Severance - AppleTV+ - (***Spoilers***)

Agent Coulson

Apple's latest all star cast series starts February 18th.

Produced and directed by Ben Stiller starring Adam Scott, Patricia Arquette, John Turturro, Dichen Lachmanm & Christopher Walken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEQP4VVuyrY&ab_channel=AppleTV

The Black Oil

Messing with memory, from Feb 18.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTqlZkvbNVg&ab_channel=AppleTV

Slydice

That looks like a solid concept science fiction show.. but being a little wary of Apple since Invasion.. it looks like they might have underdone it.. maybe..

Just a trailer so far and the idea has a draw to it though.

The Black Oil

Merged the threads, but the new site isn't the smoothest.

Something rotten at the heart of the trailer.

Agent Coulson

Did a search but nothing showed up.

Slydice

Maybe it got severed? 😀

The Black Oil

Out today. Some positive reviews about.

Agent Coulson

I enojyed those first two episodes.

Stiller directing the first 3 episodes and the last 3 episodes and Irish director Aoife McArdle is directing the middle 3 episodes

Slydice

Car Bed!

First impression is this is a really well made show. There's some good camera work/directing/writing/mystery building.

For this first episode, it feels like would be even better to go in completely blind without even knowing the name of the show.. catch 22 there though I guess.

1: Good intro. Definitely feels like there's some kind of mystery or dodgy goings-on happening that will be explored.

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I really liked how they showed the effect of how Helen percieved continuously re-arriving back through the door. That's the part that being completely blind to anything about the show would've been cool for.

While Mark might have something going on with the workplace. I think I see some deeper story for him building with how people are treating him outside, something about his wife, how his hands shake when holding a sandwich.

Oh and the music feels like it builds the right kind of atmosphere for a mystery

Slydice

Alright, this show feels like it might be very bingeable. Strong cliffhanger feel in this one.

Apple might have dropped the ball on the release schedule.

2: Oooooh I struggled with the start of this one. Big story and characters story continuing well. Episode, again, well made.

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That brain surgery! 😲 Pushing myself to keep looking.

Marks hands shaking again.

I like how the facility is slowly being revealed. Break room seems very ominous.

Like the cameos from the wellness room Christopher Walken and  Dichen Lachman .. I was like Sierra from Dollhouse!!! 🙂

Don't have a clue what's going on. Laughed about the eels theory 😂

Slydice

3: An episode to introduce more of the world, build some relationships and

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send Helly to the Break Room.. which doesn't seem too bad.. unless there's more to it than just rereading that passage over and over

Slydice

4: WTF is going on in this show. Okay.. OK.. okay.. it's just 4 episodes in. All right.

Definitely a compelling set of mysteries going on here. Things at this stage seem very dark.

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Hellys story is so grim... I.. I can't see any clues that she'll be alive next episode.

Then there's the boss woman, like what's her story. Feels like there are hints she might be a little severed but it's playing out like she's not.

Then Irving wandering into O&D like that and I was just like.. WTF are they doing in this place.

Irving and Burts story is being played out really well by Walken and John Turturro

Slydice

5: Well that bit with Kurt and Irving

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was funny.. how they made the jokes about the two teams going at each other.

Definitely still seems like Lumon is up to something bad if they don't want more teams to be found.

Maybe not maybe it's all some kind of thing to keep them from bothering someone in the middle of the maze of offices.

I dunno.

fluke

Loving this show so far. The last two episodes seems more focused on a mystery box element.

Slydice

6: Oh! That was a brilliant! That was an expertly crafted episode. Looking forward to the next one.

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Looking forward!?!?! I need the next one!

The CUT in the office story to the 'What happened to your hand' moment on the date was a masterwork!

Feels like something big happened in the office. That and the dudes installing lockable doors.

This wife of the senator that the sister is looking into.. I paused on the web search screens and with combined with her scenes so far.. it feels like she may be under some severance control.

The company I think knows about the other people trying reintegration.

So then, what's Lumon about.. those cards yer man pocketed didn't seem a big deal. Plus making hatchets and watering cans.. it feels like they just make stuff for people to buy in regular shops. Maybe like a huge Supermarket type job or a supply everything type company. The goats throws the feeling off but might be explainable that way too. Seems a bit wierd to go so overboard with severance for it though.

Who knows.. could be a big evil, could be a big not-evil-just-money-making, could be something completely different.

MargeS

It seems to be a cult and I think the employees might be an experiment.

But I'm intrigued.

Slydice

7: I really like this show. It's so well made. So then..

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Ms. Casey is Marks wife.

They killed the head of security!

Glad the sister talked about the wife of the senator maybe being severed.

So much going on in this show.

The writer of this episode, Helen Leigh, had some expereince with Archive 81: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm8225205/

fluke

Much better episode than 6, and as for that ending!!!

DrZeuss

Spoiler Warning

I wonder is the severance a type of prison sentence. For example maybe Mark caused the accident with his wife and as an alternative to prison there is the severance option, it might also explain why Helly's outie wants absolutely nothing to do with her innie.

Also everyone's task inside Lumon is basically just busy work to keep their minds busy doing a "job".

And if they can activate the innie at any stage like they did with Dylan, is this a sort of crime prevention.

Probably way off, but there is obviously something weird going on. Great show!

Slydice

Honestly, I think they've kept the mystery really strong. Could be any combination of those or none. They could have a huge curveball.

For a season one, at least, they've done really well so far.

Agent Coulson

Damn now that is how to do a cliffhanger going into next weeks finale.

Slydice

8: Me, right now, just at the end of the episode: OH YOU ABSOLUTE FUCKERS!!

anyway.. I'm in for the next episode! Oh yes indeed!

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Ms Casey went down the Dark Corridor to the Dark Elevator with the Red Light!

Irving paints the Dark Corridor to the Dark Elevator with the Red Light!

What could it be?!?! What could it mean?!?!

Who the heck were those performers in the Perpituity Wing?!!?

gazzer

I was actually getting stressed out towards the end of ep 8 :) Can't wait until next week's ep. Such a good show

DrZeuss

Wow, that was a very strange episode, but good!

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So Irving paints the same picture that Ms Casey sees as she is on the way back to the testing floor (hell or death maybe?)

I don't recall now but were there any other people in the scenes with outtie Irving (bar the dog), maybe he goes to somewhere other than outside.

Ms Casey also saying she was only a 107 (open to correction) hours old...so is she only real inside Lumon and same as Irving maybe.

As for the performers....wtf was that and did they resemble Ms Casey and Harmony Cobel? (plus others)

Slydice

The painting definintely had me thinking about earlier scenes where

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Irving and was there others? I think maybe Dylan too? Maybe Mark? who had been imagining this black goo coming from the ceilings and walls and such.

Maybe the test floor is a bad bad place to be

DrZeuss

I have to say Milchick is an amazing character, whenever he comes on screen there's the fear he could be there to escort someone out....or is it a party with a very uncomfortable fake smile and

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with his coldness when walking Cobel out of the building after being fired, I was really expecting (or hoping) to see some compassion or humanity in him but nada, almost robot like.

JP Liz V1

Severance' Renewed for Season 2 at Apple TV Plus

DrZeuss

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118889519#Comment_118889519

While I am delighted it has been (and I don't think there was any doubt)....it almost guarantees that there will be a whopper of a cliff hanger on the last episode.

Agent Coulson

WOW!

gazzer

Now THAT'S how to do a great episode

DrZeuss

What an ending, I think I need to re-watch that season again....so much to digest.

Best moment of that last episode:

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Fcuk you Mr Milchick....only Dylan would add the "Mr" when cursing at someone 😂

gmacww

That was quite possibly the best season finale I have ever seen. Absolutely gripped for the entire thing.

fluke

That last episode was so intense! I'm happy that some things were resolved this season, while still leaving enough of a trail for season 2.

mdwexford

Just watched all 9 episodes within the last day and a half.

Head is melted but wow it’s class tv.

Slydice

So, the end of season one, that was some damn fine science fiction story telling. The introduction, the mystery, the action, the suspence, it's all good.

9: I need to see the next episode but in a different way than how I needed to see this one from the last one.

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I think maybe it's that I need to see season two! 🙂 The last one was like Urgent, Event Needs to be seen! This one is is like.. Overall Story needs to be known.. and that'll take a few episodes.

Cool to see how the severed sides started exploring the unsevered lives. I thought that was done well, the sister and baby comment and the learning to drive for instance.

Definitely something up with the Dark Room, Red Light. Irving I think has been there and maybe something to do with Marks wife Gemma (if she's even still Gemma and not some kind of frozen into Ms Casey role)

Future: Yes to season two, wiki says it's being made, I want to see it yesterday! 🙂

Mike Litoris

That was epic TV! I haven't enjoyed a show that much since Dark. Just hope season 2, whenever it comes out, isn't a stinker.

Alfred Borden

Is it wrong to put this in my top 5 shows of all time already? Wow, what a show and what a finale.

druss

I started to notice some Twitter buzz about Severance a week ago and decided to give it a shot. I don't have much available "tv time" midweek, but burned through it at two or three episodes a night.

And while I mentioned Twitter reaction, I wonder would a show like this have found greater cultural resonance in '90's or '00s? Feels like we should all be talking about this in our respective offices over deviled eggs and waffles. :)

Alfred Borden

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VngE9BiEe7Q

Is this the greatest scene of TV history? :D

Hyzepher

From watching the series it struck me that if we have innies defined as those who work for Lumen and are so-called born when they join the workforce, then we should expect that there are people who are "innies" but exist in the outside world. With their outie counterpart off somewhere else

FunLover18

I absolutely loved this. One of the best TV series I've seen in years, everything about it is just so good. I wish more people were watching it or it was on terrestrial TV because it would probably be a Lost like show as someone mentioned above, 5he water-cooler show. Can't wait for Season 2.

seraphimvc

Yes, this show actually took me by surprise! Finished all 9 episodes last night (in the span of 3 days). Well done Ben stiller team and i would highly recommend this show (if the kind of story intrigues you of course - try the trailer).

So ya, a surprisingly pleasant project from Ben stiller this 9 episodes production:

1) Very well paced - it should have been 'slow' but not really as things are happening one after another. I cannot praise more on this. I was totally thinking another snore or snore-ish fest ha. The characters are well developed pulling us viewers in to like/hate the characters, while in parallel the intriguing mystery/plot is being revealed, well done really.

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ya fck you Ms. Cobey

2) Effort script and good directing - acting is alright i thought, good overall but nothing extraordinary (i would actually say that some moments are weak when they should have been powerful/more impactful).

A (rather) original script and a show with actual contents, a shocker! Especially again, seeing the crap that get chunked out in the past years, so many shows/productions are just show and lack of substance. Very much looking forward for season 2 aha.

Nate--IRL--

Well, not often I spot something at random in here and take a chance on it and be so well rewarded for it. This was excellent. A real Stanley Parable vibe, infused with a solid story to boot. Loved it from start to finish. Much obliged OP.

Nate

youcancallmeal

It dipped a little in the middle but final few episodes were outstanding. Season ending cliffhangers usually annoy me but that final episode was so good I can easily forgive it. John Turturro with the stand out performance even though his characters storyline wasn't as dramatic as the other innies

Homelander

Great show. Watched all 9 episodes in one sitting, I found it that compelling! Very accessible yet mind-melting (and utterly haunting) concept.

Great turn by all of the actors. It reminded me a little bit of that TV show 'Maniac' with Jonah Hill and Emma Stone though not as off-the-wall.

Fred Astaire

Sensationally good.

I envy anybody who gets to go through those first 9 episodes for the first time. Just brilliant in every way.

The Black Oil

Excellent show in its construction, delivery and making you feel uneasy by getting under your skin. Blows Succession's third season out of the water.

is_that_so

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/119016912#Comment_119016912

Up to episode 5 now and not in a rush to binge as others have done. The first three really dragged for me but now it is becoming more interesting.

Slydice

It was week to week if you want to get a feel for what it was like at the time.

peteeeed

just finished this , what a season . the last ep was perfection

pixelburp

Very belatedly watched the first 3 episodes and wow. I haven't watched something this inventive and gripping in years. And all directed by Ben Stiller so far, the biggest surprise of all. Has shades of Legion, The Prisoner and a host of dystopian ideas all mixed together.

The concept alone just leaves your imagination running wild with the ethical and existential possibilities; fun! Trying not to actually read the thread properly for fear of spoiling something - this show has properly dangled a genuine mystery in front of me.