Season 1 Completed
I will admit that I did not watch this series until last week because I thought it was about people being fired and even if they were given severance packages I would not be okay with it. I mean, watching the possibility of people’s lives being destroyed due to being let go or terminated? No thank you. When I saw this show come up for Emmy nominations however I gave it a second glance and I am glad that I did.
I did a little summary reading and came to find out that Severance is actually the name for a procedure in which the company (Lumin), that the main characters work for have had “done” to them in order to basically compartmentalize their brains based on where they are location-wise. For example, if they are in the building and near their work space, their brains will switch over like a giant toggle and they will have no memories of knowledge of their lives outside of work; and, as soon as they leave work, their brain re-toggles back to having memories of their life and no memories of work. Well, sort of. While they know where they work, they know little else other than they have had the Severance procedure. If you’re a fan of such classic shows as The Twilight Zone or possibly American Horror Stories with a lot less bloodshed, this show premise actually is quite an attention grabber and will definitely get you to consider sitting down and giving at least episode one a try. Since in this entry I am going to try really hard to avoid spoilers let me just tell you, that episode one was the equivalent of eating the first chip in a big bag of Lay’s Potato chips. If you’re not familiar with Lay’s Chips, who’s slogan for the longest time has always been “you can’t eat just one,” that is exactly what I mean with that metaphor. Once you get into the flow of the show and it’s discomfort and oddness you resign yourself to sit down, grab the entire bag and just binge until you get some sense of understanding.
The cast is flawless. I’m impressed by the actors they acquired and with heavy acting hitters like John Turturro, Patricia Arquette and Christopher Walken rounding out this group you know you are in skilled hands. What surprised me most is that most of the episodes are actually directed by Ben Stiller. Yes, Zoolander or a thousand of other comedic persona’s he’s played over the years. He does a remarkable job directing work that is not intended to be comedic but more akin to the thriller genre and work that is disorienting and disconcerting. That doesn’t mean there’s zero humor in this show but it’s not that kind of show. I actually found myself thinking that I had wished both his parents Jerry Stiller and Anne Meara were still alive to see this, because I know they would have praised this growth as an artist. His direction is quite smooth and yet jarring but not in a novice way. He’s literally getting these performers to bring you into this world for a while and make you feel as disturbed as their personas gradually become.
Like a lot of the “rooted-in-reality” dystopian near-future series we watch like Black Mirror, Westworld and the like all give us a point of reference that can make sense to us in the here and now. In Black Mirror it changes from episode to episode, in Westworld it’s the human fear that robotics will becoming more sentient potentially overtaking us, and in Severance it’s that desperate need for many of us to find a way to adequately manage the work/life balance. Yes, the premise is that simple. The procedure in an extremely invasive way allows you to solely focus on work while at work, and enjoy your life outside of life without nagging stressors from work overflowing. You are expected to leave and arrive to work at designated and staggered times so you don’t run into your coworkers on the outside unexpectedly. Bliss right? Only if you don’t ask questions or have any curiosity as to why you may have chosen this path in your life. Therein lies the conundrum and provides us with the meat for the storyline.
This existential need to understand our purpose both as a complex outside of work human (or outties as they call them in the show); as well as why/what we as innies are doing within our workplace walls and how that relates to a larger purpose is one of those fundamental questions. A question that if you explore can lead you to either decide to stay or make you move towards more self-actualized goals for yourself. We all want to know that we are doing something of value, and while it may seem completely freeing to not have the spillover of thoughts and memories within this framework, it does essentially take away one main theme or topic of conversation for us as humans. If you go to a party on the outside you can’t really talk about what you do for a living cause you honestly don’t know; and in an effort to “get to know” your coworkers there’s no potential to find commonalities in life like having kids or hobbies, because you don’t know any of those things while you’re on the job. These realities become very uncomfortable for the main cast of workers who are just trying to eek their way through changes both inside their jobs and out.
The pacing gets very even and the climax is truly nerve wracking in the right way, so if you like some of shows I’ve mentioned and don’t mind exploring why we as humans truly abhor the concept of living our lives out like rats in a maze, please check this series out. At first it feels really heavy but give it a few episodes to find its footing and by the last episode you’ll googling the release date for season 2. Trust me on that.
If you are interested in spoilers, we’ll be deep dish discussing this in the weekly podcast companion to the blog released each Sunday.
THE AMUSED LIFE 
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