I didn’t realize how much I missed sci-fi stories and television series that make you wait for answers. Heading into the Season 1 finale this week, Apple’s Severance, is a marvel. A disorienting, regularly off-putting marvel. I keep finding myself thinking about it later. It’s hard for some reason to accurately translate this type of speculative fiction to screen (even if it was made for it). So I’m impressed. It’s crazy to think what a relatively small audience of Apple subscribers are watching this suspenseful masterpiece unfold. If this was on Netflix, I have to believe it’d be the talk of the town like Stranger Things or Squid Game.
(Spoilers ahead)
Screenwriter Dan Erickson has created something designed to disorient. I know Ben Stiller spent years wanting to adapt CivilWarLand in Bad Decline, so I think this show is a fitting alternative — a reality that is like ours but somehow just off-center. The premise of Severance is simple on the surface, but the more you think about the ramifications of it, the darker it gets. Not since Parasite has a mainstream show or film captured the slow crawl of dehumanizing workers and the story line of Turturro and Walken’s Irving and Burt is beautiful and heartbreaking.
It reminds me of some of the shorter, high concept sci-fi stuff written in the seventies that I’ve read. None of it got especially famous, but I still remember the feelings/vibes if not the actual titles. Also, I have a soft-spot for absurdist dark comedy set in office environments. It was interesting to hear the creatives used overseas decor for the offices to give their version of “America” a look and feel that is just “off.” That subtle dissonance is almost more intense than confronting something entirely novel. The design reflects this confidence at every turn.
I’m digging the way the show makes you massively care for the characters, especially the fearless foursome at MDR. I was right there with them when they were pulling off the overtime scheme, and one by one entered the elevator, not knowing what their outcome would be. Exceptional leading performances from Adam Scott and Britt Lower. Patricia Arquette is brilliant. I love that Tramell Tillman dresses like a 1970s math teacher/NASA mission control operator. And man does he deploy a big smile in the creepiest way possible.
This show goes into a lot you don’t initially think about. Anyone else questioning their own careers/work life and feeling like minions being controlled by the upper echelon management after watching this? Or maybe that you’re a slave to yourself. Your work self might want to quit, but your outside self keeps marching right back in unaware of how you might be treated on the inside. Real heady stuff here. Surely, there will be more cliffhangers and unanswered questions after this season ends, after all it’s a series, not a miniseries, so there needs to be some mystery and intrigue left to carry us into Season 2. I know it’s a dystopian hellscape. But I want one of those keyboards.
Severance (Season one) is streaming in full on Apple+.