I think about Mr Robot a lot. I know I bash the ending a lot but that's because the rest of the show was so good, it was in the running to be one of my absolute favorites, after all. One of the things I loved about it was how off-kilter everything (especially the cinematography) was, it made me feel on edge for the whole show. Nothing I saw since ever captured that same unsettling vibe, until Severance came around. And it's really good to boot! Let's hope it manages to keep this up...
Severance is a show about the workers of a company called Lumon, who splits the memories of their workers between work and life, meaning they don't remember anything that goes on inside the office when not at work, and in the office, they don't remember anything else about their life. It's intended to fix the work-life balance issue, allowing workers to keep their home life out of their work and their work out of their home life, while also letting them essentially be mindless drones while at work who don't know any better. It's a complex but very unique Black Mirror-esque premise, and while the show establishes pretty early on that this is a bad idea, there's still a gripping mystery about what really goes on in Lumon and what secrets the bizarre and mysterious company holds. Severance is very much a psychological horror show, and it does a great job of showing off how terrifying things are for the in-office memories (aka the Innies). It's the type of horror I adore. No jumpscares, no excessive gore, no gross-out scares, it's all intellectual. And best of all, despite essentially being a mystery box show of sorts, the ending absolutely lived up to all that payoff. This isn't WandaVision, this season didn't just end on a stellar note, it had one of the best season finales I've seen in a very long time.
While Severance has a fantastic hook and mystery, it's really the entire production that helps it really stand out. In particular, I think the acting is phenomenal across the board. Adam Scott and Zach Cherry both pull off convincing dramatic shifts, John Turturro and Christopher Walker are adorable, Britt Lower and Tramell Tillman are revelations as Helly and Milchick respectively, and Patricia Arquette makes for a terrifying and unpredictable main antagonist. I really like all of the characters here, but the cast's performances elevates every single one of them. In addition, the overall presentation of Severance, from the sarcastic and blunt dialogue, to the at times off-center cinematography, to the haunting liminal set design of Lumon's offices, to Theodore Shapiro's dissonant score makes for a very unnerving show that heightens the suspense even more. As mentioned above, it gives me Mr Robot vibes in the best way possible. However, this does lead to my one issue with the show. The scenes in Lumon are so gripping, tense, eerie, and visually stunning that the scenes which take place outside of the office, focusing on the Outies, end up being the weakest part of the show a lot of the time. They're not bad, mind you, they just don't live up to how fantastic the rest of the show is.
Here are some of the episodes I found to stand out especially well:
The You You Are: This was easily one of Severance's most suspenseful episodes, particularly in regards to Helly. She pulls off her most successful attempt to escape Lumon yet, only for her Outie to flat-out state she doesn't see her Innie as a person in a massive gut punch of a scene. The final five minutes had me on the edge of my seat wondering what she'd do next, only for her to attempt to kill herself in a truly unfair cliffhanger. Also, the scene at the funeral was one of my favorite "outside" scenes of the show.
Defiant Jazz: That "music dance experience" scene was easily one of the highlights of the season, dark, dissonant, shocking, and containing Zach Cherry's best moment of acting. But that was just one scene in an otherwise really fantastic episode, which also included the shocking death of Graner, Burt's retirement, Irving finally turning against Lumon, and the reveal that Mark's wife was Mrs Casey who, as we know very well, isn't dead at all.
The We We Are: Despite my complaints about the "outside" scenes, The We We Are takes place almost entirely outside the office, and it was the best episode of the show by a mile. The usage of cross-cutting between the different characters, the score evoking a ticking clock, and the many shocking twists and reversals made for one of the most tense and anxiety-inducing episodes of television I've ever seen. The episode starts with the bombshell reveal that Helly is an Eagan, and things just keep spiraling from there, with Devon learning the truth about Lumon, Innie Mark realizing Casey is his wife, the reveal that Burt has a husband, Helly tearing apart Lumon in a public speech, and Dylan being forced to pull the plug at the very last second. What an astonishing episode of television, the best season finale I've seen since Michael's Gambit.
Overall, Severance makes me happy. Not the subject matter, of course, this is a very upsetting show, it just makes me happy whenever I watch a new show and come out thoroughly impressed. Severance is a really great series, with a creative premise, gripping mystery, brilliant cast, fantastic presentation, and a killer ending. Ben Stiller & crew have a stellar hit on their hands and I hope the show will continue to improve as it goes on.
4/5 Stars
No comments:
Post a Comment