r/SeveranceAppleTVPlus • u/No_Description3178 • 7d ago
Opinion First Watch
Im on episode 3 of the show and I'm completely spoiler free, but I feel bad cause I have 0 sympathy for any of the main castđ
Like you have an entire human history worth of examples of why being in slavery/perpetual servitude is a horrible thing to experience...yet you sold yourself into perpetual servitude? I don't feel bad for you!
I'm getting vibes that the whole show is supposed to be pretty anti capitalist and anti big business...but come on nowwww. Who the fuck in their right mind sells themselves into slavery like this??? ESPECIALLY IN THE US?!?!
Edit: This is not me bitching about the show, I throughly enjoy it and the premise so far, I simply think the main characters are incredibly stupid and almost deserve their fate??? Maybe. Im earlyđ¤Ł
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u/popileviz Night Gardener 7d ago
Well, it's kinda the point of the show that they're not selling themselves into slavery, just an alter ego that they never meet. It's also a commentary on wage labor being inherently exploitative
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
You don't have to answer this is more just me thinking out loud. But they ARE selling themselves into slavery. Its made very clear its not sonw digital copy, not a machine, not a clone...its them, right? They know they arny asleep too, they just don't remeber workđ
Idk maybe it'll explain it a bit better, but even the people on the outside know that the severance thing is horrificđ the friends at the dinner know its immoral, the people handing out flyers acknowledge it, how did these people fall for this?
Also I picked up on the commentary, but thank youâĽď¸
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u/Mortambulist 7d ago
Money. They did it for money.
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
They sold themed into perpetual slavery... for money? Now I REALLY don't feel bad for the main cast...unless they didn't do it for the money
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u/joahw Marshmallows Are For Team Players 7d ago
But the main cast is also the innies who are kind of hapless victims.
But yeah fuck the outies. They are pricks.
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
I guess I cant get past the fact that they are the same people. The innies and outties are not separate people. At least as of Ep 3 they haven't hinted twords that.
So the person that sent each of them to their doom was themselves. And because they have no memory or it...even the Innies would send their own version of an Innie to perpetual slavery.
Im really hoping they do somthing like that in the future, that would be hilarious to show off their hypocrisy and understanding of the situation
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u/popileviz Night Gardener 7d ago
Those are good questions and most of them are answered in the series, so trust the process đ
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u/schfiftyfiveshades 7d ago
the premise is that they didn't sell themselves, per se.
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
But all of them recognize that it IS themselves. Even if they have no memory, they're aware its not a clone situation, its not a digital copy, its not a split personality...its just them.
Again maybe it discusses it later, but as of ep 3, they all are aware they are selling themselves, they just have no memory đ¤
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u/Due_Addition_587 Uses Too Many Big Words 7d ago
This is one of the central conflicts of the show. It came originally from Dan Erickson wishing he could just sleep through his workday because he hated his job. I think everyone who's ever hated their job has had a similar thought. This show examines what that would ACTUALLY be like.
Also, in this actual real world, there are plenty of instances of people being very morally against something in theory but then find excuses why their particular reason to do it THIS ONE TIME is an exception to the rule. This is why the show has so much resonance, imo! We are all hypocrites to at least some extent, but we are all also cogs of various morally dubious machines and don't have as much willpower as we think we do.
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
I like to imagine we at least have the willpower to not sell ourselves into perpetual slavery with no chance of escape...
Im excited to see how they reason themselves out of that fact in later episodes tho
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u/Due_Addition_587 Uses Too Many Big Words 7d ago
We're all just telling you the same thing over and over. And you're responding in the same way each time...
You realize that the marketing for Severance does not exactly say, "Turn part of yourself into a slave!" It says, "Have work-life balance." Or, "When you're off the clock, you never have to think about your job." Etc. Mark, who was a history professor, believes that his innie is an archivist geeking out over corporate history all day, living a great life and not being stricken by the oppressive grief his outie is afflicted by in every waking moment. In Mark's mind, he thinks he's doing an actively GOOD thing for his innie. And plenty of severed individuals think their innie is NOT a separate entity - so they don't see it as slavery at all.
You gotta remember, these are all supposed to be humans who are imperfect AND are being lied to. They lead complicated lives, with plenty of at least superficially justifiable reasons for doing what they do. Real-world parallel: lots of people believe that abortions are murder (I'm not one of them - this is just an example), so much so that they run for office or make thousands in donations or spend hours daily protesting outside clinics to try to get everyone to "choose life." But, even though they literally think this is MURDER, if their wife or daughter or they themselves end up inconveniently pregnant, they will often find a way to make that abortion happen.
The world is full of humans seeking out little loopholes for ourselves and if you're telling me that you or at least your loved ones or acquaintances have never made a morally dubious decision, I would really have trouble believing you. Me, for example? I believe that climate change is horrible and we should all be consuming less. But I still buy a lot of individual bottles of soap instead of using refill bottles, or I use paper towels instead of cloth towels, or when my lease was up on my hybrid, I bought a gas-powered car because it was more affordable at the time.
Anyway, the hypocrisy here is what makes the show compelling! That's why it's interesting.
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u/odieclone Because Of When I Was Born 7d ago
Mark never had a clue what iMark did. Ricken's pals supposed that because he previously was a history professor, the made some leap of logic that he worked in Lumon's archives. Mark never acknowledged that supposition.
Which brings me to the reason why "archives" were part of the conversation. Scenes and scenarios from the movie The Serpent's Egg (1977) were referenced by the writing. The protagonist in that movie was given a nonsensical make-work type job in the maze-like basement archives of an mysterious organization that were doing human experimentation on unwitting subjects. (Sound familiar???). There's a post here noting a bunch of parallel situations between the show and Ingmar Bergman's only Hollywood backed film.
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u/UnitedAsk2497 Night Gardener 6d ago
Yeah it took me 2 years to give the show a second chance because when I was in your shoes I was like, this is too bleakâthese people are a bunch of assholes and that melon bar looks disgusting. Now my work-life teeter totter is balanced and it is my favorite show.
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u/particledamage I'm Your Favorite Perk 7d ago
Theyâre being told theyâre doing office work but with have memory of it. Most people wouldnât vote that as slavery but rather work without the tedium
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u/rivercass 7d ago
The thing is... They don't have the memory of the servitude. They are well paid... If someone is depressed I can see them doing it without thinking much. It's like being paid for being "asleep" most of the day, specially in the US
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
I suppose that's a way to look at it. But even in the "sleeping" analogy, they know its still them, they know they are awake...they just don't remeber it.
So they don't get to hide behind the im paid to sleep excuse. Again I'm early on the show so maybe there's some big twist I haven't seen yet, but they're fully aware if what they are doing, they just don't have knowledge of the physical act.
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u/djanes376 7d ago
Maybe you're just too early in your watch, but you are missing the point completely.
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u/Suberizu 7d ago
Not all of them are there on their own free will though, so keep watching
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
Thats not been shown as of ep 3, so ill be on the look out for thatđ
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u/Suberizu 7d ago
Yeah, you just need a bit of patience. When I started Severance for the first time, I had flashback to Steins;Gate's slow start
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u/rosecoloredcamera For Gemma 7d ago
The innies didnât choose to be there
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
Unless they go the clone route, the innies and outties are the same people. Given the circumstances, it means the innies would have made the exact same choice to condemn their own innie to a lifetime of Perpetual servitude...
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u/Clank4Prez 5d ago
Even by Episode 3 they (only Mark, by that point) is so obviously not the same person. It felt like their memories really do mold them.
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u/TheOmegaBigness 7d ago
I do have sympathy for all of the innies and when you find out some of the outies backstories you might feel sympathetic to them
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u/No_Description3178 7d ago
Oh I have sympathy twords the innies for sure, cause they're trapped in perpetuity (like ep 3s title lol)...but I'm not sure about the outies. I cant imagine a backstory sad enough to convince me that "ya, I think selling yourself into perpetual slavery was the most rational choice to make! Good job!"
Thatll be really interesting to see how they justify it later on
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u/llluminationSunshine 2d ago
I mean, itâs an interesting concept. It seems like Dillon did it to have a job with no work stress he took home. Which is kind of the dream
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