characters or more characters are having a conversation with the
important information kind of lifted out that they know and
(04:30):
we don't. And this is one of those episodes where
I'm like noticing that.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
They're just having a scryptic conversation.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Anyway, They're talking about Sissy, who it will turn out,
is Kobel's maternal aunt and a full on cure cultist
who took in Harmony when Harmony's mom was was ill
with ether related lung disease. Coobel admits that listen, I've
got some lumin heat on me. They're mad at me,
(04:56):
and so they're after me for whatever reason, and I
need to go talk to Sissy, but also I can't
be seen in case anybody's watching the house. So Cobel
is like, can you take me up there? So Cobel
then drops some cure lore about the factory, saying, you
know Kiri, which we've seen, We've seen the painting right
where yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
There's a g I will say if you are not
somebody who watches the recaps, this is a great episode
because I have to say, if there is an editing
award for a recap and a previously on that actually
tells you every single thing you need to know, this
episode has an unbelievable recap where you get some really
(05:36):
great quotes and kind of context from Helena. There's this
great moment where she and me and Joel were kind
of going mad about this one where she shows her
saying to Harmony in a previous episode like you overestimate
your brilliance and underestimate your blessings. And you can start
to see the bitterness and kind of why the vegans
might not like Harmony in this episode. And then yeah,
(06:00):
we get the Imagiant and Kia paintings and kind of
the the we it's such a good raycap, Like give
that head some money, because I was really like, whoa
they they drool the threads together for me? But yes,
so we've seen the paintings. We kind of know a
bit more. But now we're getting the real law.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Right, So apparently according to the Egan lower kir Met.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
His partner imagen imaging imaging.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
Yeah, I'm a giant imagine they say it and strange.
They say it in a stranger basically imagen at the.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
Ether factory, and Hampton is like, oh was her Like
were her lungs ravaged as well? And then Cobel is like,
take me up to Sissy. So they go up there,
and Cobel rides in the in the bed of Hampton's
pickup just in case the Luogoons are watching. Hampton is
clearly not a fan of Sissy at all. Cobel knocks
(06:58):
on the door, barges in, and Cissy's like, what the
fuck are you doing here? She just goes in and
starts looking around, and we see that there. You know
that clearly Harmony and Hampton grew up here because we
see their growth markers on the door, like any house
that has children in it. And Cobel is looking for
desperately looking around for her stuff. There's something in her
(07:20):
stuff that was that she needs. There's a plaque on
the wall announcing that Sissy real name Celestine. Cobel was
like the lumin version of employee of the Month, but
it's like employee.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
Of the Quarter, like the striver of the quarter.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
You're like a cult follower of yes.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Like so, Harmony's like, where's my stuff, Where's my childhood stuff?
Where's my stuff from when I was a kid, when
I was a student, when I was in the Fellow
Tide Wintertide Fellowship.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
I need all that stuff. Cecy's like, well, I sold
it to the.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
Poor everyone has bo babe, why did you sell it to?
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (07:54):
Why did you do that?
Speaker 1 (07:56):
And Harmony's like, well, has anybody from Lumen come.
Speaker 4 (07:59):
By or called?
Speaker 1 (08:00):
And He's like, yeah, mister Drummond called. And it's clear
that Sissy knows that Harmony is in some kind of trouble.
Harmony immediately runs over, disconnects the phone, rips the fucking
cordla phone, and then is like, give me the key
to my mom's room. And here's an interesting exchange. She
then asks Cissy, what were my mother's last last words?
(08:24):
And it basically accuses Cissy of like against.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
Her mother's will, pulling her mother.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Off of life support, and Cissy is basically implies that
her mother wanted her to take her off life support
and then says of Harmony's mom quote, if only she
was a believer, perhaps she would have found solace in
the Nine. The nine, you know, the command.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Potentially, which is also of cure. Yeah, okay, So if
I'm dying of lung disease from either recycle, I'm going
to be I'm like, I'm gonna be thinking about vision
of witch, realty, benevolence, nimbleness, wild, how you.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Will be lifted away. But I found the the last
word it felt very weighted, to the point where I
was like, it almost made me wonder if Sissy.
Speaker 4 (09:23):
Truly knew her reasons for.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
In a severance kind of way, truly understood what happened
when she took Mom off life support, was that her
doing that was There's some because clearly, you know, Ether
was one and early product of Women, which we now
understand is a pharma tech kind of company makes a
(09:47):
lot of products, but forman tech seem to be the mainstays,
and that Ether was an early attempt at like wiping
people's minds so that they would not experience and the
rigor of the work they were doing.
Speaker 3 (10:02):
They were like, oh, you can basically just use ether
as essentially an anesthetic, but a walking anesthetic, because ether
is an anesthetic. But they were like, can you get
people to be on it so they don't notice how
bad their lives are, which is honestly very real. Like
up north in England in places where there was a
(10:23):
lot of minds, there was big like pain huffing culture
and like different kind of substance abuse because of how
bad it was to work in the minds and to
be a child laborer and stuff. So this is actually
like very depressingly real. But it's interesting to see how
they're now going to take that and as we learn
(10:43):
later in this episode, kind of how it became severance
as we know it now.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
We get a lot of information from this back and
forth argument between Harmony and her aunt, including that Harmony's
mom really started to serious declined when Harmony was at
school and Cissy kept this from her. She said, I
would have come back to take care of her. But
Sissy is like, no, it was so important that you
(11:09):
were in the Wintertide Fellow and like you're a Wintertide
fellow and Keer saw you with his own eye, Jamee,
and you know it was like you are you're such
an incredible striver, like you were hand hicked by the Egans.
He saw Kier and you yes, say James saw here
in you. All that kind of stuff Harmony is like, well,
what a drummond want when he called? And Sissy doesn't say,
(11:32):
but basically is like, just go back, ask forgiveness from
the Egans and they will agree to forgive you. And
Harmony looks down in Cissy's hands as she's playing with
some kind of like jame Egan dollhead, which will become
clear what this reminds her of later, but that sparks
something in her. She remembers something about the things she's
(11:52):
looking for, runs up to Sissy's room and then basically
like cop tosses it, looks through everything, finds the key
to mom's room, and then goes to open the door.
And we're gonna take a quick break to.
Speaker 4 (12:06):
Listen to a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 5 (12:07):
Then we're going to talk about what is inside there,
and we're back.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
First of all, I would have just kicked the door open,
because this house looks like it hasn't been updated built
like one. Yeah, just like bad boy in worry about
the Pompy.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
Is strong compared to everyone else here, who's like fucked
up on etha like she.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Anyway, she gets the key, she goes inside and there's
her mother's room just as it must have appeared when
she was ill and when she passed away. You know,
the the bed is raised at at like a forty
five degree angle, so that which is easier for people
with bathing issues. It's easier to breathe when you're resting.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
When you're sitting up slightly.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
We see the breathing machine, We see her moth eaten,
her mother's moth eaten clothes in the closet. We see
a picture what I assume to be Harmony when she
was a child. And then Harmony lays on the bed.
And it's interesting because I perceive this as she puts
(13:27):
the breathing tube to her mouth and begins breathing through it.
And I perceive this as she's trying to get in
touch with her mother's last week's, last.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Months exactly like what did it feel like. It's a
really unsettling and kind of depressing image because there's also
the duality of like she's like laying there like breathing
into her breathing in and out, and it's very similar
to kind of the ether huffing kind of breathing that
you would do. There's a lot of layers here, and
(13:58):
I have to say which I'm way you feel about
the episode. Patricia Ucat is absolutely killing it, like this
is a powerhouse episode and I wouldn't be surprised with
that trying to put forward for some awarned contention here.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
So she Harmony cries herself sleep, and then we see
this image that I originally thought was like something under
a microscope, like crystals and her microscope, but which our
discord chief Heidi tells me is like a satellite shot
of ice that they then superimposed over the waters in
(14:38):
the bay, kind of sloshing around against the testing. And
then time passes and Harmony is awakened to the sound
of Hampton and Sissy arguing as he comes in to
basically look for and he's he's just like, you.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
Know, it's been a long time, and I'm freezing like what.
Speaker 3 (14:59):
He outside of a truck? Why are you having a nap? Like, please,
it's very cold out there.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
Harmony is like, I can't find it, whatever it is,
and they talk about her mom. Hampton liked her. When
Harmony says, well you barely knew her, he says she
hated lumin more than I did. That's all I needed
to know. So interesting interesting details.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Yeah, it also feels like adds to the idea that
Sissy probably took her off life support or you know,
killed her, because potentially, I don't know, maybe she was
an early hater of Lumen in a way that could
impact the rest of what we see going on in
the rest of the seas.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
Hampton then asks like, do you want to get huh,
pulls out an ether rag and gets into it. You know,
Harmony huffs a little, rag gets into that rag, and
she's like, I haven't done that since I was eight,
And it was clear this was part of the work day,
because Hampton is like, you're ready to man the that
for ten hours, which is just dire.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:59):
She then tells.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Hampton that it's shameful that you sell this, and they kiss,
and then suddenly Harmony's like, oh, now I'm getting another
piece of where that stuff might be. And we're realizing
that whether it's ether or her long life, Harmony's memory
is spotty as like, not as spotty as obviously someone
has been severed, but like she's trying to claw back
(16:22):
that year in a way that many characters.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
There's still stuff she can't remember.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
So she gets the idea and she's like, Sissy would
not have thrown my stuff away or given it to
the poor.
Speaker 4 (16:32):
I don't believe that.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
She goes outside to like a kind of underground pantry,
a cold room, and she finds her stuff, including like
a lumin yearbook and with her like Wintertide fellow right
up in there, and some stuff animals, and then she
finds her Wintertide like Fellowship award bust of James Egan.
(16:55):
And that is the thing that sparked when she looked
in Cissy's hands and saw her holding like a Jame
Egan doll head. This is what sparked in her because
inside of the bust, she unscrews the base. Inside there
is a rolled up leather bound notebook, and then she goes.
She immediately runs into Sissy, and she's brandishing the rolled
(17:19):
up notebook and she's like, I'm leaving now. Don't tell
the lumins that I was here. And Sissy's like, I
would never lie to an Egan.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
Oh, come on.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Sissy is like, listen, you owe the Egans. You're fealty
because of what they lifted you up from nothing and
the fellowship, and look at your great success and all
the things you've done in your life. It's all because
of them, so you can never go against them. Harmony
then says, oh, I owe them, and she opens the
notebook and she's screaming that like, basically, severance was her idea.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Quite to me.
Speaker 4 (17:55):
It's the design, the.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Chip, the surgery, the brain waves, the glass go block,
all the fucking shit that is involved in the process,
the technology created by her and stolen essentially by Jame
Egan and passed off as his own. She Harmony says, like,
they told me if I sought credit for this, that
I would be banished whatever that means from the e
(18:18):
I guess from the Egan cult. And Sissy then tries
to burn the notebook, which come on, baby, why Harmony
snatches it out of the fire and says basically that
she hopes that she dies, and then Sissy's like, well,
oh yeah, well your mom pulled the tube out herself.
She clawed it out of her neck, and Harmony's like,
(18:40):
oh well, I don't fucking believe you. Meanwhile, Hampton is
honking because someone's coming. Harmony gets into Hampton's car is like,
I'm leaving, and Hampton is like, well, I'm gonna stay here,
and face whatever this is, and then Harmony speeds off
and you see these headlights approaching and Hampton says, come
to take these tempers assholes. Meanwhile in the truck, Harmony
(19:04):
finally answers her phone. It's Devin. Devin is like, oh
my god, thank God. Like Mark is integrating, but we
want to we want to try something else, she says,
and immediately Harmony understands that only Regabi could have done this,
the reintegration process with Mark, and then she's like, put
(19:27):
Mark on the phone, markets on the phone, and then
we basically cut.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Yeah, She's like tell me everything.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
Yeah to Oh, what's the name of that bed?
Speaker 3 (19:37):
Oh everyone's favorite patent?
Speaker 4 (19:44):
Oh yeah it was what was it? Firewoman? I think
by the Cult.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Which pointed here's a little trivia, a little trivia for you. Yeah,
very pointed, right. The Cult also a little trivia that
I think the lead singer for the Cult was like
in the Running for Play Jim Morrison in the Doors movie. Anyway,
let's go to a quick ad and then come back
and talk about this episode. And we're back, Rosie. We
(20:24):
got a lot of interesting stuff in this episode. It
is a little light of an episode in terms of
connected to something to everything else.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
But your thoughts on this episode.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
I think that it broadens the world in a way
I do find intriguing, but I give.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
You some of the really important backstory.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
It gives us some of the backstory. It also kind
of hints at what is out there, because I've always
thought one of the most interesting things about separance is
we know what the Ennis are trying to escape, but
we never really know what the our ties are kind
of living through, Like is the Egan cult something that
(21:06):
is in control of the world like we we it's
there's They could do a broad kind of rug pull
where they reveal and I think this does broaden it
a bit. I get why people were kind of shocked
by the shift, but I do also think that there
is something very interesting about Harmony's journey here and the
(21:30):
you know, yeah, it is as I saw a lot
of people talking about, it's very interesting to be like, oh,
a woman made this and it was stolen, but also
then she stayed within the company and used it to
exploit many other people, And I think that it adds
a moral complexity. I also think that Regarbi and Harmony
(21:52):
clearly have some kind of past together and I'm interested
also to know. I believe what Sis she said when
she said that Harmony's mom pulled out her own breathing tube.
And I think the reason why is because Harmony's mom
was told that her daughter had created this kind of
even more extreme, horrible thing, and I think she was horrified.
(22:14):
I thought this was a very hard episode to watch,
but not because it wasn't good. It's just incredibly depressing. Amply,
it is a very very depressing episode something I mean
Severance has had. I just think that they the genre
concept and the mystery when You're in with the Innies
has kind of had a lightness to it that this
episode does not have.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
You know, it's it's a very very bleak episode, down
to the landscape being bleak and like it's almost lifeless,
like a moonscape this episode. I agree with you in
everything you're saying about, you know, the harmony of it all.
I think that the way I perceived this, the complexity
of her creating the Severance procedure, is that, like I
(22:58):
think it was an act of love. I think she
saw her mom be damaged by the mines, she watched
everyone around her be damaged by breathing in this ether,
and she thought, okay.
Speaker 4 (23:09):
Since.
Speaker 1 (23:10):
I mean, like, it's crazy that the culture of working
for Egan is like, we do such crazy, rigorous, dangerous
work that you want to not remember you were there
when you leave, Like, how can we make how can
we make that part of it essentially like a kind
of punch clock slavery situation, you know, where you're a
slave when you punch in, but then you leave and
(23:31):
you're and you're fine, you're yourself. And clearly coming up
with this procedure was an act of love, almost like
the others would have saved my mom's life, her lungs
would not have been ravage. Here's a way that you
can separate yourself from the dangerous work that you do
and still be able to like have a family and
(23:52):
have an enriching life outside of that. Not understanding the
horrors of the thing that she had created clearly, and
it's uncles to me now whether she really believes it,
believes in the horrors of what she's mad having seen
all the things that she's must have seen. So I
thought that I really enjoyed that part of it. I
(24:12):
thought it was so interesting. This is a good episode
not a bad one. I think, on the scale of
severance is so high quality that it's like there are
no bad episodes.
Speaker 4 (24:19):
But this was the one episode.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Where I became a little worried as I texted you
about the Donnie Darko syndrome, which is that when the
mystery is active and you don't know air quotes what
the show is about, there's this propulsion to you know,
there's this fascination, almost like a magical hold that the
story has on you, where it's so intriguing, but as
(24:43):
soon as you know, it becomes dumb. And this only
I was only worried about it because you barely notice
watching this show and being a fan of it, that
almost all the mystery would go away if only certain
characters would just have a conversation. For instance, if we
would just like have a conversation or watch a conversation
(25:06):
between like Cobell and Regabi, or like a full conversation
between Mark and Regaby, almost everything that we were wondering
about would be like lifted, like the veil would be lifted.
The fact that we're not annoyed by that shows us
what a great show this is.
Speaker 4 (25:19):
And I think, mm hmm. I while I thought this
was a good episode. I hope not too many more
of these, because.
Speaker 3 (25:26):
I'm interested to see where they go next.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
A few more of these and people will start to
be like, why can't we have that conversation with Gaby,
Why can't we know more about what's going on in Yeah?
Speaker 3 (25:36):
So I agree, no, no, no, no, I agree. I
think I've definitely seen a lot of very divisive reactions
online as well, like is this the first bad episode
of Severance? Like I don't think, no, this is not
a badly made episode of television. Now does it fit
into your world of what you were hoping Severance would be?
Now that's the question, because I do think something else
that's really interesting that this episode raises is we've will
(25:59):
be and like, you know, clones, goats, like what's going on?
But also I'm like, miss Wang, maybe it's just child labor,
Like she's another child, just child labor, and they you
do it. So I'm interested because I think that the
moral complexity of where this show is at could get
(26:22):
very very very intriguing and messy and real if they've
got the chops. I do believe the show has the chops.
I also want before we get into kind of where
this leaves us before the last two episodes. I want
super producer Joelle to jump in because she is the
queen of theories on this show, and I know she
has a lot of thoughts about Severs episode eight from
(26:45):
season two.
Speaker 6 (26:47):
Hi, guys, Hi, there's really just one theory for me
this week, and I text you guys about it, and
it's a thing that's been talked about in sevent for
a really long time. You have all these illusions to
the Civil War. Cold Harbor is a big battle that
the South one really decimated the North during the Civil War.
People have been online being like, hey, we don't want
(27:09):
this show, for very obvious reasons, to be about slavery.
But I'm just like, with the child labor infusion this week,
I just have to think, like, is this show just
about the impact of slavery on labor and throughout like
American history, Like, there's a reason we keep going back
to all of these different these and time periods. There's
a reason. Like I really liked this episode. I was
(27:31):
kind of surprised by the reaction, although maybe I shouldn't be.
Bottle episodes are notoriously Yeah, not a bottle episode but
these all shoots of like one character far away from
everybody are often controversial, but to me, I always feel
like this is the writers being able to expand the
story in such an interesting way and watching Harmony navigate
her past, and especially like that whole breathing tube scene.
(27:55):
So you guys mentioned, oh like it. It's sort of
like the huffing. It's sort of her connected to her mother.
To me, I was like, is she suckling? Is this
her like perverting to being a right?
Speaker 4 (28:06):
Yeah, in a way, there's that too, for sure.
Speaker 6 (28:09):
I was like this, this whole episode to me, really
cemented a lot, to the point where I was like,
are there mysteries left in this show?
Speaker 5 (28:16):
Like hop like this is a series.
Speaker 6 (28:17):
About it's just just about the impact of slavery, labor
and throughout history. And I was so compelled by that
as like a thought experiment, And I was curious if
that works for you guys, or if that idea of
that it's off putting for you. I know a lot
of people are like, please don't touch this, Oh messy,
it's so difficult.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
Well, I think that obviously in America, first of all,
slavery as a practice is like sadly an age old
and global industry or was, and it has a very
specific and I think different kind of connotation here in America,
(28:55):
which I'm not super eager to is like the basis
of a show, but I don't think that that's necessarily
what this show is about. I think what this show
is about is like the gray line between work and exploitation.
And like one thing I was thinking about with this show,
(29:18):
you have this factory in this town, and then it
closes down and you see the devastation that it leaves behind.
But when it was active, it was actively devastating the community,
getting kids looked on ether and then it's pulled out
and you get this very cynical, cutting mini speech from
(29:39):
Hampton in which he spouts the kind of corporate capitalist
jargon about the reasons that they pulled the heart out
of the town. The heart of the town was this
terrible factory that was killing everybody. But now that it's gone,
nobody's happy about that either. And I think that's what
this show is about. It's about the fact that we've
created this exploit tative system that nurtures and sustains and
(30:04):
exploits us all and the only thing worse than this
terrible exploitive system is if it goes away, And I think,
because there's nothing else, there's only chaos afterwards.
Speaker 4 (30:17):
And to me, that's what this show is about.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
It's about quote air quotes late stage capitalism, which is
late stage capitalism to me means we don't have any
other ideas except this horrible thing that we are actively.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
Doing that's getting more horrible.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
Yeah, So that to me is what this show is about,
not necessarily not slavery.
Speaker 4 (30:39):
It's about exploitation.
Speaker 6 (30:41):
It's like, yeah, we're trying to like recreate or something
like that, which I've seen some theory.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
Oh yeah, you see that theory.
Speaker 6 (30:47):
That's the case. But I do think if when you
look at labor structure through it's consistently like our laws
are constantly Oh, let me, it's the reason we have,
like was like two thirty minimm wage for waiters and
things like that. I think like that thread is being
constantly put to your point, this space now where people
(31:08):
are like, hey, as awful as places, I would rather
just be high so I can survive it because I
don't seem like an outside of it, And I think
that works really well. I'm excited to see Harmony re
enter the picture. The thing that was also really interesting
to me and Rosie and I Sideline talked about this
a little bit, was like this the way people felt
about Harmony after this episode. I thought it was really
(31:28):
interesting because it's massively divided. Some people were like, hey,
you were a part of the system, and then you
created a device that a sort of allows you to
survive being a part of that system, which I think
is haunting.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Probably came from yeah, like she doesn't want about how
was it used.
Speaker 6 (31:47):
Yeah, because it's really interesting to think about, Like, Okay,
so Harmony is both a victim and a supporter of
the system, right and and potentially making the lives of
folks within the sysem much worse. But she was trying
to do that by alleviating the daily stress and impact
of the ten hours you have to be on the grind.
(32:07):
And I think that there are a lot of folks
who are like, oh, she's a hero now because she
sees the evil and she's marching back.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
But we don't know, I mean, we don't know. I'm like, guys,
I will say too ahead of the game. We don't
know what she's I don't know. Also, I just want
to say before Joel and Jason, I both think you're right.
I think that this is a show and I do
think that to talk about exploitation in America well around
the world and the way labor works is to recognize
(32:38):
that when slavers were stopped from owning people, they had
to find new ways to exploit people. And I do
think that the show wants to reckon with how that
impacts global economy and capitalism. And I also want to say,
and I'm sorry if you don't want to hear me,
make this about real life right now, how you can
(33:00):
put your ear off song, because I know sometimes people
get tired of me. But like, guess what, Slavery still exists,
and it's called the prison industrial system, and in its
own way, severance is very much akin to that, because
it is this idea of you go into somewhere and
when you are in there, you are allowed to be
a slave, even though in every other part of American
(33:22):
culture allegedly slavery does not exist. But in the prison
system people are used as indentured servitude labor. They don't
earn money, and giant corporations make millions and millions of
dollars of the off of them, huge companies like Walmart,
like you know, Victoria's Secret, Like, there are companies that
do that. And I think that if this show has
(33:44):
the chops and it is exploring that, I think there's
a lot of similarities there that could be explored. And
obviously child labor is a part of that too, because
that has long been a way that working class people
and people without opportunities to move up the social lata
in capitalism have been exploited. But yes, so I think
(34:05):
that it's really interesting. I don't think we're getting any
of those answers in the next two episodes. I think
that's like a season three season full type.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
You know, I've been thinking about this before we dive
into a real theory corner, I think it's maybe useful
to just kind of list off what we actually know
for sure, and so let's start here Lumen. Lumen is
a company with its roots in the mid nineteenth century.
We know that they started, you know, with topical salves
(34:36):
and clearly ether this is kind of like early pharmaceutical industry,
and are now a company that works in the kind
of confluence of tech medicine and pharmaceuticals somewhere in there, right.
Speaker 3 (34:52):
And they do.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
They probably do other stuff as well, but it seems
like medical supplies, technology and pharmaceuticals is where Lumen works
because we remember, I remember there was like a piece
of dialogue earlier in the show where they were talking
about someone was sick because they had taken like non
lumin medication. So we understand that there's Helene I had
(35:14):
taken non limit. We know that we know that Severance
was created by a Harmony Cobell who was then the
manager of the Severed Floor but lost her job in
the Severance Uprising for reasons that are kind of still
like a little.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
Is it because they felt like she failed because the
seven people were able to rebel? I'm interested in that also,
how much I think it's.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Because I think it's because she was being too nice
or what they perceived to be. It's very clear to
me that they part of what they like about Miltchik
is milk Chick. When they're like, you got to crack down,
Meltchick's like fine, and Cobel was not willing, perhaps to
crack down in the way that Miltchick is.
Speaker 6 (35:59):
Cobell did what she wanted to do.
Speaker 4 (36:02):
She did what she wanted to do.
Speaker 6 (36:04):
At this point, like when they're like, hey, be less smart,
he's like, all right, I'll grow up. I'll just yell
at myself in a mirror until I conform to year
they were. His harmony is like I'll pretend to be
a milk helper and like teach this woman.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:19):
Well I think like the introduction of miss Casey into
the severed flass clearly her idea, and it went badly.
We know that you can be severed multiple times, which
was a big question mark, right. We know that specifically
the board level people and probably management level people look
at Innis with utter disdain. And we know that that
(36:43):
this process was seen, at least in some leadership circles
in Lumen as a kind of way to like rehabilitate
people who were either criminals as we saw with Bert,
or maybe something else. Is that all we know?
Speaker 3 (36:59):
But that's a lot, that's a lot. We That's the
funny thing, like Joelle said where she was like she
watched this episode and she was like, is there a mystery?
Like is it just about this person who is like
escape child labor by creating apparently a more humane way
to create a labor force and is now living with it.
I think it really could be that simple. I'm interested
(37:22):
to see if they do a big swing kind of
genre hint moment at the end, because they have to
have that hook in the last two episodes to make
people want to watch season three.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Here's what the miss there's there's two mysteries to me.
One is why is Jemma down there? Like why what
does specifically her being down there accomplish for the company,
Because clearly that's important, right and Mark's work with Cold
Harbor is tied up in that. That's to me the
(37:57):
central mystery. Why is Jemma down there? Why they kidnap her?
Why do they make her disappear? And why is she
so important or whatever the project is, because what the
project is, I think is kind of that the central mystery.
And then the second overall missing piece, to me, that
is kind of mystery, and we've gotten hints of it.
What does the rest of the world know about Severance
(38:19):
and what do they think about it?
Speaker 4 (38:20):
Like we get these hints.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
That like, oh, the story of your innies became very popular,
like on the outside, it was all over the news
like this. Uprising notes we get these hints right where
they say stuff like that, but we don't really know
what people almost.
Speaker 3 (38:33):
It's like, is it just a company town.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
We don't really know what people think about it. And
I think that's an important part of this, because do
we live in a world in which this is fine, right,
or do we live in a world in which this
is not?
Speaker 3 (38:48):
Okay? That's kind of a big deal.
Speaker 6 (38:51):
I got a hint of it when Dylan was interviewing
at the Door Factory and it was all going well
until the guys are like leaning into like, oh, you're
severed and so definitely, and then a little bit when
we go to Birt's place and when you're like, okay,
so the church is okay with it. Is it like
(39:12):
connected to Lumen in a larger way or is it
that like there's something really about that where they're like, hey, no,
these are like individuals who still have a chance of
getting saved at the end of their lives. I think
it's probably split. I'm curious to see, like to what level, Yeah, like,
are were people marching in the streets against it? Is
this just a thing where like, hey, if you choose
to do it like that's your business. I think that
(39:33):
will be really interesting. I do hope we find out
like I hope we get a world opener at the
very end. I hope we see a different space or
a different angle outside of the main building to sort
of fill that space. And I'm also hoping, yeah, I'm
also hoping, like I really love when the penultimate episode
has a big reveal and then the finale is questions.
(39:54):
That's always really thrilling to me. I hope that's the
direction we're going with season two.
Speaker 3 (39:58):
Yeah, I do think. I I would love to see
if it's going to be like a kind of, you know,
a classic very divisive pull out where you kind of
realize that the places that have severance are almost like
company towns where no one else can go, and there's
kind of like what Saltsneck was, but in an even
more broad way where there's I'm very interested. I think,
(40:21):
as much as we know, they're doing a good job
of keeping us intrigued with questions like this that could
be completely relevant or absolutely irrelevant, and we never get
the answers to them. So I'm interested for the next
two episodes to see.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
Why any theories any did this episode change or create
any new theories for you, Joel.
Speaker 6 (40:43):
No, I'm just more convinced than ever that Milchik is
also part of this like fellowship program back in the day, I.
Speaker 4 (40:52):
Know that miss as a wintertime.
Speaker 6 (40:54):
Fellow harmony was like his like.
Speaker 4 (40:58):
Teacher or like maybe she victim or something.
Speaker 6 (41:01):
Yeah, And then I saw a really good theory that
I liked, which is that Burt isn't severed and never
has been.
Speaker 3 (41:13):
He could sell it. I believe it. One of the
ones that something you sent me, Joel that I thought
was really interesting that I'd love to know more about.
Is the connection between Like what Natalie wears is essentially
the same jumpsuit as we see Gemma when she is where,
and I think there's some interesting stuff there, Like, is
(41:35):
the reason that mil Chick and Natalie connect not because
of some you know, they're looking at each other and
being like, oh, maybe we're both being exploited in this system,
or but actually because she is his Gemma? Like is
that something do they make? They do they bring in
people who are close and see to test how well
(41:55):
the severance is working. And do those women have to
constantly be traumatized and tortured and in this case, two
women of color that we've seen to keep proving that.
I think that that I don't think anything is aesthetically
an accident here. So I want to know the jumpsuit connection.
I think that's so interesting and otherwise I just want
(42:17):
to I would like to know, and I think this
is doable in a way that doesn't explode the show out.
I want to know the connection between Harmony and mcgarby
because I think that is going to be very very interesting.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
I mean, that is sadly the one you know, it's like,
that's the one conversation that if they are allowed to
have a five minute conversation on screen, then we know
everything about the show.
Speaker 3 (42:41):
Maybe maybe the writing's good enough to get around it,
but yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
My takeaway theory wise from this episode is, listen, we
saw the previous episode that Devin was like really struggling,
not really struggling with where to call Harmony was gonna
call her, and where Gobbi walked out and was like,
don't you dare call that woman. You're on your own
understandably right, And then then you know, Mark woke up
(43:08):
and we wondered what she would do, and clearly she
made the call but then she puts Mark on the
phone and says, we have a different idea.
Speaker 4 (43:15):
I think a lot of it.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
I do think that this call was significantly Mark's idea,
because I think whatever he has come to discover through reintegration,
he understands that.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
He needs Cobel.
Speaker 5 (43:33):
Now.
Speaker 3 (43:34):
Yeah, I was wondering if he's trying to draw her
back in and they're planning on taking Cabell as not
necessarily like a hostage, but holding her and trying to
get answers out of her. That was kind of the
feeling I got.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
I think he knows obviously knows a lot more now
about the and has the full a fuller picture, and
I think he knows that Cobell in her position would
have much more of the picture, and maybe he sees
her actions differently to that end.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
You know, we had been earlier.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
In the season, not now, I've been talking about like
a milk Chick redemption arc. I do think it's that
we get. I don't think that's happening, but I do
think we get a Cobel redemption arc for the wrong reasons,
Like I think that she will help Mark, but probably
not for pure reasons, not fully pure reasons, but I
(44:27):
think there we're gonna get something like a Cobel redemption arc.
Speaker 3 (44:30):
Okay here this is my bleakest possible ending, but I
do think it would hook people up. What if Cobell
somehow convinces Mark to essentially like go back in and
just like essentially take over her role as a manager,
to be able to be close to Jemma to kind
of and it's kind of about this systemic like what
will you accept if it works for you, Like if
(44:53):
you can get something you want out of this interesting
what will you do to other people? I don't think
they'll go there, but I do think it would be
an interesting hook. Obviously, then you know, sorry, right as Room,
I know I'm not part of you season three? You do?
Oh well, Mark's actually like a spy, a kind of
reverse Helena, and he wants to help everyone out. But
I think that could be a good hook on the
end where it seems like to get Jemma back, he's
(45:14):
willing to become part of the lumin system.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
Do we think that Mark, in his reintegration, has discovered
that there are more any any Marks than he was
aware of, because there is that Yeah, there is that
thing from the credits, the earlier version of the credits
where Cobel is looking.
Speaker 4 (45:33):
Down at all the little marks, and.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
I would not be completely surprised if on reintegration Mark
discovered all these other pieces of himself in there.
Speaker 6 (45:44):
There's also somebody did a rewatch of the first episode
for hints we may have missed, and there seems to
be this feeling that Mark is missing time in between
him going into the building and him appearing on the
lower floor, Like when he walks in, his boots are dry.
When he's taking them off before he goes down, they're
like covered and water. It seems to me that they
(46:07):
made such a big deal. What was that like episode
two where like the time was suddenly completely messed up
after he got reintegrated. So you kind of wonder, like, oh,
as he's getting further into his reintegration, will he discover
additional ania.
Speaker 3 (46:22):
And that's the one that also would would make sense
because of how hard it was to reintegrate him and
how he was kind of the reintegration was so dangerous
because how do you reintegrate into like how do you
reintegrate if there's like multiple versions of you that have
been seven Yeah, where is the time. Okay, I think
you guys here and I think that is a good likely.
(46:44):
We were right theory for the last two episodes. I'm
saying it now.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
On tomorrow's episode of Extra Vision, we're getting back into
the suit visiting our favorite Hell's Kitchen restaurant. In the
third episode of daredel Board again, that's it for this episode.
Thanks for listening, Thanks for joining us, Joelle.
Speaker 3 (47:01):
Thank you, Joel, and goodbye from luman our sponsor.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
X ray Vision is hosted by Jasoncepcion and Rosie Knight
and is a production of iHeart Podcast.
Speaker 3 (47:13):
Our executive producers are Joel Monique and Aaron Kaufman.
Speaker 4 (47:17):
Our supervising producer is Abu Zafar.
Speaker 3 (47:19):
Our producers are Common Laurent Dean Jonathan and Fay Wag.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
A theme song is by Brian Vasquez, with alternate theme
songs by Aaron Kaufman.
Speaker 3 (47:27):
Special thanks to Soul Rubin, Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman and
Heidi our discord moderator.
Warning today's episode Today spoilers for episode two eight of
Severance Sweet Vitriol. If you have not watched that, watch
it come back here you warning. Hello, my name is
(00:27):
Jason Concepcion and I'm rosday Night and welcome back to
Excervader of the podcast where we dive deep in your
favorite shows, movies, comics and pop culture coming from our
podcast or we're bringing you three episodes week every Tuesday, Wednesday,
and Thursday on Saturday.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
In today's episode, we are recapping and discussing the raw,
the sad, and depressing new episode of Severance Sweet Vitriol, which.
Speaker 3 (00:54):
Is currently on Apple TV Plus. We will be recapping
the episode. Then we're gonna fall up on our theory
corner and see where that's at. Maybe let's get to.
Speaker 1 (01:05):
It, okay. Episode two eight Sweet Vitriol, directed by Benjamin Stiller,
written oh by series creator Dan Erickson, Adam County, and
Casey Perry. This is a Kobel bottle and a little
bottle of ether for all you fans of Cobel out
(01:26):
and also the shortest run time of the season, and
I think almost of the series I need to go
and look back, but just over thirty five minutes, Cobell
is driving what I assume to be north.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
It feels like somewhere north, especially.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
In the North Ish, to a desolate coastal town called
salts Neck. It will turn out that this is her hometown.
On the way, Devin is like blowing up her phone,
but Cobel is just gonna.
Speaker 4 (01:57):
Leave her on read.
Speaker 1 (01:58):
She pulls up to the town and is brushing her
teeth and she's just looking around. And we get our
first look at this husk of a town where as
we will see, everyone who lives there is somehow attached
to the illicit ether trade. They are either huff in
the stuff out of a rag or as with Cobel's
(02:23):
former coworker Hampton, selling it. So she pulls up to
this diner, the Drippy Pot Cafe. Incredibly, the manager Hampton
is her old colleague aka former child laborer, alongside Harmony
Cobell at the Lumen Plant, which is on the outskirts
of town back.
Speaker 5 (02:42):
In the day.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
There is clearly something happened between them. Because clearly there's
something between them I seen as something like almost anger,
but just under the surface. Yes, Cobell says, wow, the
town looks like shit doesn't look anything like I remember
remembered it and Hampton, and one of my favorite parts
of this episode is this little spiel that Hampton gives,
(03:07):
which is he basically goes into the corporate jargony reasons
that the town now looks like absolute fucking shit, and
it's clear that he's like regurgitating this corporate pr speaks
story that was given to the inhabitants of the town
when Luman pulled out, She's like, can we go to
the factory to go discuss some things? So they go
there out by the factory, Cold Harbor question mark, Yeah,
(03:30):
the entire town mark Cold Harbor.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
They definitely want us to think that because it's literally
icy cold, coupled by the ocean, webs can come and go.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
So yes, they have an annoyingly cryptic conversation out here.
And I will say this was the one. This is
the This is not a bad episode, although I've seen
it as semi divisive, and.
Speaker 3 (03:54):
I think it's a little divisive. I think it widened well,
we'll talk about mobile. I think it widens the wild
of severance that is very different to what the peak
of the show has been. So I'm I'm not surprised
that it got people.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yes, but this is very This is an episode is
very dependent on those kind of maybe like the lowest
value cryptic conversations that Severance is known for, where two
characters or more characters are having a conversation with the
important information kind of lifted out that they know and
(04:30):
we don't. And this is one of those episodes where
I'm like noticing that.
Speaker 4 (04:33):
They're just having a scryptic conversation.
Speaker 1 (04:35):
Anyway, They're talking about Sissy, who it will turn out,
is Kobel's maternal aunt and a full on cure cultist
who took in Harmony when Harmony's mom was was ill
with ether related lung disease. Coobel admits that listen, I've
got some lumin heat on me. They're mad at me,
(04:56):
and so they're after me for whatever reason, and I
need to go talk to Sissy, but also I can't
be seen in case anybody's watching the house. So Cobel
is like, can you take me up there? So Cobel
then drops some cure lore about the factory, saying, you
know Kiri, which we've seen, We've seen the painting right
where yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:14):
There's a g I will say if you are not
somebody who watches the recaps, this is a great episode
because I have to say, if there is an editing
award for a recap and a previously on that actually
tells you every single thing you need to know, this
episode has an unbelievable recap where you get some really
(05:36):
great quotes and kind of context from Helena. There's this
great moment where she and me and Joel were kind
of going mad about this one where she shows her
saying to Harmony in a previous episode like you overestimate
your brilliance and underestimate your blessings. And you can start
to see the bitterness and kind of why the vegans
might not like Harmony in this episode. And then yeah,
(06:00):
we get the Imagiant and Kia paintings and kind of
the the we it's such a good raycap, Like give
that head some money, because I was really like, whoa
they they drool the threads together for me? But yes,
so we've seen the paintings. We kind of know a
bit more. But now we're getting the real law.
Speaker 1 (06:18):
Right, So apparently according to the Egan lower kir Met.
Speaker 4 (06:26):
His partner imagen imaging imaging.
Speaker 3 (06:30):
Yeah, I'm a giant imagine they say it and strange.
They say it in a stranger basically imagen at the.
Speaker 1 (06:36):
Ether factory, and Hampton is like, oh was her Like
were her lungs ravaged as well? And then Cobel is like,
take me up to Sissy. So they go up there,
and Cobel rides in the in the bed of Hampton's
pickup just in case the Luogoons are watching. Hampton is
clearly not a fan of Sissy at all. Cobel knocks
(06:58):
on the door, barges in, and Cissy's like, what the
fuck are you doing here? She just goes in and
starts looking around, and we see that there. You know
that clearly Harmony and Hampton grew up here because we
see their growth markers on the door, like any house
that has children in it. And Cobel is looking for
desperately looking around for her stuff. There's something in her
(07:20):
stuff that was that she needs. There's a plaque on
the wall announcing that Sissy real name Celestine. Cobel was
like the lumin version of employee of the Month, but
it's like employee.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
Of the Quarter, like the striver of the quarter.
Speaker 3 (07:34):
You're like a cult follower of yes.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Like so, Harmony's like, where's my stuff, Where's my childhood stuff?
Where's my stuff from when I was a kid, when
I was a student, when I was in the Fellow
Tide Wintertide Fellowship.
Speaker 4 (07:47):
I need all that stuff. Cecy's like, well, I sold
it to the.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
Poor everyone has bo babe, why did you sell it to?
Speaker 4 (07:53):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (07:54):
Why did you do that?
Speaker 1 (07:56):
And Harmony's like, well, has anybody from Lumen come.
Speaker 4 (07:59):
By or called?
Speaker 1 (08:00):
And He's like, yeah, mister Drummond called. And it's clear
that Sissy knows that Harmony is in some kind of trouble.
Harmony immediately runs over, disconnects the phone, rips the fucking
cordla phone, and then is like, give me the key
to my mom's room. And here's an interesting exchange. She
then asks Cissy, what were my mother's last last words?
(08:24):
And it basically accuses Cissy of like against.
Speaker 4 (08:28):
Her mother's will, pulling her mother.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Off of life support, and Cissy is basically implies that
her mother wanted her to take her off life support
and then says of Harmony's mom quote, if only she
was a believer, perhaps she would have found solace in
the Nine. The nine, you know, the command.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Potentially, which is also of cure. Yeah, okay, So if
I'm dying of lung disease from either recycle, I'm going
to be I'm like, I'm gonna be thinking about vision
of witch, realty, benevolence, nimbleness, wild, how you.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
Will be lifted away. But I found the the last
word it felt very weighted, to the point where I
was like, it almost made me wonder if Sissy.
Speaker 4 (09:23):
Truly knew her reasons for.
Speaker 1 (09:27):
In a severance kind of way, truly understood what happened
when she took Mom off life support, was that her
doing that was There's some because clearly, you know, Ether
was one and early product of Women, which we now
understand is a pharma tech kind of company makes a
(09:47):
lot of products, but forman tech seem to be the mainstays,
and that Ether was an early attempt at like wiping
people's minds so that they would not experience and the
rigor of the work they were doing.
Speaker 3 (10:02):
They were like, oh, you can basically just use ether
as essentially an anesthetic, but a walking anesthetic, because ether
is an anesthetic. But they were like, can you get
people to be on it so they don't notice how
bad their lives are, which is honestly very real. Like
up north in England in places where there was a
(10:23):
lot of minds, there was big like pain huffing culture
and like different kind of substance abuse because of how
bad it was to work in the minds and to
be a child laborer and stuff. So this is actually
like very depressingly real. But it's interesting to see how
they're now going to take that and as we learn
(10:43):
later in this episode, kind of how it became severance
as we know it now.
Speaker 1 (10:48):
We get a lot of information from this back and
forth argument between Harmony and her aunt, including that Harmony's
mom really started to serious declined when Harmony was at
school and Cissy kept this from her. She said, I
would have come back to take care of her. But
Sissy is like, no, it was so important that you
(11:09):
were in the Wintertide Fellow and like you're a Wintertide
fellow and Keer saw you with his own eye, Jamee,
and you know it was like you are you're such
an incredible striver, like you were hand hicked by the Egans.
He saw Kier and you yes, say James saw here
in you. All that kind of stuff Harmony is like, well,
what a drummond want when he called? And Sissy doesn't say,
(11:32):
but basically is like, just go back, ask forgiveness from
the Egans and they will agree to forgive you. And
Harmony looks down in Cissy's hands as she's playing with
some kind of like jame Egan dollhead, which will become
clear what this reminds her of later, but that sparks
something in her. She remembers something about the things she's
(11:52):
looking for, runs up to Sissy's room and then basically
like cop tosses it, looks through everything, finds the key
to mom's room, and then goes to open the door.
And we're gonna take a quick break to.
Speaker 4 (12:06):
Listen to a word from our sponsors.
Speaker 5 (12:07):
Then we're going to talk about what is inside there,
and we're back.
Speaker 1 (12:24):
First of all, I would have just kicked the door open,
because this house looks like it hasn't been updated built
like one. Yeah, just like bad boy in worry about
the Pompy.
Speaker 3 (12:37):
Is strong compared to everyone else here, who's like fucked
up on etha like she.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Anyway, she gets the key, she goes inside and there's
her mother's room just as it must have appeared when
she was ill and when she passed away. You know,
the the bed is raised at at like a forty
five degree angle, so that which is easier for people
with bathing issues. It's easier to breathe when you're resting.
Speaker 4 (13:03):
When you're sitting up slightly.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
We see the breathing machine, We see her moth eaten,
her mother's moth eaten clothes in the closet. We see
a picture what I assume to be Harmony when she
was a child. And then Harmony lays on the bed.
And it's interesting because I perceive this as she puts
(13:27):
the breathing tube to her mouth and begins breathing through it.
And I perceive this as she's trying to get in
touch with her mother's last week's, last.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
Months exactly like what did it feel like. It's a
really unsettling and kind of depressing image because there's also
the duality of like she's like laying there like breathing
into her breathing in and out, and it's very similar
to kind of the ether huffing kind of breathing that
you would do. There's a lot of layers here, and
(13:58):
I have to say which I'm way you feel about
the episode. Patricia Ucat is absolutely killing it, like this
is a powerhouse episode and I wouldn't be surprised with
that trying to put forward for some awarned contention here.
Speaker 1 (14:13):
So she Harmony cries herself sleep, and then we see
this image that I originally thought was like something under
a microscope, like crystals and her microscope, but which our
discord chief Heidi tells me is like a satellite shot
of ice that they then superimposed over the waters in
(14:38):
the bay, kind of sloshing around against the testing. And
then time passes and Harmony is awakened to the sound
of Hampton and Sissy arguing as he comes in to
basically look for and he's he's just like, you.
Speaker 4 (14:57):
Know, it's been a long time, and I'm freezing like what.
Speaker 3 (14:59):
He outside of a truck? Why are you having a nap? Like, please,
it's very cold out there.
Speaker 1 (15:04):
Harmony is like, I can't find it, whatever it is,
and they talk about her mom. Hampton liked her. When
Harmony says, well you barely knew her, he says she
hated lumin more than I did. That's all I needed
to know. So interesting interesting details.
Speaker 3 (15:19):
Yeah, it also feels like adds to the idea that
Sissy probably took her off life support or you know,
killed her, because potentially, I don't know, maybe she was
an early hater of Lumen in a way that could
impact the rest of what we see going on in
the rest of the seas.
Speaker 1 (15:36):
Hampton then asks like, do you want to get huh,
pulls out an ether rag and gets into it. You know,
Harmony huffs a little, rag gets into that rag, and
she's like, I haven't done that since I was eight,
And it was clear this was part of the work day,
because Hampton is like, you're ready to man the that
for ten hours, which is just dire.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (15:59):
She then tells.
Speaker 1 (16:00):
Hampton that it's shameful that you sell this, and they kiss,
and then suddenly Harmony's like, oh, now I'm getting another
piece of where that stuff might be. And we're realizing
that whether it's ether or her long life, Harmony's memory
is spotty as like, not as spotty as obviously someone
has been severed, but like she's trying to claw back
(16:22):
that year in a way that many characters.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
There's still stuff she can't remember.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
So she gets the idea and she's like, Sissy would
not have thrown my stuff away or given it to
the poor.
Speaker 4 (16:32):
I don't believe that.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
She goes outside to like a kind of underground pantry,
a cold room, and she finds her stuff, including like
a lumin yearbook and with her like Wintertide fellow right
up in there, and some stuff animals, and then she
finds her Wintertide like Fellowship award bust of James Egan.
(16:55):
And that is the thing that sparked when she looked
in Cissy's hands and saw her holding like a Jame
Egan doll head. This is what sparked in her because
inside of the bust, she unscrews the base. Inside there
is a rolled up leather bound notebook, and then she goes.
She immediately runs into Sissy, and she's brandishing the rolled
(17:19):
up notebook and she's like, I'm leaving now. Don't tell
the lumins that I was here. And Sissy's like, I
would never lie to an Egan.
Speaker 3 (17:25):
Oh, come on.
Speaker 1 (17:32):
Sissy is like, listen, you owe the Egans. You're fealty
because of what they lifted you up from nothing and
the fellowship, and look at your great success and all
the things you've done in your life. It's all because
of them, so you can never go against them. Harmony
then says, oh, I owe them, and she opens the
notebook and she's screaming that like, basically, severance was her idea.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Quite to me.
Speaker 4 (17:55):
It's the design, the.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
Chip, the surgery, the brain waves, the glass go block,
all the fucking shit that is involved in the process,
the technology created by her and stolen essentially by Jame
Egan and passed off as his own. She Harmony says, like,
they told me if I sought credit for this, that
I would be banished whatever that means from the e
(18:18):
I guess from the Egan cult. And Sissy then tries
to burn the notebook, which come on, baby, why Harmony
snatches it out of the fire and says basically that
she hopes that she dies, and then Sissy's like, well,
oh yeah, well your mom pulled the tube out herself.
She clawed it out of her neck, and Harmony's like,
(18:40):
oh well, I don't fucking believe you. Meanwhile, Hampton is
honking because someone's coming. Harmony gets into Hampton's car is like,
I'm leaving, and Hampton is like, well, I'm gonna stay here,
and face whatever this is, and then Harmony speeds off
and you see these headlights approaching and Hampton says, come
to take these tempers assholes. Meanwhile in the truck, Harmony
(19:04):
finally answers her phone. It's Devin. Devin is like, oh
my god, thank God. Like Mark is integrating, but we
want to we want to try something else, she says,
and immediately Harmony understands that only Regabi could have done this,
the reintegration process with Mark, and then she's like, put
(19:27):
Mark on the phone, markets on the phone, and then
we basically cut.
Speaker 3 (19:32):
Yeah, She's like tell me everything.
Speaker 4 (19:34):
Yeah to Oh, what's the name of that bed?
Speaker 3 (19:37):
Oh everyone's favorite patent?
Speaker 4 (19:44):
Oh yeah it was what was it? Firewoman? I think
by the Cult.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Which pointed here's a little trivia, a little trivia for you. Yeah,
very pointed, right. The Cult also a little trivia that
I think the lead singer for the Cult was like
in the Running for Play Jim Morrison in the Doors movie. Anyway,
let's go to a quick ad and then come back
and talk about this episode. And we're back, Rosie. We
(20:24):
got a lot of interesting stuff in this episode. It
is a little light of an episode in terms of
connected to something to everything else.
Speaker 4 (20:33):
But your thoughts on this episode.
Speaker 3 (20:35):
I think that it broadens the world in a way
I do find intriguing, but I give.
Speaker 4 (20:43):
You some of the really important backstory.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
It gives us some of the backstory. It also kind
of hints at what is out there, because I've always
thought one of the most interesting things about separance is
we know what the Ennis are trying to escape, but
we never really know what the our ties are kind
of living through, Like is the Egan cult something that
(21:06):
is in control of the world like we we it's
there's They could do a broad kind of rug pull
where they reveal and I think this does broaden it
a bit. I get why people were kind of shocked
by the shift, but I do also think that there
is something very interesting about Harmony's journey here and the
(21:30):
you know, yeah, it is as I saw a lot
of people talking about, it's very interesting to be like, oh,
a woman made this and it was stolen, but also
then she stayed within the company and used it to
exploit many other people, And I think that it adds
a moral complexity. I also think that Regarbi and Harmony
(21:52):
clearly have some kind of past together and I'm interested
also to know. I believe what Sis she said when
she said that Harmony's mom pulled out her own breathing tube.
And I think the reason why is because Harmony's mom
was told that her daughter had created this kind of
even more extreme, horrible thing, and I think she was horrified.
(22:14):
I thought this was a very hard episode to watch,
but not because it wasn't good. It's just incredibly depressing. Amply,
it is a very very depressing episode something I mean
Severance has had. I just think that they the genre
concept and the mystery when You're in with the Innies
has kind of had a lightness to it that this
episode does not have.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
You know, it's it's a very very bleak episode, down
to the landscape being bleak and like it's almost lifeless,
like a moonscape this episode. I agree with you in
everything you're saying about, you know, the harmony of it all.
I think that the way I perceived this, the complexity
of her creating the Severance procedure, is that, like I
(22:58):
think it was an act of love. I think she
saw her mom be damaged by the mines, she watched
everyone around her be damaged by breathing in this ether,
and she thought, okay.
Speaker 4 (23:09):
Since.
Speaker 1 (23:10):
I mean, like, it's crazy that the culture of working
for Egan is like, we do such crazy, rigorous, dangerous
work that you want to not remember you were there
when you leave, Like, how can we make how can
we make that part of it essentially like a kind
of punch clock slavery situation, you know, where you're a
slave when you punch in, but then you leave and
(23:31):
you're and you're fine, you're yourself. And clearly coming up
with this procedure was an act of love, almost like
the others would have saved my mom's life, her lungs
would not have been ravage. Here's a way that you
can separate yourself from the dangerous work that you do
and still be able to like have a family and
(23:52):
have an enriching life outside of that. Not understanding the
horrors of the thing that she had created clearly, and
it's uncles to me now whether she really believes it,
believes in the horrors of what she's mad having seen
all the things that she's must have seen. So I
thought that I really enjoyed that part of it. I
(24:12):
thought it was so interesting. This is a good episode
not a bad one. I think, on the scale of
severance is so high quality that it's like there are
no bad episodes.
Speaker 4 (24:19):
But this was the one episode.
Speaker 1 (24:21):
Where I became a little worried as I texted you
about the Donnie Darko syndrome, which is that when the
mystery is active and you don't know air quotes what
the show is about, there's this propulsion to you know,
there's this fascination, almost like a magical hold that the
story has on you, where it's so intriguing, but as
(24:43):
soon as you know, it becomes dumb. And this only
I was only worried about it because you barely notice
watching this show and being a fan of it, that
almost all the mystery would go away if only certain
characters would just have a conversation. For instance, if we
would just like have a conversation or watch a conversation
(25:06):
between like Cobell and Regabi, or like a full conversation
between Mark and Regaby, almost everything that we were wondering
about would be like lifted, like the veil would be lifted.
The fact that we're not annoyed by that shows us
what a great show this is.
Speaker 4 (25:19):
And I think, mm hmm. I while I thought this
was a good episode. I hope not too many more
of these, because.
Speaker 3 (25:26):
I'm interested to see where they go next.
Speaker 1 (25:29):
A few more of these and people will start to
be like, why can't we have that conversation with Gaby,
Why can't we know more about what's going on in Yeah?
Speaker 3 (25:36):
So I agree, no, no, no, no, I agree. I
think I've definitely seen a lot of very divisive reactions
online as well, like is this the first bad episode
of Severance? Like I don't think, no, this is not
a badly made episode of television. Now does it fit
into your world of what you were hoping Severance would be?
Now that's the question, because I do think something else
that's really interesting that this episode raises is we've will
(25:59):
be and like, you know, clones, goats, like what's going on?
But also I'm like, miss Wang, maybe it's just child labor,
Like she's another child, just child labor, and they you
do it. So I'm interested because I think that the
moral complexity of where this show is at could get
(26:22):
very very very intriguing and messy and real if they've
got the chops. I do believe the show has the chops.
I also want before we get into kind of where
this leaves us before the last two episodes. I want
super producer Joelle to jump in because she is the
queen of theories on this show, and I know she
has a lot of thoughts about Severs episode eight from
(26:45):
season two.
Speaker 6 (26:47):
Hi, guys, Hi, there's really just one theory for me
this week, and I text you guys about it, and
it's a thing that's been talked about in sevent for
a really long time. You have all these illusions to
the Civil War. Cold Harbor is a big battle that
the South one really decimated the North during the Civil War.
People have been online being like, hey, we don't want
(27:09):
this show, for very obvious reasons, to be about slavery.
But I'm just like, with the child labor infusion this week,
I just have to think, like, is this show just
about the impact of slavery on labor and throughout like
American history, Like, there's a reason we keep going back
to all of these different these and time periods. There's
a reason. Like I really liked this episode. I was
(27:31):
kind of surprised by the reaction, although maybe I shouldn't be.
Bottle episodes are notoriously Yeah, not a bottle episode but
these all shoots of like one character far away from
everybody are often controversial, but to me, I always feel
like this is the writers being able to expand the
story in such an interesting way and watching Harmony navigate
her past, and especially like that whole breathing tube scene.
(27:55):
So you guys mentioned, oh like it. It's sort of
like the huffing. It's sort of her connected to her mother.
To me, I was like, is she suckling? Is this
her like perverting to being a right?
Speaker 4 (28:06):
Yeah, in a way, there's that too, for sure.
Speaker 6 (28:09):
I was like this, this whole episode to me, really
cemented a lot, to the point where I was like,
are there mysteries left in this show?
Speaker 5 (28:16):
Like hop like this is a series.
Speaker 6 (28:17):
About it's just just about the impact of slavery, labor
and throughout history. And I was so compelled by that
as like a thought experiment, And I was curious if
that works for you guys, or if that idea of
that it's off putting for you. I know a lot
of people are like, please don't touch this, Oh messy,
it's so difficult.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
Well, I think that obviously in America, first of all,
slavery as a practice is like sadly an age old
and global industry or was, and it has a very
specific and I think different kind of connotation here in America,
(28:55):
which I'm not super eager to is like the basis
of a show, but I don't think that that's necessarily
what this show is about. I think what this show
is about is like the gray line between work and exploitation.
And like one thing I was thinking about with this show,
(29:18):
you have this factory in this town, and then it
closes down and you see the devastation that it leaves behind.
But when it was active, it was actively devastating the community,
getting kids looked on ether and then it's pulled out
and you get this very cynical, cutting mini speech from
(29:39):
Hampton in which he spouts the kind of corporate capitalist
jargon about the reasons that they pulled the heart out
of the town. The heart of the town was this
terrible factory that was killing everybody. But now that it's gone,
nobody's happy about that either. And I think that's what
this show is about. It's about the fact that we've
created this exploit tative system that nurtures and sustains and
(30:04):
exploits us all and the only thing worse than this
terrible exploitive system is if it goes away, And I think,
because there's nothing else, there's only chaos afterwards.
Speaker 4 (30:17):
And to me, that's what this show is about.
Speaker 1 (30:20):
It's about quote air quotes late stage capitalism, which is
late stage capitalism to me means we don't have any
other ideas except this horrible thing that we are actively.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
Doing that's getting more horrible.
Speaker 1 (30:34):
Yeah, So that to me is what this show is about,
not necessarily not slavery.
Speaker 4 (30:39):
It's about exploitation.
Speaker 6 (30:41):
It's like, yeah, we're trying to like recreate or something
like that, which I've seen some theory.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
Oh yeah, you see that theory.
Speaker 6 (30:47):
That's the case. But I do think if when you
look at labor structure through it's consistently like our laws
are constantly Oh, let me, it's the reason we have,
like was like two thirty minimm wage for waiters and
things like that. I think like that thread is being
constantly put to your point, this space now where people
(31:08):
are like, hey, as awful as places, I would rather
just be high so I can survive it because I
don't seem like an outside of it, And I think
that works really well. I'm excited to see Harmony re
enter the picture. The thing that was also really interesting
to me and Rosie and I Sideline talked about this
a little bit, was like this the way people felt
about Harmony after this episode. I thought it was really
(31:28):
interesting because it's massively divided. Some people were like, hey,
you were a part of the system, and then you
created a device that a sort of allows you to
survive being a part of that system, which I think
is haunting.
Speaker 3 (31:42):
Probably came from yeah, like she doesn't want about how
was it used.
Speaker 6 (31:47):
Yeah, because it's really interesting to think about, Like, Okay,
so Harmony is both a victim and a supporter of
the system, right and and potentially making the lives of
folks within the sysem much worse. But she was trying
to do that by alleviating the daily stress and impact
of the ten hours you have to be on the grind.
(32:07):
And I think that there are a lot of folks
who are like, oh, she's a hero now because she
sees the evil and she's marching back.
Speaker 3 (32:15):
But we don't know, I mean, we don't know. I'm like, guys,
I will say too ahead of the game. We don't
know what she's I don't know. Also, I just want
to say before Joel and Jason, I both think you're right.
I think that this is a show and I do
think that to talk about exploitation in America well around
the world and the way labor works is to recognize
(32:38):
that when slavers were stopped from owning people, they had
to find new ways to exploit people. And I do
think that the show wants to reckon with how that
impacts global economy and capitalism. And I also want to say,
and I'm sorry if you don't want to hear me,
make this about real life right now, how you can
(33:00):
put your ear off song, because I know sometimes people
get tired of me. But like, guess what, Slavery still exists,
and it's called the prison industrial system, and in its
own way, severance is very much akin to that, because
it is this idea of you go into somewhere and
when you are in there, you are allowed to be
a slave, even though in every other part of American
(33:22):
culture allegedly slavery does not exist. But in the prison
system people are used as indentured servitude labor. They don't
earn money, and giant corporations make millions and millions of
dollars of the off of them, huge companies like Walmart,
like you know, Victoria's Secret, Like, there are companies that
do that. And I think that if this show has
(33:44):
the chops and it is exploring that, I think there's
a lot of similarities there that could be explored. And
obviously child labor is a part of that too, because
that has long been a way that working class people
and people without opportunities to move up the social lata
in capitalism have been exploited. But yes, so I think
(34:05):
that it's really interesting. I don't think we're getting any
of those answers in the next two episodes. I think
that's like a season three season full type.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
You know, I've been thinking about this before we dive
into a real theory corner, I think it's maybe useful
to just kind of list off what we actually know
for sure, and so let's start here Lumen. Lumen is
a company with its roots in the mid nineteenth century.
We know that they started, you know, with topical salves
(34:36):
and clearly ether this is kind of like early pharmaceutical industry,
and are now a company that works in the kind
of confluence of tech medicine and pharmaceuticals somewhere in there, right.
Speaker 3 (34:52):
And they do.
Speaker 1 (34:52):
They probably do other stuff as well, but it seems
like medical supplies, technology and pharmaceuticals is where Lumen works
because we remember, I remember there was like a piece
of dialogue earlier in the show where they were talking
about someone was sick because they had taken like non
lumin medication. So we understand that there's Helene I had
(35:14):
taken non limit. We know that we know that Severance
was created by a Harmony Cobell who was then the
manager of the Severed Floor but lost her job in
the Severance Uprising for reasons that are kind of still
like a little.
Speaker 3 (35:31):
Is it because they felt like she failed because the
seven people were able to rebel? I'm interested in that also,
how much I think it's.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
Because I think it's because she was being too nice
or what they perceived to be. It's very clear to
me that they part of what they like about Miltchik
is milk Chick. When they're like, you got to crack down,
Meltchick's like fine, and Cobel was not willing, perhaps to
crack down in the way that Miltchick is.
Speaker 6 (35:59):
Cobell did what she wanted to do.
Speaker 4 (36:02):
She did what she wanted to do.
Speaker 6 (36:04):
At this point, like when they're like, hey, be less smart,
he's like, all right, I'll grow up. I'll just yell
at myself in a mirror until I conform to year
they were. His harmony is like I'll pretend to be
a milk helper and like teach this woman.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1 (36:19):
Well I think like the introduction of miss Casey into
the severed flass clearly her idea, and it went badly.
We know that you can be severed multiple times, which
was a big question mark, right. We know that specifically
the board level people and probably management level people look
at Innis with utter disdain. And we know that that
(36:43):
this process was seen, at least in some leadership circles
in Lumen as a kind of way to like rehabilitate
people who were either criminals as we saw with Bert,
or maybe something else. Is that all we know?
Speaker 3 (36:59):
But that's a lot, that's a lot. We That's the
funny thing, like Joelle said where she was like she
watched this episode and she was like, is there a mystery?
Like is it just about this person who is like
escape child labor by creating apparently a more humane way
to create a labor force and is now living with it.
I think it really could be that simple. I'm interested
(37:22):
to see if they do a big swing kind of
genre hint moment at the end, because they have to
have that hook in the last two episodes to make
people want to watch season three.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
Here's what the miss there's there's two mysteries to me.
One is why is Jemma down there? Like why what
does specifically her being down there accomplish for the company,
Because clearly that's important, right and Mark's work with Cold
Harbor is tied up in that. That's to me the
(37:57):
central mystery. Why is Jemma down there? Why they kidnap her?
Why do they make her disappear? And why is she
so important or whatever the project is, because what the
project is, I think is kind of that the central mystery.
And then the second overall missing piece, to me, that
is kind of mystery, and we've gotten hints of it.
What does the rest of the world know about Severance
(38:19):
and what do they think about it?
Speaker 4 (38:20):
Like we get these hints.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
That like, oh, the story of your innies became very popular,
like on the outside, it was all over the news
like this. Uprising notes we get these hints right where
they say stuff like that, but we don't really know
what people almost.
Speaker 3 (38:33):
It's like, is it just a company town.
Speaker 1 (38:36):
We don't really know what people think about it. And
I think that's an important part of this, because do
we live in a world in which this is fine, right,
or do we live in a world in which this
is not?
Speaker 3 (38:48):
Okay? That's kind of a big deal.
Speaker 6 (38:51):
I got a hint of it when Dylan was interviewing
at the Door Factory and it was all going well
until the guys are like leaning into like, oh, you're
severed and so definitely, and then a little bit when
we go to Birt's place and when you're like, okay,
so the church is okay with it. Is it like
(39:12):
connected to Lumen in a larger way or is it
that like there's something really about that where they're like, hey, no,
these are like individuals who still have a chance of
getting saved at the end of their lives. I think
it's probably split. I'm curious to see, like to what level, Yeah, like,
are were people marching in the streets against it? Is
this just a thing where like, hey, if you choose
to do it like that's your business. I think that
(39:33):
will be really interesting. I do hope we find out
like I hope we get a world opener at the
very end. I hope we see a different space or
a different angle outside of the main building to sort
of fill that space. And I'm also hoping, yeah, I'm
also hoping, like I really love when the penultimate episode
has a big reveal and then the finale is questions.
(39:54):
That's always really thrilling to me. I hope that's the
direction we're going with season two.
Speaker 3 (39:58):
Yeah, I do think. I I would love to see
if it's going to be like a kind of, you know,
a classic very divisive pull out where you kind of
realize that the places that have severance are almost like
company towns where no one else can go, and there's
kind of like what Saltsneck was, but in an even
more broad way where there's I'm very interested. I think,
(40:21):
as much as we know, they're doing a good job
of keeping us intrigued with questions like this that could
be completely relevant or absolutely irrelevant, and we never get
the answers to them. So I'm interested for the next
two episodes to see.
Speaker 1 (40:36):
Why any theories any did this episode change or create
any new theories for you, Joel.
Speaker 6 (40:43):
No, I'm just more convinced than ever that Milchik is
also part of this like fellowship program back in the day, I.
Speaker 4 (40:52):
Know that miss as a wintertime.
Speaker 6 (40:54):
Fellow harmony was like his like.
Speaker 4 (40:58):
Teacher or like maybe she victim or something.
Speaker 6 (41:01):
Yeah, And then I saw a really good theory that
I liked, which is that Burt isn't severed and never
has been.
Speaker 3 (41:13):
He could sell it. I believe it. One of the
ones that something you sent me, Joel that I thought
was really interesting that I'd love to know more about.
Is the connection between Like what Natalie wears is essentially
the same jumpsuit as we see Gemma when she is where,
and I think there's some interesting stuff there, Like, is
(41:35):
the reason that mil Chick and Natalie connect not because
of some you know, they're looking at each other and
being like, oh, maybe we're both being exploited in this system,
or but actually because she is his Gemma? Like is
that something do they make? They do they bring in
people who are close and see to test how well
(41:55):
the severance is working. And do those women have to
constantly be traumatized and tortured and in this case, two
women of color that we've seen to keep proving that.
I think that that I don't think anything is aesthetically
an accident here. So I want to know the jumpsuit connection.
I think that's so interesting and otherwise I just want
(42:17):
to I would like to know, and I think this
is doable in a way that doesn't explode the show out.
I want to know the connection between Harmony and mcgarby
because I think that is going to be very very interesting.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
I mean, that is sadly the one you know, it's like,
that's the one conversation that if they are allowed to
have a five minute conversation on screen, then we know
everything about the show.
Speaker 3 (42:41):
Maybe maybe the writing's good enough to get around it,
but yeah.
Speaker 1 (42:47):
My takeaway theory wise from this episode is, listen, we
saw the previous episode that Devin was like really struggling,
not really struggling with where to call Harmony was gonna
call her, and where Gobbi walked out and was like,
don't you dare call that woman. You're on your own
understandably right, And then then you know, Mark woke up
(43:08):
and we wondered what she would do, and clearly she
made the call but then she puts Mark on the
phone and says, we have a different idea.
Speaker 4 (43:15):
I think a lot of it.
Speaker 1 (43:18):
I do think that this call was significantly Mark's idea,
because I think whatever he has come to discover through reintegration,
he understands that.
Speaker 4 (43:32):
He needs Cobel.
Speaker 5 (43:33):
Now.
Speaker 3 (43:34):
Yeah, I was wondering if he's trying to draw her
back in and they're planning on taking Cabell as not
necessarily like a hostage, but holding her and trying to
get answers out of her. That was kind of the
feeling I got.
Speaker 1 (43:48):
I think he knows obviously knows a lot more now
about the and has the full a fuller picture, and
I think he knows that Cobell in her position would
have much more of the picture, and maybe he sees
her actions differently to that end.
Speaker 4 (44:02):
You know, we had been earlier.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
In the season, not now, I've been talking about like
a milk Chick redemption arc. I do think it's that
we get. I don't think that's happening, but I do
think we get a Cobel redemption arc for the wrong reasons,
Like I think that she will help Mark, but probably
not for pure reasons, not fully pure reasons, but I
(44:27):
think there we're gonna get something like a Cobel redemption arc.
Speaker 3 (44:30):
Okay here this is my bleakest possible ending, but I
do think it would hook people up. What if Cobell
somehow convinces Mark to essentially like go back in and
just like essentially take over her role as a manager,
to be able to be close to Jemma to kind
of and it's kind of about this systemic like what
will you accept if it works for you, Like if
(44:53):
you can get something you want out of this interesting
what will you do to other people? I don't think
they'll go there, but I do think it would be
an interesting hook. Obviously, then you know, sorry, right as Room,
I know I'm not part of you season three? You do?
Oh well, Mark's actually like a spy, a kind of
reverse Helena, and he wants to help everyone out. But
I think that could be a good hook on the
end where it seems like to get Jemma back, he's
(45:14):
willing to become part of the lumin system.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
Do we think that Mark, in his reintegration, has discovered
that there are more any any Marks than he was
aware of, because there is that Yeah, there is that
thing from the credits, the earlier version of the credits
where Cobel is looking.
Speaker 4 (45:33):
Down at all the little marks, and.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
I would not be completely surprised if on reintegration Mark
discovered all these other pieces of himself in there.
Speaker 6 (45:44):
There's also somebody did a rewatch of the first episode
for hints we may have missed, and there seems to
be this feeling that Mark is missing time in between
him going into the building and him appearing on the
lower floor, Like when he walks in, his boots are dry.
When he's taking them off before he goes down, they're
like covered and water. It seems to me that they
(46:07):
made such a big deal. What was that like episode
two where like the time was suddenly completely messed up
after he got reintegrated. So you kind of wonder, like, oh,
as he's getting further into his reintegration, will he discover
additional ania.
Speaker 3 (46:22):
And that's the one that also would would make sense
because of how hard it was to reintegrate him and
how he was kind of the reintegration was so dangerous
because how do you reintegrate into like how do you
reintegrate if there's like multiple versions of you that have
been seven Yeah, where is the time. Okay, I think
you guys here and I think that is a good likely.
(46:44):
We were right theory for the last two episodes. I'm
saying it now.
Speaker 1 (46:50):
On tomorrow's episode of Extra Vision, we're getting back into
the suit visiting our favorite Hell's Kitchen restaurant. In the
third episode of daredel Board again, that's it for this episode.
Thanks for listening, Thanks for joining us, Joelle.
Speaker 3 (47:01):
Thank you, Joel, and goodbye from luman our sponsor.
Speaker 1 (47:08):
X ray Vision is hosted by Jasoncepcion and Rosie Knight
and is a production of iHeart Podcast.
Speaker 3 (47:13):
Our executive producers are Joel Monique and Aaron Kaufman.
Speaker 4 (47:17):
Our supervising producer is Abu Zafar.
Speaker 3 (47:19):
Our producers are Common Laurent Dean Jonathan and Fay Wag.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
A theme song is by Brian Vasquez, with alternate theme
songs by Aaron Kaufman.
Speaker 3 (47:27):
Special thanks to Soul Rubin, Chris Lord, Kenny Goodman and
Heidi our discord moderator.
Hosts And Creators
Jason Concepcion
Rosie Knight
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