If you have not watched Apple TV’s slow-moving workplace horror comedy romance Severance then you have missed out on the pleasure of “defiant jazz” music. The extravagantly produced show is an awesome blossom of strangeness that, somewhat unlike an actual awesome blossom, gets more pleasurable the deeper you get into it. Also, the car casting is bizarre and I have a theory about it I want to discuss.
The short version of the plot is this: A quasi-religious company called Lumon has developed a surgery that allows people to not realize they’re at work (this is being “severed”). There’s a professional version of themselves, called an “innie” that knows nothing about the outside, real-world version of themselves called an “outie.” The lead characters are Mark, played by Adam Scott, and Helly, portrayed by Britt Lower.
Having listened to the show’s accompanying podcast, it’s quite clear that every detail of this show was meticulously planned. For some reason, Apple gave Ben Stiller an insane amount of money to make exactly this script and it works extremely well. If you start to watch it, I think I’m fairly sure I’m not setting you up for Lost-style rage.
The big reason why you’ll enjoy this show is that each episode is experienced a little more like a game of sodoku than a Russian nesting doll, with each new reveal introducing possibilities elsewhere. Pacing-wise, they’ve done a good job of establishing a truly insane universe without losing focus on the quirks of inter-office life. If the show is about anything, it’s about the dehumanizing nature of work in modern times. But funny! And with goats!
I’m going to attempt to avoid any big spoilers, so if you haven’t watched the show you can read this piece and maybe it’ll inspire you to join the rest of us. If you have watched it, I’d love to hear your theories. I’ll also give the more straightforward explanation given by one of the show’s creators for the cars and explain why I don’t trust it.
A Very Quick Note About The Universe
In the same way that the “severed floor” of this show is aggressively indistinct, the whole universe they live in is also specifically non-specific. The technology, for instance, is a mix of new and old (CRT monitors but also modern-ish cell phones).
It’s not clear what state or country we’re in, but the characters are aware of the existence of Grand Rapids and Deleware. They also speak, generically, in American accents (though characters with other accents do appear at one point). The license plates have photos of the company’s messianic founder Kier Eagan, who gives off real Joseph Smith vibes, and feature the phrase “Remedium Hominibus” which is Latin for “A cure for mankind”
Mark’s license plate says “Remedium Hominibus” which is Latin for “Cure for Men”
byu/ghostface_starkillah inseveranceTVshow
A State Senator also appears and gets (PE) next to his name in an article, implying he’s either part of a political party (Party of Eagan?) or, perhaps, a different state. There’s a reason to think PE stands for another state.
There’s also a map of Kier that appears at some point, encompassing a large area. This is important to my theory.
The Cars Are All A Mix Of ’80s And ’90s Vehicles, Mostly Sedans
Here’s a shot of the parking lot of Lumon Industries, which is actually the old Bell Labs building in New Jersey. It was designed by Eero Saarinen and the whole show takes inspiration from its 1950s application of neo-futurism. It is at least a visually appealing place to work if not, you know, otherwise unnerving and strange.
This extends to the cars. Here’s a closer look:
You’ll notice some real cars from the ’80s and ’90s, including a Plymouth Horizon, a Ford Crown Victoria, and an ’80s Ford Thunderbird. Look even closer and you’ll see some cars that don’t make any sense:
Whats going on here?
These are CGI-generated cars, I think. While it looks a bit Polo-ish or Skoda-ish, there’s no car that seems to quite fit. More proof of this seems to come from this Instagram post that shows many of the cars actually used in the parking lot:
View this post on Instagram
It’s the best of the Malaise Era! The newest vehicle might be the de-badged Chevy Express “LUMON” bus. The most exciting car is the busted red Honda Prelude that looks an awful lot like one I saw for sale in New Rochelle at the beginning of the pandemic and disappeared. The oldest is probably the Ford Galaxie 500 or the Lincoln Continental sedan.
I have more theories on those as well.
Curiously, Adam Scott’s character drives a relatively nice (for Kier) and newer 1995 Volvo 960. In all the episodes I’ve seen, this is probably the most premium new vehicle anyone has that isn’t, say, an ambulance.
Mark S. drives a Volvo [Severance on Apple TV+]
byu/Delicious_Adeptness9 inVolvo
The behind-the-scenes photos show that the production team has at least two of these, which either means that multiple exist in this universe, or the production team is just smart and bought two of the same car just in case it needed two.
Ms. Cobel, Mark’s boss, drives an old de-badged Volkswagen Rabbit [Editor’s Note: this is a 1981-1984 Westmoreland, PA-built Rabbit, even – JT]:
The car is as perfect for the character as Patricia Arquette is for the role. None of these characters existed prior to the show, yet I somehow know in my heart of hearts that no one other than Patricia Arquette in a de-badged VW Rabbit could be in Severance. I will not be answering any questions about this.
One more car, and it’s a tiny spoiler, though I won’t say who it is:
That looks like one of the newer 4th generation Lincoln Continentals, so a 1966-1969 model. The person getting in is obviously important because they have a driver.
My Theory: Kier Is A Sanctioned, Soviet-like State
I’m not saying that Kier is North Korea, because there’s some form of representative government. There’s a press of some sort. People are allowed to protest.
That being said, there are issues of food scarcity. [Editor’s Note: I’m not buying the food scarcity part: the ‘dinnerless dinner party’ was just Rickon bullshit. But I’ll let Matt keep going. – JT] There’s a level of coordination that exists between the corporation Lumon and the government. Advanced technology does exist, but it’s definitely rationed. Kier is always in winter and, I assume, somewhere far to the north. Kier is a cold Cuba, perhaps in northern central Canada above the Great Lakes.
Kier’s own timeline states that the company was founded in 1865, which is also the end of the Civil War. This is too big of a coincidence to not be intentional. Kier, I think, was a breakaway state or territory that did not join the Union. This could be because it was an outer territory that, while aligned with the Union never gave up its independence, or it could be a far-off outpost of the Confederacy.
Either way, much as in Cuba, most of the cars are old vehicles that have to be maintained on the road because there’s no local automotive production. Presumably, there’s free travel between the United States and wherever Kier is located, but there may be some form of sanctions (or tariffs) that make it harder to get newer vehicles. This is also reflected in other technology, including Mark’s watch, which is a Russian-made Vostok Komandirskie 341307, aka a Commie watch.
The Volvo is also important here because North Korea, other than a few nice cars for execs, has a lot of Volvos. Why? North Korea made a deal to buy about 1,000 cars from the company’s 144 series from Sweden. Famously, North Korea never actually paid for the cars, but good luck repossessing them.
As a severed employee of Kier, it might make sense that Mark has access to a nicer car as part of his compensation (along with copious melons).
Here’s What Severance’s Creator Has To Say About It
The show’s creator, Dan Erickson, answered a bunch of questions during a Reddit AMA. One of them was “what’s going on with all the cars?”
His answer?
“They’re for transporting the characters from one place to another.”
Lol. Here’s his real answer:
“Bet seriously, we used cars from a lot of different time periods to give a slight sense of disorientation. At Lumon, the Innies are intentionally made to feel unmoored from time and space, and that bleeds into the town a bit too. We wanted the town to feel like an extension of Lumon in a way.”
That is a sensible, entirely comprehensible explanation that also fits in with many other details about the show. I also don’t completely buy it. The show is written to be palimpsest and every detail seems to have more to it. Maybe Ben Stiller, the show’s main director, just saw the Volvo and thought it looked right. That’s possible.
Perhaps Kier was right when he said “The light of discovery shines truer upon a virgin meadow than a beaten path.”
I still very much want to beat this path, sorry Kier! Give me your Severance theories and, maybe, you’ll get rewarded with a waffle party or some very coveted eggs.
I’ve literally been waiting for you guys to write about this — My wife and I rewatched S1 in its entirety a couple weeks back ahead of starting S2, and are absolutely enamored with the story and the scenery. And yes, I know I’ve bored her to tears at several points with my automotive observations and speculation about why they chose to handle the vehicles this way.
Can’t wait to watch episode 4 tomorrow!
I would really like to know what kind of motorcycle Mr Milchick drives? Judging from his controlled persona it can almost only be an original spec BMW R80.
Lede car looks exactly like our 82 Rabbit LS, down to the reflector on the rear flank. -Minus the ‘Rabbit LS’ badging, of course. The wheel covers ought to be covered under the Geneva Convention imo, though.
Having never even heard of the show till moments ago and just going on what I skimmed off this post I’m gonna say Kier is alt-Greenland.
I’m highly skeptical that they live anywhere besides a regular US State. Matt is taking the fact that the license plate doesn’t have a state listed and running with it.
Whose to say alt-Greenland isn’t a US state? Or at least a protectorate?
What about Milchick’s motorbike? HD or Triumph .. or something else?
They mention it on the podcast. It’s a customized Royal Enfield.
Lumen sounds a lot like limen, which a Latin for “threshold,” and the root of liminal, as in those liminal “dead mall” memes from a couple years ago.
Someone else knows liminal!
-that’s what I put on the tag of my ‘fast’ car cause it’s on the threshold of being pointless on the street—and it’s my mid-life crisis purchase 🙂
PE is a jurisdiction, most likely “Province of Eagan”. It’s present both on Irving’s license plate and his mailing address on a credit card statement envelope. The senator being a representative for PE within a national legislative body, means it’s not a breakaway/standalone country, it’s like a state in the US or a province in Canada.
Futhermore: that credit card envelope with the PE address has a US zipcode and postmark on it.
https://severance.wiki/_media/irvings_map_credit_card.webp
If that’s US postal code, then 0 first digit tells us the fictional location is somewhere in the Northeast US. The second digit 7 would be northern NJ. Cutting to the chase, 07452 is a real in use postal code for Glen Rock NJ, just outside Paramus
I am relieved that I’m not the only person that looked up that ZIP Code
The office is the former Bell Labs building in Holmdel, NJ. Apparently it is now a multi-use building. There’s an Escape Room, which is a little too on the nose for me.
This weird mix of times seems to happen in Archer too, They seem to have mobile phones from the 2000’s but computers from the 80’s etc. I quite enjoy both shows.
I was thinking the same thing, plus a mix of 60’s spy and Mad Men vibes, but better old cars than any show I can think of. Easier being animated, I know, but I still appreciate it
The early seasons of Archer really leaned into this with concepts like real-time videoteleconferencing.with the head of a not-defunct KGB, and Archer’s brand-new 1970 Dodge Challenger with a screen in the dash.
At one point one character rhetorically asks, “What year is it?” and another responds, “I know, right?”
Dammit I really don’t have time to rewatch 14 seasons of Archer…
I think archers 1970 dodge challenger was some kind of special custom built spy edition thing, so not timeywimey
Why are the cars sort of random?
We could say it’s to make the time and location indistinct and all that meta/thoughtful/creative BS…
Or we could just accept the practical reality that using random old cars is an easy way to keep production costs low for details that have minimal connection to storytelling.
Because if the symbolism of hierarchy really mattered – Ms Covel would be in the Volvo and Mark S. would be in the VW.
(Mic Drop)
BTW – The Lincoln is a 1968 Continental. The front fenders/front turn signals are post-’67, and the taillights indicate (HA!) that it’s a ’68 and not a ’69.
My Cobel theory is that it’s virtue-signalling for her to have a cheaper car.
…or that a quasi-religious corporation that panders to POC employees with color-coded art to make them feel ‘represented’ pays women less than the men they supervise.
Because of course they do.
‘Common Side Effects’ is also a great “someone cared about the cars” show.
The cars keep the era indistinct, which is one of the things about the show that give it almost a Lynchian feel.
I think the first car you questioned is not AI Generated.
https://images-stag.jazelc.com/uploads/theautopian-m2en/CloseUp.jpeg
It seems to be a 2door VW Fox
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/7f/c4/ca/7fc4ca43712c1768899b2609e269f5d1.jpg
I’m about to drop a piping hot take after my better half
forced me to sit throughkindly suggested we watch all the available episodes last weekend: this would have been better as a Black Mirror episode. The concept is brilliant, but boy does the novelty wear off – maybe the slog is by design and meant to be a metaphor for the in-office grind, but it does not make for good entertainment IMHO. Then again, my partner has always insisted that I “cannot enjoy a work of fiction unless sweaty men are driving cars fast and shooting guns the entire time” so take this with a massive grain of salt.I do like the theory, though – nice observation!
Yeah no this is a god awful take
Irving + Burt = 4Eva
I suffered through the pilot of Black Mirror after multiple people told me how great the show was—”It’s like a modern Twilight Zone!” and I was angrily yelling at the screen almost the whole time. Then they told me, “oh no, the pilot is the worst to start with. Try another episode.” Yeah, well that was their decision to start with that and I found nothing redeemable about it that would lead me to watch another, so F that show. Severance, I like, but I like most of David Lynch’s work, which is also known for its slower pacing, creepiness, surrealism, and ambiguity and I can completely understand how someone else would hate it. I find it surprising that it’s by Ben Stiller.
It’s called Black Mirror because phone scary! It’s a show that insists that it’s challenging and thought provoking but actually has about the depth of your great aunt’s facebook reposts.
That’s about what I took from the pilot. I thought I was watching something written by an edgy teen.
The New Yorker agrees with you, if that makes you feel better
Just like to add that the miniseries “Say Nothing” on FX about The Troubles has some really great cars in it as well. I was actually thinking while watching it that one of the Autopian’s across the ponders might have a fun take on them.
I’m listening to Ben and Adam’s podcast and The Prestige TV podcast on it and the theory that I’m currently framing it with is a huge spoiler.
It’s not much of a theory since it’s explicitly what the show explained with those flashes
Gemma’s face also flashed over Helly R’s while he was in the tent with her on the last episode.
I’m not sure if he might be “glitching” because of the reunification(?) thing or if LUMEN is doing it on purpose but I definitely noticed that. I do wish we would have had more time with Helena but I guess will find out the impact of that next week!
I’ve wanted to watch Severance, but I just can’t bother with another streaming service at the moment.
Yeah, I know people claim you can just subscribe, watch what you want to, and cancel. But that hasn’t worked out, and it seems like every single one we end up with, someone in the household feels the need to keep forever. Sorry Apple, Peacock, Paramount, etc.
Stremio is your friend, my friend.
I suppose I’d have to go down the VPN route if I was going that direction. Not necessarily against it, but also not necessarily excited to put that together either.
Not really. I mean, if you wanna get ballsy and download stuff, then for sure you need a VPN or risk getting kicked off your internet plan. Downloading is a whole other level of PITA, for sure.
But, if you are just streaming stuff? Meh. That’s not a big deal at all. Takes about 5 minutes total to set up. The big bonus is being able to get 2160p streams. I bought myself a fancy pants TV, and the difference is truly stunning.
I dropped Apple even though it’s home to my favourite show For All Mankind, because the price went up twice inside a year. I will re-up when the next season of FAM appears (probably towards the end of the year) and then catch up with Silo season two and Slow Horses (which is good but not as mind blowing as everyone says it is).
All of those have been mentioned to me numerous times. Maybe I’ll carve out March (a totally dead time of year anyway) for a subscription and plow through a few shows, and maybe I won’t tell anyone that I have it.
Slow Horses kind of petered out to me. It’s fine and all, but at this point it’s more just something to put on in the background. I just kinda lost interest in it.
Tinker Tailor it ain’t. I find it a bit light and breezy and they seem to be filming them very quickly, which would explain why it can look a bit cheap in some shots (as opposed to The Day of the Jackal where you could see every penny on screen).
I like it a lot and love the characters but four could have been more like one or two. I’ll keep watching, hopefully it stays good.
Oh boy. Currently bingeing, so many questions.
How do innies know how to drive? You see this sort of addressed when innie Irv awkwardly fires up his Nova. He’s tentative and awkward with it but eventually figure it out and is able to reach a destination on a map (trying not spoil here).
But, if someone is severed, how does that affect their memory of other functional stuff, like driving, cooking, or cultural references. There must be some level of “bleed through” that would allow someone with, presumably, no memory of drivers ed or practical experience, to drive a car.
Without giving too much away, we see this also in characters’ personal lives. For example, their sexual orientation seems consistent between innie and outie. I’d normally let this all pass as suspension of disbelief, but the Severance universe is so meticulously constructed, I can’t image these are not intentional decisions.
If you remember the new hire orientation they are answering questions about general knowledge, just not personal knowledge. Basically they have a full vocabulary and general knowledge (state names), but anything that is personal (My mother’s eye color or name) isn’t accessible to them, at least not consciously.
Ok, but what about innie Irv in the car (since this is a car site)? He looks like he has no idea how to drive it, then he kinda figures it out, then he lurches it into reverse. So maybe he’s got general knowledge, yet I’d give the guy a wide berth on the road.
I don’t have a strong memory of that scene, even if I can assume where he was going, maybe he remembers basically how to drive but is unfamiliar with his particular car?
At some point you have to have to accept some plot contrivances for the sake of moving the story along.
Theory one: It’s just all inside the dude’s head.
Theory two: It’s the director’s signature. Like forced perspectives and pastel colors in Wes Andersen films. Or explosions and lens flare in Michael Bay films. Oh utter shit in Uwe Boll’s films.
This and Game of Thrones are the biggest coworker shows of all time. Like everyone you casually know is super, intensely, into it and tells you once a week that you need to watch it and it’ll change your life, and every week you tell them you’ll check it out but you just go back home and watch Simpsons.
I’ll just say I knew nothing of the show, but turned it on not too long ago. Ep 1 was cool enough for me to give it another episode. 7 hours (or whatever) later, I was googling when season 2 was starting.
Never seen The Simpsons.
You need to address that.
Maybe just the first 8-10 seasons though.
I’m out after 9, personally.
It’s an alternate universe. It’s everywhere and nowhere, everything and nothing. It’s not bound by a particular time or place on earth. It’s not trying to be here or there. I still haven’t figured out the goats, yet, though.
I’m going to say that it might be as simple as their universe using a different abbreviation for Pennsylvania, PE instead of PA (Prince Edward Island might be PI or something). The show uses locations in both New York and New Jersey to depict the fictional town and environs, and what’s right there smack in the middle between those two states, to the point that geography, climate, trees, etc will all be largely identical?
Uh, “P.E.” stands for “Professional Engineer”, i.e. someone with both a civil engineering degree and professional licensure in their state.
Apple has TV shows?
Many of them, and many of those are actually very good. Better than the absolute trash Netflix continually pumps out.
I see the following as some of the best TV around, and I have no idea what 3/4s of their shows are:
For All Mankind
Slow Horses
Shrinking
Silo
Sugar
Dark Matter
Silo and Dark Matter are nice!
Silo is great. I got about halfway through the first season before picking up the books.
Looking forward to the For All Mankind spinoff too.
‘Silo’ was such a deeply weird choice for them to have developed in the context of [contemporaneous flagship product], but it’s turned out great.
It’ll be interesting to see how they handle their adaptation of ‘The Murderbot Diaries’ considering that the dominant personality trait of the title character is ‘unrepentant media pirate’.
I’ve done at least one of the Murderbot books and my youngest went through a lot of them. Had no idea it was going to be a show, thanks!
Foundation is good too. A few significant departures from the book, but even those are interesting and fit the original narrative really well.
I think foundation would be pretty impossible to do if you stuck very close to the books
I agree but you should see the reddit threads about how they massacred the story to make it work for TV. I think one of the major changes is a fantastic addition to the story though, and the show overall is solid scifi.
It’s hard to have a narrative without characters that at least overlap, which the books lacked as I remember, Asimov’s work in general isn’t really character-driven as opposed to concept-driven. Probably why I read so much of it when I was a kid.
Yeah definitely, and Foundation is chock full of interesting concepts. Check it out, Lee Pace is incredible.
Yeah, I love sugar, but try explaining it to somebody
I’m really glad I watched it because I like Colin Farrell and noirey type things but didn’t have any further insight into the show.
Ted Lasso absolutely needs to be on this list.
I fell out of love during S2 and haven’t gone back.
The sweet, loving show I fell in love with during the pandemic was no longer.
You can actually see the VW on the Rabbit in the plastic of the grille in one shot. They took the badge off but didn’t do anything about the plastic behind it.
from the excellent Severance podcast with Ben Stiller and Adam Scott, they said it was a modified Royal Enfield.
More importantly:
Sorry Matt, I absolutely hate this show and consider the time I spent watching it (no longer) utterly wasted. That’s as far as I’ll go on the negative side. I find your enthusiasm for, and analysis of the show far more entertaining than the show itself. You keep being you, though.
You know you know this wasn’t written to you right?
Praise Keir! So glad to see my favorite website discussing my favorite TV show. Seriously, this is one of the best, if not the best, shows ever. I literally jumped out of my chair when I saw that 60’s Lincoln pull up in the last episode. I immediately started looking online for one for sale – wow, what a car! I think your theory is very likely to be accurate, and I wonder if they’ll ever reveal anything to definitively support it. But to me, the most glorious thing about the show is how devastatingly it hoists corporate America on its own petard. Anyone who can’t immediately recognize and identify with “macro data refinement” has never worked for a large corporation. The casting, acting, plot development, etc. are just… <chef’s kiss>.
I’m rewatching Mad Men right now and had a weird car deja vu because Betty’s dad also had a similar black Lincoln, they’re great looking cars.
Did we just become best friends?
Seriously, I can not wait for tonight’s episode. Reviewers that got to preview the whole season said Episode 4 is where shit gets real.
Hey Bestie! I hadn’t heard that about episode 4, so now I’m looking forward to it even more – thanks for the tip.
Four more hours!
Yeah, I too get the feeling that the vehicle choices are all very intentional, much like Breaking Bad / Better Call Saul. It’s only through the cars in the show that I was able to get any sense of what era this is supposed to be set in, because the other technology shown on the show is a mix of new and old.
I heard Ben Stiller give that answer at some point…..it keeps the time period of the show somewhat ambiguous.