The Sci-Fi Inspiration Behind Severance
How AI is Splitting Our Work Selves in Severance
The fluorescent-lit corridors of Lumon Industries house a chilling experiment. Employees move through their workdays with no memory of their personal lives, their consciousness surgically divided by a procedure called “severance.” This dystopian scenario from Apple TV+’s hit series makes for compelling television, but its underlying questions about identity, autonomy, and the role of artificial intelligence hit closer to home than we might care to admit.
When Algorithms Become the New Managers
In a nondescript warehouse on the outskirts of Seattle, Maya checks her performance metrics for the third time today. The AI system tracking her movements has flagged her efficiency as dropping 4% below target. She’ll need to pick up the pace or risk a scheduling penalty.
“It feels like being watched by something that doesn’t understand fatigue or bathroom breaks,” she says. “At least human managers go home at night.”
The second season of Severance delves deeper into these themes, exploring the evolving role of AI in workplace dynamics and its impact on employees.
Maya’s experience is increasingly common as AI systems take on managerial functions across industries. While no surgeon has split her consciousness, technology has effectively created a workplace self that operates under different rules and expectations than her personal self.
Dr. Eliza Morton, who studies workplace psychology, sees parallels between Severance‘s fictional procedure and our evolving relationship with AI. “The algorithm handles tasks I once dreaded,” she explains, “but there’s an illusion of control that Severance brilliantly exposes. We think we’re making choices, but increasingly, the parameters are set by systems we didn’t design.”
The Digital Blank Slate
Adam Scott’s character, Mark Scout, begins each workday as if born anew. His “innie” self exists solely within Lumon’s sterile environment, unaware of his life beyond office walls. His “outie” returns home each evening with no recollection of the workday’s events.
While less dramatic, our own relationship with technology creates similar divisions. When chatbots handle customer inquiries or algorithms sort through job applications, these tasks never enter human consciousness at all. Unlike Severance‘s characters, we’re not losing memories—they’re simply never being formed.
In one particularly revealing episode, Mark’s ‘innie’ self begins to question the nature of his existence, highlighting the show’s exploration of identity and memory.
The appeal is obvious. No bringing work stress home. No personal distractions at the office. A clean separation between professional and private selves.
But at what cost?
The Blurred Lines Between Work and Personal Life
The Severance procedure, which surgically separates an employee’s work and personal life, raises profound questions about identity and humanity. The show delves into the consequences of such a division, highlighting the resulting disconnection and isolation. Characters struggle to maintain their humanity in a world that treats them as mere cogs in a machine, a central theme that resonates deeply.
This critique of corporate culture, where employees are expected to sacrifice their personal lives for work, is starkly portrayed. The use of AI tools in the workplace, such as the “Optics” system, further complicates this dynamic, prompting us to question the role of technology in our lives. The show’s narrative is a poignant commentary on our modern world, where the lines between work and personal life are increasingly blurred.
Characters grapple with maintaining a sense of human connection in an environment that dehumanizes them, a powerful reflection on the human condition. Symbolism, like the “Perpetuity Wing”, underscores the show’s exploration of these blurred boundaries. The consequences of manipulating human consciousness serve as a cautionary tale about the dangers of unchecked technological advancement.
Through its social commentary, Severance critiques the excesses of corporate culture, offering a powerful reflection on our contemporary world. The show’s exploration of these themes not only entertains but also challenges us to consider the implications of a life where work and personal life are completely separate.
Pawns in Someone Else’s Game
The true horror of Severance emerges gradually as the “innies” realize they’re not employees but prisoners. They believe they’re making choices while actually following predetermined paths designed by unseen architects.
Dan Erickson, the creator of ‘Severance,’ has drawn parallels between the show and ‘Black Mirror,’ emphasizing the unsettling nature of corporate control and technological manipulation.
Jamie Chen, a marketing director at a tech startup, describes a creeping sense of similar manipulation: “After using AI tools all day, I sometimes wonder which thoughts are mine and which were subtly guided by the technology. The line gets surprisingly fuzzy.”
When algorithms determine productivity metrics, schedule shifts, or even make hiring decisions, workers find themselves increasingly evaluated by systems optimized for efficiency rather than human flourishing. The parameters that matter to algorithms—speed, consistency, quantifiable outputs—become the parameters that matter to management.
“We’re creating a system where people serve the technology instead of the other way around,” warns Dr. Morton. “Just like Lumon’s employees, we risk becoming components in someone else’s machine.”
When Work Becomes Disembodied and Lacks Human Connection
Severance poses an unsettling question: If significant parts of your experience are removed from your consciousness, are you still whole? The “innies” struggle with their incomplete identities, desperate to know who they truly are beyond Lumon’s walls.
Unlike traditional sci-fi settings that depict a distant future, ‘Severance’ presents a world that feels eerily close to our present reality, blurring the lines between current technological trends and speculative fiction.
Modern workers face a different but related challenge. When AI drafts communications, generates content, or makes decisions under human supervision, the boundary between human and machine contributions blurs. Knowledge workers increasingly find themselves curating and refining machine outputs rather than creating from scratch.
“In meetings, I’ll sometimes present analysis I technically ‘did,’ but an AI system did most of the heavy lifting,” admits Chen. “Am I still the author of that work? Where exactly is the line?”
This fragmentation of professional identity echoes Severance‘s central premise: that dividing human experience diminishes something essential about being human.
Finding the Way Back to Integration
What makes Severance so compelling is watching supposedly “work-only” beings develop friendships, curiosity, and ultimately rebellion—qualities their creators tried to engineer out of existence. The first season of ‘Severance’ sets the stage for these developments, showcasing the initial struggles of the ‘innies’ as they begin to form connections and question their engineered existence. The show powerfully argues that humanity persists despite powerful attempts to compartmentalize it.
Some organizations are taking this lesson to heart. Rather than using AI to monitor and control employees, they’re deploying it to eliminate repetitive tasks and create space for deeper work. Instead of fragmenting the workday into algorithm-optimized units, they’re leveraging technology to foster more cohesive, fulfilling work experiences.
“The most effective AI implementation I’ve seen preserves human connection rather than replacing it,” notes Dr. Morton. “It handles the cognitive overload so people can be more fully present with each other.”
The Resistance Begins with Awareness
Unlike Mark Scout, we still have choices about how technology integrates with our working lives. The question is whether we’ll make those choices consciously or find ourselves, like Severance‘s protagonists, suddenly awakening to constraints we never consciously accepted.
The second ‘Severance’ season continues to explore these themes, with the ‘severed floor’ serving as a central setting where the characters’ rebellion against their controlled existence unfolds.
The value of human work isn’t just in outputs but in the meaning we derive from it. The connections we forge, the purpose we discover, the growth we experience—these aspects resist severance, whether surgical or algorithmic.
As AI reshapes our professional landscape, Severance offers a powerful reminder: the struggle to remain whole in a fragmenting world is fundamentally human. And like the show’s characters, our first act of resistance might simply be recognizing the division that’s already occurring.
“I’ve started blocking off time where I turn off all the AI assistants and just think,” says Chen. “It feels revolutionary somehow, like I’m reclaiming something I didn’t realize I was losing.”
In the fluorescent corridors of our AI-enhanced workplaces, perhaps that’s where our own rebellion begins—not with dramatic gestures, but with the quiet insistence on remaining integrated human beings in an increasingly severed world.
That’s interesting because I was having a difficult time reading the first paragraph. I kept reading and re-reading to try to understand.
I think you’re right, though. People are craving authenticity and originality. Maybe the pendulum has swung a bit too far and it’s coming back.