Apple lands another hit with Severance

 


"These are our lives. No one gets to just turn you off."-Mark, Severance

Apple TV+ has been on a roll. Last year I touted several original series as among the best I saw. This year they've followed it up by being home to the Best Picture winner, CODA, and offering a number of new and compelling original series. The latest is Severance, which wrapped up its nine-episode run on Friday.

The series, created by Dan Erickson, drops us into a world where a corporation called Lumon has developed a new technology that allows it to separate the minds of its workers. While on site, they have no memory of the outside world, who they are or what their lives are like. On the outside, they have no memory of what they did during the day or who their co-workers are.

This process, called Severance, is controversial, as would be expected. It's the subject of much debate in the community. We're seeing the world through the eyes of Mark (Adam Scott), who volunteered for the post after losing his wife. He's now in charge of his department and welcoming a new member, Helly (Britt Lower). It doesn't go smoothly.

Soon, Mark, Helly and the rest of the team (John Turturro and Zach Cherry) begin to question their world and what's really going on. Can they find answers? The series begins slowly building the world and these characters.

As we start to explore the questions, more and more about the world begins to take shape. I enjoyed the early episodes, but it was down the stretch of the season that I became completely hooked. The penultimate episode set the stakes and the finale, "The We We Are," blew me away.

Scott, Cherry, Turturro and especially Lower are fantastic in the series. So, too, is Patricia Arquette in a nefarious role as the supervisor of Mark's unit, who is also his neighbor and lives completely unsevered.

I was surprised at the emotional resonance of this series, and the tension of the finale had me on the edge of my seat. As I've argued before, Apple TV+ has quietly taken the lead in terms of original content, and this is another home run. It's worth checking out. If you give it a chance, I know you'll quickly become hooked.

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