The following story contains spoilers for Severance Season 1.
Severance, Apple TV+’s new satire/dark comedy/thriller/mystery series, is nothing short of the hybrid, genre-bending mishmash of a film buff’s dreams. As a combination, in places, of the premise of Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, the aesthetic of Being John Malkovich, and the mystery/thriller nature of something like Lost—where there’s an entire world that we need to learn to understand—Severance is nothing short of masterful. For a show that aims so big and complex, it’s a mystery that not only does Severance hit on a thrilling week-to-week story, but it lands thematically, too.
The show centers on a man named Mark (Adam Scott) who’s undergone a procedure called “severance,” which entirely separates his life at work (for a company that’s possibly evil, possibly a cult, and maybe even a bit of both called Lumen) from his life at home, where he’s still greiving the loss of his wife. When he’s inside the walls of his office, he knows nothing about his life outside. When he’s outside the office, he knows nothing about his life inside. Hence, the show has adapted new terms for these different versions of Mark (and his Lumen colleagues, all of whom have also undergone the same procedure): innies and outies. You get the idea. Severance is a commentary on the modern work/life balance and how we all manage to cope with different issues and traumas that come from different parts of our lives; a show satirizing these issues isn’t new, but doubling as a mysterious edge-of-your-seat thriller keeps every episode fresh and exciting.
While the show was created by Dan Erickson, the biggest name creative force behind Severance is none other than Ben Stiller, who is both an executive producer of Severance and also directed six of the season’s nine episodes. You probably know him best from his comedic roles in movies like Zoolander or Meet the Parents, but Stiller has been a talented filmmaker behind the camera for basically the duration of his entire career; he directed shorts for his brilliant-but-short-lived show The Ben Stiller Show, before helming the movies Reality Bites, The Cable Guy, Zoolander, Tropic Thunder, and The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. A few years ago he made the jump to TV with Escape at Dannemora, and Severance continues his winning streak as a filmmaker (we can all agree to ignore Zoolander 2) while allowing him to expand his skillset both visually and thematically. Severance, in more ways than one, is a striking series.
Atsushi Nishijima
And now that we’re at the end of the Severance first season run, it’s time for us to start thinking about what could go into Season 2. We’re starting to get answers, and as soon as the show’s Season 1 finale airs, we’ll likely have an even better idea. Now, we just have to wonder how all of our innies are ever gonna get the news.
Will Severance return for Season 2?
There sure will be. Just ahead of the Season 1 finale, it was announced that the show will go on for Severance.
“Thanks to creator Dan Erickson, the brilliant Ben Stiller, and an incomparable cast and crew, Severance has imagined an existence that‘s equal parts riveting and enthralling as viewers around the globe can’t get enough of these rich characters,” Matt Cherniss, head of programming for Apple TV+, said in a statement. “We’re excited to go deeper into this wholly unique world and unpack more layers of Lumon in season two.”
Stiller added that he’s been excited to see the response from everyone who’s seen the show, and that he’s eager to continue on. “It has been a long road bringing Severance to television,” he said. “I first read Dan’s pilot over five years ago. It has always been a multi season story, and I’m really happy we get to continue it.” (For more on the background behind Severance, we highly recommend reading Esquire‘s feature on Stiller)
Apple
What will Season 2 of Severance be about?
You’ll have to check back with us after the Season 1 finale on that one. Severance is such an unpredictable show that the final episode of Season 1—particularly after Episode 8’s cliffhanger—could leave us anywhere. It’s possible that Mark, Dylan, Irv, and Helly all figure things out, and it’s also possible that things go terribly wrong; there’s really no way we could possibly guess.
We have to imagine that the Season 1 finale will give us some sort of information about Mark and Ms. Casey (Gemma!) and how they ended up in their current situation. We also would be curious to see what the deal is with Dylan and Helly on the outside, and whatever the hell Ms. Cobel is up to. And we’re not forgetting Irv and Burt; if Irv and Burt aren’t reunited somehow—innie, outie, whatever!—we are going to be quite unhappy.
Based on the promise that we’ll see more layers to Lumen in Season 2, we could also perhaps see the next season with either flashbacks, or an entire exploration of the start of Lumen, and how Kier Eagan (the almost certain cult leader who founded Lumen) convinced others to join him.
Apple
Who will be in the Severance Season 2 cast?
Another good question; the Season 2 announcement didn’t make it clear if any of our Season 1 cast, which includes Adam Scott, Zach Cherry, Patricia Arquette, Dichen Lachman, Tramell Tillman, Britt Lower, John Turturro, and Christopher Walken, would be returning. It would be a delight to see any of them return! But it’s also a possibilitie that the show shifts to an entirely different story within this Lumen/Severance world.
When will Season 2 of Severance come out?
We truly have no idea, but a standard guess would be about the same time next year—let’s go with Winter-Spring 2023.
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