Severance Stars Breaks Down That Intense Episode 4 Outing, [Spoiler]’s Villainous Turn — Plus, Grade It!
The following contains copious, luxury spoilers from Season 2, Episode 4 of Severance, now streaming on Apple TV+.
The MDR team took a field trip for the ages this week on Apple TV+’s Severance, in an episode that dramatically unmasked an abhorrent deception and in turn forever altered the group’s make-up.
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Irving, Mark, Helly and Dylan each “woke” to find themselves in a bit of a frozen tundra, soon to be revealed as the Dieter Eagan National Forest. Pressing play on a TV/tape player situated on a nearby stand, a video made my Milchick revealed that, with their outies’ OK, they were on a two-day ORTBO — Outdoor Retreat and Team-Building Occurrence.
The first leg of this retreat involved a trek to Scissor Cave — “the very same grotto where Kier Eagan tamed the four tempers for the very first time,” Milchick said — to find the The Fourth Appendix, “a text of such sanctity that it is forbidden upon the Severed floor.” Helping guide MDR to said cave was… a series of uncanny, Us-like doppelg?ngers, each stiffly raising an arm to point the way.
Upon finding The Fourth Appendix, Helly and then Irving read aloud the first chapter, as they embarked on a trek to Woe’s Hollow, a seminal location in the story of Kier and his ill-fated twin Dieter — and home to (ahem) “the tallest waterfall on the planet.” There, they rendezvoused with Milchick, who led the team to their tents. Sitting around the campfire that night, things grew tense when Mark and Helly made light of The Fourth Appendix (miffing Milchick)… Irving taunted Helly more about the “night gardener” her outie met during the OTC… and then when Irving chided Mark for “making goo-goo eyes” at Helly. Milchick brought the cozy get-together (and Miss Huang’s theremin recital) to an abrupt halt having the Kier-branded marshmallows lobbed into the fire pit. Irving wound up storming off into the frozen night, while Mark and Helly on the flip side opted to warm things up, inside Helly’s tent, where they made (hopefully very quiet) love.
Come morning, Mark arose to find both Helly and Irving missing. He, Dylan and Milchick raced to the ledge overlooking Woe’s Hollow, where Irving was confronting Helly once and for all. “What you said to me last night,” about losing Burt to his outie partner? “It was cruel,” Irving said. “Helly was never cruel. So if you’re not her, who are you? Who would have the power to send their outie to the Severed floor?” Irving then grabbed “Helly,” dragged her to the pool of water nearby, and started drowning her, until she ‘fessed up.
“She’s an outie!! She’s a f–king mole!” he bellowed to Mark and Dylan above. “She’s not Helly, she’s an Eagan! Turn her back, Mr. Milchick!” Between gasps for air, Helena Eagan then appealed to “Seth” herself — conforming Irving’s theory. Milchick in turn barked into his walkie-talkie, “Shut down the Glasgow Block now,” and an instant later, we could see Helena, underwater, switch back to a surprised and terrified Helly. Arriving at the pond, Milchick announced that because Irving “threatened collegial murder,” there was no option but “immediate dismissal.” As Mark rushed to a shook Helly’s side and Dylan protested from above, Irving shouted to Dylan, “It’s OK!” And then, somewhat conspicuously: “Hang in there.”
In the video above, TVLine asked John Turturro about why Irving wasso well-suited to suss out Not-Helly.
“I think that from whatever Irving’s background is, he’s sort of trained in that world of tracking, or hunting,” the actor said. “I have my own theories that I’ve discussed with [series creator] Dan [Erickson] about his background. Obviously, he was involved with the military in some way.”
As for Helena tipping him off bit by bit, Irving and Helly “do have a connection,” Turturro noted. As such, when she showed the tiniest signs of not being her usual self, red flags started flapping in Irving’s brain.
“It’s like meeting a friend and the friend has changed after 10 years, and you’re like, ‘They’re not the same person they were before,'” Turturro put it. “That happens in real life a lot — ‘I used to like that person and now they don’t see me anymore.’ Irving suspects it but it’s incremental until you’re 100% sure, and then something happens that makes him certain,” such as “Helly” firing off that cruel comment.
“In real life,” Turturro continued, “sometimes someone does one little thing and they reveal a lot of their character, and you go, ‘Uh-huh.’ And it never goes away.”
The video above continues with Britt Lower’s POV on Helena’s subterfuge, and whether she as an actres enjoyed the villainous (?) turn.
“Yes…,” Lower said with some consideration, while noting: “All of us try to avoid thinking of any character as a ‘villain’ and [instead] try to come to that perspective with a sense of empathy” — and hope the audience comes along for that ride. Lower then weighs in on whether she gave Helena a different “walk” than Helly R, to oh-so-subtly differentiate the two.
As Episode 4 drew to a close, Milchick ordered Irving to walk into the woods, saying that from here on out, “It will be as if you, Irving B, never existed nor drew a single breath on this Earth! May Kier’s mercy follow you into the eternal dark.” As Irving stood there, a bit dazed, a bit defiantly, Milchick said into his walkie, “Now.” The scene then faded to black, Irving B’s fate unknown… for now.
Want scoop on Severance, or for any other TV show ? Shoot an email to [email protected], and your question may be answered via Matt’s Inside Line!
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