‘Severance’ Creator Says Ben Stiller Was Right About Changing Season 2 Finale Ending
Note: This story contains spoilers from “Severance” Season 2, Episode 10.
The question of Helly or Gemma is one that has haunted both Mark S. and viewers of “Severance” throughout Season 2. Most fans suspected that Mark (Adam Scott) would be forced to choose between the woman his innie loves and his outie’s wife eventually. But few could predict that the actual choice would be so dramatic.
Together with his sister Devon (Jen Tullock) and the mysterious Ms. Cobel (Patricia Arquette), Mark devises a plan to sneak into Lumon’s depths and rescue his outie’s wife, Gemma (Dichen Lachman). At first, Innie Mark refuses the plan. It’s only when Helly (Britt Lower) reminds him that Lumon plans to kill all innies anyway, and that he may as well cause some hell, that he changes his mind. Throughout the escape scene in “Cold Harbor,” Innie Mark and Outie Mark cooperate with each other, showing that there may be hope in Outie Mark’s promise of co-habitation. But in the episode’s final moments, Innie Mark flips the script. Instead of leaving Lumon with Gemma as planned, he turns to Helly, choosing to remain with his friends, the woman he loves and a possible rebellion even if that means almost certain death.
“It’s not even because it’s a choice between these two women, but because we had built up how much each of these relationships define Mark’s identity,” series creator and executive producer Dan Erickson told TheWrap. “He’s choosing his life over this life that he’s always felt beholden to, which is his outie’s. That’s really the journey of the season.”
In a wide-ranging interview, Erickson broke down how he created the finale’s conversation between innie and outie Mark, revealed the scene that made him cry and cursed out series director Ben Stiller for once again being right about how to create an iconic final scene.
TheWrap: I’ve got to ask about Lumon’s intentions. In the finale, Gemma is shown taking apart a crib and she has no emotional reaction to it, even though her outie so clearly wanted a child. With Gemma, is the goal of Lumon to make the “perfect” employee, as in someone completely detached from their outie?
Dan Erickson: That was a moment that, to some extent, we intentionally left open to interpretation. I don’t want to spoil everything by stating the intent, but I think that you’re sort of scratching at it there.
One thing that I think is noteworthy is that in all the other rooms we’ve seen the question is, will the suffering carry over from the room to the outside? Will Gemma feel the emotional effects of having been tortured by a dentist for two hours? The fear of being on an airplane in horrible turbulence, will it carry outside? This is the first time that we’ve seen the opposite where there is this question of will her pain from the outside carry into this room, into this new innie version of her? What exactly that means and why that’s important to Lumon is something we still don’t quite know yet as viewers. But that’s the main thing that differentiates that room.
This season delved into the relationship between innies and outies more than last, which culminated with Mark’s conversation with his innie. How did you write that scene, and what kind of advice did you give Adam to perform it?
It was really hard. I was so excited about this scene because I always thought it would be cool — and very important — to put them face to face to the degree that they’re able to. You’ve never really seen anything like this before.
I talked to Ben [Stiller] about it. I knew that we would edit it where, at the beginning, you get the full procedural. It’s like, “OK, then he’s going to go outside. He’s going to sit down. He’s going to record.” But pretty quickly into it, we knew we would have to start editing it to feel like it’s a conversation happening in real time. So much of that was going to depend on the direction and editing as well as Adam’s performance.
We had [Adam Scott] record both sides of it. We shot the innie part almost in its entirety, and then we shot the outie part almost in its entirety to give him a sense of the cadence of the conversation and what each version of him is going through. But it’s hard because he has to then pretend he’s hearing this line for the first time that he himself recorded. I’m amazed he was able to do it as organically and as honestly as it came across.
It wasn’t until I saw the cut, I actually cried. It wasn’t something I was certain we could do. But then everybody brought their A-game, and we made it work.
It’s truly a testament to this team that it was able to to work. You know exactly which Mark is speaking, and it has nothing to do with the background changes. There’s more vulnerability in innie Mark.
It’s funny, the first time I saw the finale for Season 1 — the first time I saw Innie Mark walk across Devon and Ricken’s [Michael Chernus] kitchen — it was the first time I really realized how different his gait was. I had a similar experience with Britt [Lower]. The first time she returned as Helly on the severed floor, I thought, “Oh, God, there’s Helly.” Things I didn’t even realize were missing I suddenly saw. These actors blow my mind every day, but especially when something like that happens, my jaw is on the floor.
At what point did you know you wanted the Season 2 finale to be a choice between Helly and Gemma?
Kind of the whole time. That was something that was built-in from the conception of this season, although it’s funny — I hate to keep telling Ben Stiller that he was right and I was wrong, specifically about finales. But in Season 1, I remember I was like, “It should be [Mark] writing ‘She’s alive,’ but then it gets cut off before he finishes.” And Ben was like, “No, no, no, no, he’s going to yell it.” I was like, “All right, let’s see how it works.” And then it was one of the best moments I’d ever seen on TV.
Similarly here, I had come up with a version where Helly was not there, and Mark makes the decision to go back and finds her later. Ben — goddamn it — in his wisdom, was like, “It’s going to be such a moment if they’re both there.”
It’s not even because it’s a choice between these two women, but because we had built up how much each of these relationships define Mark’s identity. The relationship with Helly is a signifier of his whole innie life he’s built and that he’s worked toward, and Gemma is someone whom I think he has great empathy for, but she’s not his person. So he’s choosing his life over this life that he’s always felt beholden to, which is his outie’s. That’s really the journey of the season. The very first thing we see him do this season is he runs out of the elevator and almost instinctively goes to find Ms. Casey, as opposed to going to find Helly and his other friends to see if they’re OK. That’s because he doesn’t value himself on the level that he values his outie at the start of the season. By the end, he does. That first scene and that last scene feel like a question and answer to each other.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
“Severance” Season 1 and 2 are now streaming on Apple TV+.
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