Severance - S2 Wrap - feat. Excerpts w/Mark and w/Steve & Anthony

[00:00:00] The Wheel of Time turns, and ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. In one podcast, called The Lorehounds by Some, a weekly recap with tons of analysis, two Wheel of Time superfans will lead you through a world of powerful magic, tricky prophecies, and cutthroat politics. Join me, John, and my co-host Alicia for weekly coverage of Season 3 by searching your podcast app for The Lorehounds.

[00:00:27] Dov'ye Andi S2 Vasegin, it's time to roll the dice. Fish, plankton, sea greens, protein from the sea. That do anything for you?

[00:00:52] Hey everyone, David here, with a sort of wrap-up episode, clip show kind of thing. It's about three weeks since Severance finished up, and Steve and Anthony have put out a couple of episodes on the Properly Howard podcast feed.

[00:01:17] They did a full season wrap-up, and then they did a podcast about Logan's run, and then tied it back into Severance. And I then have had a conversation with Mark from our affiliate Nevermind the Music, and we went into depth about the season.

[00:01:41] And in fact, he actually helped me sort of recontextualize a bunch of stuff, and I have some very different thoughts and feelings now about the episode. So that's a really great conversation. So I've taken an excerpt from my conversation with Mark, and then Steve and Anthony's conversation about the Logan's run tie-in. And put that into this little podcast.

[00:02:08] It's just sort of a final thanks and farewell till season three. And just sort of a way to close out and bring some, you know, finality to the season. We had a really successful season. We had a lot of fun with Steve and Anthony. And this was a really wow television show, even though my feelings personally about the last episode were a little mixed.

[00:02:37] That said, it was a lot of fun to cover the show. And John has been busy with Wheel of Time coverage. He and Alicia have been putting in extra time over on that on our main Lorehounds feed. I've gotten to catch a little bit of a break, which is good because I've got a bunch of personal stuff going on. You know, real life family work, you know, normal stuff.

[00:03:02] And then we're about to pick up full-time coverage of The Last of Us. John and I are going to be covering that week to week. And then right after that starts, we have Andor Season 2 starting. And we're doing full court press on that as well. Both, well, all John, Alicia, and myself will be covering that full-time. We're calling in our squadrons.

[00:03:29] We're going to be rotating because of the way that they've released the 12, they're going to be releasing the 12 episodes. They're going to be dropping them three episodes at a time for four weeks. And so we have a whole squadron rotation thing so that we can cover every episode, but nobody gets overburdened with recording and trying to catch up with everything.

[00:03:52] So that's been taking a lot of time and focus for me while John and Alicia wrap up with Wheel of Time. So needless to say, we're all very busy, but we're all very happy as podcasters. It's been a productive year so far, and it was really great to start off with Severance. Anyway, there is a snippet of a conversation with Mark.

[00:04:15] That whole episode is available to our regular monthly subscribers and anyone who purchased a season pass. The season pass is still available. If you wanted to throw in five bucks and support the podcast with that, that would be great. We'll just leave it open until we come around to season three. And thanks everyone who did support us that way. It was really successful.

[00:04:40] Then after that, there is a snippet of conversation with Steve and Anthony about the Logan's Run tie-in. Again, if you want the full Logan's Run movie conversation, because they do a whole thing on the movie, it's great. That's available on the public feed as well as their full season wrap up of Severance.

[00:05:06] That is also available for everyone on the public feed for Properly Howard movie review. Just search for Properly Howard. I'll put a link to it in the show notes as well. And then our website and our little Linktree thing, they all have links to that kind of stuff. All those things. So anyway, thanks again. And we'll see you for season three.

[00:05:37] So I think it remains to be seen what this show is trying to do, what this show is trying to say. I don't know yet what the themes are. We're starting with this, oh, it's sort of about work-life balance. And it's about religion and it's about love and it's about identity. But then there's like, what are they saying about it? I still don't know. Yeah. And I'm kind of okay with it. I'm more than kind of okay with it. But I don't know.

[00:06:06] Is this coming out going to be a condemnation of X or Y? A celebration of A or B? I don't know. It might just kind of be framing the scenario and we can ask the questions of meaning. I don't know that every story has to have a sort of message. And I know you're not saying it has a message, but I think Watchmen did have a point of view. Right. And I think the Tulsa Massacre, as illustrated in that cold open to that one episode of Watchmen,

[00:06:36] very much had a point of view on what we were supposed to think about it. Right. And we're supposed to have a point of view, I think, of like Lumen versus our Innies or in our Audis. But I think this episode alone, this finale, like shifts your frame on like, who am I empathizing with more? Is it the Innies or the Audis? Right. And I go back to episode seven and I forget which episode it was where Irv goes over to Bert's house for dinner.

[00:07:07] And they have a conversation about, you know, can Innies be saved? And I think of all the antecedent conversations where, you know, oh, you know, the Innies are just workhorses and they have no existence outside of it. Or the conversation that Mark and Helena have at the Chinese restaurant. There's all these great antecedent conversations that really are working for me in this question of who is deserving of grace? Who is deserving of love?

[00:07:33] Who is deserving of being saved, if you believe in some sort of afterlife? And all of that was working for me. And then none of those were – and there was a great conversation between the Marks that really drove a lot of that stuff.

[00:07:52] And I suppose the ending does leave you with a feeling about these Innies know that they're trapped and that they have outside of this floor, which is totally controlled by Lumen. They totally have no agency. They only have this little finite amount of agency and they're going to capitalize on it as much as they can.

[00:08:23] But because they are deserving of love and attention and individuality. Free will. That's right. And I think that – I mean, if you could say what's the moral here, it would be that, right? It's like we know in season one when Helly's Audi says you're not a person, we know she's wrong in that moment. We know that, right?

[00:08:45] And the extent that this season lets us really kind of see the nihilism of the Innie situation and also the sort of beauty and sparkle in it at the same time, like that last scene illustrates, is I think not what people would have – I don't think that's what I went in thinking I was getting with this show. So I still don't know where it's going to end though. So what are they putting out? What's the real message? But maybe not.

[00:09:14] Maybe it doesn't matter. Meaning, sorry. Like the truths, the emotional truths ring real to me, even if the ins and outs of the marching band don't. And that's where I go back to like episode seven. That was a meaningful episode for me. Sure. And that episode doesn't exist outside of the season, right?

[00:09:45] Yeah. You could have stopped there. Are you a Stephen King reader by any chance? Really great. That's awesome. Have you ever read Stephen King? Yeah, you know, I read some Stephen King back in the day. I've certainly obviously seen Stephen King movies. I think I read – is it The Dark Tower or Gunslinger? What is that series? The first Dark – so The Dark Tower is a series. That's the one about the Gunslinger in – Yes, the first book.

[00:10:11] I read the first three and I think it was the first three. And I had caught up to what had been published and then I was waiting for the next one. And then I like, I don't know, just got – And then he had to have a terrible accident and nearly lose his life. And then he wrote all three of the following books in the next year or two. Oh, wow. Okay. Because he like was worried he would meet his maker. So – I never came back to them. The reason I'm going to bring it up is there's a moment in the last book of that series. Okay, okay.

[00:10:41] The Dark Tower. And I'm not going to spoil anything, listeners. We can talk about Stephen King on another time. But the point here is he tells you to stop reading. He's like, I'm going to answer stuff in this last section of the book. Okay. And I think you're going to be disappointed because you've been reading this book for – And you have – This series since the 70s. You've been building it up. And it's like the author meta talking to us. Yeah. Like the omniscient narrator saying, stop reading. And it's like, I told you to stop reading.

[00:11:10] And then you read the ending. And I like the ending. But some people don't like the ending. And it's like – But he told you if you were going to – Like at the end of episode seven, they need to be like, David. Yes. Are you really looking – This goes back to The Leftovers. Let the mystery be. Are you looking for answers? Just don't watch episode eight. Right. Just – If you stop now, it'll be the greatest show of all time. Now we're not done. We still got at least another season, right? But I think that that had so much –

[00:11:39] Like to me, I was so struck by the almost – The self-awareness of Stephen King in that moment to say like, Yeah. Yeah. I know for a fact nothing I can do will please all of you. So it had just – It had just sort of had – It's like the return of the king. Extremely self-aware. Ending number one had already happened. So you could just turn off the movie before Frodo sails off to the Westlands or whatever. The Grey Havens or goes there. I'm mixing it up. Don't tell John.

[00:12:10] But he's – So you've got your emotional ending. Now I'm going to really end it now, but maybe you should just not read the last 50 pages of the book. And I hope that we don't feel that way when this is over, but maybe there is something to be said for that. Like you had your perfect episode of episode seven. Would it ever be good enough after that moment? And maybe not. You've put a frame around something that I had not thought of before,

[00:12:38] and that may very well be the case. That that episode was such a high watermark for me that that had to be the penultimate episode and then just wind down. But for the show, it was 10. So I think you're right. I think you're – And for me, that's just a me thing. I got so much satisfaction from that episode. There's just no way that they could deliver anything that would have satisfied.

[00:13:10] We'll have to see if they ever outdo season two, episode seven in any television series ever. So much for a short keep it light podcast. That's right. Since when I told my wife, well, yeah, you know, I don't even really have that much to talk about. It'll probably be like a half an hour. You're good, right? You've got – the kids have friends over. You're fine. She's like, yeah, sure. She did not believe that it would be a half an hour.

[00:13:40] And here we are, proving her right once again. We are grateful to all of our – those of us who happen to have spouses, they are very indulgent of our podcasting activities. That's right. Mark, thank you. This was a pleasure. I think you've given me some new insight I was not expecting, and I think that's pretty cool. How many people does it take to convince David that this is a good episode of television? Everybody – I love it too, because every once in a while, we'll be going along in one direction.

[00:14:09] And then when I do my zag, like, you know, that didn't quite – everybody's like, oh, my God. I mean, the same thing with Last of Us Season 1 and my take on Joel. And, man, we had to do – I don't know if you listened to that, but we had to do a two-part feedback because everybody was coming for me. We should not be talking about this. This is wasting everybody's time. But you can all be right when it comes to Last of Us. Like, I know people were mad at you about that,

[00:14:36] but, like, I think we're supposed to wonder to the ethics of that episode. And to act like, no, he's totally justified and that's it is – No, we're supposed to question the ethics of – We're supposed to be in that conundrum. That's where exactly they want us is to be in that pocket. And that doesn't mean you're right. But it means asking the question is not absurd, right? So, all right. Which is why I asked you the crazy question at the beginning of this episode. That's right. And here we are talking about last hour and 20 minutes later. All right. This was fun. Thanks, David.

[00:15:05] Thank you, Mark. Talk to you soon. All right. So, let's go through some of the severance parallels here. And if you've hung out with us this long just to hear us talk about severance, I apologize that this podcast exists. I've got a few of these. I'm sure I'm missing a few of them. But let's just start with what first clued you into the connections between severance and this movie. So, yeah.

[00:15:35] So, the reason why I got into the Logan's Run concept, it was actually – Was it episode six? Which is the Shikai Bardot. Is that – anyway, it's the Shikai Bardot episode. Yeah. Where there's the – there's sort of the montage of their relationship. And it's this French song. And it's like a thousand waltzes. And it's just – it's kind of frenetic. And it just goes and goes and goes kind of repetitive. And it spins and it spins.

[00:16:04] And, like, it's just – it feels like – it's kind of, like, overwhelming and manic in some regard. And I looked up the lyrics. And the lyrics were, like, a thousand waltzes and blah, blah, blah. But there was a – like, a play or a musical done about the performer, the singer of that song. And they had changed the words to the carousel. And so, when I first looked up the words, that was the first thing I had found was this idea of carousel.

[00:16:30] And it kind of went with the sort of – almost the imagery. Like, the imagery almost felt like you were going around a lot. So, it was interesting. And so, I thought, okay, well, I was wrong maybe about that. But then when they did the final scene when they're running down the hallway in the finale, you know, the windmills of my mind came on. And I heard the word carousel again sung by Mel Torme. And so, that sort of, like, popped it back in. And I was like, wait a minute.

[00:16:57] You know, like, you know, and I – you know, you start believing that there are no accidents or everything's connected so that you just start connecting everything, whether it's meant to or not. So, I started thinking carousel, looked up, and I'm like, isn't that a Logan's Run thing? So, I looked up Logan's Run a little bit more. Again, assuming I had seen it. And I had been conflating some of the scenes from Soylent Green, the death scenes in Soylent Green with Ernest Borgnine as well. I was thinking the carousel scene. I had already seen it, but that was – so, anyway.

[00:17:25] So, that was the first thing that kind of clued me in. And then I started – you know, when I started pulling up information, I'm like – I looked at the next part that really clued me in was Adam Scott's hair and Michael York's hair are remarkably similar. Yeah. Yeah. It's like you copied and pasted. Right. And that part struck me because we talked so much about when is this, you know? Well, not only that, but Farrah Fawcett is adamant that his hair should be brown. Right. Right. Yeah.

[00:17:55] That's a good point. And so, it's almost like you copied and pasted and then gave Farrah Fawcett her wish. Exactly. Yeah. And so, then you get this. So, then the idea of – so, as I started to like really go unpacking even further, I'm sure you have a longer list. But that's when it was like, okay, well, there's this last scene. It's grainy. They're running. They're – you know, it kind of brings you a 70s, you know, sort of motif. It's a white hallway. A lot of white in these types of movies, especially the hallways.

[00:18:22] The idea that Logan's Run is in an inside dome and there's an outside world and it's like trying to get out and then they come back. Anyway, so, all of a sudden it was like, okay, I'm not saying that this is a remake of Logan's Run, but I'm kind of – I wanted to bring up that Wicker Man moment because I almost wondered if there is an element of going like same kind of feeling. You see Logan's Run and you're like, I'm interested in this world, but I feel like I'm more interested in the world that they didn't show me.

[00:18:51] And maybe that's what I want to explore. Right. And I think that my take on this is that when they were thinking of season two, there were themes in this movie that they thought, let's play with that a little bit. So, I don't know if any of this is going to be like predictive. Right. Yeah, and that's the thing. It's possible. I don't know that you're like anything that we pull out of Logan's Run and we can now go, aha, because there isn't a lot of that, right?

[00:19:20] They don't tell you the whys and they don't tell you – you don't understand box. He just is. So, let me just run down my list here. You have this inside society with no memory of life before. Now, in this case, it's not personal memory. It's sort of collective cultural memory. Mm-hmm. Right? They don't know what a mother is. They don't know what a father is. You know, they don't – they just have zero memory of life outside.

[00:19:50] People just show up. People just show up and it's like you're in this little any world society that all kind of makes sense as long as you're in here. But anything about like American history or aging or social relationships, that's all been forgotten. You've got the myth of a utopia inside.

[00:20:16] You know, it's sort of like – what does Milchick say episode one of the first season? He said, you don't have to worry about Petey's death. You don't have to worry about Petey's absence. You never have to experience pain or death in here. Right. That's something that we provide for you. Almost a minute later, Marcus telling Helly, like, Milchick can't always be that nice. It's best to just obey.

[00:20:47] So you kind of see like as long as you play by the rules, as long as you sort of remind yourself that you're an ant in the ant farm, everything's going to be perfect in here for you. Right. You're going to have food. You're going to have structure. You don't have to worry about, you know, suffering or death. And it's kind of like Logan's run in that way.

[00:21:15] In fact, Logan's run is probably that even more so. It's like we've created the perfect society for you. You have every desire that you'd ever want. Just don't forget to play by the rules. Right. You have running as a theme. So running is like a major theme in season two. In fact, it's bookended. Yeah. We've also got an age mystery in both.

[00:21:43] You know, what does Miss Wong say? Who are you a child? Because of when I was born. Because of when I was born. Yeah, yeah. Because of when I was born. And then they ask the old man in Logan's run, how old are you? And he says, as old as I am, I suppose. Right, right. Yeah, that's great. So it's the same kind of joke. Okay. So you've got an age mystery in both.

[00:22:09] You kind of have sentinels observing runners in both shows. You've got almost a woes hollow thing in both shows. Right. Because in Logan's run, they go into the icebox world. Mm-hmm. And they have to put on the old timey clothing. Yeah, that's one of the ones too. Yeah, the furs. There's people frozen.

[00:22:36] You have these doppelgangers roaming through woes hollow. And then they get to see the sky for the first time. And that's a big deal. It's a really big deal in both. It's like, it gives off warmth. You know, they've got no idea of what the sun is.

[00:22:56] And you have that sense in the woes hollow episode that it's just a huge deal for them to see the outside world. Well, and they even bring it up when he has this new team. They're like, what was the sky like? And they're just like, he's like, huh? And he's like, I've seen my behind. Talking to my brother-in-law was like kind of low on the list of things I would do if I got out. Okay.

[00:23:24] So, and then of course, sort of the mystery cult underlying the technology. Right. Technology. And it appears at least in, you know, it's not explicit in Logan's run. But there is an implication that the obedience part of it is maybe maintained through like almost a religious lore. Well, there's a death ritual, right? Right.

[00:23:49] There's a death ritual that's sort of established and there's a religious mythology built around it. You know, in... So much so that they're excited about it. Yes. Yes. Yeah. In Logan's run, it's sort of like white masks in a circle watching people spin up into, you know, fireworks, I guess. Yeah. It's almost like their retirement ceremony for your innies, right? Right. And then, of course, you've got the ritual with the goats.

[00:24:16] You know, they're going to send Gemma to the other world with, you know, with a goat guide. So there's a ritual around that. But in both cases, there's... It's not... It's sort of on the surface, it's kind of a technology sci-fi thing. But in both cases, there's this culty underpinning happening. And then the last thing, and I don't know if this is a parallel.

[00:24:46] But this is... To me, this could be the most predictive element, if indeed it's not just themes. I wonder if there's an AI component in Severance. Because in Petey's map, you know, he's got this detailed map of what he's trying to, you know, put together. He's trying to map out the Severance floor. And there's this spot on the map that says, Mind.

[00:25:16] Right, right. It's a big box that says, Mind. And I don't know what that means. But you've got to pay it off. You know, you've planted that early on. Right. The mapping of the Severance floor is so important throughout. And you've got this canary in a coal mine character, Petey, who knows more than he has divulged.

[00:25:45] And he's written in very big, bold letters on this thing, Mind. And I don't know what to make of that. But it does make me wonder, like, is there a Logan's Run style, you know, AI computer? Right. Yeah, and I think for me. Either at work or trying to be built. Right. If I was going to take a predictive element out of this, it would be to suggest that the world of cure outside is not.

[00:26:17] Lumen is not the source of all this. There's a bigger domed world, so to speak. Okay. Like, I think that part of the reason why things are maybe a little anachronistic in terms of technology and whatnot might have something to do with the fact that this world is – this outside world isn't purely outside. Right. So that kind of brings us back to one of our earliest theories. But I will say this.

[00:26:44] Because if you had a lumen cure kind of ideology around going to war against pain and suffering, like that's the religious appeal to this thing. Is that we're using the technology available to us to end suffering. A logical outcome to that might be a world like we see in Logan's Run. Right.

[00:27:11] Because there was this idea, at least – and again, I think that's where I would say that the inspiration of a Logan's Run is maybe based not only on the appreciation of some of the themes, but maybe a frustration of the lack of flushing some of them out.

[00:27:28] And this is an opportunity to say, okay, well, I can create a Logan's Run type – I can play with the themes, but I can – the part that I would have been the most interested in, I get to now create. Like maybe as a showrunner, you have this opportunity to say, look, I can either – and I'm just – I'm not speaking for them, but you could potentially see a situation where you're like, well, I would love to remake it, but I don't want to just remake Logan's Run.

[00:27:56] I don't want it to be compared to Logan's Run. Let's take what we saw and explore the things that we found the most interesting. Like, who are these people in the white mask? Let's talk about those, the people in Greatentale. Yeah, right, right, right. Yeah. It could be that this is kind of like just a season two thing. Mm-hmm. You know? Let's just really sort of do a Logan's Run themed season.

[00:28:27] Or it could be that they're trying to tell us something. Right. And that's – yeah, because I think it could also – yeah, like you said, it could just be like, look, there's some thematics here that we really do owe to Logan's Run. So maybe it is almost a respectful homage and not necessarily a clue of where things are going. But it could just be also like, look, I owe a lot to this. And so let's have some fun with that. Yeah. Yeah.

[00:28:51] Did thinking about Severance impact your ability to watch the show or the movie and maybe give it a little bit more interest than you might not have otherwise had? Um, it wasn't that big of a chore. I mean, it wasn't like I was like deeply emotionally connected to the film and I was distracted in some way because of Severance. Gotcha.

[00:29:16] Um, but I did get to hear my wife make fun of your theory a number of times. That's nice. It's like, so Steve thinks this is what Severance is based on, huh? Well, and I – and if, you know, my only counter to that is like, ha ha, you're watching a Logan's Run show. We – no, we – she could not finish.

[00:29:45] So she was like right in the middle, but she's – I would say she saw most of it. And, um, we quite enjoyed it. She would probably not say that we enjoyed it as much as I think that we did. Yeah, those are my favorites when I'm like, ah, we had a really good time. Heather's like, uh, you did. I heard a lot of laughter from her side of the room. So, I mean, look, we could probably cover Logan's Run a lot.

[00:30:15] We could just do it almost exclusively. We could do a Logan's Run portion to every episode from here on out. Yeah. Welcome to – welcome to the next season of Properly Logan. Is this better, worse, or on par with Logan's Run? This podcast is a joint production of the Lorehounds and Properly Howard. Click the link tree in the show notes for links to more podcasts, our Discord server, and ways to support the show.

[00:30:44] Any opinions stated are ours personally and do not reflect the opinion of or belong to any employers or other entities. Is it Frank or the beans? Lord Vader underway. Excellent. If we release three episodes per week, the Lorehounds will never be able to cover every episode. The Imperial forces will crush the Rebellion before it begins. Standby. We're picking up something on our scanners. Echo Squadron reporting in. Delta Squadron on your left.

[00:31:13] Jango Squadron on your six. With Imperial forces coming in fast, we're calling all Rebels to join the fight this season. Starting after the April 22nd premiere, you'll hear three full breakdowns for each week's episodes of Andor Season 2. Each podcast will be led by one of our Squadron leaders, Alicia, David, and John. We'll be bringing in new and familiar voices to fill out the roster. Search for the Lorehounds on any podcast platform to join us in a galaxy far, far away.

[00:31:39] And don't forget to check out our season pass for even more content like our Holocron bonus pods. It's good news for anyone except Darth Vader.