Why The Latest Episode Of Severance Bothers Me So Much

Severance remains one of the best shows on TV, but some of the creative choices in Season 2, Episode 8 'Sweet Vitriol' left me feeling a bit worried about the direction the show is headed. I'll try to explain.

The song is once again an AI ditty I came up with. Hope you enjoy!

[LeviPennington-vvkq]

I don’t really understand what people mean when they say they liked Cobel the way she was. Cobel was 100% a mystery character from the beginning. Why was she constantly fixated on getting into Mark’s life? Why was she so distressed about the OTC when she was already fired?

She really wasn’t even a normal character at all because she never had clear personally or characteristics that could be understood by the viewer. People are acting like she was just a perfectly normal character who they turned into something else.

She was a mystery character. And this reveal is the answer to that mystery.

Personally, I loved the way these episodes have been sequenced and how they sort of put the plot on halt for these two. I think it makes sense narratively, it’s a good way to make the show more interesting towards the end of the season, and it was just the break I needed to become really intrigued again for the main story.

Your opinion is totally valid, though. It’s totally just a matter of preference. But I don’t think this was a bad writing choice at all.

[cameronielsen]

What makes me not care is that the characters are so compelling that the mysteries are secondary. This isn’t the case with most mystery box shows.

[ndanny]

This episode is about an old lady in the middle of nowhere, confronting and even older woman (in a more remote location) about an even older lady (that is so old she is dead), and then… nothing happens

[rogermazuca]

I think Cobel doesn't necessarily want to take down Lumen. It seems like she ha a very serious personal vendetta against Helena. Maybe she wants to convince Jame to make her next in line instead of H. 🤷🤯

[georgekleinfelter]

Cobel as a "fanatical middle manager type" never explained her bizarre fascination with Mark (including moving in next door to him). Mark is a lab rat to her. She has zero skills as a manager and she's odd in that autistic way that scientists can be odd. It took me a bit to readjust my understanding of Cobel after I saw Episode Eight but this makes more sense than the understanding of her that we previously had.

[tyizzle]

Yea bro get so rest you look exhausted.I think after the Finale people will appreciate episode 8 more.

[scotthallgv]

And thats what separates you from the opinioneers, not saying things when you have nothing to say. I can appreciate the hell out of this because Im the same way and its the reason I never did content creation with any sort of consistency because if I dont have anything to say I just shut up haha.

[PhilCrimmins]

I think it would be fair to wait to see how this develops. It may turn out to be cool as hell.

[boethius]

Cobel instantly became the least ‘believable’ character in the series by a country mile imo. The reveal broke immersion for me and reminded me I’m watching a TV show. Massive eye roll.

Good writing shows, doesn’t tell. This was the writers loudly telling us the character we’ve come to know has actually secretly been an egolesss super genius all along. And it comes at the expense of the overall mystery surrounding the Eagans.

Her vendetta is motivated solely by ego / feeling taken advantage of, an ego we’re simultaneously asked to believe that she had ‘transcended’ in service of Kier for decades till now, ‘dutifully’ forgoing recognition.

I’ve come to expect more from the writers, and am holding out hope they’re setting us up rather than making her have a ‘change of heart’ and joining protagonists..
I’ll die of cringe if she too earnestly recites the break room spiel.

[guyjperson]

The thing about this reveal is that it doesn't humanize Cobel in any way. We have come to hate Severance. Who cares who invented it? If she somehow gets recognition for inventing it, it's still a thing we hate. That they "stole" this process from Cobel doesn't change our feeling about Severance. It doesn't change our feelings about Cobel. It doesn't make her much more important. Either everybody at Lumon already knows that she invented it.(So why is she a middle manager?) or they don't and she kept mum about it for 40 years. She invented the process long before Gemma, so long before this Cold Harbor, which Gemma says just recently appeared as a doorway on the Testing Floor. So who cares about that? The breathing tube thing is not a huge payoff, so who cares about that? And how did she invent it? Super Genius or not, she's a child labour slave growing up in a backward house, where does she get the KNOWLEDGE to know how to work on a brain? Genius doesn't mean you just get a suite of knowledge as your load out as a child.
As for NFL. I've been to Bonavista, to go to the lighthouse. It's a fine enough town, but not fine enough to go all the way up there to hang around for five weeks to shoot inside a house. The ep is not a five week ep either. It's very short. Eps usually take about 8 days to shoot. Anyway, I didn't like it either.

[devonmarr]

Felt like 20 mins of content ment to be a back and forth with another episode.

The problem imo became that the episodes were so well put together and dense that there was nowhere to fit this in over the past 2 episodes. So they readded 17 minutes they would have edited down and made it am episode because they couldnt completely destroy it.

[The_RedVIII]

Going away from our main characters for 2 episodes in a row is not great, and I gotta say the biggest disappointment in the last episode for me was actually just how boring and slow it was. And yes, the whole show is usually rather slow, but at least it's still interesting. But this episode was just boring. The reveal didn't bother me as much.

[SteveLaw-UK]

I have no problem with the Cobelvig reveal. She came up with the idea and "base code" ( _someone_ literally had to come up with the initial idea), Lumon developed and realised it. They could have helped her develop it during the Wintertide Fellowship (Regahbi could have also worked on it with her being close to the same age, this explains their animosity twiards each other) and then when it was closer to actually being ready they took it over to actually start working on it for real. Creating and coding the Glasgow Block is different to having the idea that some kind of block would be needed. How many times has the show lied to us? Why take this entirely at face value?

Also remember that Severance is _still_ being tested and _refined_ - that's the whole premise of the show. It took far more than a genius school girl doodling in a book to actually develop this.

I have no problem with the pacing - the last two episodes add a ton of story rather than "put the brakes on it".

I am, however, still bothered by Helena's terrible, clumsy lie. I can't justify that Helena, the heir to the Lumon lie factory and experienced PE spinner, went in after two days research and preparation, _asked_ what happened to the others and couldn't have a better lie ready than save the gorillas and night gardeners? Nope. That's a Helly lie, not a Helena lie.

[Nauseaa]

You do you sir. The maturity of remaining silent… Personally, I feel the weekly structure impacts the season. If I delay watching a week, catching up two at once works. I enjoyed this episode for its Cobel history, let alone the location. I’d agree the pacing of the story has been impacted, but last weeks episode was amazing film making in itself. Regarding Devon, I understand your position, but I see it more that Cobel is the only other person she knows who could help…maybe..

[alex-c]

I think severance would take many decades to develop, hopefully they reveal it has been in the works since the 60's and that Cobel cracked the code to finally get it to work.

[ChaosMarine]

This last episode reminded me too much of how The Walking Dead started going downhill… Episode after episode started to become 40% dialogue and 60% shots of characters just looking out into space with this numbed or vaguely curious look on their faces… It’s called padding the run time. And it blows. Combine that with the fact that MOST of the dialogue lately has been WHISPERED!!! It’s like we’re watching some sort of slowed down universe where everyone just looks at each other and then whispers something, and then the other person stares for 30 seconds and then whispers something back… When did this become acceptable in visual storytelling? I’ve had to really try to stay awake the past couple of episodes.

[boethius]

I’m reminded of George RR Martins quote about writing, architects vs gardeners. Up till now I felt confident we were in the hands of architects, now I’m not so sure. Time will tell.

[banparlous]

My only slight issue abt it is that we really didn't NEED to know who invented severance. It's like the midoclrorians or whatever with the Force. However, having that come out does explain a lot concerning Cobel & why she so fckin obsessed w/ Lumen, the Severed floor, Mark, Mark's family, Mark & Gemma's candle, leaving The You you are book out, why she felt under-valued or special to Lumen in the first place. I do hope we get a tiny break down this season or next on how intelligent she really is because sniffing ether before the age of 12 has to kill-off a ton of really important brain cells & increase a full range of developmental issues. She never came off as some savant to me but then again we never knew too much about her to begin with. It hasn't ruined the show for me tho. I can suspend disbelief & tend to be much more forgivable than most if a show is great most of the time.

[FonceFalooda]

14:35 Oh, my god, THIS. I've been on about Devon immediately calling Cobel for days. It makes NO sense. THANK you.

The last time Devon saw her, Cobel left Devon's baby in a room unattended and skipped out to stop the OTC, and the last time Mark's Outie saw her, she tried to RUN HIM OVER. That's ALL THEY KNOW. "Oh, let's call our old buddy Cobel!" WTF?!!!

Even worse than making a character Super Important suddenly, what you REALLY don't want in your show is a Moment or Plot Point that simply doesn't make any sense no matter how you look at it, and I'm afraid that's what we got here. :\

[grapenutcom]

Severance is a good show, i like the dark humor in it. Theres a lot of theories, but with Gemma, she signed up with Lumon and they kidnapped her and faked her death to do experiments on to mass market the severed chip. With Cobel, the writers/showrunners pulled an ex machina and put her back in by making Devon call her which was a danger to Mark when Reghabi wasn't as she even said it was Mark's choice to reintegrate, and then they said Cobel designed the chip so now she can come back and has something to do on the show.