Warning: Spoilers ahead for Severance Seasons 1 and 2

I love Severance. I’ve been a fan since the first season premiered on Feb. 18, 2022, and waited the grueling three years after Season 1’s harrowing finale. I have to admit, I was bracing myself for another nail-biting cliffhanger to close out Season 2 — while the show has been renewed for a third season, there’s no release date in sight. I was pleasantly surprised. Sure, we have no idea how Helly (Britt Lower) and Innie-Mark (Adam Scott) will fare after their romantic, stirring, slow-motion running sequence, but at least we weren’t left behind in the hallway with Innie-Mark, staring down 2 (4? 29?) women, forced to make a choice. The season finale grounded the viewer in the most enduring themes of the show, gloriously delivered in a visual and sonic feast. 

Let’s rewind. The episode begins with Innie-Mark panic-pacing in the innie birthing cabin. The following scene digs into the conflict at the heart of the show, a point of contention foreshadowed visually and textually since Season 1, Episode 1: How do you reconcile two lives in one body? It was immensely satisfying to witness (relatively) open communication between Innie-Mark and Outie-Mark after a season of near-misses and crossed wires. I particularly appreciated the aesthetic choice of communication via camcorder, an underpinning of the show’s anachronistic time period.

The discussion between the Marks is raw. Anger and dissatisfaction reach shouting volumes as a level of uncertainty regarding Innie-Mark’s commitment to the ‘Save Gemma’ plan emerges. I found myself wanting to reach through my television and take Outie-Mark by the shoulders: tell him about Petey! Explain reintegration! And for the love of God, get his girlfriend’s name right! This scene was masterfully edited and sets up the ultimate result of the season’s arc. Innie-Mark isn’t the same person as Outie-Mark — he has different allegiances and entirely different emotional instincts. 

After Innie- and Outie-Mark’s verbal tennis match, we return to the severed floor of Lumon Industries, where Helly stares down an eerily shadowed Jame Eagan (Michael Siberry). The Eagan dynasty is one of the most intriguing, shadowed plotlines on the show. I’m fascinated by the occultist, pagan traditions entangled with futuristic biomedical technology. The rare glimpses of Jame Eagan throughout Season 2 add a little more texture to the Eagan family myth, and his speech to Helly in the finale is sufficiently terrifying. He describes the ominous “fire of Kier,” which he saw in young Helena and goes on to say he now sees it in Helly — further evidence of the inner-child-like nature of innies. 

After this eerie interlude, we return to our regularly scheduled programming. Innie-Mark and Helly arrive on the severed floor in sequence, reuniting in front of the dramatic, Renaissance-style painting heralding the conclusion of Cold Harbor. They walk down the hallways guided by a single moving ceiling light and enter a dream-like sequence that the entire series has been building up to: the completion of the 25th file, the culmination of Lumon’s prized experiment. 

Briefly, we see Dylan (Zach Cherry) receiving his outie’s denial of his previously issued resignation request — a surprisingly tender moment, contrasting Innie- and Outie-Mark’s contentious relationship. Despite Dylan’s acceptance, the power dynamic between an innie and outie isn’t forgotten. Innie-Dylan is stuck, and outie-Dylan is free. After handing off the fateful black folder for Dylan to review in the privacy of the break room, Mr. Milchick (the talented Tramell Tillman) dashes out to prepare for the crowning jewel of the show’s audiovisual feats: Choreography & Merriment’s glorious marching band performance.

The deafening spectacle, delightfully out of place in the severed floor’s land of muted colors and cubicles, soundtracks some of the most tense, espionage-esque physical conflict between Mr. Milchick and Macrodata Refinement. I held my breath every time a rage-filled yell escaped Mr. Milchick; I cheered when Dylan shoved the vending machine in front of the bathroom door; I laughed when Helly struck Milchick in the forehead with a trombone; and I grieved as my hopes for a Seth Milchick redemption were dashed on the rocks of a musical office dogfight.

Another half-answer the episode offers is regarding the mystery of the goats, haunting the narrative with bleats since Season 1. Apparently, they’re sacrifices — although not this time, if Lorne, the head goat-herder, has anything to say about it. The goat-sacrifice room is chilling, outfitted with a single-serve bullet dispenser — perfectly representing Lumon’s particular brand of sanitized, ready-made violence. The manner in which the goat is prepared in a smooth, clinically sterile room contrasts Lorne’s ceremonial, folk-style dress, disheveled hair, and dramatic makeup. After another chaotic showdown in the hallway, complete with fantastic fight choreography, we’re left with a bloodied Innie-Mark leading Drummond down to the testing floor with his gun to his neck.

I’d been holding my breath for the entire episode, but I’d propose Mark and Mr. Drummond’s elevator descent as the finale’s definitive turning point. Upon Innie-Mark crossing the severed barrier, his grip tightens on the trigger. Drummond is dead. Outie-Mark is drenched in blood, high on adrenaline, wildly confused, and every cell in his body is urging him to find Gemma (Dichen Lachman).

As Innie-Mark has been throwing punches and firing bullets (accidentally) on the severed floor, a brand-new innie has been facing a final examination on the testing floor below, behind a door labeled Cold Harbor. A version of Gemma, born into existence minutes prior, is in the process of disassembling the very same crib Outie-Mark disassembled after her outie’s painful miscarriage. It’s a test designed to probe at the deepest, most painful parts of Gemma’s consciousness — will the barrier hold? Jame Eagan and Dr. Mauer (Robby Benson) watch eagerly (and creepily) from a camera set in the wall. 

When a bloody Outie-Mark bursts into the room, begging this version of Gemma to trust him and not the voice of Dr. Mauer, the weakness of Lumon reveals itself. Gemma follows Outie-Mark out of the room — in my opinion, evidence that love does, in fact, transcend severance, as Dylan wonders in Season 1. The reunion of Outie-Mark and Gemma that we’ve been waiting for since that fateful Season 1, Episode 7 reveal is as tender and painful as I’d imagined. 
Of course, happiness can’t last for long inside the walls of Lumon. The lights in the building abruptly begin flashing red — an indication that it’s time for Outie-Mark and Gemma to make their exit, but also, as production designer Jeremy Hindle explained in an interview with Variety, “‘There’s red only a few times [in the show], whenever there’s a bit of real love.’” This frantic red light remains for the rest of the episode, reminding the viewer that the core dilemma of this show is, in fact, very human — it revolves around love. How far will you go for it? Who gets to experience it, and who doesn’t? Can we remove an all-consuming love from our consciousness when it manifests as unbearable grief?

Although the Season 2 finale of Severance doesn’t answer all of our plot-focused questions, it certainly sticks the landing thematically — and opens the door to another delightfully tormenting season.