This week, the podcast dives into the intriguing developments of Severance Season 2, Episode 2, titled "Goodbye, Mrs. Selvig." The episode explores the awakening of the outies and the complexities of their experiences as they navigate their new realities. Mark grapples with the emotional weight of finding his wedding photo in a moment that resonates with the show's themes of identity and memory. Meanwhile, Helena's strained relationship with her father and the unsettling power dynamics at Lumen come to the forefront, showcasing the show's knack for intense character interactions. As the episode unfolds, tensions rise with Milchick's manipulative tactics and the looming question of Mark's future at Lumon, setting the stage for an exciting continuation of the series.

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The show where Aubrey and Jeff talk about shows worth binging.

This week, we'll be discussing episode two of season two of severance.

I'm pretty pumped.

I'm very.

Start.

Vacation, you said?

I've already started.

I don't know if it really officially starts until I'm getting paid for not working.

Well, I think.

I think you've started.

Maybe, But I would definitely be on vacation tomorrow.

I plan on sleeping in.

Yeah.

I plan on looking for the mail.

What do you mean by that?

I mean I have something coming in the mail tomorrow, most likely.

What is it?

Steam duck.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

That we know that you're just gonna take so you can play Spider Man.

Oh, yeah.

But it's, you know, it's gonna be good.

Take a couple days off, do some.

Some housework and editing.

Yeah, and some editing.

I gotta do that too.

But either way, I am excited to have some time off, you know, and we're going to go ahead into the episode.

Let's do it.

Season two, episode two is titled Goodbye, Mrs.

Selvig.

Mark contemplates the meaning of a message.

Yeah, it seems like you got your wish.

I did.

I finally did.

We got to see what happens when the Audis wake up from last season.

For the most part.

For the most part, we still have.

A little bit of missing time, but, yeah, we got it.

We had a good deep dive.

The most information we got was definitely from Mark's point of view, and that was obviously the one we probably wanted the most.

But it would have been cool to see exactly what happened on Bert's doorstep.

Yeah, I hope we get to see that.

I feel like we will.

I just don't know.

I kind of also feel like it's not episode three.

Yeah, it might be a little later on.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I don't know.

I could be wrong, but I kind of feel like it's not right away.

So we're starting this episode.

We get a compilation of audio, kind of like we did with episode one of the season one finale.

And then we get to see Mark yelling for Devin.

Yeah, these two felt like sister episodes.

And then the Audis wake up, and we see everybody kind of staring at Mark, but he's kind of not sure why everybody's staring at him.

Yeah, I feel like I've had that same dream, like, a hundred times.

Oh, yeah.

Just awkwardly with standing there with people all around you.

Yeah.

Devin goes over to Mark and gives him a hug and checks on him and ask him, is that.

Is that you?

So weird.

Yeah, it's weird in every context except this show.

Mark looks down after she checks on him and notices his wedding photo is in hand.

Yeah, you gotta feel some kind of way about that.

Yeah.

So then we go back to Lumen to see Helena Egan after the gala, and she's having a weird encounter with her father, who walks into wherever they are.

Her father looks at her in disgust and says, fetid moppet.

And then he leaves.

It was so aggressive.

Yeah.

Another example of the excellent face acting in this show.

How angry he was.

And then the slow confusion into turn into disgust, either with her or himself.

I'm not sure, but maybe a little of both as he spins away.

Yeah.

And Helena doesn't really look scared, but she's just like, father.

Yeah.

She.

That's a weird dynamic because she was not surprised by that.

No.

Next we see Dylan's Audi leaving for the night with an ice pack on his head.

And Milchek is watching him creepily from above.

Yeah.

It was interesting to see the lights turn out as he was, like, walking through the lobby.

I don't think we've ever seen that before.

Yeah, he stayed late.

I would be so confused, like, why?

Why am I here so late?

Like, I've never left this late before.

But he seems cool with it.

Yeah.

We see Helena meeting Milchick and she asked him to do some damage control.

And Milchik asks if he should fire them.

And Helena says, let Keir guide your hand, which kind of gives him permission to do whatever he wants.

Sounds like it.

Yeah.

We get to see a really cool wide shot going in in Lumen outside, and Helena's walking through, going to a boardroom where we see Ms.

Cobell in there.

Yeah, it was a really cool looking shot, although I feel like it.

That one was probably CGI, I think.

Probably.

I don't know.

Helena thanks Mrs.

Cobell for her loyalty and asks if she'll come back to the company.

Wants to give her a really bogus promotion.

Yeah.

She's like, yeah, I'll think about it.

Yeah.

She says it's to a severance advisory council, which Cobell's never heard before.

After that, we cut to Milchick taking off on his motorcycle, which I didn't.

See him as a motorcycle guy, but he looks amazing.

He does.

And we cut back to Helena sitting down to record an apology video.

She states that she was drinking while taking a non lumen medication for an arm rash.

And then, I don't know I thought that was.

You pointed out the non Lumen part to me.

Oh, yeah.

Obviously it wasn't a Lumen product making her act so crazy.

Mm.

Did you think that was Natalie recording the video?

I didn't really think about it, but.

Maybe I was trying to think of who would be back there, but.

So as she continues this apology video, we cut back and forth between her and Milchick.

And he's knocking at Irving's door.

He asks Irving if anything weird happened, and Irving says, not that he can think of.

Then we see Milchick at Dylan's house, and he tells him he is also fired because he got in an altercation with a.

A co worker and he was the aggressor.

And that he was the aggressor.

Yeah, that.

That's crazy.

So then we cut to our new intro.

Yeah.

Just like season one, we only saw the actual intro cinematics in the second episode, not the first one.

Yeah, it was interesting.

There's a couple things to this new intro that I thought were really weird.

Like these babies that are just crawling over Mark.

Yeah.

I don't know.

It was very bizarre.

And the babies were in suits.

They indeed were.

And not birthday suits.

We see this projector with a goat on it and the goats also wearing a suit, which I thought was weird.

Good for the goat.

We see Ms.

Casey and we see Helly are running around in Mark's brain like shadows of them.

Yeah, he's definitely got a lot on his mind.

I thought it was interesting, too, the depiction of.

We see the severance chip, and it's not being put in like it was for season one.

It's being taken out of the brain.

So that might be a symbol of reintegration for someone.

I don't know.

Maybe.

I think it's going to happen, I think, before the season's over, but definitely, I think, before the series is over.

Yeah.

Which, by the way, we got confirmation of season three.

Yeah, that was exciting.

Yeah.

And then baby Kier at the very end of the intro, crawling up to Mark.

He's cute.

You think Kier's gonna be reborn?

I think he already has.

Interesting.

All right, so after our new intro, we cut back to Rickon's party as the last guest, Rebecc, leaves.

She is so funny.

She says, don't punish the baby, Rickon.

Yeah, it's.

It's not the baby's fault that your entire book reading got ruined.

Yeah, it's.

It's definitely not.

Devin and Mark are kind of contemplating the meaning behind what any Mark said she's alive, which I thought was self explanatory, but I guess not.

They think it's the baby being alive.

I mean, I don't blame Mark for not believing it.

Mm.

I mean, it's a weird thing to hear when you know that your spouse is dead.

That's true.

We get Rickon giving Cobell a new nickname.

Kobe.

Sorry.

Kobelvig.

Yeah.

Which is just her new name now.

Just.

Yeah, we're gonna.

We're gonna make it a thing.

We got milkshake.

We got Cabel bake.

Devon continues telling Mark about the evening when the doorbell rings and it's milkshake.

And no one even ordered him.

Devin covers up the wedding photo with a towel.

Before they go and sit down with milkshake, Milchick explains to them about the overtime contingency and how one of his co workers was able to access it for 39 minutes.

Yeah, and mildly weird thing when he was saying it, just the way he says lines sometimes.

He said it was in your start paperwork.

Mm.

Not that weird, but just I thought it was a little bit weird to not be in your starting paperwork.

Yeah.

And I thought he said stark, like with a K.

So I was kind of confused.

Definitely even more weird than starting paperwork.

But you'd think that.

I mean, maybe Mark didn't care, but you would read through that paperwork.

I don't know.

Yeah, I mean, most of us skip the terms and conditions.

That's true, if it was even in there.

Yeah, I mean, dude's a serial liar, so who knows?

Got a long record of lying.

Milchick asked Devin what any Mark said to her, and she says, if I tell you, are you gonna punish him for it?

Yeah.

Little sassy Devin.

Heck yeah.

And Milchick answers with, we don't.

We have no punishments at Lumen.

No break room.

Yeah, no break room.

No weird mirror rooms making people sweat.

Yeah, and we can tell Devin doesn't believe that for a second.

She then brings up Kobel Big, and Milchick says that she's no longer going to be bothering Mark at Lumen or at home.

Yeah, she'll never descend onto that floor again.

Oh, my gosh.

His verbiage is insane.

That one felt on purpose.

Yeah.

And then Milchick gets up to leave and says he hopes to see Mark on Monday.

And Mark's not too sure about that.

Yeah, he finally seems like maybe he's going to.

Going to quit.

We get a compilation of all the Audis after Milchick's news.

Irving's Pulling the map of Burt's out of his pocket.

Dylan's on his couch and Helena watching a severed floor footage.

And Mark is driving home.

That face acting there was.

Was really intense, like watching her eyes as she took all that in.

She.

We get to see her watching Marquess and Heliar saying goodbye to each other and she does a little half smile at their banter that they have, which I couldn't tell if it was like she thought it was sweet or she's like knows how to manipulate the situation now.

I couldn't really tell.

Probably both.

She stops the tape after their kiss and she rewinds it and watches it again from another angle.

What a perv.

Very much so.

But then to make it even worse, she stops and rewinds it again and re watches it a third time.

So crazy.

We cut to Mark in a reversed sense.

He is now the one creepily looking out his window at Kobelvig's house.

And he gets a text from Devin to meet him for some diner food.

Yeah, some crappy diner food.

Crappy diner food.

Next we see Audi Dylan.

He's driving through Kier to go to a job interview at Great doors.

Before going in, Dylan pumps himself up in the mirror, which I thought thought was super cool.

And the interview seems to be going great until.

Do you remember the guy's name?

No.

Okay.

But the dude is from Secret Life of Walter Mitty, so that's pretty cool.

Until the guy finds out he's severed.

Yeah, Then it goes real bad and it ruined Devin's really sweet door jokes he had going on.

I know he had some great ones.

The guy didn't really like his door prize joke though.

Yeah, this is the best one.

Yeah, I.

I laughed at that one.

It was, it was pretty good.

Dylan.

We get to see him in his car.

He's kind of defeated.

His phone rings and we hear his wife trying to console him on the phone.

Her voice sounded really familiar to me, but I can't really tell where I know it from, whether it's from another show or if we've heard it in the season before the series before.

So then we're back at Lenora Lake at Irving's house.

He walks down the street to a payphone and leaves a mysterious voicemail to someone saying, I want you to know my auntie got the message.

Yeah, I had to cheat on that one and rewind it and let Apple show me the subtitles.

I know, me too.

And then a car rolls up.

Who's in the car?

Cobelvig.

Milcheck?

No.

Dylan?

No.

I don't know.

It's Bert.

It was Bert.

He looks kind of suspicious, but I.

Mean, it is Christopher Walken and this.

Lunatic was just banging on his door, so I guess he has a reason to.

Yeah.

And we don't know what happened after that still, so.

Yeah, I really want to know.

Maybe.

Maybe one day that we'll find out.

Maybe.

We cut back to Mark's house and his doorbell rings.

It's Milkshake.

He just never stops.

He's got a fruit basket for him with a pineapple.

Did you immediately think of a different show of yours?

Mm.

Psych.

Milchig comes in and tries to give Mark some incentives on trying to get him back to work.

He incentivizes him with a pay bump, an investigation into his any's claims, regular wellness checks, and solace like his innie has if he gives it time.

A 20% pay bump?

Yeah, that's.

That's money.

We don't know how much he's making, but that's a lot.

20 is a bunch.

Do you think the wellness checks for.

For him or for his.

Any.

Because if it's.

Who knows?

If it's for his any, they got rid of wellness.

So that's a lie.

Yeah.

I mean, who knows?

I don't know.

He also tells Mark he found love there, which is such a weird thing to say.

And then when Mark asked, he kind of goes over it.

Yeah, he's like, with who?

Which also is weird because Mark doesn't even know who he works with.

But yeah.

Yeah, I guess he knows one person he used to work with, but.

Yeah, he knows that Petey's dead.

And he used to work with Kobe.

I thought it was kind of bad of Milk Milchick to start talking about Gemma.

I don't know.

I guess he was trying to hit the heartstrings of trying to get him back that way.

Lean into his.

I mean, if Pineapple won't do it.

Yeah, you gotta go with what you got.

Yeah.

But it works because we see Mark outside of Lumen, kind of debating whether to go back in or not.

Then you finally decides to.

Yeah.

Going back to the first time he came back in episode one, when he had that brand new team that no one knew anything about.

Yeah.

We get to see Helena watching him walk in from the upstairs window.

She's with Milchick, Natalie, and Mr.

Drummond.

Milchick tells them that he's hired a new team and says that he thinks they'll have chemistry.

But Helena tells them they don't need chemistry.

We just need Marcus to get back to work on Cold Harbor.

Mark is important.

We get a montage of Mark going into the elevator and coming right back out.

Kind of the opposite perspective of we did with Mark.

Any from the last episode?

It was so weird that the night he gets sent home early, like, he's only worked 15 minutes, but.

But he still comes out of the elevator and says, good night, Judd.

Yeah.

Because he thinks it's nighttime.

We hear the message, any Mark left for the board?

As we fade into a tape recorder playing his message on the boardroom table.

Milchick, Helena, and Mr.

Drummond are there.

Mr.

Drummond explains that the board will.

Give them what he wants, Including Helly R.

Including Hellyar, by the way.

Drummond.

Also from Secret Life of Walter Mitty.

You love that show.

Yeah, that movie.

I guess it is great.

They're giving him what he wants because he's not gonna finish without him.

And they really need for him to.

Get this done, whatever he's doing.

Yeah, whatever it is.

We get to see two more fruit baskets being delivered by Milchick to Irving and Dylan.

Getting the team back.

Getting the team back.

I kind of wanted to see him groveling a little bit more to get them back.

Mailchick doesn't grovel.

I know, but, like.

But after they're fired, like, what would convince them to come back?

Like, I guess Dylan needed the money.

Really, And Irving has other weird stuff going on.

Yeah, I guess so.

He got a plan.

We see Mark come back the next day, and he passes Mark W.

Being kicked out of the building by security.

Yeah.

He broke a lease.

He broke a whole lease in Grand Rapids.

This time, we get to see the Audi perspective of everyone coming back to work.

And it was a really cool, like, looked like one shot.

Yeah.

We get to hear two dings on the elevator for everyone but heli.

Yeah, the sound was definitely different.

Almost like something was different about this person going down the elevator.

Almost like she didn't undergo a change as she hit the severed floor.

I guess we'll find out, but I think we know.

I think we know.

Yeah, That's.

That's Helena.

What we don't know is if any or everyone else knows it's Helena.

Like the other people at Lumen.

Mm.

I think Irving has some suspicions, but.

Yeah, but I'm talking the bosses, everyone else up top.

Did they approve that?

I mean, Drummond said Mark's getting heliar.

Did Helena decide to do that on her own?

Is she curious about feelings that she thought she Might get to feel.

I get that.

But I don't think there's any way that she would let Heliar go down there and tell everybody who she really is.

That's true.

That's true.

Yeah.

I get that.

So we got one more scene when Mark gets home from work and he sees Cobelvig leaving her house.

He confronts her about everything.

She doesn't even seem faced.

Not a little.

She's packing.

She's getting ready to go.

And Mark jumps in front of the car as she's taking off.

He asks her what this is all about.

Does she know something about Gemma?

Yeah.

And she.

Her eyes looks down.

Yep.

She gives it away.

Gives it all away.

And then lets out this primal scream that really is only rivaled by Dylan's primal scream when he took down Milkshake in season one.

Oh, yeah, the guttural pig scream.

It was insane.

As she's honking on the horn.

Yeah.

And begins to go.

Yeah.

Doesn't care.

She runs down Mark.

I mean, she swerved.

She didn't hit him.

Luckily, Mark jumps out of the way, and Cobel rides off in her vehicle.

Good riddance.

I don't think he's gonna have to worry about living next to her anymore.

No.

Do you think it's the last we savor?

No, no, no.

I don't believe that.

But I think it's the last he has of her as a neighbor.

Yeah.

Good for him, because she can't even handle trash day.

She can't, you know, I mean, you.

Can'T handle the trash day.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So, I mean, it's gonna be way easier on him to handle that.

Mm.

I think cinematically, for me, this episode, I'm gonna have to go with Milkshake on the motorcycle just looking like an absolute unit riding around and.

And even the, like, little bit of touch they left of the leather jacket sounding how good it sounded as he.

It, like, added to the uncomfortableness of him talking to the different MDR team members.

Yeah.

I just thought it had a little bit of touch with his.

Like, we know he's a liar, but, man, is he smooth.

So smooth you wish you were as smooth as Milkshake.

I mean, maybe I don't even know where my life would be right now.

I don't think I could handle it.

I don't think I could be that smooth.

Like, Rob Thomas would be singing about me.

So Dylan's amazing verbiage this episode.

Yeah.

Mostly at the Door Factory.

Mostly at the Door Factory.

And it wasn't even any Dylan, which we love any Dylan but Audi.

Dylan has a great line when he talks about the door prizes.

Yes.

And getting all the rest of those, those door puns in there.

So that's your, your winner for his line for this episode, huh?

Yes, that's my winner.

That's fair.

That's fair.

It gets the, the door price.

Yes.

An observation I wanted to give really quick was we finally get around to Mark changing his burnt out light bulb that I noticed first season.

But we don't like he actually makes the effort to do it and then in the process he can't because the doorbell rings.

I don't think it's ever getting changed.

You're just going to be frustrated about it for years.

And he's finally taking care of those fish.

I finally saw some, some food.

Yeah, he's healing.

He's getting a little better.

I'm surprised the fish aren't, you know, gone yet.

But anyway.

Yeah, it might not be real.

I don't know.

I don't know even know if they are real.

I mean I told you in our first episode that they weren't even there one scene.

So.

Yeah.

So they may not be.

So I guess we'll have to find out as the season goes on.

Yeah, that we will.

We appreciate you guys listening to us talk about episode two.

Remember, if you'd like to tell us your thoughts or have questions that we can talk about, you can call in on our Podline at 415-podline.

Thanks so much for listening to us.

We're out.

Later.

Bye.

Let's cut that other part out mentally.

You hear that?