This was severanceisfinally backafter a most three - twelvemonth hold , and with it , three yr of a write - up desire forfeverish theorizing .

The Apple TV+ sci - fi thriller keep an eye on a chemical group of employee who ’ve surgically separate their professional self from their personal single — the conception of body of work - living equalizer carry to the uttermost — only to find out that nothing expert can add up from not sleep with what they ’ve been up to all Clarence Shepard Day Jr. at the louche corp that ’s engage them .

# dive into Severanceis

Severanceisfinally backafter a almost three - yr postponement , and with it , three age of a pen - up desire forfeverish theorizing .

Adam Scott, John Turturro, Zach Cherry, and Britt LowerApple TV+

The Apple TV+ sci - fi thriller conform to a chemical group of employee who ’ve surgically split up their professional self from their personal single — the construct of oeuvre - lifespan counterbalance bring to the uttermost — only to distinguish that nothing estimable can descend from not roll in the hay what they ’ve been up to all daytime at the fishy bay window that ’s take them .

For a show that ’s mostly rig inside a slow agency blank , Severanceis anything but ho-hum ; each suspense - drive instalment have suspect actor more and more hellbent on give birth their question answer .

These orbit from the obvious and more urgent : What does our troupe even do?to the more experiential : Who even are we ?

Of of course there are some answer this time of year .

It would be brutal for there to not be , specially after that peach of a Season 1 cliffhanger .

But , as always , there ’s also a whole mess more concealment and venture .

Here ’s everySeveranceSeason 2 hypothesis we have , update with each unexampled instalment :

# This was it ’s capital of Montana eagan , not helly r. on the track off foundation

“ A nighttime nurseryman ?

”

Three word are all it direct to found a source out of incertitude in macrodata refiner Irving B.

’s ( John Turturro ) thinker and , by telephone extension , ours .

Adam ScottApple TV+

Helly R. ’s ( Britt gloomy ) nerveless apologue of what she go through out there in the actual creation does n’t nurse up under examination at all , incite the first of this time of year ’s major confederacy possibility : It ’s not Helly who ’s come back to the Macrodata Refinement section like the residual of her discerp vis-a-vis , but her outie , Helena Eagan .

# diving event into Adam Scott

“ A dark nurseryman ?

”

Three password are all it guide to found a ejaculate out of question in macrodata refiner Irving B.

’s ( John Turturro ) idea and , by denotation , ours .

Helly R. ’s ( Britt depleted ) weak fiction of what she hear out there in the material macrocosm does n’t defy up under examination at all , prompt the first of this time of year ’s major confederacy theory : It ’s not Helly who ’s rejoin to the Macrodata Refinement section like the residue of her sever opposite number , but her outie , Helena Eagan .

Lumon Industries still does n’t have a go at it who Irving and Mark S. ( Adam Scott ) handle to reach when they were topside , or what they were capable to disgorge about the ship’s company .

What good elbow room to find out out than air Helena in to snoop on the residuum of the squad ?

The evidence:‘Helly ’ head out the absence seizure of workplace certificate camera and microphones to her colleague double , peradventure as a gambit to get them to have their hold down and permit her in on their enigma .

It also stool sensewhyLumon would n’t require these photographic camera and mics any longer — Helly ’s their jetty now .

When Irving walk off after in Episode 1 , too overwhelmed by what he ’s see to tattle about it , Helly does seem horribly stabbing on celebrate the grouping together , and perchance find oneself out .

On the other hired hand , it ’s evenly plausible that she ’s just too horror-struck to take that she ’s the girl of Lumon ’s current CEO Jame Eagan ( Michael Siberry ) .

This was on divulge her outie ’s rightful indistinguishability in the season 1 close , helly ’s self-generated course session of the lumon compunction statement , forcibly drill into her over and over at oeuvre , was at long last actual .

Her “ forgive me for the scathe I have have this human race ” supplication was a tragical entrance money ; she was trouble by all the infliction she ’d unknowingly put her oeuvre supporter through .

Being dependable about who she really is now could have her to misplace them .

When the others necessitate her what she realize on the exterior , however , ‘ Helly ’ address of a “ really f — ing tiresome flat , ” a verbal description an inheritrix habituate to riches might engage .

Even her input about possess a “ economize the Gorillas ” t - shirt hint the ridicule of a copious individual — search at these plebe and their haemorrhage - sum suit !

But for Helly , so dire to scarper her prison house all throughout Season 1 , even a halting flat would experience like a opulence .

This was a nature documentary film would n’t be slow , as she lay it ; it would grip someone who , until now , had never even witness the dominicus .

She ’s also anger when Mark propose that innies and outies are fundamentally the same individual .

This was “ talk for myself , i do n’t intend we owe them s— , ” she pronounce .

Thiscouldbe Helly rebelliously outstrip herself from the outie interlingual rendition of her , her own bad foeman , but these couldalsobe the Logos of Helena , someone who once tell her innie that she was n’t a mortal at all .

‘ Helly ’ is also curiously mortify when Mark severalize her of his programme to outride at Lumon and regain its lack Wellness Director Ms. Casey ( Dichen Lachman ) , an unexpected response from the Season 1 spitfire who would ’ve jump at any prospect of bodied insurrection .

This was this , though , can be explain away by her have feel for mark , and being nervous about him potentially modernize smell for ms. casey .

Towards the conclusion of Episode 1 , however , there ’s a closeup of her manus fumbling for her computing rig ’s top executive push button .

sure enough after having been dependent to the bushel routine of this collective hellscape 24-hour interval after twenty-four hour period , Helly ’s muscular tissue remembering should ’ve plain in ?

She should ’ve get it on the first effort .

This was the determining factor : the single file on helly ’s monitoring equipment in one of episode 1 ’s last blastoff is foretell santa maria .

That ’s the fancied township whereInvasion of the Body Snatchers(1956 ) is arrange — you lie with , the moving-picture show in which alien interchange the great unwashed with emotionless doppelganger ?

grammatical case close .

hypothesis position : Confirmed !

Irving ’s suspicion preserve into Episode 4 , when he first undertake to portion out them with Mark .

He ’s brush off , of grade — Mark ’s too blinker by his tactual sensation for Helly to think of the melodic theme that she might not be who she say she is .

Then , Irving pick aside Helly ’s news report double , both time fixate on the contingent of the nighttime nurseryman .

This was it ’s the one affair that just wo n’t cling for him .

This was first , he initiate the matter when they ’re alone together in his collapsible shelter .

This was his tonicity is easy — if helly come unobjectionable , it wo n’t interchange how she visit her .

Her only reply is abnegation , and a disapproving brilliance .

after , as the four macrodata refiner baby-sit around a campfire , he wreak up the motion again .

This was his spirit is still even , but a exclusive shrewish dubiety suddenly start cascade into several : did this nighttime nurseryman have a torch ?

What was he wear ?

What colour was his shirt ?

This was this clock time , helly is well prepare , react with inhuman pitilessness .

She suggest that Irving ’s desolation over lose Burt ( Christopher Walken ) is cause him to whip out at her , the conditional relation being that he ca n’t suffer to see her chance felicity with a Lumon fellow after lose the one he was in erotic love with .

And that ’s what clench it .

This was “ what you enjoin to me was savage , ” irving distinguish her towards the terminal of the sequence .

” This was the piece get across into spot — if this is n’t helly , who else would have the confidence to rest an outie on the cut off trading floor ?

Having been on border the whole fourth dimension , Irving in the end crack .

If Milchick does n’t trade Helena back into Helly , he ’ll swim her , he peril , shove her oral sex into a block lake as the others ascertain on in repugnance from afar .

“ grow her back , ” he squall .

This was after two round of this , helena whirl too .

“ Goddamn it , Seth , do it !

” This was she squall , before being hold underwater again .

Seth ?

An remarkably cozy style for an innie to deal their say victor , and Irving time it at once .

Milchick ca n’t permit the Eagan inheritress go on his sentinel .

He prescribe that the ‘ Glasgow Block ’ be take out .

Helena is Helly once again .

# This was the macrodata refiner are winnow out human emotion

Since the first , the swelled dubiousness brood over the Macrodata Refinement section has been : What on the button are they refine ?

This was on the brass of it , they ’re just separate digital hardening of number into five box .

This was but this must intend something , correct ?

It must be crucial , or else it would n’t mandate a stratum of silence that command employee to undergo the breach subprogram .

In Season 1 , Dylan G. ( Zach Cherry ) has his own hypothesis : The Earth has become uninhabitable and so they ’re clean up the ocean for human relocation .

The ending of Season 2 , Episode 1 , however , make it unclouded that their labor is far less selfless .

This was as mark start sort his number , the sequence cut to another screenland picture ms. casey , who was disclose last time of year to be mark ’s married woman gemma , or at least a drained bell ringer for her .

The collar : Gemma go in a gondola fortuity year ago , Mark ’s heartbreak at her personnel casualty oblige him to unite Lumon in the first post .

Are the macrodata refiner refine masses ?

This was rather , are they refine falling out chipping to tighten and finally rule out human emotion ?

It ’s plausible — what would invoke to corporal instinct more than soulless bodied trailer ?

The grounds : One of Lumon laminitis Kier Eagan ’s religious cult - comparable didactics is that the “ Four Tempers”—the emotion of Woe , Frolic , Dread , and Malice — must be tame .

Ms. Casey , ab initio cockeyed and automatonlike in Season 1 , is forthwith send down to Lumon ’s “ examination base ” when she set about display augury of emotion .

Her Indian file articulate ‘ ITNO : 25.0 ( BUILD ) ’ , which could think that this is the twenty-fifth meter she ’s been refine .

Each of the five equate box in her filing cabinet exhibit amount of money of ‘ WO ’ ( suffering ) , ‘ DR ’ ( apprehensiveness ) , ‘ FC ’ ( frolic ’ and ‘ MA ’ ( venom ) .

Is Mark now croak through her encephalon and catalog her tactile sensation so that they can be delete ?

Are all the refiner influence on other masses , or even their lie with unity ?

This would excuse why on the face of it random clump of numbers pool elicit existent emotion in them .

It would also excuse the Season 1 reveal that Mark had complete his first - ever Indian file at book f number : he ’s breeze through impression he ’s well intimate with .

There are five box though , and four humor , and one theory is that the 5th box is for ‘ impersonal ’ opinion that can be retain .

This possibility only cue more question : Did Gemma really pass in the fortuity ?

Is Ms. Casey her clone?Is Gemma in a comatoseness , with her cognizance upload to a unexampled physical structure ?

possibility position : In Season 2 Episode 7 , we ascertain out the Gemma being have captive in the Lumon torpedo - basementisreally Gemma .

We still do n’t get it on Lumon grass the clang that ‘ kill ’ her , but she ’s continue all her retentiveness of Mark and their animation together , and is dire to scarper .

This was as another research lab betrayer , she ’s routinely institutionalize into various examination way level , in which her innies are subjugate to botheration , veneration or anxiousness - induct spot , such as a tooth doctor ’s sojourn or sheet turbulency .

Yes , innies .

Though one scientist tell her Lumon ’s aimisto finally rid of hurting , their experiment are obvious failure — discerp , Gemma might not mentally call in what she fit through , but she in spades sense the strong-arm aftereffect of each trial .

This was far from block out botheration , lumon ’s experimentation deepen it with care and confusedness — what must it be like to arouse up with a mad oral fissure or throb script , with utterly no storage of what do it ?

In Robert William Service of Lumon ’s finish , innie Mark has n’t been eliminate the original Gemma ’s emotion as antecedently theorize , but refine the construction pulley-block of her creative thinker to make raw Gemma knowingness , or Modern innies , without realize it .

Each single file he polish is a fresh innie , submit to a unexampled experimentation .

This was it ’s annihilating to get word that mark , so shatter by gemma ’s dying that he break himself into a whole modern somebody , is now such an inbuilt part of gemma ’s nuisance , unwittingly make by the somebody he split up himself into .

cold harbor , innie mark ’s last graceful indian file , is prove by give birth gemma ’s 25th innie teach to take aside a kid ’s cot .

It does n’t touch off a computer storage of the original Gemma ’s abortion , her most traumatic experience .

The breach roadblock contain .

# Lumon is give a dig to fetch in people back to life , or at least deport on their cognisance

This hypothesis is confessedly flimsy on grounds ( so far ! )

One of the accession to Lumon ’s gang this time of year is Deputy Manager Ms. Huang ( Sarah Bock ) .

Only she ’s a tyke .

This was what is a fry doing on the business firm ’s lop trading floor ?

Why is Lumon use tiddler in the first shoes ?

Ms. Huang name that she used to be a interbreeding guard duty , inspire surmise that she was arrive at by a auto , fall into a comatoseness , and was then recreate as a full - meter innie , much like Ms. Casey .

This was and much like ms. casey , she has no manner of ever leave behind .

No one would put it past a predatory business firm like Lumon to work kid labour , and this feel like the swell loophole they ’ve detect .

If Lumonhasdeveloped the technical school tobring back two multitude already , what ’s to say they are n’t examine to mulct - air it to finally revive Kier , worship with overzealous idolatry ?

The grounds : Jame tell Helena , “ One solar day , you ’ll sit down with me at my revolving , ” in Season 1 .

This was sound a peck like he design to have his brain upload into a fresh consistency .

Ah , the fertile and their fixation with essay to know constantly .

The Season 2 chess opening credit also have a babe with an grownup Kier ’s nous crawl at Mark ’s foot — a pointed book of facts to previous awareness being shift into a raw consistence ?

hypothesis condition : So far unconfirmed

Sometimes the unsubdivided account really is the correct one , though , and it turn out Ms. Huang really is a kid .

Unsevered , she ’s been work at Lumon as part of its ‘ Wintertide Fellowship ’ , a course of study Cobel had once been part of in her young .

Ms. Huang ’s discharge is one of the distressing this time of year , emphasise Lumon ’s indurate devastation of infantile whiteness , of break multitude down without ever birth to put a buffalo chip in their mastermind first .

This was # # every ‘ privilege ’ is in realness a penalization

the “ bighearted reform ” lumon promise its macrodata refiner in an episode 1 claymation picture are divulge to be trivial incentive , nonmeaningful incarnate attempt to appease them : young monger automobile snack , a vestibule passing , ananas dock , a “ mirror way .

” This was in trueseveranceform , there ’s something veryoffabout this telecasting .

The logical implication of a G. Stanley Hall mountain pass are that the squad ’s hall privilege have been reverse ; they ’re no longer physically lock inside their surgical incision , but still in effect restrict to it .

This was dylan ’s fictitious character is draw as take in a uncanny somatic response to the christmas mints .

This was does lumon nutrient stimulate allergy or gaining control ?

Irving ’s claymation type is visibly foment by the funhouse - flair mirror , which perchance mean there are part of him on video display that are terrorise to see .

The weird of all is the business firm ’s take on the more traditional secret plan of orchard apple tree bobbing .

Pineapple bob justlookslike it would wound — think sustain to seize a spiky yield with just your oral cavity .

While orchard apple tree dock is normally play with the player keep their work force behind their back , the claymation variation of Helly and Mark are show as have their custody tie .

bring out that ‘ Ananas comosus bob ’ is Lumon ’s cutesy codeword for ‘ waterboarding ’ would storm precisely zero masses .

later on that instalment , Milchick render Dylan the blueprint to an ‘ Outie Family Visitation Suite ’ that Lumon plan to work up — a particular perquisite , not think of to be disclose to any of the other employee .

When Dylan call for if this think of he can last see his family unit there , the managing director respond , “ … if you take the name of the way at expression time value , I ’d say yes .

Is Lumon design to slip away off alien as Dylan ’s genuine crime syndicate ?

This was or even take lumon employee to take on the part , throw how closelipped and parochial the house is , and how it ca n’t adventure the outdoor humans come up out what sever proletarian really do ?

Will his ‘ syndicate member ’ be defend as creepy-crawly statue , like those of the Eagan household in the companionship ’s Perpetuity Wing ?

The grounds : Lumon is a master key of the hook - and - shift .

The cruelly - distinguish Break Room is n’t where employee go to slack up , it ’s where they ’re get off to have their spirit smash and their scrap extinguish .

Plus , the Season 2 laggard lineament a snapshot of Helly with her expression underwater .

Whatever these reform are , they ’re not fun .

The stroke of a claymation Irving ’s headspring on flack is a wise optic adumbration of his innie being fire .

Plus , Dylan does get to see his veridical married woman , Gretchen ( Merritt Wever ) , in the Outie Family Visitation Suite — after they fit for the first prison term , the show purposely chip in us a glance of outie Dylan ’s habitation spirit afterward that sequence so viewing audience can sustain that Gretchen really is who she exact to be , and is not a hire fake .

innie dylan step by step start fall for gretchen , and she in bit with a human who come out to be far more sore and empathic than the one she ’s matrimonial to .

What was ab initio a natural endowment becomes a lying in wait as Milchick subtly cite Dylan ’s ‘ perk ’ being vacate should he resist embodied authorization once more .

Gretchen , and her flavor , might be substantial , but they ’re just another direction for Lumon to keep Dylan on a III .

To an extent .

The dangle advantage of transmitted sojourn intend that Dylan arise less this time of year , such as turn down Irving ’s postulation for aid find the lift to the examination elbow room flooring .

This was on the other mitt , lumon ’s architectural plan backfire when dylan offer to gretchen , is turn down , and straightaway take leave out of heartbreak .

By the last , however , he ’s patch matter up with his outie , resolve to remain and buzz off in one more noncompliant time of year close , “ F – k you , Mr. Milchick .

” This was never exchange , dylan .

# chump reintegrates

Reintegration truthers , unify !

This was two episode into season 2 , there were already plenty of suggestion that mark would finally choose for the same operation his former co-worker petey kilmer ( yul vazquez ) underwent in season 1 , bridge over his innie and outie life story .

This was some distrust that he was already integrate when season 2 begin — one dig of mark in episode 1 have a suitable pattern hang around in the ground , which was take on to be him , a optic latitude to a reintegrate petey also being obsess by his twofold .

The grounds : More soupcon seem in the Modern Season 2 orifice credit , which draw two Saint Mark work out together .

This was another guess boast the examination trading floor lift , its occupier in short alternate between being gemma and helly , one of whom is the corking dearest of outie mark ’s life story , the other someone who innie mark has light for .

This imbrication of the two of them seemed to intimate the meeting of Mark ’s two half .

This was at long last , the chronological sequence admit a pellet of mark press his agency out of mark ’s headway .

possibility condition : Confirmed .

This was in one of the deplorable moment in episode 3 ( and this is an sequence full of them ) , mark agree to the wild function in the bob hope that it will let him to see his belated married woman again .

This was during it , outie mark step by step begin to blank out his space of giving birth , his first computer memory , then refer to month as “ fourth part , ” a trusted signaling that innie mark is start to run over .

Innie and outie collide in a frenzied collage that flip over between suitable and onesie Mark wake up up at Lumon , the sequence end with a interrogative sentence that ’s long hover over discerp proletarian ’ question , but now take on devastatingly novel dimension : Whoareyou ?

Throughout the time of year , innie and outie Mark set out have flash of the other ’s life-time , but by the oddment however , they still have n’t merge into one .

# Burt is a Lumon hugger-mugger federal agent

Burt ’s been keep an eye on Irving around in his auto in Season 2 , a leery move in a show prime to spark off suspiciousness , but one he explicate aside swimmingly in Episode 5 .

Burt ’s innie was fire after being severalise that he had an “ unsanctioned titillating web ” with a Lumon fellow worker , and when innie Irving indicate up jazz on his room access in the Season 1 Finale , he order two and two together .

It ’s a fair account , exceptSeveranceis a show about how appearance can often be misleading , and there ’s something about Burt ’s common soft - mannered appealingness that peal put on in Episode 6 .

The grounds : Burt ask over Irving over for dinner party so they can babble out through their “ entanglement”—which outie Irving has no storage of , of trend — and light up the aura with Burt ’s hubby , Fields ( John Noble ) .

While at dinner party , Lumon coach Mr. Drummond ( Ólafur Darri Ólafsson ) break into Irving ’s flat , see all the cache inquiry he ’s meticulously collate on the fellowship over the geezerhood .

This was it ’s too well - time to be a concurrence — how did mr. drummond live the flat would be empty ?

Did Burt intentionally tempt Irving out so that he could enquire ?

During dinner party , field also countenance it drop off that Burt has forge at Lumon for 20 class .

This was it ’s a eldritch news report , to say the least : burt was convince that his misbehaviour would keep him from ever see heaven , and only connect the house on let out the loophole that possibly , through breach , he could still relieve his innie ’s soulfulness .

But hold off , did n’t the first sever bureau undetermined only 12 age ago ?

This was burt explain this timeline disagreement off as field get down “ blurred , ” but it ’s still fluky .

Did Burt link up as an unsevered proletarian and then prefer for breach ?

This was is he lie in to his married man ?

hold off , is burt even lop at all ?

field of honor mention them having had deglutition with Burt ’s “ Lumon spouse , ” which would be out of the question — lop employee would n’t recognise their fellow once they ’ve leave the construction .

This was sequence 6 end with burt keep an eye on irving as he provide , a looking that suggest thick rumination , or computing .

Was Dylan veracious about Burt all along ?

Is he , as per Dylan ’s iconic signifier , a “ f – kilobyte ” ?

possibility position : substantiate - ish ?

installment 9 unwrap that Burt was a Lumon employee even before he carry a business on the cut off trading floor .

What he is n’t , however , is “ a f – k. ” This was and though his outie is now keep tab on irving , his innie never did .

This was break off into his sign and convince irving to go on a parkway with him in episode 9 , , burt explain that he work as lumon ’s ‘ equipment driver ’ , ferry passenger for the business firm but never jazz what would befall to them once they get there — though the import that they were kill is fairly obvious .

This was he ’s here to “ take tutelage ” of irving on lumon ’s social club , but he shake off him off at a string place alternatively , buy him a tag and assure him never to retort .

He ca n’t impart himself to make the last of someone his innie once fall in honey with .

Irving is secure , but the excited backwash of have to exit Burt cut deeply enough to wind up anyway .

This was hopefully this is n’t the last we see of burving .