In a rare, noteworthy achievement, Apple TV+‘s acclaimed workplace thriller Severance became one of the greatest shows on television without a single Season 1 sex scene.
While the debut season featured its fair share of sexual tension, a romantic forehead touch, a high-stakes kiss, and a Waffle Party where freaky sex in service of Lumon is technically allowed, viewers didn’t see two characters sleep together until Season 2, Episode 4, “Woe’s Hollow.”
From revealing more about the characters involved to raising crucial questions about consent and autonomy in the show’s world, the physical intimacy was groundbreaking for a variety of reasons. It’s a palpably passionate, gorgeously shot scene that takes the show to terrifyingly twisted new heights.
Severance Season 2, Episode 4 spoilers ahead.
Written by Anna Ouyang Moench and directed by Ben Stiller, “Woe’s Hollow” follows Mark (Adam Scott), Helly (Britt Lower), Dylan (Zach Cherry), and Irving (John Turturro) as they embark on an Outdoor Retreat Team Building Occurrence (ORTBO) organized by Milchick (Tramell Tillman) and Miss Huang (Sarah Bock).
After spending the day learning more about Lumon’s lore through Kier’s fourth appendix —which revealed he had a twin brother named Dieter — the MDR team parts ways for the night and Mark visits Helly in her tent. He comforts her wake of her tense interaction with Irving by the bonfire. Helly apologizes for distracting Mark from finding his wife Gemma/Ms. Casey (Dichen Lachman). And after getting their flirt on a bit, the two start kissing and undressing in a love-fueled, lustful Severance first. (Which, by the way was also presumably Innie Mark’s first time.)
To heighten the intensity, the series toggles back and forth between the intimate scene and Irving’s stressful solo excursion. As Irv explores the icy dark forest, Mark and Helly explore each other’s bodies under the warm, somewhat menacing red glow of a heater. Theodore Shapiro’s brilliant score ups the ante, then helps our heart rates slow as Mark and Helly bask in their post-coital connection.
Despite an overarching feeling of danger, the special moment between Mark and Helly initially feels pure and positive, but the feeling is soured and replaced with pure dread when the final minutes of the episode reveal that Mark didn’t have sex with Helly at all. In an act of OTC damage control, Helly’s outie, Helena Eagan, has been pretending to be be her since the Season 2 premiere. In other words, Helena MISLED! HIM! INTO! BED!
Before Helena headed down to the Severed Floor, she watched footage of her innie interacting with her colleagues and took special interest in Helly and Mark’s big Season 1 kiss. She rewound and replayed the footage, genuinely captivated by her innie’s confidence and romantic connection. Despite the power afforded to her as Lumon’s future CEO, it’s clear that Helena is isolated and has struggles with her family, job, and life outside of the limelight.
“I didn’t like who I was on the outside. I was ashamed,” Helena (as Helly) tells Mark. While some might see the comment as a way for Helena to let him in just enough to safeguard her lie after Irving called her out again, Season 2’s outie world scenes give us the sense that Helena Eagan doesn’t like who she is as a person, as Jame Eagan’s daughter, and Lumon’s protector. Instead, Helena longs to be more like Helly, who boldly stands up for her beliefs and lives life (despite her Severed Floor limitations) with a level of freedom that feels foreign to her. Pretending to be her innie gave Helena a taste of the affection, connection, acceptance, and security that she craves. In doing so, however, she committed an atrocious violation of Mark and Helly’s autonomy.
Post-Helena reveal especially, the “Woe’s Hollow” sex scene renews Season 1 concerns related to the severance procedure and consent at large. (Remember that news report about a newly severed woman whose innie got pregnant?!) But it also raises questions about Lumon and the Eagan family’s views on sex. Among the episode’s major Dieter reveals, it’s suggested that Lumon’s founder, Kier, killed his twin brother for masturbating and spilling his lineage for self-pleasure instead of serving the Eagan family. And when asked about the Waffle Party in Season 1, Severance creator Dan Erickson told Variety, “You can have sex, it’s not wrong, it’s not dirty — as long as it’s all about Lumon and it’s all about reverence for Kier Eagan.”
By actively seeking self-pleasure while masquerading as her innie, Helena not only followed in Dieter’s footsteps, but actively rebelled against the Lumon and Eagan way. She hinted that she wasn’t fully buying what the family business was selling earlier in the episode, too, when she called out the fourth appendix for its absurdity, so challenging her way of life is likely something she’s longed to do an an outie before.
The more you think about Severance‘s first sex scene, the more twisted, impressive levels of depth you’ll unlock within the series. At the core of it all, Severance is crafting one of the most complex TV love triangles — or hexagons — of all time. Helena, Helly, and Mark’s innie are directly involved in this instance, but Mark’s Outie — not to mention Gemma and Ms. Casey — are also connected, as stressed through Mark’s reintegration flicker, where he sees Helly as Gemma for a split second.
While we’ll have to see what romantic endgames Severance has in store, there’s no doubt that Innie Mark and Innie Helly will need some serious time to process the events of “Woe’s Hollow.”
New episodes of Severance premiere Fridays on Apple TV+.
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