Unsurprisingly, Severance spends this season’s penultimate hour setting up the finale, which is allegedly 76 minutes long. The last couple of episodes have deviated from the main narrative anyway to focus on important backstories, so this table-setting is somewhat necessary to get back into the game. “The After Hours” straightforwardly accomplishes two major things to brace for the season closer. It very leisurely progresses outie Mark (Adam Scott) and innie Helly’s (Britt Lower) individual stories that are bound to collide in a big way, while also seemingly wrapping up—far too quickly, in my opinion—everything going on with the remaining characters.
Ms. Huang’s (Sarah Bock) early dismissal is a bummer because the curtains were just being pulled back on her purpose at Lumon. Instead, Mr. Milchick (Tramell Tillman) fires her before she can finish the quarter—as in, the writers don’t need to worry about where to fit her in anymore because she’s on her way to the Gunnel Eagan Empathy Center in Svalbard. After learning about Harmony Cobel’s (Patricia Arquette) time as a young Wintertide Fellow herself, the buildup to Ms. Huang’s arc is a letdown when it could’ve been an opportunity to see how this company manipulates young minds. Milchick tells her the next deranged gig Lumon has lined up for her is to “steward global reform.” As she processes this information, the camera focuses on her sad, childlike, big brown eyes. So long, Ms. Eustice Huang.
Then there’s the sad state of affairs at the George household. Gretchen (Merrit Wever) calmly tells her husband that she cheated on him…with him. She confesses to Dylan (Zach Cherry) that she’s having an emotional affair with his innie and that they kissed for a whole minute. He’s understandably pissed. (“This is so many fucking dimensions of fucked.”) At least we know both versions of Dylan have a similar cadence while cursing. Gretchen later “breaks up” with Dylan G. out of guilt, even though she’s upset about it.
The poor guy gets dumped, proposes to Gretchen in desperation, and when she declines, resigns from the job and leaves all within a matter of hours. Talk about a bad day at work. Cherry and Wever are incredibly moving here, with the former laying out his innie Dylan’s emotions and the latter guarding Gretchen’s until the dam breaks. It’s awful to watch her cry as her own husband goes down on one knee and promises to give her the life of her dreams when he hasn’t even seen the outside world. Meanwhile, outie Dylan has distinctly not given her the life of her dreams. What a mindfuck indeed. Dylan G.’s heart is broken to the point of no return. His resignation might not be long-term—outie Dylan could very well reject the notion—but this allows the writers to put an end to the “affair” in time for the finale.
The most devastating blow in “The After Hours,” however, comes for us Burving ‘shippers. Severance has tested us this season, offering only crumbs of John Turturro and Christopher Walken together. And even then, they’re not the Irving and Burt of the severed floor, coyly flirting and making eyes at each other in the hallways. But the actors’ wholesome chemistry is alive and well even if it’s their outies interacting, as seen during episode six. That carries over in episode nine, even if it might be the last time they’re together. (Please don’t let that be true though!)
Irving comes home to see that Burt has broken in and is waiting for him. Burt makes them go on a car ride, admitting during the trip that he’s a Lumon enforcer but he’s never killed someone directly. His job is to drive people places and not ask what happens to them after. Is that what he’s doing to Irving, taking him to his death because Lumon knows Irving is doing some good old spying on them? If the Eagans or Drummond sent Burt after him, it means Irv has some solid insider information. Although we still don’t know who he’s been talking to on those payphones, and who knows when we’ll find out.
All of his hard investigative work goes to waste though because Burt tells him to leave town. He takes Irving to the train station, buys him a ticket to a far-away destination, and tells him never to return to Kier. Burt makes himself a target because if Lumon finds out he let Irv go, it’s not going to end well. Burving’s goodbye here is a fantastic, overwhelming callback to one of their most beautiful season-one moments: that sweet forehead touch. It’s not fair that we get a glimpse of their romance only for the rug to be pulled from under us.
Burt says he’s letting Irving live because Burt’s innocent side fell in love with him. It sure looks like his sinful side is also into Irving, but what do I know? Meanwhile, Irving pleads that he’s never been loved like this before—at least his outie hasn’t—so he doesn’t want to let go yet. First of all, much like them, I forgot about Fields’ (John Noble) existence. Secondly, the two also don’t care that they’re surrounded by a bunch of other travelers. All they care about is gently professing their feelings. As they do, they get physically closer, and Irv says he’s ready for a kiss, leaning in before Burt stops him. It’s all full circle because in season one, it was Irving who didn’t want to kiss Burt, and they happily touched foreheads instead. To see it again is lovely and brutal because it’s followed by Irving on the train with his dog Radar and Burt alone at the station.
With these arcs wrapped up, Severance paves the way for a bananas Mark–and-Helly-centered finale. He spends “The After Hours” annoyed that his sister Devon (Jen Tullock) called Cobel for help before finally agreeing to it. So all three of them drive to the Damona Birthing Retreat in the dead of night, and, at last, innie Mark awakens in one of the lodges to see his sister and former boss again. As for Helly, all she does here is wonder why Mark hasn’t shown up to work, commiserate with Dylan, and sneak Irving’s drawing out of the poster to memorize the directions to get to the dark hallway. Why can’t she just keep the piece of paper with her though? Her day is disrupted when, out of nowhere, Jame Eagan (Michael Silberry) pays her a little visit and says, “You tricked me, my Helly.” Now what the hell does that mean? Is he still referencing the night of the OTC, or is Helena doing some other shit that Jame just found out about? Their father-daughter relationship feels fractured based on the opening scene alone, when he looks at her having breakfast and is upset that she isn’t eating her eggs raw, as Kier preferred. He also wants to watch her eat, which signals some form of mental and emotional abuse.
“The After Hours” barely spends time with Mark and Helly but with both of them in precarious situations now, Severance has to bring them together while also answering a lot of unanswered questions in that lengthy finale. I can hardly wait.
Stray observations
- • Drummond blames Milchick for Mark’s absence from work on the day Cold Harbor was meant to be completed and tells him to apologize for using the word “remonstration.” Tramell Tillman is a magnificent performer because I could feel Milchick’s catharsis through the screen when he ends up calling his boss to “devour feculence”—that is, eat shit. Seriously, Tillman is the underrated MVP.
- • Ms. Huang is shipped off to Svalbard for the next phase of her Lumon career. It’s a Norwegian archipelago that is very cold and isolated, so not unlike the town they’re in now. It still sounds bleak.
- • “If he smells chicanery, he’ll lock you out of the building.”
- • Cobel confirms that whenever Mark finishes the mysterious Cold Harbor assignment, Gemma will be dead.
- • I loved Mark’s conversation with Milchick on the phone because of the honesty with which he tells the floor manager “Work is just work, right?” when they both know that’s never true with Lumon.
- • Let’s talk about the plate on which Helena eats her eggs. It features a child being held down on a chair by two adults, one dressed in a red gown and the other in a blue. It’s on-the-nose symbolism, but the bigger query is: How is that an appealing plate to eat food off of?
- • When Cobel drives Devon and Mark into the birthing retreat, she lies to the security officer to get in and claims Devon is pregnant. “She’s one of Jame’s, no one is to know.” Um, does Helena have half-siblings running around? And if so, how many?
- • Seasons one and two end their ninth episodes with the quote “She’s alive.” Damn these parallels!
- • So does this episode confirm that Irving is reintegrated? Because why else would he tell Burt “I’m ready” as a callback to the last time they were in this position to kiss? There are far too many Irving-related mysteries I need answers to.
