It’s time to get some answers—maybe? After last week’s near-masterpiece of an episode (“Chikai Bardo,” directed by the visionary-force-in-the-making Jessica Lee Gagné), we’re back in that dangerous Severance cycle of answers only fueling more questions. There’s no question that “Chikai Bardo” will go down as one of the finest episodes of television this awards season, what with the tender braiding of subnarratives and the cinematography so full of longing it was like, somehow, like a song. We’re finally given an episode from Gemma’s perspective (played with such reserved rage and hope by actress Diane Lichen) And, as we get more answers, and barrel toward episode eight, terrifyingly titled “Sweet Vitriol,” it feels like we’re getting closer to danger, too. Not even the most thoroughly-written episode seven recap could untangle all the cords, theories, and mess.
I’ll get you set with the major story notes from last episode to prep you for what’s sure to be a doozy of an installment in what’s currently the best show on television.
As far as release notes go, this episode, like all episodes of Severance, will be available everywhere on the Apple TV+ app on Friday. However, viewers have made a point of watching the new episodes when they first drop, which is at 9pm E.S.T./6pm P.S.T. on Thursday nights on the Apple TV+ app. If you want to watch “Sweet Vitriol” before any Friday morning water-cooler talk might spoil your Friday night viewing plans, saddle in tomorrow night.
Story notes
Let’s run through some brief story developments, just so we’re all on the same page as to where episode eight of Severance might take us.
There are some genuine questions as to how all these timelines played out, especially seeing as so many of these scenes of Mark and Gemma had to be part of his feverish, comatose state. In any case:
The Gemma/Lumon mystery
We’ve now got some answers—Gemma’s imprisonment on the Testing Floor of the Lumon branch 501 seems to be a systemic testing of the Severance chip. The file names on the Macrodata Refinement computers are rooms that are associated with memories, inside which Gemma severs into many different Gemmas who all relive that room, that memory, over and over. It’s a bold introduction to Gemma, seeing as we’re watching her be systemically tortured (writing thank-you notes with her left hand until it’s in a constant gnarl; sinister dentistry) in the basement of a major corporation.
The common denominator here is Gemma’s Keeper—who looks and sounds a heck of a lot like Fields, no?—and is in different costumes—like Gemma—in each room/memory. We assume this Keeper is somehow intimately related with the Eagans at the highest levels, because …
The Control Room
We saw Drummond and Gemma’s yet-to-be-named Keeper twice in a control room environment with four desktop machines. The operators of these machines appear to be the twins of each MacroDat from “Woe’s Hollow,” and it appears their job is simply to monitor their respective refiner all day. It is as if the screen of their computer is directly on the other side of our heroes in Macrodata Refinement. How this fits into the larger purpose of Lumon—this deliberate, heavy-handed mirroring—isn’t anything “Chikai Bardo” bothered itself explaining. It didn’t need to.
Drummond reminds the Keeper that he’ll have to say goodbye to Gemma when the “Cold Harbor” file—stuck at 96% because Mark and Helly are off romancing—is complete. Whether that means Cold Harbor’s completion triggers Gemma’s death or her freedom remains to be determined, but freedom feels like a Hail Mary hope.
And thus, it’s in this Control Room where we’re made aware that Gemma’s fate indeed has an absolution to it. And, with Lumon, absolutions are only nefarious.
“Journeying” with Mark and Gemma
This is the term Dr. Reghabi used for Mark’s comatose state after he fainted at the end of episode six. Presumably, this means that there is a neurological purpose to the sleep-state in which Devon and Reghabi find Mark. It’s only during this miniature coma that we get the fractured windows into Mark’s and Gemma’s marriage as they struggled through a miscarriage.
The major question is: did they somehow experience these memories together? Lee Gagné is on record saying she shot much of this episode from Gemma’s perspective—hence the stunning film-camera visuals in the nostalgic winks of gentleness between Mark and Gemma, clearly what’s driving her will to live—so it’s fair to question just exactly what Mark experienced while he was under.
What we know for certain is that he awoke, had some flashes of that film-camera cinematography Gemma, and started to weep as episode seven smashed to black.
The question remains: What exactly did Mark see down there?
Hello (again?), Ms. Cobel(vig)
Let’s keep an eye out for the return of Harmony Cobel/Mrs. Selvig (Patricia Arquette), as Devon made a point to call her in the last episode. Keep in mind, too, that the Severance season 2 theme’s penultimate shot is of Harmony Cobel closing a book. Those absolutions again.
It’s a near-certainty she shows up this episode.
What to expect with the rest:
Quick-hitters & questions:
- Will Gemma’s escape to the severed floor, where she became Ms. Casey and was turned around by Mr. Milchick, somehow fall on Milchick again? Another contention for his monthly reviews?
- While everyone else appears lost, I maintain that Irving Bailiff (Irv B.’s outie) is spearheading the flank attack on Lumon with some clear and deliberate purpose. He didn’t seem to fall for all of that sugar dripping out Burt’s and Fields’s wine glasses. And we know Irv is making phone-calls (from a payphone in a Lumon housing area) to someone.
- The see-saw of storytelling suggests that, after Mark S.’s and Helly R.’s plastic-wrapped union, this journey Mark Scout went on as part of his integration is going to obliterate the possibility of any sort of honeymoon phase before he even greets Judd at the elevator.
- For those who believe Lumon’s ultimate goal is The Permanent Innie, we’ve got a lot of momentum building that way with Dylan and Gretchen. It is Clear that Dylan G., not Outie Dylan, is the more motivated, more passionate, more engaged—ultimately, less-flawed-and-thus-less-human—version of Gretchen’s husband. You wonder if, given the choice, the two of them would choose to replace car-shopping Dylan with World’s Best Refiner, Dylan G.
- Fans of Orpheus and Eurydice are rightfully terrified.
Enjoy “Sweet Vitriol” this weekend! Courage for our MacroDat friends.
