*’Kier, chosen one, Kier.
Kier, brilliant one, Kier.
Brings the bounty to the plain through the torment, through the rains,
Progress, knowledge show no fear,
Kier, chosen one, Kier.’*
My name is Katelynn C. I’m making this statement roughly nine months before it will be shown to you. I have, of my own free accord, elected to undergo the procedure colloquially known as severance. I give consent for my perceptual chronologies to be surgically split, separating my memories between my work life and my personal life. I acknowledge that, henceforth, my access to my memories will be spatially dictated. I will be unable to access outside recollections whilst on Lumon’s severed basement floor, nor retain work memories upon my ascent. I am aware that this alteration is comprehensive and irreversible. I make these statements freely.
Whether or not you’ve yet had the pleasure of watching the AppleTV masterpiece *Severance*, the standout characteristics of the above-presented hymn, plus the statement of ‘free will’ in assenting to an altered state that limits freedoms by default easily bring one of two things to mind.
Religions.
And when taken too far: cults.
For the sake of the uninitiated, *Severance* is a masterclass in both body-horror sci-fi and an unsettling approach to philosophical questions surrounding identity, ethics, alterity, and—ultimately—various forms and levels of freedom. At Lumon Industries—the “world’s leading biotechnology company”—what employees see as a blessing in the so-called severance procedure—a medical intervention of forced work-life balance separating work memories/awareness from all other mental activity for the sake of worker wellbeing (and of course: productivity)—slowly unravels to be a cog within a more sinister endgame.
However, one established element of the larger Lumon lore surrounds the scope of company influence—the money on display in opulent events, the apparent existence of an internally controlled political/governmental entity in which Lumon Industries’ main location exists, with employees and families residing inside its borders—and perhaps most vague yet most consequential: the often-reverenced status of the founders of the Lumon empire, the Eagan family, specifically its first CEO: Kier Eagan.
Operating from an ideology that equated a life of service with the highest form of love, Kier fostered what he believed to *be* a love—“more selfless and sacred than romantic love”—between employer and employee, an ethos echoed by one of his modern descendants’ recollection of growing up believing she had thousands of literal cousins, for how lasting the impression of the sentiment remained. Additionally, a set of doctrines—notably reminiscent of the nine fruits of the Holy Spirit—was likewise penned by Kier in the 1800s and continues to shape the company:
* I was blind till you gave me Vision.
* I was languid till you gave me Verve.
* I was simple till you gave me Wit.
* I was peevish till you gave me Cheer.
* I was in vain till you gave me Humility.
* I was cruel till you gave me Benevolence.
* I was gawkish till you gave me Nimbleness.
* I was false till you gave me Probity.
* I was dim till you gave me Wiles.
* I was Me till you gave me You.
These nine core principles serve a dual purpose within the show: company culture dictates to improve quality of workers, and commandment-esque edicts for those who take their employment at Lumon to the level of hero-worship—or full-blown religious devotion—to the founder-cum-deity: Kier. Moreover, the Nine (as referenced in-show) alongside Keir’s Four Tempers (certainly *not* Horsemen)—Woe, Frolic, Dread, and Malice, which he deemed the key components of all human emotion, and their balance as the driving factors behind all things, from personalities to corporate strategies—serve both sides of this coin: a gradual and systematic usurpation of individuality (and ultimately: freedom) that may have originated well-meaningly—that more-selfless-higher-than-romantic love (similar to or even beyond *agape*, given the eventual god-status of the man)—but which eventually devolves into cultish insularity, the darker aspects of the severance procedure, and the idolisation of the Eagans, with Kier’s writings being read from as easily for instruction as an earned reward for workers, or the so-called Perpetuity Wing, a museum chronicling the awe-inspiring lives of the Eagans and Lumon’s history—a treat for severed employees to visit. The worship of the founders and the largely-faceless (to the severed employees) Eagan family in power presently is increasingly revealed for its toxicity, and ultimately begins to foment rebellion in the main characters: not accidentally through acts aimed to regain *freedom* and the only kinds of love we see with meaningful power in action: romantic and filial (*not* agape, Kier’s version or otherwise).
The significance of these storylines and their connections to religious and, when evolved more darkly, cult movements present significant and relevant venues for analysis and consideration given the show’s audience: the real world, 2022–present. Reeling and redefined from the *isolation* of a pandemic; increasingly *divided* socially and politically from communities pitted against one another; the rise of right wing *cults* worldwide, systematically chipping away at *freedoms*; wars waged in the name of *religion* for the accumulation of *power*; real-world corporations increasingly pitching ‘we’re like a *family*’ only to be revealed for dysfunctional/abusive *working* conditions—questions regarding the role of the leader (religious or corporate), the place of religion in post-pandemic society, and where the line exists between healthy appreciation and cultish grovelling ripe for exploitation are collectively thrust to the fore by a workplace drama, *specifically*.
What’s more, in reflecting upon the above argument, a new thread emerges: that hymn of praise sounds reminiscent of an Alma mater; that statement of assent sounds like a loan agreement, or a travel waiver.
Is academia *itself*—a workplace—thereby a religion? A cult? A Lumon-like behemoth that began with good intentions but is falling to restrictive forces that limit the freedoms of its actions and its workforce?
In these ways and many more, the character actions and storylines in *Severance* stand as exceptionally fruitful for examination, reflection and potential instruction for the field, the Academy, and the larger global sociopolital context of modern times.
AppleTV’s Severance is on the surface a sci-fi flavoured workplace drama, but alongside this presentational veneer lies a more dynamic, multifaceted interrogation of what it means to believe in leaders (corporate, faith, and governmental alike), where the line is drawn between healthy faith and cult-like devotion, what freedom looks like and how (and when) it needs to be fought for, and how one defines identity (not least of all: their own). From these launch points, as illustrated by characters individually and collectively as well as through the overarching plot, Severance provides an exceptionally fruitful source material for examination, reflection and potential instruction across numerous critical and consequential contexts: our personal communities, the Academy as a whole, and the larger global sociopolital context of modern times.