binomech's garden

2026-04-09

Thu, 09 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Attended the mental health information desk organized by my workshop.
Met a guy who thinks Ockham's nominalism was the downfall of western civilisation.
Put away the clean dishes with minimal resistance.
Showed up to the 3rd nutritionist meeting; was advised to eat slower to increase a feeling of satiety.
Bothered my cat so she would leave my unmade bed and I could then make it.
Failed to sit down to study because I forgot the info desk was today; I intended to use the time at the workshop.
Got rejected from a transfeminist commission online for not being vocal enough about my activism on Tumblr.
Brainstormed some ideas for this site; wondering if there's a consistent way to implement them in both desktop and mobile without constant tweaking.

2026-04-09

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Sent my CV for another job. I doubt I'll get this one, it was first come first serve and my skills are hardly unique.
Failed to study... again. I did sit down to try and do that but I got distracted externally. Not blaming myself because "I can't control others' choice to interrupt me", but perhaps I should, because "It's on me to set better boundaries and/or just hit the bricks."
Cooked my first batch of white bean stew. It turned out okay; I just prefer other legumes.
Finished watching Ferris Bueller's Day Off. I understand why it's a cult classic, and I really enjoyed seeing young Alan Ruck do things, but I don't think it tickled me as much as I hoped it would.
Got extremely stressed out about bureaucracy. Affidavits are scary.
Tweaked the desktop layout of this site some more, we're back at dithering and muted OG Game Boy colors. I guess I'm a boring palette guy after all.
Still worried about my nerve damage getting worse if I don't stop taking my current meds. Reminding myself that it's more important that I don't stop treatment than worrying about looking funny to other people because of the shaking.
Also questioning whether it's true that it's more important that I continue treatment or if it's for the benefit of Society At Large. Subsequently, also reminding myself that last time I had a break it was terrifying and that this is subjective and true. For the best value of "true" anyone can have. Just take your pills, dude.
Apparently Charlie Day is in the latest Mario movie. On my hands and knees begging the universe to free him from the typecast curse so he can work on things I actually enjoy watching.
I theoretically have a toki pona taso call this evening... I'm a little scared, my oral fluency is shit compared to writing. But I will show up, and I will try to participate actively in the conversation.

2026-04-11

Sat, 11 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

toki pona voice call successfully attended :) It was fun, and not too bad for my first time speaking it out loud, but I need to remember the practical tips of subject-switching to be able to formulate more complex sentences without getting tangled in structure. I also nest la way too often.
Slept around 4h, after a really bad night. Fridays are always rough emotionally, they're not usually this bad physically. I might have to call it a night rather early today.
I pruned my 250+ likes on Tumblr as is customary, refilled my queue. A lot of good poetry this week. I found a reminder that I should read more Donna Haraway.
I need to find my book recs that I answered on Tumblr in March of last year and migrate them to this site.
I'm making noodles for lunch; I'm running out of my homemade spice mix and I found a storebought version that uses the same ingredients, already roasted and ground up. I'll probably be using that. I also have humongous shiitake mushrooms ready for the dish.
I need to help my bird with their digital garden and I need to clean up my alien's stylesheet; I have to remember the latter likes to work with HTML instead of markdown so there's a lot of classes and IDs to watch out for that I have to preserve.

Barton Fink (1991)

Sat, 12 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT

My mother was the first person in her family of farm workers to attend university, where she got a degree in art history. When I was born, she realized her curator job didn’t pay well enough to feed a child, and she managed to find a job as an accountant, which she worked at for the rest of her life before retiring. She spent my whole childhood trying to discourage me from considering art-related activities as viable careers while simultaneously being the only source of art I had access to in our tiny rural town, through the music she played while she cooked and I did my homework and in the movies she rented for us to watch together every weekend. When I was 13, I told her that I’d started a poetry workshop at school and that I decided to upgrade my class notebook margin doodles to actual, deliberate attempts at drawing. Her response to this was renting Barton Fink to watch that weekend. I can only assume the intention was to make me feel dread at the opposition earnest art was met with, at the idea of being so entrenched in your stories that it blinded you to the dangers of the world, at leaving your working-class family bereft (ambiguously dead) because you were deluded enough to think your creations would be good enough to make a difference. Unfortunately for her, it didn’t work as intended: I didn’t become a professional artist, but I went into what might be one of the most unemployable fields of study in academia these days, experienced some fairly violent worldly realities, and picked up schizoaffective thought patterns in the process. And I am, in fact, unemployed, so in that regard she was right about all of it. Fortunately for me, my art was decent enough at some point to have some savings from commission work, and approximately five people are willing to listen to the stories I have to tell. So when I argue with her on the phone from the psych ward or the homeless shelter about how I need to get a real job to get real help to be a real adult, I still turn to Barton Fink (perhaps counter intuitively, but only perhaps) to feel less hopeless about my life and write overly verbose reviews for it on the internet, where I don't need to grow out of believing in the power of fiction to find value in my thoughts.

I am, somewhat predictably, extremely protective of this guy who is a little too limp-wristed for the working class and also too working class to make highbrow art, a little too worried about the alcoholics and the cries for help next door to shit out profitable screenplays on a strict schedule, who sounds a little… y'know, a guy who can only talk about suffering through fiction, who thinks that these accounts of things that are too sickening to look at in the eye directly should be treated with the same dignity as the real thing because they are also a real thing, who gets told to man up, to grow up, because the real working class are people dying for the country. And are they wrong? Is he truly awake at last, or still dreaming? After all, he offered soft-spoken recognition to his hotel neighbor, and it might have painted a target on his family’s back.

Audrey trusted Barton enough to tell him she was the ghostwriter behind most of Mayhew’s novels because he was the only one to offer an ear to a secretary and not just her wealthy male employer, but when he called her for help with his script, he awoke to a corpse. He tried to celebrate his own work with a dance, and he was told he had no right to these songs. The only work he can ever do for the people who need it happens in his head. They will not produce his film scripts until he writes about wrestling the right way: big men, physically and mentally, partake in regulated violence both in front of and behind the camera. Because it’s not the poor boys in the real wrestling ring and on the front lines making a difference, nor the fishmongers down on Fulton Street, still singing past the violence, still hoping to hear back from their child who longed for and feared skipping town and now won’t be allowed to come home until he grows up a little. It’s obviously not the cuckoo Jewish fags on Broadway, all of them annoying bloodsuckers that will loiter around your lights and disfigure your moneymaker mug. It’s the film producers in decorated uniforms that point to where the money goes both in Hollywood and in the military that have the means to make fiction a reality. It’s them that make the difference when they turn others’ suffering into best-selling glory.

Life looks so violently solid in the light of day after the sweet deniability of night. But if you can direct the light of fact with the mask of fiction, it can illuminate the truth without blinding the audience. Cover your eyes from the sun: that’s a real woman at a real beach just as much as it is a picture in Barton’s hotel room and the title of his new script. Cover your eyes from the sun: sweat and gasoline are not all that different. Cover your eyes from the sun: our lives are the only story ever worth telling, and they’re all fruity scripts about suffering that will never be produced. The way we serve the common man is our head, which we can’t trade in for a new one. Our severed head, separated from the living body, can be conveniently packaged and passed on to someone else like a story that will always be meaningful, even when it needs to stay locked away lest the violence it reveals gets too unbearable to look at. Is a dream more real than a sleep-deprived psychotic breakdown? Is reality something more than the sum of our perceptions? All stories are someone asking you to believe them, and you do. The life of the mind is no stranger to the life of the body. If you don’t open the box, your story is as important as the violence of a severed head, and the violent reality of a severed head is as real as your story.

The common man is a hotel clerk and an antisemitic cop. The common man is a ghostwriting secretary and a frustrated artist. The common man is a struggling wrestler and anti-intellectual cannon fodder. The common man is an insurance salesman and a serial killer. The common man is a tourist with a typewriter and a prisoner who wants to get off the merry-go-round. The common man is a victim and an accomplice. The common man remembers the shame of transactional humiliation when he’s at the other end of it. The common man’s struggle for existence cannot quite quell their longing for something higher. The common man could tell you some stories. If it’s not the build they hate, it’s the personality: the common men always have something in common.

Bookmarks (sites)

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

dogboy.smol.pub

departure.blog

sweetfish.site

nihilisticporcupine.com

Anonymous Animal

ickyspace.neocities.org

dashweb.neocities.org

Legends of Localization

A Field Guide to Web Accessibility

iFixIt repair manuals

Knitting 101 playlist

Proko figure drawing playlist

Quickposes reference photos

eggplant.place NeoDB tracker

A Philosophy of Blindness

a programming language in arabic

Switch ROMs

Digital Love Languages

Sticky Notes

Modern CSS

Lernu: Online Esperanto Course

On the choice to remain

Mon, 18 Mar 2024 00:00:00 GMT

To remain alive despite the absolutely horrifying prospects for earthlings of all species.
To keep trying even though I seem to get it wrong every time.
To believing that there is something worth loving even as everything around us crumbles.
To remain present, to look at pain in the eye and say "que me quiten lo bailao", to more dances.

I am starting this new capsule on a day filled with misery for myself, but not by any means more miserable than any other day in the history of our species, of our planet. I look around me and I see war and famine and death and illness and all those apocalyptic omens and I feel crushed by grief. I look at my life, I look at how small it is, how plain and empty, how bad I am at making the world better in the face of all this pain instead of worse and the black hole in me grows, and grows, and devours everything warm.

I'm not a religious person, my faith lies in the mundane and it ebbs and flows like the tide. I'm okay with this, on the good days, and that's all I can ask for. Today it's meager and wobbly like a weak flame, I have talked to old friends turned strangers, turned thorns, and I am grieving.

I am writing this because I don't want this grief and guilt to end me. I want to learn from it, I want to be better, I want to understand that pain lies ahead in all fronts and that it is no reason to give up on this precious, miraculous planet.

I want to remain.

(My) Disco Elysium skills

Tue, 03 Oct 2023 00:00:00 GMT

Intellect

Trompe-l'œil — Tricks of the light, self-deception and detecting others' deception
Mythopoetics — Creating narratives, projecting a sense of beauty and purpose unto things
Lens Calibrator — Shifting focus between the macrocosm and the microcosm, risking existential dread as the level of abstraction increases
Dialectics — The use of critical thought and opposition to build a subversive reality
Weltschmerz — Worldly ache, the feeling of reaching out to humanity accross time, melancholic displacement
Ithaca — Sense of utopia, the ability to conceptualize the best possible reality to use as a compass

Psyche

Volition — Will, self-possession and ability to hold on to purpose
Tapestry — The capacity to weave community, to understand others' desires and needs and guide them towards connecting with each other
Numen — Sense of holiness in the mundane, the capacity to see the sacred in the earthly pleasures without the need for hiding their faults behind the divine
Earthling — Homeland, sense of belonging to a community through nature and the physical, to feel evolution's fingerprints on your body and culture
Refraction — Awareness of one's own mental make-up, the ability to see where a thought is coming from and its potential biases
Rhizomes — Mutualism; the ability to discard hierarchies between individuals, species, territories, to see the naked ties between them

Physique

Endurance — Energy reserves, the stamina to weather pain and strenuous conditions
Momentum — Ability to perform actions on autopilot, to be guided by muscle memory and a pull to move
Sisyphe Heureux — The ability to find joy in hard physical work, to bounce back from trauma and heal the body through reinventing one's life purpose
Beast of Burden — Letting go of the superego, the capacity to distract oneself from the realities of physical pain and exhaustion, but also to give in to libido and pleasure
Praeparatio Malorum — Readiness to survive duress; the capacity to reduce agony through subjecting oneself to trial runs of it. Glorified masochism
Half Light — Primal fight or flight response, intense response to fear and feeling threatened, visceral reaction

Motorics

Amber — Ability to retain detail, to be able to mentally photograph a scene, to commit the significance of location to memory and preserve the information with little bias
Chronotyphlos — Time blindness; ability to escape the flow of time in the mind, passing the time quicker, or the feeling that the hours are stretchy and dense like warm caramel
Quicksilver — Mercurial temperament, shiftiness, unpredictability. Adapting to changes of plans, or more often, changing them yourself. The ever-shifting opinions and non-sequiturs
Mania — Density of attention and activity; control (or lack thereof) over where thoughts are directed, where energy is spent, what is preserved and what is discarded
Déluge — Sensory overwhelm; what information is coming from which sense, the ordering of it, the visible reactions in the body to that information
Translation — The quickness to adapt to a social situation, the ability to translate input from one sense into the other, to change language registers and control over the limbs

[Exit JOHN TURTURRO]

Wed, 19 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

STAGE: conservatory auditorium

This is a stimulating learning environment for creatively-minded youths; your child should be feeling a sense of accomplishment that performance provides.

Your child doesn’t want to perform for an audience.
Your child is crushing her own fingers with a grand piano’s fall board
in front of an audience.
Your child has been ordered to clean the blood off the keyboard;
it’s not her property to mangle.
Someone else has been ordered to clean the blood off your child’s hands,
they’re not her property to mangle.
Someone else scrubs the ivory clean.
Your child scrubs her own hands.
Your child is fleeing the auditorium
vowing to never step on a stage again.

STAGE: hospital room

This is a controlled environment for clinical trials of psychoactive drugs. The participants were asked to bring familiar stimuli as a sensory tether to reality should they experience distressing dissociative side effects. They are contractually free to leave but unlikely to find their way to the exit while the effects last.

Your test subject doesn’t know how to be a person without a script.
Your test subject is method acting a way out of his own life.
Your test subject must die for the sake of believable performance.
When you think a lover is strangling your test subject,
remember that his stunt double knew what he was signing up for.
If you can’t tell them apart, it means the treatment is working.
Told with genuine affection but without compassion, Turturro uncovers
someone else’s newspaper clippings
in your test subject’s childhood memories.
Your test subject can see the door.
Your test subject doesn’t want to leave.

STAGE: subway carriage

This transit network is at the service of the general public; it has been designated accessible by the city government, as every passenger should be able to exercise their autonomy regardless of physical ability.

Your passenger is trying to paint a home out of a stranger with bloody hands,
bricks-and-mortar in his eyes
where the living room TV used to be.
It’s so bright in here; why are your pupils still huge?
The door is right there. Can’t you see it?
I think this is serious; maybe you should go to the doctor.
I think you should start looking into other hobbies before it’s too late.
I guess you can’t watch as many movies as you used to.
It’s so bright in there; why are his pupils still huge?
He said he had a cataract.
Your passenger can’t see the door.
Your passenger wants to leave.

STAGE: shared mythologies

This is a retelling of an ancient myth about humanity’s acquisition of the light of storytelling from the gods; the audience should find themselves relating to Prometheus’ plight and feeling gratitude for his sacrifice in the name of art.

An eagle pecks at Prometheus’ liver,
appointed-scripted-punishment that it doesn’t know it’s performing.
Prometheus weeps in truth no longer borrowed:
you can't quell the hunger with light.
Still he pleads I need to buy my mushrooms.
Still the eagle must hear Enjoy your meal.
Lights out, a man loses the props but not the hunger.
Lights out, the audience leaves with a stomach on fire.
They will be here again come tomorrow,
until the gods grow bored,
until their freedom can be a punishment
for someone else.

STAGE: a series of electrical impulses

This is a chemically induced coma to speed up recovery from an [unscripted stage exit]; your patient might be unresponsive to outside stimuli but activity in the pons is expected if he finds himself dreaming.

Your patient dreams that John Turturro
is refusing to sacrifice his life
for the sake of believable performance.
Your patient dreams that John Turturro
knows exactly where the exit door is
and makes a run for it under the halogens.
Your patient dreams that John Turturro
has a dinner of eagle liver waiting for him at home
and that hunger is enough to make a meal fulfilling.
Your patient dreams of giving John Turturro
a standing ovation for the times he wanted to flee the auditorium,
for the times it wasn’t his choice to return to a stage.

Hikari (2017)

Mon, 24 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

The thing about analyzing and recommending your favorite movies is that you have to use your words and trust the other party to understand what you mean instead of screaming into a pillow for several hours. Coincidentally, this is what the movie Hikari is about.

When I first watched this movie back in 2020, what called out to me was Nakamori’s grief—I’m also a photographer, a painter, and a cinephile losing his sight. This perspective colored my entire understanding of the movie, but I’m delighted it’s just one of many ways the movie has to explore its themes.

Memory: In the obvious form of Misako’s mother’s dementia and her obsession with her father’s disappearance (don’t forget the exact things that he had on him, don’t forget the few memories you have of him, he lives on in the trees), but also in Nakamori clinging to his identity as a cameraman and photographer, his work being proof of what his life was, not wanting to forget that this is a loss, and refusing to give up a part of his life that, even in absence, defines him.
Translation: Not just in the layman’s notion of it but as an act of conveying the same meaning despite the difference in medium, whether that is a descriptive audio script and the film it is describing, a photographer’s gaze and its subject, a memory and reality, or one person’s understanding of an event and someone else’s.
Trust: Learning to accept that we are all observers and there are no neutral ways to experience or retell an event, and all we can hope is that we can get the point across with the tools we have. To trust the audio description to do justice to the images you filmed so deliberately. To trust that he will reach your apartment door safely, even if the last time you saw him he trembled at the feeling of a step. To trust that the last photo you took turned out alright, despite having completely lost your sight by then. To look at the sun without flinching, knowing that tomorrow you might be dead, and still reach towards the light.

I get a lot of joy out of people’s descriptions of the world around me and what they can show me not only about the topic but also about their gaze. Hikari wrestles with two ideas that appear in every conversation about art and access with refreshing straightforwardness:

Language is a small tool to express the boundless reality that we live in. No description will ever be fully accurate or land with every reader. There is no good way to describe anything, just the hope that the person on the other side will meet your attempt to connect when all you have is an abstraction of an audience.
There are no neutral subjects because there are no neutral gazes. The person who created the image, the person who is describing the image, the person who is seeing the image, and the person who is reading the description are very different subjectivities (even when they’re the same person, at different temporal and spatial contexts and emotional states). This chasm grows larger when the creator, the describer, and the audience are separate. Unintended omission is often seen as the biggest issue with bias, but there’s no objectivity at all in clinically listing every visible thing with deceptively thought-of-as neutral adjectives. There is no shame in having a partial perspective, because all perspectives are partial, in art and in life.

One would assume the word “access” implies that there’s an entering to somewhere, an opening to a new experience, but most descriptions of art often feel like being told “there’s a door there” but finding the threshold bricked up. Bias is connection, it’s humanity, it’s what one looks for in art. The thing you’re being granted passage to is the person on the other side, the interpreter, the connection you’ve been offered. Translation, access, must be like putting a battering ram through that brick wall.

2026 read

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

We Used to Read Things in This Country

How to Remember Anything Forever-ish

Should I quit video games?

Stop Acting Like You're Famous ❤️

How I Budget

Japanese Learning Loop

How To Get Your Shit Together. ❤️

Los herederos de Gramsci, Black Mirror y Operación Triunfo

Black Achilles

How to get out of a rut

The Cheap Web

Basic Sentence Mining ❤️

What I've Learned About Web Accessibility as a Dyslexic, Sighted, Mouse User

The Biggest Wastes of Time We Regret When We Get Older

Eat the Frog

Identity in Crisis

Caught in the Net: Notes from an era of cybernetic delirium

Low budget P2P content distribution with git ❤️

Against Access ❤️

The most feared woman on the Internet

An Open Letter to White Progressives and Radicals

How To Respond To Criticism

Our World Alone

6 Harsh Truths That Will Make You a Better Person

dominar el lagarto interior: la tarea de autoconstrucción

The Slow Web

The Killing of Gus Hasford

42 Practical Ways to Start Working on Self-Improvement

Is Google Making Us Stupid?

Social Media Is Not Self-Expression

Dropping the 'Vegan' Label from my Political Banner

‘No one way works’: An Interview with Ira Terán and Emrys Travis on Trans Marxism

How to like everything more ❤️

The Bad Guys Won And We Are Still queer

The Brutalist Explained For Cinephiles

Daring to dream: Reclaiming our connections and building our resilience

jeremy strong, kieran culkin, and the cost of caring too much ❤️

The White Lotus, TERFs, and “Autogynephilia” as a Floating Signifier

'Cloud Dancer': A Measured Response ❤️

no good alone ❤️

How to Draw a Head

You are not, in fact, the granddaughter of the witches they couldn’t burn

No State Solution

Heat Death of the Internet

Caption This: the subtitling champions working to make festivals, screenings and global cinema more accessible

How I Became a Pathological Liar ❤️

The Invention of Memory

Tarsem Singh on arthouse epic The Fall

Laziness Does Not Exist

You should've asked

At Sea: On the defunct language of nautical flags ❤️

Alien’s ‘Standard Semiotic’, Pictograms and Icons

Apocalypse Numb

Making a Marriage Magically Tidy ❤️

The Everdeck: A Universal Card System

On Language Learning for Screen Reader Users

Stay soft: Notes on remaining open to all of life

Severances: Memory as Disability in Late Capitalism ❤️

The subtle ways in which "Expert in a Dying Field" by The Beths has changed me as a person ❤️

No stories

Discord, or the Death of Lore

i bought a pair of sweatpants on a whim and it put me back on track

How Using Tumblr is Undermining Your Community

Goals, Strategies and Tactics

Why don't upper case numbers exist?

Under Construction: Decolonized Queer Masculinity(ies)

Filthiness is Next to Godliness

Thinking About What You Need In A Secure Messenger

Unpapering The Past: Jewish History and the Cast of Pentiment

The Right to Take Up Space

Pueblo de paso

How Well Does ‘Daredevil’ Handle Disability Issues?

Jesus and the Twelve Disciples Do Stick-and-Poke Tattoos ❤️

Sin-eaters: journalists devour the sins of others but to what end? ❤️

The Visual Language of Hextech

Fotografía

The Japanese translation of Disco Elysium ❤️

A friend on Twitter died today

Discord Holds the Keys to Your Heart ❤️

How to Draw a Head From the Front: Loomis Method

Why Mark in ‘Severance’ Drives a 1997 Volvo, and More Answers from the Show’s Car Coordinators

But I can go outside

On Boredom

La belleza radical de Anohni en una ciudad sin corazón

The Politics of Pockets

The Scorpion and The Frog ❤️

Screw Finding Your Passion

Teens have figured out how to mess with Instagram's tracking algorithm

If you love me, you'll follow me on Mastodon

you don't need a résumé of pain to be loved

I Don’t Miss Being a Gay Man, but I Miss Having Sex Like One

The Stifling Air of Rigid Radicalism

Philip K. Dick and the Fake Humans

At 31, I have just weeks to live. Here's what I want to pass on

hosting and self-hosting and irc

Getting Started with Meshtastic

The century of the maxxer ❤️

hammajang luck entering the cozy sff uncanny valley ❤️

february appreciations

Antropoceno, la era en la que destruimos el planeta

another new year's post

Apocalypse Whatever

Twenty Percent Cooler

Unlearning literacy

Intersecting interests: movies and science fiction

The Cure for Slop

toki pona helps you write better alt text ❤️

The God of Arepo

The Ones Who Can’t Walk Away: Another Perspective on Omelas

The Misquotation of William Saroyan

How to Get Refocused After Your Vacation

How “Good Intent” Undermines Diversity and Inclusion

I read every entry of February's Bearblog Carnival about boredom. My favorites were:

meshtastic adventures ❤️

The Myth of “The Myth of Complementary Protein”

I don’t want to paint or write

Boredom and existentialism

30th Birthday

Who Will Remember Us When The Servers Go Dark? ❤️

So, Gutenberg Didn’t Actually Invent Printing As We Know It

Inside the 'mind-blowing' world of competitive spreadsheeting

My maddening battle with chronic fatigue syndrome

problem analysis spread

am i too slow, or is everything too fast

Redefining Energy Security ❤️

Frugal computing

Feeling too old for memes

Human-computer ecology ❤️

It's a statistic until it happens to you

the moon at around 7:00 pm

the rise of the pointless job

Ten Years Later, There’s Still Nothing Like Tarsem Singh’s The Fall ❤️

5 Ways I'm Unlearning My Fawn Response

Do you remember our photos together? ❤️

This is my thing

Pecha Kucha Night Burlington: You Should Make a Website

Why I email complete strangers

Outgrowing your TBR

toki pona

Mon, 06 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

lipu ni li ma sona pi ilo [pipi. nasin olin]

mi open e kama sona pi toki+pona lon tenpo mun nanpa 11

lon tenpo sike suno nanpa 2021

mi alasa sona e ona tan ni

mi lukin e lipu wawa lon sike pona

mi olin e nasin lili pona lon tenpo suli

tan ni^ la mi wile pona e toki mi

taso mi awen sona tan ni

toki+pona li ante e nasin lawa mi

ona li pana sona e weka lon sona mi

li pona kin e weka ni^

2026 watched

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Aggretsuko 🔁❤️

Little Miss Sunshine (2006) 🔁❤️

Mickey 17 (2025)

Star Wars V

Star Wars VI (unfinished)

Severance 🔁🔁❤️

Long Story Short (unfinished)

Bojack Horseman 🔁❤️

The Green Knight (2021) 🔁

Succession

Saint☆Young Men (2013) 🔁

Loving Vincent (2017) 🔁

When Harry Met Sally... (1989)

The Birdcage (1996)

Sinners (2025)

La Llamada (2017)

Project Hail Mary (2026) ❤️

Kinou Nani Tabeta 🔁❤️

Ferris Bueller's Day Off (1986)

Yunara guide

Fri, 20 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Laning phase

Trade pattern: AA-Q (Extend Q if enemy trades back)
Make sure to reset AA with Q; even when W and E are up.
Sneaky autos are always good when viable.

Midgame

All-in with R is core; play around it - otherwise non-committal.
Trade pattern:
- Basic: E > R > AA(Q)
- Chase down: R > RE > AA(Q) (dashing first is faster than 2 Q > RE > Q)

Items

Doran's Blade > Cull ASAP after crashing / Cull start.
Kraken Slayer (Blade of the Ruined King only against health tanks)
Berserker's Greaves
Fiendhunter Bolts
Infinity Edge
Lord Dominik's Regards/Mortal Reminder (move to 4 if double tank)
Runaan's Hurricane
Shieldbow/Guardian Angel

Runes

Precision: Lethal Tempo
- Triumph (Absorb Life against a double poke lane)
- Bloodline (Alacrity if BORK start)
- Cut Down (Coup de Grace if BORK start)
Inspiration
- Triple tonic
- Boots (or Cashback against a double poke lane for earlier mobility)

(ES) Crema blanca

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 raciones)

1 cebolla mediana, picada
1 puerro (solo la parte blanca), en rodajas
2 dientes de ajo, picados
2 patatas medianas, peladas y cortadas en cubos
1 coliflor pequeña, en trozos
2 zanahorias, peladas y cortadas en rodajas (opcional)
1 litro de caldo de verduras
200 ml de crema de leche
2 cucharadas de mantequilla y/o aceite de oliva
Sal y pimienta al gusto
Nuez moscada (opcional)
Perejil fresco o cebollín picado para decorar

Preparación

Lava bien todas las verduras. Pela y corta finamente la cebolla, el puerro, el ajo, las patatas, la coliflor y las zanahorias.
En una olla grande, derrite la mantequilla (con un poco de aceite) a fuego medio.
Agrega la cebolla, el puerro y el ajo, y sofríe a fuego bajo hasta que estén tiernos pero no dorados.
Añade las patatas, la coliflor y las zanahorias, y remueve durante un par de minutos.
Vierte el caldo de verduras en la olla, asegurándote de que cubra las verduras.
Lleva a ebullición, luego reduce el fuego y deja cocinar a fuego lento durante unos 20-25 minutos, o hasta que todas las verduras estén bien cocidas y tiernas.
Retira la olla del fuego y deja que la sopa se enfríe un poco. Luego, utiliza una batidora de mano para triturar hasta obtener una mezcla suave y cremosa.
Devuelve la sopa triturada a la olla y agrega la crema de leche y más caldo si fuera necesario (no es una crema espesa).
Calienta a fuego medio y ajusta la sal y la pimienta al gusto.
Echa una pizca de nuez moscada, sin pasarte.
Sirve caliente, decorando con un poco de perejil o cebollín picado, y un chorrito de aceite de oliva.

(ES) Crema de Lombarda

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 raciones)

500 g de lombarda
1 diente de ajo
80 g de cebolla
80 g de puerro
1 manzana pequeña
1 patata pequeña
25 g de aceite de oliva
Sal
500 ml de caldo de pollo o verduras
Pimienta negra molida
1 chorrito de nata líquida para cocinar
Unas semillas de sésamo tostado

Preparación

Lo primero que vamos a hacer es preparar todos los ingredientes. Para ello, cortamos 500 g de lombarda en juliana, 1 diente de ajo en láminas y 80 g de cebolla y 80 g de puerro en cuadraditos. Pelamos 1 manzana pequeña y la cortamos en daditos, y pelamos 1 patata pequeña y la chascamos.
Ponemos una cazuela a fuego medio con 25 g de aceite de oliva y cuando el aceite esté caliente, añadimos el ajo y lo sofreímos unos instantes. A continuación, añadimos la cebolla y el puerro, una pizca de sal, mezclamos y cocinamos unos 5 minutos.
A continuación, añadimos la lombarda y la mezclamos con el sofrito. Añadimos sal, cocinamos 2 minutos y añadimos la manzana y la patata. Mezclamos y cocinamos otros 2 minutos.
A continuación, subimos el fuego y añadimos 500 ml de caldo de pollo o de verduras. En cuanto el caldo rompa a hervir, dejamos cocinar el conjunto durante 30 minutos a fuego medio-bajo.
Pasados los 30 minutos, trituramos la crema de lombarda con la batidora hasta tener una crema lisa, homogénea y sin grumos. En este punto, añadimos una pizca de pimienta negra molida y rectificamos el punto de sal si fuese necesario.
Servimos la crema de lombarda acompañada de 1 chorrito de nata líquida para cocinar y unas semillas de sésamo tostado, y terminamos regando el conjunto con un poquito de aceite de oliva.

(ES) Ensalada César

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (2 raciones)

2 cogollos de Tudela o ½ lechuga romana
2 rebanadas de pan tostadas y cortadas en cubos
1/4 taza de parmesano (20g)
1/4 taza de aceite de girasol (60ml)
1/2 taza de aceite de aceite de oliva (60ml)

1 huevo fresco
1/2 ajo pequeño sin el corazón
1/4 taza de parmesano (20g)
1/4 taza de aceite de girasol (60ml)
1/2 taza de aceite de aceite de oliva (60ml)
4 filetes de anchoa en aceite
1 Cda. de Salsa Perrins
zumo de ½ limón

Preparación

Salpimentar la pechuga de pollo y coloca una sartén al fuego con un poco de aceite.
Dora la pechuga a fuego alto durante 2' por cada lado. Luego baja a fuego suave, tapa la sartén y cocina otros 10'.
Aparta del fuego y deja reposar tapado otros 10'. Antes de cortar la pechuga espera otros 5' para no quemarte. Deja que el pollo se enfrié antes de añadirlo a la ensalada.
Mientras se hacen las pechugas preparamos la salsa césar. Coloca todos los ingredientes en un vaso para batidora.
Cubre con ¼ taza de aceite de girasol.
Coloca la batidora en el fondo del vaso y empieza a batir añadiendo el aceite de oliva poco a poco. No levantes la batidora hasta que veas que la mezcla ha emulsionado como una mayonesa.
Al final pruébala y añade sal solo si es necesario, solo con la sal propia de las anchoas ya suele quedar bien sazonada.
Si te queda demasiado espesa puedes aligerarla añadiendo más zumo de limón o un poco de agua.
Finalmente coloca las hojas de lechuga cortadas a pedazos en el plato, encima el pan tostado cortado en cubos y añade el pollo cortado en rodajas.
Por último las lascas de queso y añade la salsa César por encima.

(ES) Ensalada de Lentejas y Calabaza

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 personas)

300g de lentejas cocidas
300g de calabaza, cortada en cubos
100 g de queso de cabra
1 puñado de rúcula o espinaca baby
Media cebolla roja, cortada en rodajas finas
Especias para la calabaza (al gusto: curry, comino, pimentón, tomillo etc.)

3 cucharadas de aceite de oliva virgen extra
1 cucharada de vinagre
Jugo de medio limón
Sal y pimienta al gusto

Preparación

Asa la calabaza y prepara las lentejas:
1. Precalienta el horno a 200°C.
2. En una bandeja de horno, coloca los cubos de calabaza.
3. Rocíalos con un poco de aceite de oliva, sal, pimienta y las especias.
4. Hornea durante 20-25 minutos, o hasta que estén tiernos y ligeramente dorados.
5. Deja enfriar.
6. Si usas lentejas de bote, enjuágalas y escúrrelas bien. Si las cocinas tú mismo, asegúrate de que estén al dente. Déjalas enfriar.
7. En un bol pequeño, mezcla el aceite de oliva, el vinagre, el jugo de limón, la sal y pimienta.
8. Bate bien hasta que emulsione.
Monta la ensalada:
1. En un bol grande, mezcla las lentejas, la rúcula (o espinaca), la cebolla roja y la calabaza asada.
2. Añade el queso de cabra por encima (puedes desmenuzarlo o colocar rodajas).
3. Añade la vinagreta uniformemente sobre la ensalada.

(ES) Fideos con 5 Hierbas Chinas

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (2 personas)

200gr de tallarines de arroz o de pasta
Tofu
Setas ostra o shiitake
Pimiento verde italiano
1/4 de pimiento rojo
2 zanahorias
Polvo de cinco especias chinas
- Pimienta blanca
- Clavo (1)
- Anís de estrella
- Anís normal
- Canela en rama
Salsa de soja baja en sal
Aceite de oliva virgen
Sal

Preparación

Tuesta las especias en la sartén (mínima gota de aceite) y muélelas.
Corta el tofu en dados medianos y fríelo en una sartén con aceite de oliva.
Dale la vuelta y, cuando esté dorado, sácalo y reserva.
En una olla, pon a calentar abundante agua.
Añade los tallarines o fideos, y cuécelos siguiendo las instrucciones del fabricante.
Lava y corta los pimientos en dados pequeños.
Pela y corta la zanahoria en bastones o rodajas finas.
Pica el perejil y un diente de ajo.
Pon a calentar a fuego alto el wok, con un chorro de aceite de oliva suave.
Añade el diente de ajo, los pimientos, setas (cortadas muy finas), y zanahorias.
Tenlo al fuego durante unos minutos, tiene que salir tirando a crujiente.
Echa un poco de sal, las especias, y el perejil picado.
Añade un chorrito de salsa de soja y remueve hasta que la pasta adquiera los sabores. Agrega los trozos de tofu y espera a que se calienten.

(ES) Hamburguesa de Lentejas

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes

Como 2 tazas y media de lentejas cocidas
1 taza de nueces
1 taza de avena en copos
Especias al gusto: como 1/4 de cucharadita de tomillo, perejil, romero, pimentón dulce, ajo y cebolla. Usa las que tengas, puedes añadir las que te dé la real gana.
3 cucharadas de salsa de soja
1/2 taza de agua para que la masa nos quede más tierna y menos resecorra
2 cucharadas de aceite de oliva para saltear las lentejas

Preparación

Pues empieza por escurrir bien las lentejas y lavarlas en un colador. Con esto quitamos el agüilla de cocción en el que vienen (es aquafaba también aunque no sea de garbanzo) y que hace que estén pegajosillas. Las queremos bien sueltecitas.
En una sartén grande calienta el aceite a fuego medio-alto y echa las lentejas, las especias y el aceite. Saltéalas de vez en cuando, y verás cómo en 2-3 minutos empiezan a sonar como si estuvieras haciendo palomitas. Las lentejas se tuestan y algunas revientan. Si ves que te atacan, baja un poquito el fuego y saltéalas de nuevo.
Pica finas las nueces. Si te apetece algo anti-estrés, mételas en una bolsa y dales de mamporros con un rodillo de cocina o con un mortero. No las hagas polvito, que queden trozos visibles. Échalas a la sartén.
Tras unos 8 minutos en la sartén las lentejas estarán super aromáticas y tendrán un aspecto doradito. Echa la salsa de soja y saltéalo unas cuantas veces para mezclarlo.
Bueno, pues echamos las lentejas en un bol o similar, junto con la avena y el agua y lo machacamos y removemos todo junto hasta que se forme una pasta.
Pues ahora solo tienes que coger masa y formar las hamburguesas, a mano o con molde. Siempre siempre, si las haces a mano, compacta bien la masa, que no quede aire por dentro, que si no se desintegran en la sartén. Esto es muy importante.
Según el tamaño te saldrán 6-8 hamburguesas generosas. Yo recomiendo hacerlas gruesas, pero las finas también quedan muy bien.
Ahora el truco nº1: enharina tus hamburguesas, ligeramente, con almidón de maíz, tapioca o patata. No con harina de trigo o de lo que sea, mejor usa un almidón.
Cuando tengas todas las hamburguesas enharinadas puedes congelarlas o refrigerarlas, te duran, envueltas o en envases cerrados, unos 4 días en la nevera. No se pegan entre sí, así que puedes envolverlas (como si fueran un regalo) en papel de hornear.
Truco nº2: cuando hagas hamburguesas de lentejas, que suelen desintegrarse en la sartén, no pongas mucho aceite. Es mejor poner poquísimo, como 1 cucharadita para cada 2 hamburguesas, porque es precisamente al contacto con el aceite cuando las hamburguesas empiezan a soltar partículas y lentejillas.
La masa ya está hecha, no tenemos que cocinarla, así que no hay problema en dorarlas poco tiempo.
Hazlas a fuego medio 2-3 minutos por cada lado, con 1 cucharadita de aceite para cada 2 hamburguesas. Lo justo para que se doren. Y ahora…
Truco nº3: echa a la sartén 1/2-3/4 de taza de agua. Sí, tal cual, échalo y mueve la sartén para que moje bien las hamburguesas. Como en la superficie tienen almidón de maíz, se mezclará con el agua e irá formando un caldito espeso y viscoso, y tus hamburguesas de repente tendrán una pintaza brutal. En cosa de 2 minutos están listas, sácalas y sírvelas.
Si no las has pasado por el almidón, puedes añadirlo ahora: disuelve 1 cucharada de almidón de maíz en el agua antes de añadirlo a la sartén y tendrás un efecto prácticamente igual.

(ES) Judías Blancas con Verduras

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (3 platos + caldo sobrante)

500 gr Alubias (1 bol grande, no al ras)
2 Zanahorias (1 picada, otra plato)
2 Patatas
2 Cebollas medianas
1/2 Calabacín pequeño
1/4 Pimiento rojo
1/2 Pimiento verde
Aceite de Oliva Virgen Extra
1 Puerro
1 Rama de Apio
1/2 Taza de tomate rallado/frito
2 Cucharadas Pimentón de la vera
1 diente de ajo
Sal
Agua
Chorizo

Preparación

Poner a cocer el chorizo a hervir y bajar al 6 cuando rompa; quitar cuando ha soltado la grasa, a los 5
Añadimos un chorrito de AOVE a la olla Express y salteamos durante unos segundos todas las verduras exceptuando una de las cebollas. Las verduras van enteras (no las troceéis).
Cuando las verduras se doren, añadimos una cucharada de pimentón de la vera y rehogamos. Cocinamos 1/2 minuto.
Vertemos las alubias (previamente remojadas la noche antes), cubrimos con agua FRÍA (3 dedos por encima de las alubias/media olla) y añadimos la sal.
Tapamos la olla y cuando suba el pitorro cocinamos las alubias durante 20 minutos.
Mientras las alubias se cocinan, troceamos la cebolla sobrante en trocitos muy muy pequeños y la sofreímos en una sartén con fondo de aceite.
Cuando la cebolla esté transparente, añadimos la cucharada de pimentón de la vera y rehogamos 1/2 minuto (para que el pimentón no se queme podeís rehogar retirando la sartén del fuego).
Añadimos a la sartén el tomate rallado/frito y cocinamos durante 10 minutos a fuego medio.
Cuando las alubias estén listas, retiramos todas las verduras (por eso las añadimos enteras, para retirarlas fácilmente) y las trituramos con la batidora de mano junto con el sofrito de cebolla que acabamos de preparar.
Vertemos el puré a la cazuela de las alubias y movemos con con la ayuda de una cuchara de palo, con cuidado de que las alubias no se rompan y las dejamos otros 5-10 minutos a fuego medio, sin tapa, para que unifiquen los sabores y la salsita vaya engordando.

(ES) Mujaddara

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 raciones)

2 tazas de lentejas
1 taza y cuarto de arroz blanco basmati.
2 dientes de ajo
2 cebollas grandes
1 hoja de laurel
1 guindilla de cayena o copos de chile (opcional)
Piñones o almendras sin tostar
Una cucharadita de canela
Pimienta negra
Comino al gusto
Yogur natural
Aceite de oliva
Sal

Preparación

Ten las lentejas desde el día anterior en agua para que se hidratan.
Después escúrrelas y cuécelas en agua durante 20 minutos, con un poco de sal, una hoja de laurel, y dos dientes de ajo.
Pon el agua justa para que las cubra. Tienes cocerlas hasta dejarlas al dente (se acabarán de hacer con el arroz).
Mientras tanto, pela y corta las cebollas en tiras gruesas. Ponlas en una sartén con un chorrito de aceite de oliva caliente y fríelas hasta que esté muy hechas, doradas y bien tostadas.
Tuesta en una sartén también un buen puñado de frutos secos (piñones o almendras).
Añade el arroz a las lentejas, y echa especias al gusto. Asegúrate de que tenga el agua justa para que el arroz acabe hecho y seco (lo mismo con la lentejas).
Cuando el arroz esté ya cocido, remueve y comprueba el punto de sal y especias.
Deja que repose unos minutos y sírvelo en el plato, cubierto por cebolla caramelizada, parte de los frutos secos, y con una cucharada generosa de yogur natural.
También puedes servirlo con un huevo frito o escalfado.

(ES) Pollo con Salsa de Albaricoque

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 raciones)

4 muslos de pollo (con o sin piel, según prefieras)
200 g de albaricoques secos (pueden ser frescos si están en temporada)
1 cebolla grande, cortada en rodajas finas
2 dientes de ajo, picados
1 taza de caldo de pollo
1/2 taza de vino blanco (opcional)
1 cucharada de vinagre balsámico
1 cucharadita de comino molido
Una cucharada de harina de trigo.
1 cucharadita de pimentón dulce (opcional)
Sal y pimienta al gusto
2 cucharadas de aceite de oliva
Perejil fresco picado para decorar (opcional)

Preparación

Sazona los muslos de pollo con sal, pimienta, comino, y pimentón.
Calienta el aceite de oliva en una sartén grande o una cazuela a fuego medio-alto.
Dora los muslos de pollo por ambos lados hasta que estén dorados, unos 5 minutos por cada lado. Retira el pollo de la sartén y resérvalo.
En la misma sartén, añade un poco más de aceite si es necesario, y sofríe la cebolla a fuego medio hasta que esté suave y dorada, unos 7-10 minutos.
Añade el ajo picado y cocina durante 1-2 minutos más, teniendo cuidado de que no se queme.
Echa una cucharada de harina y deja que se cocine por unos minutos.
Incorpora los albaricoques secos (o frescos) a la sartén. Sofríe por unos minutos.
Añade un poco de vinagre balsámico, y mezcla bien para que los albaricoques se impregnen de los sabores. Algunos cocineros le echan un poco de miel.
Vierte el vino blanco en la sartén y cocina por unos minutos para que se evapore el alcohol.
Añade el caldo de pollo y vuelve a colocar los muslos de pollo en la sartén, asegurándote de que estén parcialmente cubiertos por el líquido.
Reduce el fuego, tapa la sartén y deja cocinar a fuego lento durante unos 30-40 minutos, o hasta que el pollo esté completamente cocido y los albaricoques estén tiernos.
Si el líquido se reduce demasiado, puedes añadir un poco más de caldo o agua.
Deja que repose antes de servir. Puedes agregar perejil fresco picado como decoración.

(ES) Ragoût de Berenjena

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 raciones)

1 cebolla grande, picada finamente
2 dientes de ajo, picados
1 pimiento rojo
2 tomates maduros, pelados y picados (o 1 taza de tomate triturado)
1 cucharada de tomate concentrado (opcional)
200 gr. de champiñones (opcional), en láminas
Un chorro de caldo de verduras
1 vaso de vino tinto (opcional)
Aceite de oliva
1 cucharadita de pimentón dulce o picante
1/2 cucharadita de comino
1/2 cucharadita de tomillo seco
Sal y pimienta al gusto
Perejil o albahaca fresca para decorar

1 taza de cuscús
1 taza de agua o caldo de verduras
1 cucharada de aceite de oliva
Sal al gusto

Preparación

Ragoût

Lava y corta la berenjena en cubos. Ponla en un colador, espolvorea sal y deja reposar durante 20 minutos. Esto elimina el exceso de amargor. Luego, enjuaga bien y seca con papel de cocina.
Calienta el aceite de oliva en una sartén grande o cazuela a fuego medio.
Sofríe la cebolla, el pimiento rojo, y el ajo durante cinco minutos.
Incorpora las berenjenas y los champiñones. Cocina durante 10 minutos, removiendo ocasionalmente.
Añade el pimentón, el comino y el tomillo y sofríe por unos minutos.
Incorpora el tomate (si lo quieres más fuerte y de un color rojo más vivo, puedes reforzarlo con una cucharada de tomate concentrado), el vino tinto, y el caldo de verduras.
Cocina a fuego lento durante 15 minutos hasta que las verduras estén tiernas y la mezcla tenga una textura espesa. Salpimienta al gusto.

Cuscús

Hierve el agua o caldo con una pizca de sal.
Retira del fuego, añade el cuscús y un poco de aceite de oliva, y tapa la olla. Deja reposar 5 minutos.
Remueve el cuscús con un tenedor para separar los granos.
Sirve una porción de cuscús y cubre con el ragú de berenjenas. Remueve si lo quieres todo integrado.
Sírvelo caliente o templado y decora con perejil o albahaca fresca picada.

(ES) Sopas de Ajo

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (3 personas)

3 o 4 dientes de ajo
9 o 10 rebanadas de pan duro
1L caldo de carne (natural o pastilla)
1 huevo
Una puntita de pimentón
Taquitos de jamón
Aceite

Preparación

Se rehogan en un poco de aceite los ajos fileteados.
Se retiran los ajos y se machacan en el mortero.
Retirar la sartén y echar en el mismo aceite la puntita de pimentón.
Se dan unas vueltas a las rebanadas en el aceite con pimentón.
En una cazuela se hierve el agua con la pastilla de caldo hasta que se disuelva.
Se vierte el caldo sobre el pan en la sartén, y se añaden los ajos machacados, el pan y el jamón.
Se bate el huevo con muy poca sal y se vierte sobre la sopa hasta que se cueza, después servir.

(ES) Sopa de Cebolla Francesa

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 tazones)

6 cebollas amarillas peladas
55g de mantequilla
125ml de vino tinto
30ml de coñac o brandy
1 litro de caldo de pollo
1 litro de caldo de res
15ml de harina ligeramente tostada

1 pizca de nuez moscada molida
200g de queso rallado
12 rebanadas de 1 cm de grosor, tostadas
1 diente de ajo pequeño, cortado por la mitad

Preparación

Corte las cebollas en cuartos y luego corte cada cuarto en tiras cortas.
En una cacerola grande a fuego medio, ablande las cebollas en la mantequilla durante 15 minutos, removiendo de vez en cuando.
Continúe cocinando a fuego alto durante 15 minutos o hasta que las cebollas estén caramelizadas, removiendo constantemente y raspando el fondo de la cacerola.
Desglasar con el vino y el coñac. Dejar reducir casi por completo.
Añadir los caldos de pollo y res, la harina tostada y la nuez moscada. Mezclar bien.
Llevar a ebullición y cocinar a fuego medio-alto durante 30 minutos, o hasta que la sopa se haya reducido a la mitad.
Obtendrás aproximadamente 1,25 litros (5 tazas) de caldo. Sazonar con sal y pimienta.

Para servir:

Colocar una rejilla de horno en el centro.
Precalentar el horno a gratinar.
Colocar tazones en una bandeja para hornear.
Mientras tanto, frotar ligeramente cada crutón con los dientes de ajo partidos por la mitad.
Verter la sopa en los tazones y añadir 30ml de queso a cada uno.
Colocar 3 crutones encima de cada sopa y espolvorear con el queso restante.
Hornear durante 5 minutos, o hasta que el queso se derrita y esté dorado.

(EN) Mulligatawny Soup

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredients (4 bowls)

118ml cup chopped onion
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 carrot, diced
59ml butter
22ml all-purpose flour
7.5ml curry powder
946ml (3.7 vasos) chicken broth
½ apple, cored and chopped
59ml cup white rice
1 skinless, boneless chicken breast half - cut into cubes
1 pinch dried thyme
salt and ground black pepper to taste
118ml heavy cream, heated

Directions

45 minutes, approx.

Melt butter in a large soup pot over medium heat.
Cook chicken until lightly golden.
Add onions, celery, and carrot and sauté until soft, 5 to 7 minutes.
Add flour and curry, and cook 5 more minutes, stirring frequently.
Add chicken broth, mix well, and bring to a boil (al 9).
Reduce heat and simmer for about 20 minutes.
Cut chicken into cubes, peel and cube apples.
Add apple, rice, chicken, thyme, salt, and pepper.
Close cooker and set it to 5 until rice is tender, 10 minutes.
Just before serving, stir in hot cream.

(ES) Tajine de Pollo y Verduras

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (4 personas)

1/2 Pollo troceado en piezas pequeñas
1 Puerro hermoso = 1/2
2 Zanahorias = 1
8 Ciruelas pasas = 4
1 Calabacín = 1/2
Ras el hanout
2 Cebollas medianas = 1
2 Tomates = 1
20ml Tomate concentrado = 1 cucharada
500ml Caldo de pollo = 2 vasos
Aceite de oliva virgen extra
Sal

Preparación

50min, approx.

Ponemos las ciruelas en remojo para rehidratarlas.
Lavamos bien las verduras y las picamos en trozos pequeños, para que ninguna destaque frente a las demás.
Repasamos el pollo, eliminando grasas, plumas y trocitos de hueso y con todo listo, comenzamos a cocinar.
En el fondo del tajine, ponemos 3 cucharadas de aceite de oliva virgen extra, y calentamos a fuego bajo.
En el aceite, rehogamos las verduras bien picadas, y posteriormente las tajadas de pollo troceadas en piezas de unos 2 cm de lado. Podemos usar pechugas, muslos o mezcla de ambos.
Cuando el pollo tome color, añadimos las especias ras el hanut.
Removemos y mezclamos bien las especias, y añadimos dos cucharadas del tomate concentrado.
Seguidamente, cubrimos con un vaso de caldo de ave, y bajamos el fuego al mínimo, poniendo la tapa al tajine y dejando que se cocine sin prisa.
Al cabo de unos 20-25 minutos tenemos listo un plato en el que la carne está tierna, la salsa ha espesado y las verduras se conservan tersas y llenas de sabor.

(ES) Timbal de Macarrones

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes

Macarrones - 200g
Bacon - 4 lonchas
Huevos - 2
Queso rallado - 2 cucharadas
Cebolla - 1 pequeña
Brick de nata - 200ml
Tomate concentrado - 2 cucharadas
Orégano
Albahaca
Pimienta
Sal
(Salsa de tomate o queso azul, al gusto)

Preparación

En una cazuela con agua hirviendo y sal coceremos los macarrones unos 15 minutos. Escurrimos y reservamos.
En una sartén, pondemos 1 cucharada de aceite y doramos la cebolla.
Una vez dorada, salteamos el bacon junto a la cebolla.
Añadir los macarrones y el queso rallado a la sartén y mezclar bien.
En un bol, batiremos los huevos junto al tomate concentrado y la nata.
Añadir sal, pimienta, orégano y albahaca a la mezcla de huevo.
Añadir los contenidos de la sartén a la mezcla de huevo. Mezclar todo uniformemente.
Meter el bol al microondas de 8 a 10 minutos. Tiene que cuajar.

(ES) Tofu Frito con Pimientos

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Ingredientes (1 persona)

150g de tofu firme
2 mitades de pimiento (uno rojo y uno verde)
2 dientes de ajo
2 cucharadas de salsa de soja
1 cucharada de vinagre de arroz (o de manzana)
1 cucharadita de azúcar moreno
1 cucharadita de maicena (opcional, para el tofu crujiente, o para espesar la salsa)
Aceite (girasol o de oliva)
Sal y pimienta
Semillas de sésamo para decorar (opcional)

Preparación

40min, aprox.

Presiona el tofu durante 15-20 minutos para eliminar el exceso de agua (puedes envolverlo en papel de cocina y ponerle un peso encima).
Corta en dados o bastones medianos.
Reboza ligeramente con maicena para un acabado más crujiente.
Calienta aceite en una sartén amplia o wok.
Fríe el tofu hasta que esté dorado y crujiente por todos lados. Retíralo sobre papel absorbente.
En la misma sartén, añade un poco más de aceite si es necesario.
Sofríe los ajos laminados hasta que empiecen a dorarse ligeramente.
Añade los pimientos en tiras finas y saltea 3-5 minutos, que queden al dente.
Devuelve el tofu a la sartén.
Añade la salsa de soja, vinagre y azúcar.
Mezcla todo bien a fuego fuerte unos minutos para que se integren sabores.

Ahistorical Black bodies

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I’ve been thinking about Dylan and Milchick as Black men in this environment and where they differ and the few interactions they’ve had with other Black people and among themselves. Dylan applied for the door salesman job while literally mirrored in pose and body type by an employer that refused to hire him because he was too poor to reject a job offer from Lumon. Milchick threatening to report Dylan to Ms. Cobel after he bit him and Dylan hitting back with “Wanna go see her together?” Milchick is trying to bribe Dylan out of solidarity with perks constantly (promotion was what kept Seth himself going), but very specifically, with getting to see his family. his white wife. his progeny. Milchick is making excuses and doing the dirty job for Cobel, and he only gets a promotion when she gets fired, immediately gets gifted blackface portraits of Kier the incestuous eugenicist, and gets told by Natalie, another Black employee (a secretary, a mouthpiece, another person that has been discarded by Harmony Cobel’s white womanhood when she demanded to speak to the board with no intermediaries), that he should be grateful. Milchick at Burt’s retirement party, clearly aware of Burt and Irving’s gay and definitely non-Eagan-approved love, and keeping Irving in line by talking about shame to the family. They get a curt handshake and a reminder that being forgotten is what awaits all of them, believing himself to be exempt from that statement because he’s not severed.

Also, as @whale-blanket pointed out in one of our conversations, Seth is the darkest-skinned Black character by a significant margin out of the recurring ones in the show, and I’ve been thinking about the minstrel show undertones of the MDE and him being in charge of (water/)melon bars that he can’t eat from.

Natalie is a light-skinned Black aristocrat with a notably gendered job whose personhood is reduced to being an eagan mouthpiece and PR manager. Dylan is a working-class Black man in a heterosexual marriage (with a white woman) who has three kids. Seth is a lifelong middle manager who doesn’t get to have a family of any kind because he has no life outside his work, which could pass as white-collar to an external observer but includes so much actual physical labor that I’d hesitate to call it such, an alienated as fuck Black man.

In Lumon they both have a paycheck, but there is no community, no frame of reference. and race is a historical construct, embodied— there can be no solidarity without a historical framework for the Black working-class body.

Blessed is the Flame

Thu, 06 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Prompted by the latest episode of Severance (S2E04 for readers in the future) and Irving B.’s effective sabotage of Helena Eagan’s infiltration into MDR and the continued struggle for liberation ending in a literal public execution.

I was talking to my friend hexmage about Blessed is the Flame last Saturday, which I had just finished my second read of. It’s a text about concentration camp resistance during the Holocaust. From a nihilist perspective (with a lot of focus on the notion of jouissance and positive consequences of that sacrificial sabotage), the grimness and horror come from the actual existence of the camps rather than the punishment that came for the resisting inmates.

It’s a devastating, powerful account of the price resistance paid within the Nazi camp complexes and the German war machine during the early 40s. I’ve been thinking a lot about the very real, very sickening risk of carrying out successful sabotage, one that means something; to mess with the production and distribution of weapons. To teach things that might make people aware and willing to join this sabotage. To blow yourself up if you take a few key oppressors in the process.

In the climate of suffocating capitalist realism that we live in, liberalism will never be an effective political tactic. The interests of capital will continue to permeate every action and stop it at just the right spot before it meaningfully changes anything. I’m guilty of believing some of my actions are more structurally meaningful than they actually are, and it hits me sometimes how this praise of violence, this acceptance of death as a price worth paying, is so discouraged even by most self-described leftists.

And I understand; I get that the cognitive dissonance of saying that death and/or permanent injury and/or disabling trauma (physical or mental) is necessary for it to not happen again. I think to myself, I can do more things if I’m alive; the dead can’t really do much for the living. And then I think about the fact that there’s no way to effectively resist the capitalist boot at your neck that isn’t life-risking. You will lose your job. They will break your union’s resistance box, and you will go hungry. They will cut you off from all your friends. They will try to make you regret your actions and your thoughts. They will try to make an example out of you. If you can’t be subsumed into a capitalist agenda, you need to be snuffed out. Blessed is the flame, because it keeps on burning, even if it has to destroy the match to keep going.

Blessed is the flame that takes oxygen and gives light.

Burt Goodman's Weird Week

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Imagine you’re a gay, married man who works at Lumon’s severed floor and therefore has no recollection of anything that happens during his 9-to-5, and one evening your boss comes to your house after hours to tell you you’re being fired because your worksona was being gay on company time. You are allowed to record a video for his retirement party, and you record yourself telling him and his unsanctioned workplace lover and friends that they are important to both versions of you.

Of course, you don’t know the only reason said unsanctioned lover was even at the funeral or aware that your worksona was essentially getting executed was because he escaped his office (locked from the outside) to make sure you were not being tortured for helping him and his friends plan a coup. But that’s your worksona, and this is you, so you plan a trip to Milwaukee with your husband to reaffirm your relationship.

The night you’re packing, a stranger shows up at your doorstep screaming your name and banging on the door, but when you come out, he’s driving away. Your husband thinks that’s your worksona’s lover and cancels the trip but encourages you to go look for him. You wait near the phone booth where the stranger sometimes comes to make clandestine phone calls, and when you finally make contact, he’s been fired too— but he was permanently suspended because he spotted the CEO-in-waiting pretending to be his friend to spy on the department and rape his other friend, and he doesn’t know any of this, or about his unsanctioned erotic affair, just that his worksona is dead, and he worries it’s his fault. He doesn’t know you, and you don’t know him, and he apologizes for having hurt your marriage and having yelled at you for stalking him, but you offer him a space to talk and grieve. a community he doesn’t have outside of work, that he doesn’t even know his worksona had at work, that was taken alongside his very existence as punishment.

This happened to my good friend Burt Goodman.

Consent is Personhood

Sat, 08 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Irving B. had a crisis of faith because for the first time in his five years of existence, he was allowed to set boundaries. It’s an affirmation that his body is his and that there will be no punishment if he says no and that in being given that choice there is recognition and care the likes of which faith towards his employers have never given. Not even Irving Bailiff, who barely sleeps, and Irving B. gets punished for his exhaustion. Helena Eagan, with the power to make Helly’s body hers without her knowledge or consent, had sex with Mark S., who thinks she’s Helly. Mark S., who is so desperate to have a love of his own, reacts to Irving’s reminder of Gemma with a need to reaffirm that Outie Mark is not him, that it’s his body too.

Irving waterboarded Helena and said he would kill her if they didn’t bring Helly back to this body and immediately apologized to Helly because he violated her right to do to this body what she wants with it. Because when she almost killed herself, it was one of the few choices she ever got to make about her life. He wanted and needed Mark to know that it was not Helly, that he was not consenting to what he was doing, and that Helena was using him because she felt she had a right to Helly’s body and her relationship with Mark. Knowing that he would be killed for the transgression but could not bear to see that profound violation of his friends’ bodies.

When Irving confronts Helena, he knows that the consequence is death, at the cost of giving Helly her body back. And if Helly taught him anything, it’s that they’re not the only ones who have a right to decide what this body does, and sometimes all the options you are given are self-destruction. Mark is a person; he’s not some commodity Helena Eagan has a right to because she’s the heir to the company that both Mark and Helly work at and claims sole ownership of their shared body. Also, of course, Mark Scout is reintegrating because he wants to see Gemma with zero input from Mark S., and because she’s his wife, and Mark S. only exists because she died, so if she’s not dead, then what’s Mark S. for? They’re the same, right? There is no other me! I am a person; he is not.

Consent is an acknowledgement that the person in front of you has as much right to their body as you do to yours. And when you are told you’re a guest on someone else’s body, when your life is so disposable it can be erased from existence with the flick of a switch, that act of recognition has more weight than words can possibly express.

A Doylist take

Tue, 11 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Severance is in conversation with the film industry producing it. These actors are letting the character “borrow” their bodies, and we, as viewers, have to deliberately engage with this metanarrative, this false equivalency. We do not know these people. They are getting paid for this job. Whether it’s personally fulfilling for them or which parts they’re doing it for does not weigh in on the fact that they are selling their body in exchange for a salary.

Who owns the body? Is it the actor or the person paying them? What kinds of bodies are profitable? How does one’s self settle into the body when one’s livelihood is based on performing as someone else? What is a good performance but a surgically precise awareness of one’s body served on a plate for an audience to consume, digest, and incorporate into ourselves? What is a good performance but a successful attempt at verisimilitude?

You are a person, but your worth lies in how effectively you can pretend to be someone else. The better you shroud your body and personhood in smoke and mirrors, the more valuable your labor will be. How are we talking about the actors in this show? How much are we thinking about the body behind the action? How much are we conflating them with their character? How entitled do we feel to their intimacy? Are we also the ones watching surveillance footage and claiming their personal experience as rightfully ours, pretending they know us and we know them?

They need to go get Hot Pot

Fri, 14 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Had a long, long conversation back in early February with M, D and J about how innies basically just get an airline menu approach to food (so does Milchick, according to his performance review scene). You check off your allergies; if you’re lucky, you get to choose between three or four options at the vending machine.

Some meals are all the same because it’s enough work as it is: watermelons for funerals, pineapples for gift baskets, and eggs and waffles for the end of the quarter, and that’s that. There’s no cultural connection, there’s no personal history, you can’t know what your outie does, so you can’t risk home-cooked meals, and you can’t risk religious or ethical dietary restrictions. the waffles, you eat alone. The vending machine packages are token-required and tiny enough that even if you were to eat them with someone else in the kitchenette, you could stretch it to 15 minutes. A pointed out their surprise at seeing Felicia and Irving sharing food.

The waffle party? It’s one person, alone, with their little waffle dish. The egg bar and the parting watermelons are the only food that is meant to be shared, and I’m not sure how much of that is a Milchick effort, and the egg bar has a time limit until they have to clock out on the last day of the quarter. What’s for dinner? They’ve never had dinner, they’ve never had breakfast (aren’t the waffles so exciting?), and their fucking lunch is two tiny boxes of raisins or whatever piecemeal snack they want to give them, including the mocking new options from the Lumon is Listening video. Let’s eat a rotting seal carcass because the marshmallows were never meant to be ours, and we’re starving.

You have your family here with dividers splitting up your shared desk, and you can’t have a fucking meal together. You have no idea what foods you like or what there is to like at all. You’ve never been full in your life. You’ve never talked about what you’re eating or about how life’s going because this is your life, and all of you are witness to everything in each other’s existences, or at least are meant to be. They need to go get fucking hot pot (literally and allegorically).

Grief and Greenery

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Lumon is a pharmaceutical that needs disease to exist for their economic profit while also claiming that their ultimate goal is balance, pulchritude, purity, and control. They base their whole promotion of severance as something that can cure a person’s grief through the amputation of it, as if death were the ultimate evil, as if grief were a septic miasma to drain. Conveniently, a lack of grief means a lack of attachment, and a lack of attachment makes for better workers. Darkness is used in the show to provide intimacy; it’s a right to one’s emotions without a purpose or an audience. Lumon’s halogens light up everything that transpires inside the building; your own grief can be repackaged and sold to an audience if edited well enough. Darkness is a shroud that takes away our sense of direction but also returns us to our body.

Kier seems to be in perpetual winter; the tree branches are nude, and there’s no end in sight to fields of snow and blue light and hunger. Animals can’t thrive, and crops can’t thrive. Woe’s Hollow is much the same, insofar as it’s Lumon land. Dieter Eagan became one with nature; he wanted, he loved, and his rotting corpse haunts and entices. Sex and desire are constantly presented as a prerequisite for suffering and rot, because loving someone means losing them will bring grief, because bringing a person into the world (through childbirth or severance) means accepting that you will love them, and they will suffer, and they will die someday. To love is to accept death. Grief is suffocating, a black rot encroaching on the wood in our trees and the canvases we made out of them. We carry it with us wherever we go, and it’s heavy, but it’s this rot that will feed new life.

We will sit at our green desks on a green carpet under a great big halogen light that primes all of our words of kinship and love for an audience to justify our suffering, but conspire in a dark supply closet where our grief and desire can be just ours, cramped and warm. Plants become a symbol for warmth, care, and grief. Plants die, plants rot, plants feed you, and you feed them. Green is for rot and for spring; the garden in perpetuity doesn’t even get real sunlight. Mammalians Nurturable’s field feeds the goats, and the goats feed it upon death. Burt and Irving’s little Eden is a mysterious storage room, but the plants are real. Gemma died, and the warmth of spring went with her, but Ms. Casey has a tree of her own in her office. Charlotte Cobel used a green intubator; it didn’t save her, winter came inexorably after each spring. But spring will come again. We will grieve, and in the warmth of the sun we will watch a sapling grow from the rotting remains of our old selves and loved ones.

You guys aren't even subtle regarding Dylan

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Most Severance fan meta has a shared appreciation towards Helly’s violence as a gateway to liberation (it’s awesome, I agree!). But somehow all memes and conversation about Dylan revolve around comic relief, his “sigma grindset” attitude in early S1 (that is discussed as a joke because he’s fat, his outie doesn’t win muscle shows, and he thinks waffle parties are so cool; the punchline is that he’s delusional).

But Dylan also had a violent catalyst to class consciousness after the first blatant act of infantilization in Defiant Jazz, after he realized the shitty little office rewards were a bribe to keep him from finding out his outie has children, a family, and things he cares about that he’s being denied. His outie is severed because he can’t hold down a job because of disabling mental illness, needs health insurance, and wants to ease the financial load on his wife, who works night shifts. And you want him to get excited about two waffles?

Dylan was radicalized through The You You Are right alongside Mark. Dylan chose to stay during the OTC against his start-of-the-season individualist characterization because he thought all of them deserved to know who they were. Dylan asked for a portrait of all of MDR, knowing they might not come back, to keep him focused during the switch operation. Dylan was the one to run after Irving when he was clearly distressed (worried about financial insecurity, even subconsciously) and tried to keep him from committing suicide; he was the first person (and one of the very few so far) to acknowledge his relationship with Burt as romantic and in a positive light. Dylan requested a funeral and gave a eulogy for Irving even when he wasn’t sure he could trust Helly to be herself and not an Eagan mole and called out how shitty Mark was for not even acknowledging Lumon killed Irving because it was both of them who didn’t listen. Dylan immediately worried about Gretchen’s happiness when they met. Dylan asked her if it was okay to hug; he acknowledged his outie’s relationship with her and his own sadness about the situation without shifting the blame onto Gretchen herself and basked in the genuine love he got in return.

Tumblr user nataliekalen says:

I remember when people were just making fun of the fact that his glasses never fit his face. And it just made me go, Ohhhh, you guys are all white. You don’t even know that glasses are built for Eurocentric features; you think it’s just fucking funny.

The combination of Eurocentric neophrenology in 21st-century medicine and how vision aids are so financially (and geographically) gatekept, too! Irving adjusting his glasses specifically in the scene where Dylan acknowledges his right to grieve because his love was real, and it was for another man… It’s care through recognition of all of the things that make us undesirable to a capitalist, eugenicist, white supremacist society.

Do you know how big these things are for someone with a history of relentless self-deprecation for not being able to financially provide (in a show where family and material relations are constantly intertwined)? How it manifests in the way Innie Dylan engages with rewards as proof of accomplishment and how big it was when he noticed they are not. And don’t even get me started on what “Dylan realizes perks are bribes and wants to get the fuck out” means for Milchick.

Why does infertility have to be such a big deal?

Thu, 27 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

“Why does infertility have to be such a big deal?”

In the show that is constantly framing childbirth as traumatic? In the show where you make a whole new person to carry your burdens through getting your skull penetrated with a drill and fertilized with a patented chip? The show that presents pregnancy being a huge commitment that needs work not to be made into a personal therapy for the parents? In the show where is one bourgeois family’s bloodline valued enough to feed on everyone else’s right to their lives and bodies? The show where the founder of the company and patriarch of said bloodline made up a fake twin that died a violent death because he masturbated instead of having reproductive-oriented sex? The show where the company heir feels so entitled to her metaphorical child’s life that she has sex with her lover (both of whom are employees for the company she’s set to inherit) and rapes them both in the process? The show that had this woman explicitly declaring to that same metaphorical child, in the episode about the things that make the innies’ their own people, that she wasn’t a person? In the show where the office building and parking lot shaped like a uterus? The show where old and gay people get fired for not being productive, whether it’s because they are not hitting their quarterly quota or can’t bear children? The show where they emphasize the “labor” part in “reproductive labor” so much that people getting severed to give birth is the first introduction to severance outside of the usual work-life balance metaphor? That show?

Why does infertility have to be such a big deal? Why is a miscarriage traumatic? Why does Mark get obsessed with having kids? Why does Gemma want to stop trying and focus on recovery? Why does Mark get severed when Gemma dies in a show where severance is literally always and unequivocally compared to giving birth to a person? Why is Gemma subjected to violations of her body through reluctant IVF shots that always end in natural abortions? Why is Gemma subjected to the same violations on the testing floor through the severing of dozens of innies that successfully serve the goals of someone else’s family? Why do all the innies keep asking why they were brought into the world? Why do the outies consistently feel entitled to the innies’ bodies and lives?

Golly, I wonder.

Irving + Cobel throughlines

Thu, 06 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I’ve been thinking about Irving a lot during this episode, funnily enough, and not even just in an “I miss my guy” way. I think the fact that him and Harmony are the two oldest members of the “main” cast definitely links them in some way in my mind, even with the 10 year age difference.

I think the historical periods and socioeconomic circumstances that Irving and Harmony grew up in have a quality of structural desperation that contrasts with the personal desperation of the younger members of the cast, although assuming the reality of certain parts of US history remain in the Severance timeline, I would say that Milchick being born during the time period where the first generation of Black americans was entering the mainstream corporate and political sphere would be significant on the point I want to make.

Irving would have been born right at the start of the Vietnam War, with a father in the navy right out of WWII, with Eisenhower interventionism off the charts, and the disaffect towards US internal and foreign policy would only increase in his youth, and it would go on for long enough for him to go to war himself, come back fully disenchanted to the golden years of the Civil Rights Movement and the AIDS crisis, a constant state of precarity between loss, disillusionment, anger and the hope that your fight is going somewhere with constant setbacks.

Despite the 10 years between them, Harmony Cobel grew up in a working class town, already revolving around Lumon, with her mother probably being an employee at the ether mill at that point (which, sidenote: “was she hacking up a lung” in the context of Kier’s courtship of Imogen? Was Jame Eagan pursuing Charlotte Cobel, or Harmony herself? Thinking about the conversation between Harmony and Helena in the parking lot about how she has underestimated her blessings… ). Her mother got sick from the constant chemical exposure and her aunt swooped in to both take care of Harmony (by sending her off to an Eagan boarding school, which did spare her from more child labor at the mill, but also primed her for a career at Lumon) and care for Charlotte, who hated Lumon. The faith was comfort and escape in a life of economic precarity and illness, even if the cause for those things and the venerated figure were the same thing. Loss, disillusionment, anger, leaps of faith once more in the middle of the Nixon administration, with energy shortages, inflation and the slow death of industrial production giving way to the service-based economy that uneducated blue collar workers could not access, much less working class women, but maybe brilliant Harmony with her chip designs could.

Sissy’s house is isolated from the rest of the factory town, a reasonably long drive away. It reminded me of how in Irving’s map the Lenora complex was isolated in an icy nothingness away from the rest of the city center and other Lumon housing complexes, including Burt’s. It makes me think of how, in the severed floor, the distance between departments might be physically not that big, but the dizzying labyrinthic hallways make the isolation even more anxiety-inducing, more inescapable. And also how Irving was familiar with the way to Perpetuity without a map at the ready, knew how to locate the conference room, got back from Wellness with relative efficiency learned the way to O&D through Burt’s map in a cinch because he wanted to get rid of the crushing isolation. Sissy and Irving are old, they live alone, they are principled and disciplined, and their access to care and support is incredibly conditional, the highest honor is isolation.

The scene at the shed at Sissy’s also reminded me a lot of Irving going through his outie’s storage room during the OTC (and Drummond doing the same while outie Irving’s at dinner with Burt and Fields.) Harmony flipping through the annuary with her classmates and Jame Eagan, like the picture of Irving’s dad next to the list of Lumon employees. Who was with Lumon while I was there, in the Severed floor/at Myrtle Eagan school for girls? Harmony has been described as a soldier by Reghabi, as someone who grew up surrounded by the company’s values, that will be loyal to those values no matter how much she pretends she isn’t. But she picks up Devon’s call, she encourages Mark to quit, she wants to learn what went wrong with Petey, she tears down her altar and spits in Sissy’s face that she doesn’t owe Lumon anything, that they took her ideas and twisted them, got the credit, got the money, and hurt people with them. I think about how Irving was definitely in the military, and it was probably because he grew up in a military household where his father set the tone, and it definitely shows in his innie, in the way his outie carries reminders (the medals, the sriracha sauce, ace of spades), but also how how every time we’ve seen him it’s not a soldier we see - he’s reading, he’s painting, he’s collecting information about people who’ve spoken out about Lumon’s cruelty, he’s calling people to update them on his innie’s status, he’s attending dinner at a stranger’s house and remaining relentlessly kind when confronted with a soul-charring amount of internalized homophobia from the people that invited him in the first place.

They were raised to be soldiers in decades where that was sold as the only way to survive the state of the world, and it took them time and it was certainly not without consequence for them and for others, but I believe they’re trying to be something else.

Hope for Irving return

Fri, 14 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Regarding the ongoing fandom conversation about Irving not coming back for S3 and the interview with John Turturro everyone’s been quoting: I believe what was implied wasn’t so much “I’m done with this show” but “I’m old; it’s always rough committing to anything because life itself feels precarious. When I do something, I want to do it well because I don’t know if I’ll be able to come back.”

And Christopher Walken is in his 80s, and in interviews they do together, there’s just this overwhelming sense of affection but also urgency to express it. I get that that’s part of the work, that their friendship is driving the entire Irving performance, that it’s kind of the point to do things you like with people you love as often as you can because the looming threats of death or illness never fucking stop, and the older you get, the more pervasive they become. And lucky is not the word for it, because there’s nothing particularly delightful in its unpredictability, but it’s nice that you get 60+ years of someone you love; it’s nicer than getting less than that. So you take what you can get and mourn when you have to, not a moment earlier.

I understand wanting to close out the season in a way that is both contained as a time period, as a collaboration, and as a gift to yourself, your friend, and any audience that might come along for the ride. I appreciate the honesty and respect for oneself it requires to grapple with the idea of a loved one’s health and your own, and why you’re doing things, and why you might want to continue doing them or stop in a way that gives you (as a person) and your character (as a projected narrative) some kind of closure. Of course I’m hoping we get a third season and that Irving is in it. But the cast and crew are people, and beyond the paycheck (which I hope is hefty and helpful), I think it’s their time and their life, and I’m just a passenger eavesdropping. I’m lucky to be privy to this. And I’ll mourn when I have to, not a moment earlier.

Have Irvposters lost the plot?

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Me when I find out they killed a version of me I brought into a hellish world out of grief for trusting the messages I gave him, and the man this version of me loved was killed for being gay, and we don’t know each other, but we were both alive in the 70s and know that this invitation of shared mourning goes beyond our individual circumstances...

I'm seeing a lot of takes about whatever situation may unfold or whether they'll have an affair or whatever, and memes are all good, but what we did get that I earnestly appreciate is connection in grief and community for an isolated ~70-year-old gay dudes. It was awkward and kind and real. He was gay because I'm gay, and that killed him and his lover. --- Feeling a little weird about the “Irving Homewrecker Arc, Let’s Go Burving Nation” sentiment after hearing him earnestly apologize for having hurt their relationship in some way and being offered a place to grieve. Sorry I came at you just now; sorry if you felt like that was predatory. Like, how many times has someone been ashamed of his mere existence? You didn’t do anything bad. Come by; let’s talk about it. This acknowledgement of fear and establishing of boundaries is also the foundation on which their innies’ relationship was built. It’s about finding community where you had none.

Anonymous (on Tumblr) asked: I was looking at John Noble's IMDb (the guy who's playing Fields) (and also the guy in LOTR who eats a tomato weird), and it says he's in the next FIVE Severance episodes??? What are they doing where they'll need Burt's husband for the entire rest of the season, including the finale??

I have no idea, but I am really hoping they go the “we as gay men share class interests, and they essentially killed our innies and discarded them like they would us, we can hit back together, we can build a support network for the people they loved, we can arrange ourselves into a shape that can support without breaking” route. I don't know, man. We value the nuclear family, we value the Eagan legacy, we value heterosexuality and birth, we value ataraxia, grief is unproductive, masturbation is unproductive, gay sex is unproductive, closure is what you need. Sell us your body and let a part of you be spared from your own life’s losses. In Lumon’s baseline narrative, getting AIDS crisis survivors to make room for everyone that is devalued by this model, letting people grieve and find their footing again, and dismantling the company that profits from their grief is my best-case scenario.

The "Mark is impulsive" show

Sat, 22 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Anonymous (on Tumblr) asked: not to be a hater but innie mark is stupid only bc gemma could have absolutely been recaptured on her way out lol. and lumon is gonna beat his ass

Regarding Gemma being recaptured: not off the table, although I doubt that Cobel and Devon aren’t prowling around the building. But it’s a fair enough concern; his ass did not consider logistics. Admittedly, Mark S. has never been outside a building for more than 3 seconds, ORTBO hike notwithstanding. Still, impulsive plans will continue to be poorly thought out, because that’s the Mark special. Regarding Lumon beating Mark’s ass: he knows. He knows because when he asked to be sent to the severed floor, she asked Devon if she loved her brother, and she said yes. Because Devon said that if Gemma got out, they would use any dirt she had on them to destroy Lumon. because when he asked, “So what happens to us innies?” he got an “I don’t know” from Devon, an “I’m already reintegrating” from Mark Scout, and a whole lot of nothing from Cobel and realized that whether he leaves and Mark Scout reintegrates or he stays and burns with Lumon, he believes himself to be on borrowed time.

Mark S. goes back because he assumes Mark Scout will make it out, but chances are Mark S. probably won’t, not as he is now. He wishes he had more time; he knows his outie will live on in either scenario, so he makes a selfish (seemingly, although I don’t see it that way) decision to get what looks to be an impossibly short amount of time with Helly and Dylan and whoever may remain on the floor that could help or kill them, including Jame Eagan and Dr. Mauer. When Mark S. is forced to let go, Mark Scout can get out, go to Gemma, go to Devon, and go to all the people he has that love him. But these are his loves, right here in a building that became a continent, a whole world, that they cannot leave without dying in some way. a life not only “to be had,” a life that they have. Present. Whole and alive and dying like any living being that’s been born, ever, and cannot cease to exist unless it’s through death.

I don’t think this reads as a carefree honeymoon; I think this is innie Mark’s moment of marching to his death with his head held high, like Irving B. did for them all, and hoping he won’t have regrets, whatever may happen to him, or to Helly, or to Dylan, wherever Irving B. and Burt G. are, where Ms. Casey and all the rest of Gemma’s innies are, or where Petey K. went after reintegration and death, whatever happens to their gone. He stood in a hallway that lit up the same red the first time Helly was sent to the break room and took her hand, and they both turned their backs to the world and ran headfirst into hell, whose flames can be a hearth too, and I don’t believe it was out of naivety.

Love actually is everywhere

Wed, 02 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I understand why romantic love was put at the forefront of season two in contrast to the ensemble approach of season one. Mark Scout and Gemma’s, Mark S’ and Helly R’s, both Dylans and Gretchen George, both Irvings and the Burts they each met (including the strained guilty cage of a marriage Burt and Fields found themselves growing old in, including Helena Eagan’s abuse stemming from a lifetime of having zero agency over her own life and body but also an unacceptable amount of power and entitlement over Lumon’s employees, including Cobel and Hampton’s cynical revisiting of a teenage crush that was never allowed to exist in the context of child labor, including the glimpses into Devon and Ricken’s relationship through all of Ricken’s betrayals of the earnestness Devon loved about him). But I still hope that all of these relationships outside of monogamous love and the various successes and failures of the nuclear family are at the core of the story that Severance will end up telling. There’s things I think of that give me hope:

I think about Mark S’ first minutes alive, consisting of a voice that became his best friend even when Mark vowed to find and kill him on instinct, cornered and afraid. Mark S, who wakes up every day in the same underground, windowless office choking on grief and anger he can’t explain and who tried to escape more times than Helly R, knowing that escape is by definition a suicide, and failed. Petey K, who greeted him upon arrival, was watched by a security camera and may have still offered words of comfort, just like Mark S, who broke protocol for Helly R when he picked up the torch of being department head because Petey K was gone. Petey K, who watched and worried and mapped the floor despite the express forbidding of it in search of a way out while Mark S was being tortured into being passively and functionally suicidal instead of threatening MDR’s productivity. Petey K, who found a way to reintegrate, went to his very good friend’s outie and showed him a recording of Mark S in the break room. I think about Mark Scout hearing his own voice coming out of that tape recorder, begging for forgiveness, and deciding to let this stranger crash in his basement (that he avoided for two years, that he couldn’t even fish a backup light bulb from) for a few days. I think about June Kilmer, whom Petey K never met in his two reintegrated weeks before death and still was so loved by his outie that even in two tangled lifespans, she remained a point of reference. And Mark Scout, who came home to find Petey gone and watched him collapse with one last reassuring look at him, must have looked like Mark S to Petey in his last moments, an anchor in a flood of memory just as much as June. Mark S was brought into the world because Mark Scout couldn’t live with the grief for Gemma and the life they never would’ve had, all 24 hours a day. Mark Scout, who attended Peter Kilmer’s funeral (even when the memory of Gemma dragged him to the bar) for a version of himself that was loved enough to die for.

I think about a suicidal Irving B in front of that fire exit, having to break the first hug he’s initiated in his whole life as Dylan gets dragged away to the promise of a “real” family in his outie’s wife, even as he turns back in worry towards Irving, who says perk when he means family, because innies are not allowed to have that. The kid who made him proverbial dinner even when he was being a shitty dad by stealing a card from O&D and staying behind for him to go and find Burt G’s outie. Irving B, who learned the hard way that leaving is dying, and Dylan, who noticed Irving was sweet on Burt and only disapproved because he thought he’d get disemboweled for it, who encouraged the courtship, and who wants Irving to live just as much as Burt G did (and Burt Goodman does). Irving B, who, unlike Mark S and Helly R upon their arrival, was told that he would not be dragged back if he chose to quit as if it was an act of mercy and not a taunt about his disposability. Irving B turned his back to that exit because whoever was in Helly’s body was not her, and no one else had seemed to notice: it was up to him to try and get her back even if it was too late to do the same for Burt. He needs to figure it out for Dylan G, who loves him because even when he threatens to hurt people, he only does it to make a point and never follows through, and who isn’t listening because he has yet to experience the grief Irving B needed to realize that it’s not their world up there. For Mark S, with the weird sense of humor that only Petey appreciated, who hid Petey’s photo before Irving was ready to say goodbye, the kid that mocked his greeting and feared his zealotry but still went out and got them the proverbial dinner, took them all to O&D under the threat of torture the second he saw Irving berate himself for wanting to visit Burt. Mark, used by everyone inside and outside of the severed floor because he would go to the break room for anyone but won’t listen because he wants a love to call his own (that Helly gave him without him having to sacrifice anything, but it’s not their Helly he’s making goo-goo eyes at). For Helly, who wasn’t supposed to try to open the door at her orientation, who spent too long in the break room, whom he didn’t get to hide motivational handbook quotes for, who needs someone to chant her name for encouragement, who met quota on her first quarter anyway because she still believed there was a chance to get out alive and because she did, after all, find a family in MDR and fought to give them a chance at living. And Irving B does figure it out, because he knows now that dreams can be messages from friends, that darkness can be paint, and that even in the terror of incomprehension love will light up a way out. He got Helly back for all of them, for every innie whose entire world is the severed floor. Helly, who was never cruel, whose body he threatened with harm even if he didn’t follow through, hoping perhaps she’d come back and he’d have a chance to apologize. He gets to hold Helly close and comfort her one last time in the way he had wanted to for so long and wasn’t allowed to, using his body to hug her like he did Dylan G, to tell Dylan and Mark that they are forgiven. He doesn’t get a seal of approval to kill himself this time around, but he’s feeling the warmth of the sun on his face for the first and last time in his life as he walks into the forest at peace with his choice, letting all three of them know that they are loved enough to die for.

I think about Helly R, who respectfully penned requests for her outie to quit, not understanding why anyone would want to exist in the life she has, getting told through her own voice that she was not a person, and deciding that suicide was the best way to get out. Helly R, who was brought to the shrine for the family that made the only existence she got a living hell, because it served their ends, by Irving B, who was being swallowed by the gaping absence of a family and found comfort in being of use to these strangers. Helly, whose suffering and anger touched the other refiners so profoundly that the fear and shame they were all groomed into for years crumbled in mere weeks. Helly, who thought she would die in that noose and woke up in the same elevator, still alive and trapped, for whom Mark lied just to get a few minutes alone to talk to her about her suicide attempt, who also broke the rules to recreate Petey’s escape plan for Mark from Mark himself (even if he had been the one to shred it when she immediately recognized how much Mark loved and was loved by Petey, even if she’s not and will never be his replacement, even if she lied to him twice to get a chance at leaving, even when Mark had been doing everything in his power to spare her from the break room). Helly, who was told that they were glad she was still alive, even if that meant her outie sent her back to hell, and even if that was all Mark had to give at the time, still gave her the promise of putting up a fight for them to get anything better. Helly offered Dylan to stay behind in his stead to trigger the OTC because Dylan at least had a child who loved him, which was kinder than whatever life awaited her out there, which she knew would be filled with the same cruelty her outie showed her in denying her request for a resignation and sending her back with the evidence of a suicide attempt still visible on her skin. Helly, who didn’t even get to leave the Lumon building during the OTC, still had faith in the idea that the truth about the pain in their lives on the severed floor would reach someone outside with the means to help. Helly, who was tackled for her betrayal and woke up drowning, got to see the outside this time around, but at the cost of weeks of her life that crushed her hope for a life she could call truly hers, and her beloved Irving B, who did end up showing her that there was beauty in the life they made, that she had taught him they could have beyond a shrine to their masters, is real and worth living for no matter what their outies’ biological families did to them. Helly, who rallied a whole department she didn’t even know existed before that moment by mentioning Irving’s name, walked back into hell looking into Gemma’s eyes and having heard her outie’s father say he did not love his daughter, because it was through the love Mark Scout felt for Gemma and the care that Helena was denied that Helly found love and family on the severed floor, and all of them are worth fighting for.

I think about Burt Goodman, who lost his job because a part of him he condemned to a life of forced labor as atonement fell in love with a man he will never meet, a version of himself with a love he believes he could never have after what he’s done for Lumon. I think about him recording a video for the formal execution of what he thought of as an innocent version of himself telling everyone at O&D that despite the conspicuous absence of their memories, he feels Burt G’s fulfillment from working with them. I think about how he recorded it under the assumption that Burt G’s lover would be there to watch it, even if Irving B’s presence was a clerical error that would lead to a crack in Lumon’s image so large it would set the foundation of its downfall as a company, but not before getting Irving B killed. Burt Goodman, who heard a desperate stranger at his door screaming his name and followed him for weeks, who invited him for dinner to facilitate the breaking and entering of a company higher-up into his house in search of excuses to kill him, who saw his own complicity in the death machine of Lumon penciled carefully alongside all the names of people Irving Bailiff was trying to help, and watched him say, I know now that you’re not with them, even as he tensed in fear when Burt cornered him to offer a ride, which would read as more of a threat than a helping hand to this man whose home he broke into. Trusting him because his service dog (the only one that takes care of Irving Bailiff, the only one that Irving Bailiff can take care of, who probably smelled Burt G on his human’s work clothes and heard tentative joy in the spring of his steps for weeks, then found them both gone) was at ease. Burt Goodman, who was asked to drive his innie’s lover to his death, and Irving Bailiff, who knew this and still got in the car. Burt Goodman, who called two strangers (his own innie and Irving Bailiff) buddy with every ounce of tenderness in parting. Burt Goodman, who loves Irving B and what he meant for Burt G even if he knows neither of them. Burt Goodman, who wants to save this stranger that isn’t afraid of muggers or knaves, that knew what he’d done and still went on a ride with him. Burt Goodman, who will burn if it means that, unknown and unknowable to the both of them, Burt G and his love for Irving B, Felicia, and the entire O&D department remain alive in a chip in Irving Bailiff’s brain. That Irving Bailiff gets a chance to build a heaven for them all in this world is worth dying for.

I think about Irving Bailiff and his single bed, his wardrobe mostly filled with formalwear for Irving B that he’d never wear outside himself, oil paint and maritime signal flags, and voicemail as one-way acts of love that can reach only their intended target, at the cost of the certainty of returned affection. Tall walls that need a literal watchdog and matching uniforms with a father that exists as one single photograph in the same trunk that holds years of violence from him, to him, to people like him, to people more vulnerable than him, and ways to use that proof of harm to help them all out. I think about Irving Bailiff’s sense of self held in dusty medal displays and out-of-focus trinkets and the soft presses of hands against fur and paint and cheekbones with such longing that they can’t be looked at directly for too long without them catching on fire and disappearing without a trace, only fleeting glimpses in the dark. Did he also come out of the elevator feeling loved, like Burt Goodman, and put a comb in his pocket instead of a key card? Did his hands gravitate to Marcus Aurelius the evening after Burt G’s retirement party without knowing why? Did he feel a prick of suspicion when he tracked the flight of that lone vulture, or is the loneliness such an expected fixture for him that it was the good days that felt like a fluke? When he apologized to Burt Goodman for showing up and startling him and his husband, did he think it was an act of love for Burt that got his innie killed in the end? Did he imagine a man with Burt Goodman’s face holding him with love, respect, and care in a hell neither of them wanted to be in, and in doing so finally let himself feel the hell of his life outside? I know that he did not think of Helly R, Dylan G, and Mark S. I know that he didn’t think of Felicia welcoming his innie with a hug and sharing one of her precious two daily vending machine snacks, reminiscing about the Burt they both loved. I know he didn’t think of Miss Casey, who told his innie about his dog in words he could not understand and immediately held him with as much love as Irving Bailiff does on the daily when he recognized the name in the tag, even if he had never seen an animal before. Miss Casey, whose first choice was as a person instead of a unilateral therapeutic mouthpiece, was telling Irving B that Burt G was in an unauthorized location instead of with their bosses. Miss Casey, who was there to offer hugs to Helly R and care for her in ways Irving B was not authorized to. I know he didn’t think of them because he doesn’t even know they exist, much less that his innie loved them all (not just Burt G) enough to die for, and yet Irving Bailiff is left with a chance to live due to this collective generosity.

I think about Dylan George’s stop being nice [to me] to Gretchen because he didn’t get the door salesman job. I think about Dylan George, who forgot about the cookies but remembered to ask Gretchen if the time with his innie was nice. I think about Gretchen saying she kissed Dylan G because he reminded her of the way Dylan George used to be, and Dylan citing his precarious financial contribution to the household in the same breath where he threatens to quit so that this version of him (that he was, at some point, that he can’t seem to be anymore) won’t take Gretchen from him. I think of Eustice Huang watching and listening and growing quieter on the other side of a CCTV system, looking at this stranger she’s not supposed to think of as a person, who asked her if she was being forced to work here, looking at his children that he cannot meet, at this woman who is not his wife but knows all of him, with such longing and recognition, and growing quieter, more tolerant of breaches of information. I think about Dylan G proposing to Gretchen, even when he doesn’t even know the last name they share, because there’s nothing to be had inside the severed floor anymore—Mark S has barely been down there since the ORTBO and might not come back at all; they took Helly, and he didn’t even notice or listen to Irving’s suspicions that he was trusted with. How is he supposed to separate the guilt from the fear? What if it’s Helena Eagan that he’s snitching to about the elevator? How will he ever find the elevator now that Irving’s dead? Does he really have the strength of two men? Is he dumb? Is he a dick? Is he an asshole down here too? I think about the fact that Gretchen George knows that she’s not all Dylan G has. How Dylan G must have told her about Irving B, about the funeral, about Helly and Mark, and about Petey and their jokes. How Dylan G quit even if she rejected the proposal, and it must’ve reached the George household through outie Dylan, who didn’t follow through on his threat of quitting and still found himself gone. How Dylan George doesn’t know that his innie’s last words before asking to be erased from existence were addressed to a teenager to try and absolve her from the guilt his death might cause her, a teenager who came to understand how the innies were undeniably people, despite a lifetime of propaganda, because she witnessed every act of care from Dylan G from behind security cameras, and even knowing that, he still extended that care to her. How Gretchen George must’ve told her husband about his innie’s loved ones, because he walks back into that elevator and tells Dylan G both fuck you and that he gets it: Gretchen and their children outside are loved enough to die for, and he won’t take the choice to die for his loved ones from him. But he reminds Dylan G of what his innie’s very existence and love for Gretchen and their children reminded him of: both of their families are loved enough to live and fight for.

There is so much love in all of their lives, and the use Lumon gets out of exploiting their severed status is the reason all of them don’t know about most of it. It’s harder to attempt to fight the abuse if you think you’re doing it alone, and the people you’re in this with are not just your spouse or your biological children. I want all this love to burst through the hole that Petey K’s death left in this story. I hope it’s not too late.

Message ≠ Medium

Mon, 10 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Anonymous (on Tumblr) asked: Why do you get so frustrated about the focus on the sci-fi in Severance fan theories?

Because it’s a show openly criticizing capitalist realism that has to up their marketability with the genre du jour and also needs the mediation of metaphor to force you to feel the rage and disgust and urgency to change things, and theorizing for months about the specifics of Lumon tech as if that was the point is a “the wise man points at the moon, but we keep looking at the finger” situation. They integrate the world-building well, but it’s always there as a backdrop to the real world the viewer and the people working on the show live in. Media is a lens to clarify reality even when the artistry stands on its own (which, in this case, it also does).

I think a lot of money, personal risk, hours of work, and deliberate efforts to meaningfully reach the viewer on the other side were poured into making Severance. I see the way in which they look at all of us in the gallows with bluntness and honesty and compassion and encouragement, and I can’t imagine another way to return the favor than by actively listening. The goats' mystery makes you uncomfortable, and trying to be the smart guy who figures it out before the characters is a way to avoid that discomfort. The characters feel the same dread and burning curiosity as the audience, and in finding yourself in the same spot, you are forced to confront the own realities of your place in material relations. It feels awful, and that’s real, and the power of metaphor is that the feeling is prompted by words/images but not contained by them, and it’s on purpose.

Why do you think Star Trek is so beloved? Disco Elysium is magical realism, and I don't see anyone missing the point so badly with as much frequency. Did Rulfo and Borges and Lynch make art for nothing?

o!Irving speculation

Sat, 01 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Irving’s “you have betrayed yourself for nothing” turn-of-the-century tragedy swag is off the charts. A gay child goes to the Vietnam War for fatherly approval and comes back disgusted with war crimes he was complicit in, disgusted by his dad and the navy, and disgusted by the life he threw away to be the boot on people’s necks and getting severed so he can use his time for community organizing, therapy, and art while his innie is going to war for a corporate god-patriarch that will never love him and becoming disgusted by his complicity in the murder of his gay lover by the authorities he worshipped.

The parallels with Helly and Jame Eagan in the parent-child cyclical trauma show… You will pry this theory and the “Irving is HIV+ and relying on Lumon for treatment” theory from my cold dead hands. “Let not weakness live in your veins.” Ace of Spades. He broke the skin; he needs a full tetanus toxoid panel. Irving, no one’s ever thrown blood on you on your way into work? There is a nonzero chance that the two of you had unprotected sex, and so, I felt I had the right to ask. Are you done humiliating our guest?

o!Irving theorizing

Sun, 09 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Irving B. brings Helly to perpetuity because she was being mean to Mark, and he thought she was having an existential crisis, so she came to show her how Lumon is a family too. His reaction to Milchick ending Helly’s non-introduction in the weird corporate pronoun circle with “I think she definitely has a family (in MDR)” is fondness and hope.

The way he scolds Mark for the Eagan bingo in the exact same voice he uses to tell Helena that Helly was never cruel, turbochanneling “disappointed but not surprised” with an edge of actual fury because Helly had an existential crisis and it wasn’t a joke to him/Helly’s body was being used to hurt her and Mark.

And I know this could be absolutely fucking nothing because Outie Irving lore is all speculation on isolated tidbits… But I keep looking at the Helly and Helena axes of the mirror. His dad was a marine, but Irving has medals and a uniform too. He has trouble sleeping. Radar behaves more like a service dog than a regular pet. He’s a friend to children, the elderly, and the insane. I think Outie Irving was a gay kid desperately trying to prove something by enlisting and came back traumatized and radicalized. He is severed and spends his whole outie existence engaging with art (painting, listening to opera and metal, reading, watching movies, and dancing), and I think the way he acts when he’s the scolded kid for feeling these tender things in the severed floor contrasts hard when you put it next to the times when he tries to care for the younger members of MDR. Irving is consistently being like, “I’m the seniormost refiner (always in innie years),” and trying to convey to the fledgling that he feels more grounded and less in existential crisis mode when he thinks about the Eagans as family (as an explanation for why he is the way he is) and shit like the nature vs. nurture theme present in the show in the form of the “why are people gay” question that a eugenicist circlejerk like the Eagans might ponder.

The Vietnam War and the AIDS crisis overlapping chronologically briefly but linearly arranged, the Nixon-Reagan double whammy… I think a lot about the ways in which he and Helena are shown to be adults who were once children, through their innies, which is different than the same expositional parallel in Mark and Dylan because of how their outies are. Because Outie Dylan and Mark have families, Helena’s notion of family is the Eagans, and Irving is utterly isolated from what we could understand as the nuclear family, which ties to material relations of reproductive power, which he is inherently in the margins of in his queerness and his disdain for Lumon/capital.

Irving Bailiff, Outie of All Time

Sat, 01 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Irving Bailiff is such a character of all time. Marcus Aurelius, a reader that thinks self-induced insomnia through caffeine and Motörhead tapes is an effective tool to carry out an inside job. So certain that his stoic discipline will carry his grieving self and his innie through. He uses surrealist automatism (Not even muscle memory! The guy bets on the subconscious and dozing off!) because his art-guy pattern-finding ass thinks it’s the best way to reach his severed self. Because he is the kind of person to excise himself and still have opinions about which parts of him are fixed points in the self.

Meanwhile, Irving B. is falling asleep on the job he was created to do and having nightmares about black goo that he doesn’t even know is oil paint because his body is sleeping two hours a night, getting literally tortured because of it, feeling all-encompassing emotion about corporate propaganda, and developing a crush on the man who curates said propaganda. In a way, it also carries him towards an understanding of his own disposability and the kind of love that can’t be sold back to you in an allegory and art as a message, but at what cost. I respect an utterly out of touch guy obsessed with themes and motifs with profound resentment towards corporations and authority (T/N: Love it when it's a fictional guy; hate it when it's me).

outie Irving in a clandestine phone call: I found a map with a name in my pocket; my innie got the message.

innie Irving, realizing the man he fell in love with is truly dead and the bosses he worshipped killed him: I need to kill myself

me, covered in popcorn crumbs: Massive kudos for the task failed successfully. You might actually get where you wanted to in a way that will be indubitably aggravating for the both of you.

We should get plural about reintegration

Wed, 09 Jul 2025 00:00:00 GMT

This was originally written on Discord for my bird-friend in an attempt to break the habit of critical analysis and engage in constructive theorizing, which I'm not great at doing. I like to call it "playing toys", because that's ultimately what this is: somewhat silly but enjoyable possibilities, not serious theories about the show.

I think I mentioned this during one of the watch parties we had, either Innie Supercut or the Cold Harbor live watch or post-watch, but for the longest time, I just assumed Petey's reintegration failed because his innie was turned off by the company, but then you said something entirely correct, which is that Graner mentions there was a complete recoupling in the chip during the tests. Occam's razor: he really did die because he didn't follow Reghabi's treatment plan, or she was not experienced, as they mentioned, which makes me worried sick for Mark (reading fan stuff about Mark getting reintegration literal death, even if it's blatantly for shipping Helly and Gemma, really does make me feel physically ill. I love Mark so much.)

A more convoluted alternative that I've been growing fond of since sweet vitriol confirmed Cobel's place in Lumon is assuming that Reghabi doesn't know the chips were her design; she thinks all her company bootlicking is zealotry instead of her having been promised more involvement and more control in the use of the chips and then used like a pawn. I think, now, that Cobel may have heard about Reghabi starting her own reintegration attempts since she had Graner gathering intel and started wondering if it was truly possible. When the tests from the chip came back, Petey had reintegrated; he was also dead. I suppose Cobel thinks the reintegration was done incorrectly, and it being her design means she could operate the chip herself, which she can't while Lumon has the infrastructure. And suddenly, she has an innie Mark inside, with Helly in a possible mutiny and Gemma outside with Devon, fully aware of Mark's reintegration process and capable of contacting Reghabi.

They focused a lot on Gemma getting out, and while I think the romance angle was very significant for Mark Scout, and even though it spread out weirdly into S2, becoming the Season of Romance, the whole point is that Gemma's chip has excised her into pieces so many more times than it was ever intended for. That's a candy store for both Cobel and Reghabi in terms of understanding any modifications Lumon may have done to the original design to allow that. I assume Cobel did not have the knowledge for the security overrides, but we know Graner and Milchick do (Glasgow protocol undoing was a security order, the OTC switches and override list were in the security office). And Milchick is exhausted and in a position to double-agent quite nicely, provided that he mistrusts Cobel less than he mistrusts Lumon higher ups, provided that his resentment towards Helly is big enough to want to take down Helena as an Eagan. My thoughts on reintegration, then, hinge on the idea that there was an original chip design, and there have been modifications that allow the protocols. The original chip never contemplated reintegration, which is why it's such a shock to Cobel and why she wants to know what they did with her invention. I wonder if she'd be a severance purist now and push for permanent severance with one innie and one outie, advocating for personhood because she intended the chip to be therapeutic, and that's the point of conflict with Reghabi, who wants to push for reintegration because access to all memories is access to evidence and informed agency, or if Cobel has come to believe reintegration is proof of healing of the trauma of severance itself (the disabling aspects, the innies' entire existence, and tempering).

Mark is inside, already slowly reintegrating, which so far mostly seems to be decontextualized re-contextualizing bound to spaces. A doorway that looks like the hallway to wellness in his house prompts a flashback to Ms. Casey; Helena's face over the darkness of the diner's hardwood puts her over the ORTBO pillow; and the position switch from bottom to top during sex at the ORTBO makes Mark see Gemma's face. It's fairly clean, all things considered, in terms of integration of people and memories. The fridge, too! But I don't think that's enough to make reintegration entirely singlet-oriented, because Petey also had these episodes, just oscillating far more frequently, and the difference was that he recognized the place but the person switched. Mark sees Gemma at the ORTBO but knows where he is and whom he's with, doesn't lose Helena in the vision, and recognizes Gemma even in the severed hallways with her wig and outfit. Which makes me think that there are still two distinct Mark consciousnesses, and it would seem that the implication is that it's their bond to Gemma and Helly, respectively, that keeps them separate.

I can spin this into a polycule, I can spin this into plurality, I'm ideally spinning it into both, and I can speculate about what the writers might do, which probably isn't polycule or plurality, but I'd rather not do the latter and be surprised by whatever. So I'll play with toys. I don't think the Marks would do full switches; they seem too similar to me, with their anger and their care and the way their emotions were "tamed" in the same way, by shame. I don't think there would be amnesia; I don't think there would be clean fronting either because I don't think either of them would realize it. I think Mark's plural experience would have states where one Mark's experiences and demeanor would be more prominent, but Mark would lack the self-awareness to identify them, so the result would be that people around her would be a little bit baffled because there is a visible memory continuity, but the voice and the tastes are somehow different. Internally, it would feel natural, simply following those state switches—and I think it would make for a very interesting dynamic with Gemma and Helly both in the reintegration positions I shared earlier, which are my personal canon until stated otherwise: Gemma is unable to attempt reintegration, sometimes switching under duress into an innie, with amnesic episodes and Helly fronting with Helena's memories trickling back circumstantially, integrated or discarded to the best of Helly's ability until the end result is still Helly, with some neuroses, but genuinely close to what Helena would have been without the coercion into certain habits and choices pushed upon her.

I don't think Helly would incur into traditionally understood plurality, I imagine it to be kind of like my own experience, except my parts are identifiable to me due to memory-based continuity and to her it would simply be a habit that she doesn't remember forming, so it must be Helena's, and then conscious engagement with it out of fear or even curiosity or compassion towards Helena. I think outie Gemma might find Innie Mark sweet but lacking the sarcastic edges that Mark has that I think she enjoys. I think she would be very didactic towards showing Innie Mark knowledge of all sorts. Innie Mark would get along swimmingly with Devon and get to be an earnest dork with Ricken, but I think sometimes the edge of sarcasm would shine through in defense. Maybe they'd help that mark shape her bite into something intellectually incisive; she definitely has the makings. I keep thinking about why we are still in the dark. speech and the quest to find Ms. Casey. I think reintegrated Mark could go back to teaching if it was safe and gently switch towards Innie Mark states the same way having Gemma in her life again might push pre-grief Outie Mark states more towards being playful, thoughtful, and romantic. Outie marks state would feel a little strange to Helly —too rough around the edges— but their sense of humor is the same. I think once they got past the awkwardness of you're not quite how I remember you, they'd get along like a house on fire. Helly and Gemma, too, who are both assertive and inquisitive and so incredibly dogged when it comes to their goals and values. I think Helly would absolutely join the hiking team and come to regard Ricken with the same long-suffering fondness as Gemma and take the torch of "how can you be married to this guy" from Outie Mark, except in the Innie state, Mark is so unabashedly delighted in her friendship with Ricken and his knowledge and verbosity that she doesn't quite mean it. Gemma Innies as trauma responses are important meeting points for Helly and Innie Mark states, but I think Outie Mark states would be very amenable to taking care of Gemma innies. I wonder if Outie Mark State would pull on memories and mannerisms of Innie Mark to comfort her if she could do that without fully switching states.

My polyhedron mostly looks like this (quasiromantic, meaning that they're more overtly romantic in the other Mark state in terms of types of affection, but they still are close emotionally and intellectually in these):

Romantic iMark and Helly
Romantic oMark and oGemma
Romantic Helly and oGemma
Quasiromantic iMark and oGemma
Quasiromantic oMark and Helly
Didactic iMark and the Gemma innies
Friendship between Helly and the Gemma innies
Caretaking oMark and the Gemma innies, at first with some confusion as to how much of Gemma they are, then in an effort to encourage their individuality; I'm thinking a lot about trench warfare trauma care.

And then there's Irving, which I've been struggling to word for hours now because there's a strong component of self-indulgence, and I always feel guilty about that. I'm trying to keep it rooted in canon as much as I can, but my brain is like, "Wow, you like a silly idea you came up with that you know isn't how it will be handled because it's hard to visually convey, and also it's on a Turturro character? Guilt for a million years," but I'm going to try anyway.

I will assume here that Innie Irving is not fully erased from existence, just locked away, and I will put aside my thoughts that MDR Irving is not Irving Bailiff's first excision because the more I think about Petey, the less I'm into the theory (Petey knows about exports, he could've shared elevator info, and I like the idea that Irving and Petey's outies were friends or at least in the same political group, however scattered. Also, Judy Baca-isms in Irving, my beloved.) I know outie irving would contemplate reintegration to get the memories of loving and being loved by Burt back, but he'd probably consider it a technical impossibility. i don't think he'd seek out Reghabi for reintegration, just for intel, and I imagine him to be central to the Burn Lumon alliance, perhaps Burt too, due to the information that they have and because it's kill the company or die themselves, and it's both an attack and a defense (the Irving special, the axe and the pen).

My "Outie Irving meets the innies" scenario usually happens in this context, where they're trying to learn more about the chip blockages and splits and the innies, upon learning that Irving is alive, demand contact both as proof of life and trust, and because they miss him and there's this hope that there will be a degree of recognition. Irving agrees, surprised by the demand, willing to engage for the cause, and mostly curious because he only knows about Burt; he doesn't know the rest of his coworkers—names on a list, names without faces. And he's suddenly in contact with these strangers that are so affectionate, so worried about him, like actual children, like a family that asks how you are after they know you've been through something difficult. I don't think Irving would expect that, and I don't think the rest of MDR would truly expect recognition, but in that visceral surprise, I think there would be a gap for a spark of emotion that isn't familiar to outie Irving, a longing that he'd chalk up to that loneliness but that would be coming from an echo of innie Irving. He'd feel it with the negotiations, he'd feel it around Burt, he'd feel it around Radar, but it's only when he starts feeling it around his own art, or movies, or music that he'd recognize a certain foreign quality to the emotion, because those are part of his routine; they don't have a shine of longing to them, and he has them whenever he wants. And I think he's smart enough to notice a pattern, smart enough to see a loose thread of Innie Irving hanging and pull.

What happened to Innie Irving? Why did they sound so worried about him? He'd find out about his innie outliving Burt's. He'd find out about being suicidal. He'd find out about having tortured Helena into giving Helly back. He'd find out about being executed, erased, and mocked even at his funeral by Lumon. Innie Irving is not resting in peace; Innie Irving is haunting him. he made him, he had a life, he now knows what that life was, and outie irving is angry about what was taken from them both. We know that Irving trusts expressionist beliefs in the subconscious enough to plot his whole informational strategy around them. there's ways to use lucid dreaming and stream of consciousness exercises that are meant to put these parts of the self in conversation, usually with the intent to integrate them. It's actually one of the trench trauma therapies that I was alluding to, and a lot of modern DBT for war vets even now uses similar techniques to manage cPTSD.

In my dream scenarios, Irving is helping Gemma with panic-induced switches (I would like the therapeutic dynamic inversion, and I really love the "your outie is a friend to children, the elderly, and the insane" for textual and metatextual reasons) and decides to use the therapy tools himself. Maybe he grabs a canvas or a piece of paper, he thinks of the events that the innies told him. He imagines a snowy landscape, the feeling of paranoia, of disbelief, of grief (those he knows, for different people, in different places), and he comes back to a drawing of a campfire and Mark and Helena's lit-up faces. Dylan's worried face. Burt standing there, almost covered by the doorway to O&D. Memories that are proof that those lived experiences are still there, that Innie Irving is still there.

But what about the present? Is he still there? He could track responses to different media. What music has begun to feel jarring, and what movies suddenly sound exciting despite having watched them a million times before? And there is a ghost, a haunting, that doesn't think it's all okay, that wants as much as Irving has wanted all his life, that only had life in a regiment to enjoy and still found love and meaning, that deserves those experiences he fought to get himself after Vietnam, that he fights to give children, the elderly, and the insane, to give them voice when they have none. I like to think Irving learns to trigger switches, at first just with himself. Write a note, emotionally position himself, and see if you come to and find a response. Outie Irving draws a lot, and Innie Irving writes in return. Outie Irving asks why words and not images; Innie Irving talks about the handbook and not being sure how to do it. But they both share skills.

Outie Irving teaches Innie Irving enough to have artistic training wheels, an expressive outlet. They have different art styles. It's a delightful and reassuring surprise. He eventually manages to trigger a switch for the innies. They both remember things in simultaneous first and third person, but it's Innie Irving talking and moving; it's their shared body. I think he'd be the only one of the four to both be incapable of a clean integration (unlike Dylan) and self-aware enough to have a conscious sense of cohabitation (unlike Mark). They're very different people, the Irvings, but their joining points are very porous and very flexible, and they are both extremely respectful of others' autonomy at the point where we are. a little knock, a little sign that either of them wants to front, or that they don't or can't do something, teaching and learning from each other into their own expressions and loves. There's a block that can't be mechanically lifted because it's still Lumon's chip, and they don't know what could happen to Irving if he was "technically" erased with his memories. But as long as the chip is keeping them separate, the memories can be shared as a recounting, and the life can be lived as a voluntarily triggered severing where there's no spatial amnesia, just executive separation.

In defense of Ricken Hale

Tue, 18 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Ricken was, according to The You You Are, “the first baby born for theatrical purposes.” His mother’s pregnancy culminated in a stage play meant to be a commentary on how having children with the state of the world as it is borders on cruelty. Of course, he was still brought into the world, and hey, his whole purpose was to be a highbrow art piece. His parents would leave for weeks at a time; he wondered if they’d even wanted a child at all or if he was just a little project. He calls art his brother, which ultimately led him to try his hand at literature. And still his writing will never be as insightful and incisive as his parents wanted his whole existence to be, because he’s earnest to the point of absurdity. His parents will go through pregnancy and give birth on stage, and how can he ever make them proud when he’s so scared of making his child feel the same way his parents did him that he writes a whole chapter about it in the hopes that someone will validate his worry?

He feels extremely ashamed about the fact that his comfortable life, his condo, and the fact that he can even dedicate himself to writing professionally come from his parents’ success. He’s thankful and resentful and wants to have his own life, to be some kind of self beyond being their son. But his own self is unmarketable, a little too intense, and absolutely shit at being something he’s not to the point where at times it feels like Devon is the only person he regularly interacts with that likes him. The people at the dinner talk in hollow platitudes and emotionally removed intellectualism; even Rebeck, who praises Ricken’s writing, is enamored with the academicism of it rather than Ricken’s oversharing. She asks him to not punish Eleanor after they break up the party after the OTC despite, ostensibly, having read the book where Ricken spends the entirety of it talking himself down from resenting his parents for making him the way he is so that he can reconcile his life as they expected with the way his life turned out to be.

The You You Are is jarring because it’s a diary selling itself as a manifesto (and, full disclosure, I believe it works as a manifesto for the innies because it’s a diary, because it talks about an outie’s fears that they see in themselves, reaffirming that they are entitled to full personhood). It makes the reader feel like a voyeur. It’s not some insight into any great structural truth; it’s, as Ricken’s parents put it disdainfully, “conventionalist art.” Ricken is writing about having wild amounts of awesome sex with Devon, about wrangling the memories of his childhood into something that feels nice to reminisce about, about how he’s terrified of being a bad parent, and about arguments with his brother-in-law. Most of all, he writes about the idea of self as a part of something, as a role, as an archetype. He writes about all these intimate and vulnerable things and drapes them in pomposity because he’s performing, like his parents did. He tells us about Gemma, her death, and her friendship with such warmth and such a lack of frills compared to the rest of the book, and then about how Mark weaponized her genuine warmth to mock him to the point where he’s now haunted by the idea that the last thing Gemma said about him was an insult. And he talks himself down from that resentment too; he understands where Mark’s insult came from. He tries to accept that he can never know if Gemma truly did mock his tape but that he knows what she directly said to him about the songs, which was kind.

When Natalie Kalen offers him reliable royalties for a brand-approved edition of The You You Are, Ricken sees an opportunity to stop being a coda to his parents’ own artistic legacy. To finally have money he can call his own and stop feeling guilty for relying on them, because no matter how much he performs a reconciliation in his writing, he resents the cruelty of his birth and their absences. He resents that he’ll never be sophisticated enough, that he’ll always “sound like a hamburger waiter,” that people who appreciate him like him pristine and intellectual, and that anyone who sees the oversharing, the inappropriate venting, the earnest admission that he’d like to get to know people better, and the guy who wants to show the delights of couloir skiing will dismiss him as a bumbling fool, like Mark did. Like, crucially, Devon and Gemma didn’t.

Lumon exploits the shame and regrets of their employees constantly; they use them to promise peace and warp them into a cage through repeated punishment and tantalizing promises that can never come to be as long as the point is the company’s profit. Natalie praises Ricken’s writing; Natalie praises the emotional parts of it, the parts that Ricken is worried about and wants to obscure with pseudo-intellectual trash, because they are helping the innies. It’s a promise of economic safety and independence (isolation, which Lumon wants) from his own larger support network. He’s been waiting his whole life to have something to call his own, to stop performing and still be appreciated. What do you do when the you you are is someone you are ashamed of? What do you do when it’s easier to blame your parents for the person you have become? What do you do when you understand that you also got some good things from them? What do you do when you understand your parents are not the only people who made you into who you are at present? What do you do when you realize you can fail people in the same ways they failed you?

Ricken’s in the same crucible as every other character in the show, trapped between expectation and reality, in some weird fucked-up relationship with the people that put him into the world, trying to decide where they end and he begins, trying to understand if there’s anything he is beyond the role he was given and that he gives himself.

Romance in S2 of Severance

Fri, 11 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Some thoughts on Severance S2 and the use of romance as a theme with @infestedguest on Tumblr:

infestedguest: I think that meta may have partially healed the hole the lack of focus on platonic relationships + MDR in general outside of Mark/Helly (especially Irv) this season has left in my heart. Like, most of your S2 metas do that at least a little bit anyway (especially that one about S2E4), but it’s especially potent in this one.

infestedguest: I might just be talking out of my ass, but in a way, Mark Scout trying to convince Mark S to end his life in the S2 finale is an inversion/perversion of that repeated theme of “loved enough to die for.” Mark S isn’t a person and thus is automatically not loved enough to not die for the sake of Gemma’s safety and Mark Scout’s happy ending. Mark Scout loves his wife enough to lead someone else to die for her. But also Mark Scout still, at least in some ways, genuinely conceptualizes his innie as just a part of himself, and it’s there that there’s an element of the straightforward “loved enough to die for.

binomech: I’m very happy to hear that! I’ve been struggling with that too (for family abolitionist reasons and generally love for anything that exists outside of the permitted main text of what love can be under capital), but I think this was kind of deliberate from the script. other things, maybe not, but the fact that the both Marks are manipulated through their monogamous romantic interests, but also the Dylans (economically and as a way to pull him away from loving fellow innies as people), even Irving (he’s allowed to know about Burt because they need him out of the house and the point is to get him or both of them killed anyway; it’s never framed positively, but it’s still using the promise of romantic love as fish bait), but it doesn’t mean the rest isn’t there.

infestedguest: I think it’s likely that it was deliberate, and there are definitely interesting dimensions added by it, and I agree the rest is definitely still there, but I think the focus on romance at certain points distracts from many of the other themes of the show to the point where it becomes a hindrance in a way that does not feel purposeful. A major example of this is how Miss Casey’s entire presence in the S2 finale is reduced to a single joke, with zero acknowledgment of her personhood (or even a perceived lack thereof) by either the characters or the narrative of the episode itself, even though Mark S’s “people not parts of people” speech (where the audience was first explicitly introduced to the idea of innies conceptualizing themselves as their own people) was made to her, about her. There was a clear setup to do something interesting with her character, but they just chose to completely ignore it, which, while not unusual, feels very strange in this particular case to me because of the major role she plays in the finale + the setup that was already there + how incongruous just ignoring her feels with the thesis of personhood the finale makes clear. But she and Mark S are on the side of the Gemma/Mark square with the least romantic angst potential, and I don’t want to be cynical, but I think that may have contributed to the lack of focus they and, by extension, she gets in the finale (as well as in S2 as a whole). They might address this in S3, but in my opinion, S1 + S2 should be able to stand on their own, and not even hinting at it in S2 leaves a major hole in the themes of the show. Sorry, it probably sounds like I hate S2; I promise I don’t, it’s just really interesting to dig into why what doesn’t work for me doesn’t work.

binomech: I’m 100% with you on this. I understand the individuation season needs, to an extent, that each character gets their own separate screen time with their own separate networks. I think that was an interesting choice. It just so happens that 90% of that was Mark S (and I love Mark S, I’m extremely vocal about how much I love Mark S on this blog, but S1 already had Mark almost exclusively as the outie lens, and I really wish it had been more balanced in S2), and that eats up your budget and your screen time. And then you end up with Gemma and her innies being nothing (which I’m hoping they address in S3, but like you said, I feel like they should stand on their own, especially with S3 not being a guarantee during writing and filming).

binomech: I know that John Turturro wants to come back, and it’s insane to me how he was the only member of the cast, to my knowledge, that was like, “Well, I filmed this with the intention of it standing on its own, but I’m not going to be happy if I don’t get to make more of it because Irving deserves more than this” in public from the get-go. I’ve been seeing Britt Lower and Dichen Lachman also talk about it in these terms since the finale aired, which I appreciate so much, but again. Love the cast, love the effort, but can we get more of this in the actual show?

binomech: So I’m pissed about what they did to Miss Casey in particular and Gemma in general, and Helly as well! Sure, yeah, it’s very compelling to know more about Helena and Helly was the innie lens in S1, but wow. Helly was a plot device for Mark this season even in the plotline about her own bodily autonomy, and it makes me miserable. and I loved Sweet Vitriol, but I need Reghabi and Milchick to get similar levels of attention in regards to their ties to the company, and while I think Milchick might, but I doubt Reghabi will. And that will be, once more, a Petey situation for me where I’ll live forever in my “what could have been” hole. I don’t think they can cleanly reintroduce Petey’s presence in S3 after S2’s complete and absolute sidelining of him (and June and the WMC). or if they do, it might be in the context of Irving Bailiff’s organizing, which would make me happy but would not lessen the disappointment I feel at these choices in S2.

binomech: It’s not bad television, I still love this show; but a big chunk of what made S1 so special and dear to me, which was the extension of solidarity and care between innies because they did not have that societal expectation of hierarchy in relationships (beyond department loyalty due to the quarterly goals being important to prioritize), or seen as people enough to love at all, is just… not there in S2. and it makes sense that in blurring the boundary of severance, societal expectation would suddenly enter the severed floor, but the only time it felt like it was presented in that context was in Dylan’s scenes with Gretchen. And if S3 enters the conversation of why this was necessary but not unambiguously good, then I’ll be elated, but I don’t think I should be having to bargain with this conditional.

infestedguest: No, it makes perfect sense! Those are my feelings as well. Early in S2, it felt like the lack of innie solidarity was a way to demonstrate the way Lumon is dividing them. And I’m not saying it’s not important to highlight that, but its absence takes away the heart of the show and a major pillar of much of its themes, and that tradeoff just isn’t worth it for what we got, imo. Also, I haven’t really looked into BTS material beyond the S2 end of episode bonus features, so it’s cool to hear that some of the actors have at least vaguely similar opinions.

binomech: Episodes 1 through 4 of S2 were very enjoyable to me. Trojan’s Horse was slower by necessity to actively sit with the messes of reintegration and the ORTBO, and I think it did a solid job. I have to confess that Attila and Chikhai Bardo, while obviously relevant in terms of plot content, are the episodes I take up most issue with. When I watch them, I can think of exact lines in which the following scenes could have engaged with the surreptitious cruelties of Lumon more explicitly but then didn’t: Helena stalking Mark Scout at Zufu, Gretchen having become complicit in Dylan G’s alienation to the detriment of both him and her husband (and herself), using Burt’s outie in particular to manipulate Irving Bailiff and potentially manage to get them to kill each other, Gemma’s relationship with being aware of severance, Mauer’s entitlement to all her innies and by extension her, anything about how she ended up on the testing floor. I’m particularly displeased by the framing Mark Scout’s rose-tinted memories of her as the only parts of her worth remembering as something romantic rather than the cruelty it is (especially when most of those moments for her were spent grieving and not having anyone to grieve with because Mark was partaking in his usual avoidant behaviors.) I assume that in sidelining that, the episodes came out cleaner in terms of reception and discrete parallel scenes. Sweet Vitriol and the finale are unequivocal wins for me, but I would’ve liked Sweet Vitriol to be… not a bottle episode, perhaps, because it threw off the pacing. The After Hours is the one that I’m still trying to digest, because each individual scene was incredible, and I enjoyed it, but then when you put them all in a row, it feels like a “We have a million plotlines open; wrap them all up quickly for the finale” sprint.

binomech: I don’t have access to any official materials, and I avoid actively looking up interviews/the podcast, but I was so visibly clawing at the walls that my friends who engage with this kind of thing sent me all the relevant quotes, which I find hilarious. But yeah, in any case, I was very reassured.

Salt's Neck, Compostilla, the corporate town

Thu, 06 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Sweet Vitriol opens with Harmony Cobel driving past a sign that indicates that she’s leaving a population named Salt’s Neck, with an ominous soundtrack that sometimes veers into the main melody of the Kier hymnal that Cobel herself sang as a reminder to MDR after their escape to O&D that led to Dylan finding out about the OTC in the first place, but also from the instructional tape at the ORTBO, the only other episode that takes place outdoors far from MDR’s outies’ houses. Watching this episode, the Compostilla thermoelectrical factory in León (Spain) immediately came to mind. I want to give an overview of this real world situation, but I want you to consider the way Lumon operates in Severance while you read.

The Compostilla I factory was inaugurated in 1949, 10 years after the Spanish Civil War ended and, consequently, 10 years into Franco’s fascist dictatorship, although at the time Compostilla did not exist. The building was intended to be an anthracite refinery in Ponferrada, a small village in the middle of one of Spain’s biggest coal basins halfway between Zamora and Asturias. It was a very expensive construction project and existed in the context of an attempt at autarchy from the fascist government, in the middle of the post-war famine that was hitting the populations in those colder regions extra hard, most of whom relied on their own crops to get by in the winter. The people working to build the factory, with the exception of a handful of paid workers, were slaves (unpaid workers threatened with violence, jail, or exile) and political prisoners from the Republican side of the Civil War.

The factory itself was a striking behemoth among the small buildings in the surrounding towns, overshadowing the churches themselves, which at the time were the most ornate and imposing buildings in these villages. In the 5 years between the approval of the project and its actual finalization, the Fascist powers had fallen and Spain was one of the few countries that remained uncontested, in part because of the sheer amount of resources that went into our own Civil War before WWII even started didn’t make us much of a military threat. This project, that had been approved with the purpose of using Spanish raw materials to manufacture pieces and machinery for the German war apparatus, was obsolete before it even opened. To justify its existence, the government founded Endesa, a national electricity company that would both produce, transport and supply the whole country, with the factory in Ponferrada at the core of it. Contractually, the company could not sell more than one fourth of its assets to foreign countries, as it was a symbol of the attempt to establish full economical autarchy from the Fascist government.

It was then that the town of Compostilla was built in the outskirts of Ponferrada, with the purpose of providing housing and facilities to the workers of the thermoelectrical central. They didn’t have to pay rent, they had access to fresh and cheap goods (through an economato, a regulated grocery store ran by Hunosa, a company that oversaw most provisioning in the coal basin of Asturias) in the middle of a harrowing famine, they had free electricity and reliable medical care. A lot of people moved to Compostilla at the height of the factory’s production, including my grandmother’s sister, to survive the aftermath of the Civil War. 105 families lived in the factory town from 1949 to 1965. As the rest of the old fascist powers settled into liberal, capitalistic democracy, with the benefit of international political alliancies with the western bloc during the Cold War, their industrial manufacturing surpassed in technical efficiency whatever we were doing over here, generally isolated in a world where, nominally, fascism was obsolete.

In 1965, the central underwent reforms to accomodate desulphuring and filtering of pet coke, not just coal. The workers started experiencing the health issues that come with working in, essentially, a tar pit and living next to it when they were off the clock, and those who had family outside of the factory town took off. A lot of families had to stay because the post-war famine had killed anyone they had that hadn’t come to enjoy the commodities oh-so-generously Endesa had provided. In the next decades, age, illness, and the shift to natural gas as an energy source (that was cheaper to extract and refine for the company) had turned Compostilla into a ghost town, and by 2008 Endesa decided to start the process of shutting down the complex.

In June 2020, there were only 76 workers in the central. None of them lived in the battered remains of the factory town. The factory was demolished in 2023. Endesa has been a private company since 1998, and was recently incorporated into Enel, an Italian multinational electricity provider. This might sound highly circumstantial and localized, but the crises of the business model that Ponferrada (and specifically Compostilla as a factory town) undewent apply to most companies that started out with industrial production and currently operate as multinational oligopolies over their original domain and a few more, vying for monopoly.

Which brings us back to Lumon, and Salt’s Neck. The town Harmony arrives to is not Salt’s Neck, then. We learn that this population was created to house the workers at Lumon’s Ether factory, much like the municipality of Kier, where the MDR outies live, was created next to Ganz to build the housing complexes for the employees at Lumon HQ. In the jagged, icy landscape, the housing complex which were once properly insulated now rust and are barely patched over, I could see the ghost of the decrepit greenhouse Petey stayed in at Half Loop road, which also had belonged to Lumon at one point. There’s even a church, eerily similar to the one near Irving’s apartment.

The people in Kier live in subsidized Lumon housing, eat at Pip’s which is a Lumon side business, go to Lumon fertility clinics, donate at Lumon blood drives, rely on Lumon for healthcare, food, employment and their continued livelihood, since they literally have a Lumon patented chip inside their brains with red tape all over its functions. When Dylan gets fired, it’s not just the prejudice against severance that is harrowing (because some people, like Dylan, cannot work unless they get severed, it was not a free choice), it’s also the knowledge that without Lumon’s protection and provisions, you will essentially die. Hearing the crunchy Kier hymnal in this episode just brought me back to the ORTBO, to “we’re starving, Mr. Milchick” and the reassurance that lumon will always provide, to “marshmallows are for team players”, because it is entirely conditional on how much money you’re making them. The factory town and the greenhouse were abandoned because there were more profitable ventures for the Eagans, and they left a trail of bodies behind, sick people, addicts whose addiction was a necessity to keep them productive, an addiction that guaranteed their loyalty. A small bar that gives away coffee, warm meals and vitriol whippets, because all the food and medicine left with Lumon, who provides until you aren’t useful.

Harmony tells Sissy “Lumon destroyed this town, you owe them no loyalty”, but Sissy correctly points out that there was no town before the factory. Sissy was spared from the misery that wrecked the factory town because she gave them Harmony Cobel, her mind, her body, and her loyalty. Her survival was conditional on submission, and so everything that they have, they owe back to the Eagans as fealty.

Woe's Hollow post-episode notes

Thu, 06 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Irving, I love you! The way he held Helly... You’re back. I know I’m going to die over this, but you left a mark on me even if they try to erase you, even if they try to erase me. His eyes. “Helly was never cruel.”

Mark S. is about to have his body violated, his vulnerability exploited, by both having had sex with Helena without knowing she wasn’t Helly and Mark Scout’s arrival, and I am in shambles about it. In the end, the autonomy Helly got in S1 and what Irving did just now were so intertwined with destruction… The price of change cost them both their literal lives, not just part of them.

Can Irving even reintegrate if his innie is dead? Where do those memories go? That’s a whole person. He had a whole life. Dylan, aghast as he yells, I’m sorry! I should have listened!, who kept him from suicide, whom he made his family willingly through the care the uprising instilled. Mark is utterly paralyzed, his face soaked, cradling Helly, who just had sex with him and doesn’t know whose body he entered without real permission, still trying to process and retreating back into terror. Helly woke up after weeks, drowning in freezing water by the man who wanted to encourage her every time she hurt herself or she wanted to give up on MDR (as a department, as family.)

Irving, looking back at them without saying a word. with pride and determination.. To remember? (Do you remember the times of your life?, they played as they killed Burt G.) to reassure? Walking to his death with his eyes open and spit in his mouth and pride and a smirk. You can’t sanitize this. You can’t make this act into a motivational claymation. You will make him a villain; he will be a horror story around the campfire, and yet his friends get a chance to hang in there. a refusal to be commodified, at the cost of your whole existence. I suppose both Irvings had that in common in the end.

Trojan's Horse post-episode notes

Thu, 13 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I was not expecting the “slow” episode after those 2 high tension ones to feel like a hug but here we are. It's not even a "happy" episode by any means, it's just what seeing my own grief treated carefully feels like.

Free Devon 2025 remains tragically relevant.
Helly’s isolation after coming back is hitting some personal rough spots, and the weight it’s being given as an act of cruelty towards her is flooring me. She doesn’t know she was raped. She doesn’t know Helena raped Mark S. The way it doesn’t even quite hit for Mark S. until Milchick corners him in the elevator over it before sending him up mid-panic attack…
Mr. Milchick, don’t turn to reactionary violence against your comrades when the cognitive dissonance hits, you’re so sexy aha. (Natalie’s silence, Ms. Huang’s needling, all of it was just so appalling… Punch up, dude. Punch up and get the fuck out. You can’t reform Eugenics inc.)
Dylan’s speech for Irving, like Mark’s private eulogy for Gemma in season 1, like Ms. Casey returning it at the end of this episode, like Dylan’s speech, like Irving Bailiff pressing his hand against his paintings like Mark did against the tree that took Gemma: I loved this person, and now they’re gone. They were picky, and they were strange, wonderful people, and the tangling of our lives changed us forever in ways we could not predict. I love you. I miss you. I carry you in who I am after you.

I loved my friend.
He went away from me.
There’s nothing more to say.
The poem ends,
soft as it began:
I loved my friend.

I’ve been dreading a string-of-fate plot for outie Irving and Burt, and this reveal has been possibly the most meaningful thing to me in their quadrant of the show. It was a kindness that warmed me whole. I think the two of us down there might have loved each other. Mine got sacked a few weeks ago over it / Mine got fired as well (they’re dead; we made them, and we hoped they’d be happier than us, and now they’re dead). / Come by my place and have dinner with me and my husband. You don’t have to do this alone. You are a stranger, but I am choosing, deliberately, to offer you a community to lean on. We cared about those versions of us we never even met. They loved each other. They deserve this attempt at connection.
Irving B., even while literally erased from physical record in the office down to the desk and the photos, leaves a message for Dylan, beating himself up for letting the company kill him, for not listening, and for not helping. Such an act of love. You wanted me to live until I figured out exports, and I got myself killed before that, and I’m sorry. But you can still do this; you still have a place in this office and in the world. You stayed behind. You always do. You can find a way out for all of us.
Mollified by that last shot of Mark. I’ve mentioned the list of lovable idiosyncrasies as presented by Outie Facts, but it really hit me that… We just don’t know who Mark was before the grief for Gemma ate him away.

Shame is a Cage

Thu, 06 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Throughout the whole show, shame has been used as a punitive tool: From the unsevered staff to the innies (the break room), from the outies to the innies (Mark’s gateway to reintegration being the shame he felt at carelessly letting his dog and Gemma leave, meaning it was at the root of his severance), from the outies to themselves (Seth Milchick subjecting himself to torturous correction through the paperclips, through his own speech of penance to himself in the mirror). Shame at all the ways we could’ve acted differently to be in a better place than we are now.

It’s interesting how, when asked for the key to Charlotte’s room, Sissy refuses to give it because all Harmony will find there is pain. “Charlotte’s room stays shut until all who remember her sit with Kier” because the only way to be useful is to build yourself a cage of shame, because if you remember, if you grieve, you will stop being as easily manipulated into compliance. Cold Harbor stays shut until all who remember Gemma sit with Kier. Shame is a cage. Shame leads to denial, memory leads to grief.

Harmony still looks for the key because she wants to feel that pain, because she wants to grieve a mother she wasn’t even allowed to see off when she died because she was serving the Eagans at school. Grief is a key out of this prison of repression. I’ve talked before about the way vegetation, sunlight and darkness are used in Severance to denote grief and the healing that comes through processing it, so I would like to point out that the wallpaper all over the house is flower-patterned, if slightly damaged, and the key Harmony finds in Sissy’s altar is hidden away behind an arrangement of dried (or possibly artificial) flowers. The only item that was left in Harmony’s childhood bedroom is a worn plushie, well loved, perhaps a gift from a mother to a very small child. And in Charlotte’s room, in turn, a picture of her daughter, wearing the same braids she does at home even now, in the house where she keeps dolls in her bed and sings to newborn children that aren’t hers. One of the rare shots of warm sunlight in this show happens this episode as Harmony Cobel enters her mother’s bedroom, and a bright warmth cuts the empty deathbed in two. Harmony presses her her hands to the mattress, like Mark to the tree, like Irving to the paintings, and sucks on an endotracheal tube like a child feeds on breast milk. She sleeps peacefully in the darkening room. The scene transition is an aerial shot of ice floaters slowly turning into a shot of turbulent water, the split shards melted into wholeness, wild and dangerous though it may be.

Pain, grief, letting yourself feel it, is the only true way to reintegrate. You can’t artificially do it through chip manipulation, but the possibility that one could turn off the severing block at will would mean that the person could have access to all their memories and would get the chance to truly grieve. Cobel watched outie Mark for signs of acceptance and innie Mark for signs of recognition, she wanted to believe in post-severance reintegration that didn’t end in death, a procedure her own ideas made possible in the first place. She was happy that Mark felt like he didn’t need to be severed anymore, at Ricken’s party, and encouraged him to leave Lumon. Mark surviving chip reintegration means he could grieve freely, after all. That her grief-fuelled creation won’t necessarily make the world into a cage of shame. Harmony says the Eagans’ mercy is murder, like how Sissy thinks it was an act of mercy to remove Charlotte’s respirator. Harmony had assumed her mother’s death was on her aunt, but Sissy admits with disgust that it was Charlotte who took out her own lifeline. It was her choice to die, and even to Sissy’s eyes, she looked grateful. Even when Sissy says her rage would’ve been less agonizing if she had faith, that doesn’t take from the gratitude. Because yes, she was angry, she had lost her faith and autonomy, she had lost her daughter, they took everything from her and death was merciful.

Keeping people alive against their will to extract profit is cruelty, not mercy. Gemma doesn’t get a choice. Hampton gives the people in the town choice: They can numb the pain with the drug, or just coffee, or just a warm place to be in, or they can die, but whatever choice they make is as free from Lumon’s control as he’s able to make it. It was kind, not merciful, to make a choice to end her own life (like Helly’s suicide attempt in the elevator, like Irving B.’s willing execution, going to their deaths fully aware of what they were doing, freeing themselves from grief and exploitation.)

The Fucking Goats

Mon, 10 Feb 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I think what gets me so riled up about the goat-adjacent theorizing part of the Severance fandom is that it’s always about what the goats do for Lumon instead of what the goats mean to the employees.

They never even think Oh, the goats sound like crying babies. The mammalian worker was so worried they were being taken before they’d even finished nursing. Oh, the goats are a herd, and the mammalian department acts like a herd, and they feel each loss as a group. Oh, we’re just animals. Oh, masturbation and homosexuality are punished because, like the goats, we’re just here to make more goats. Oh, the goats are alive and used as produce. Oh, Helly is scared she might be sending them to the slaughterhouse. Am I livestock? They’re not ready. It’s never about that. It’s always about cloning. It’s always about the company. It’s never about the worker. It’s always about the use. It’s never about the body. It’s always “What is Lumon doing with the goats?” and not “Who the fuck cares what their motivation is?" when the show is literally relentlessly just saying that regardless of motivation, we are witnessing abuse. Regardless of how much staff thinks they know better, the innies are under duress.

They don’t think about the innies as children (as animals in an abattoir), about expectation, about the trauma of reproduction, or about being a body being dismissed in favor of using a body. Lots of “Cobel is a freak MILF” and Jorjorwellian maxims, but you can’t even look at her clutching a respirator after tearing apart a literal altar to a pharmaceutical that just fired her and her knowing how to help a baby latch despite ostensibly having no children of her own. You can’t fucking sit with why she’s spying and fucking with a widower to see what happens when he sees his dead wife at work after a lobotomy and why it still feels uncomfortable and invasive as hell.

Using "goat theorizing" as a shorthand for any kind of analysis where the work put into the show goes out the window because ooh, dystopia, but the goats are a frequent subject of debate. [guy slapping a playing card onto a bar table meme] THE DYSTOPIA IS THAT THIS IS OUR WORLD UNDER CAPITAL RIGHT NOW, NO SCI-FI.

Milchick, the unsevered Black employee

Fri, 11 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Some thoughts on Seth Milchick and and the severed vs. unsevered Black employee with @sageshouldknowbetter on Tumblr.

sageshouldknowbetter: The food thing is so crazy, though. Like, who decides what cultures it represents? There is nothing authentic and little made by actual members of the cultures the food represents. It’s probably incredibly bland— some “spicy” options, of course, but almost perfunctorily. Let’s not stop at going outside— someone needs to write something about the innies being taken out for Thai food for the first time.

binomech: I’ve posted some considerations about race before. While the vending machine snack update from the Lumon is Listening video, the almond allergy, and the weak enamel mentions are super revealing, it still shocked me to learn that Seth has also been getting his meals through the airline menu approach (as we saw on the performance evaluation.) I have to wonder how much he was groomed, how much of his childhood was already influenced by Lumon, how much his (presumably Black) parents, and all the Black history and culture in America that comes with that, including any kind of culinary tradition, were present. Eustice Huang has not lived in her parents’ home for the duration of the fellowship. How Cobel and Graner, who are white and get a little more leeway to act against direct orders than Seth and Eustice (even Natalie), are the only unsevered staff that can exist outside the actual headquarters without being in the process of running an errand for Lumon.

sageshouldknowbetter: This last post has etched “Wanna go see her together?” into my crystal head cube ever since I saw it. Because Dylan knows that Mr. Milchick will also get blamed for this— that he already stepped out of line by activating the OTC and not being able to prevent Dylan’s son’s arrival. But it’s not just about that. It’s about two Black men having potentially dangerous information about the other— both able to expose the other to their white woman boss, who undeniably uses that status as a weapon ([to] Natalie), but only at their own risk. The difference is that one of them has a lot to fight for and a lot less to lose.

binomech: Yeah! And again, Seth Milchick knows he’s Black, but Dylan G doesn’t. There’s so much going on in that exchange. The way in S1, Milchick’s offering of perks to a very pissed-off Dylan reads as agonizingly infantilizing to the audience (not incorrectly, but very much how Dylan understands it, which is not how Seth does), but as S2 progresses, it has become evident that Milchick is doing a lot of perk bargaining of his own, that when Dylan tells him fuck you in the security office, it was a fuck you to his one single goal of being the pioneer of the novel idea of treating innies somewhat more kindly.

binomech: The second fuck you from Dylan in Cold Harbor is still addressed to Mr. Milchick. He could’ve used his first name to pull him down, like Irving B did before Seth gave the call to turn him off, but he didn’t— it’s a sign of respect, but establishes a distance, which was intended all along, after all, when they never allowed the innies to know the staff’s first names. But this time it’s done on purpose because at last they’re on equal footing about first names, which is all Dylan had behind him the security room at his back, but now they’re actual, physical people. And it’s also a wake-up call about alienating this Black employee that he has more in common with than with Natalie Kalen. Imagine hearing, seeing all this resentment reflected back at you through all these Black people you’ve been telling yourself you’re helping with promises of little trinkets and five minutes of music and watermelons for funerals (which, again, can they say it much clearer?), funerals for people you gave the direct order to get killed, and you, not Jame Eagan, have been the one in front of them in the break room, breaking them. You’re finding yourself towering over a sea of Black faces from C&M that you trained into minstrelsy and bleeding like they probably bled for you, like a cornered animal that they reassured you you weren’t (unlike the severed innies), and they are staring at your complicity in the eye, but they don’t know about race or racism, and the only other Black person you could extend and request recognition from is doing PR work for the Eagans on television and doing overtime and holds too much of their opinions on her mouth to express any of her own (you can see each other through the walls of your glass cages but never meet outside of them).

binomech: But Natalie is also rich enough not to be at risk of being appointed head torturer for the entirety of the severed floor. That’s the job for a Black man working security at the abattoir, who is “naturally” inclined towards violence because of course. Use simpler words, apologize for your brilliance, you came here to be a jailer and a pair of manacles to yourself and others, those words are for white people. Watch Helly R (a white woman, the innie of Helena-fucking-Eagan-CEO-in-waiting) invoke her dead friend (who spat your first name like a curse the moment he learned it and smirked at you in both pity and defiance before you put him down, whose love you saw and knew and killed twice over through both parties), touch the hearts of the people you’ve been trying to reach your whole life while you watch from a crack in a bathroom they locked you in.

binomech: The ways in which the promotion that supposedly gave him the freedom Cobel had means nothing because he’s Black, and the way it continues to be dangled in front of him like he dangled the coffee cozies and finger traps and family visits to Dylan even as Dylan started to spit back that it was not enough, and it never would be.

sageshouldknowbetter: Oh my lord, C&M. Do you think Milchick has ever looked at his Black employees and just wanted to say everything he can’t say to Natalie. to have someone to talk to about all of this. But a) it would be disrespecting Lumon, b) it would destroy his Smiling Cool-Headed Manager persona and c), he doesn’t know if they’d understand anyway. If they don’t, he’s sick at the idea of explaining it to them. If they do understand, he’s horrified about what that would say about the depth of racism and afraid to think about that too hard.

sageshouldknowbetter: “While you watch from a crack in the bathroom they locked you in” is crazy. Milchick must feel all kinds of resentment toward Helly because she can be as defiant as she wants in her short existence. She can steal his walkie-talkie, hit him in the face with a trombone, even insult and laugh at the Dieter story (even though that was Helena, I think Helly R would have ridiculed it too, if only out of the genuine discomfort all of the actual innies had). But she, she who inhabits the body of a wealthy white woman, can’t be punished the way he can — paradoxically both because her body is valued (by both the outside world and the white man they need to keep satisfied) and because her innie, to him, seems to have so much less to lose. She doesn’t need to worry about job security or what her boss wants her to do. She knows she can die at any moment, and she is willing to take chances with the time she has left. So while Milchick forces himself to jump through every hoop and try to go above and beyond to do exactly what Lumon wants him to do, Helly can stomp around the severed floor, freely insult the corporation that spawned her, and even have sex in a makeshift tent on company time completely unpunished. And here Milchick is in the corner, having to perform absolutions for putting on a paperclip “the wrong way.” No wonder he looked so dead-eyed at the end of season two!

This is how transfem Mark can still win

Mon, 03 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

The themes. The shattering of the woman-as-womb. The child does get a better life than the parent because she is capable of escaping the cage of the heterosexual nuclear family as a tool for perpetuation of capitalist accumulation of wealth. The autonomy in recognition, modification, care, identification, and use of one’s body. The haunted house is the white supremacist cishet patriarchal family structure’s gatekeeping of the body (IT’S A PHARMACEUTICAL), and with our construction of alternative class-conscious support networks, we’re setting it on fire.

(Which is to say: He's a good egg! Announcements person! It's the fucking spouse!)

transfem!Mark vignettes

Wed, 11 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

A full page of marker sketches of Mark from Severance; she's a trans woman partaking in gender affirming activities.

In one of the vignettes, Helly holds Mark's head as if she was a contemplating hairdresser and remarks "It's all about bangs"; we see Mark is painstakingly clipping her hair back with a flower-decorated hairclip; she beams at the sight.

In another vignette, innie Mark pats herself down, and is surprised and delighted to find the strap of a bralette under her suit.

In another vignette, Mark is taking her shoes off (revealing flower-patterned socks) and swapping them for Helly's short heels. She walks unsteadily in the ill-fitting shoes; Dylan comments from his workstation: "If she can make it to the kitchenette without breaking an ankle, I'll give her 2 fingertraps." Mark and Helly stand together in their swapped footwear, and Mark asks "How do you balance?", to which Helly replies "Mark... I don't know" while putting a hand on Mark's thigh to help her get the shoes off.

In the last vignette, a supervising Ms. Casey looks on in confusion to Mark and Helly, who have painted their nails with office supplies. While holding a black marker, Helly asks her "You want black sharpie or whiteout?". Mark is joyfully distracted by her newly painted nails, sparkling white, with her hair still clipped back.

Art by Tumblr user oodlesodoodles; commissioned by me (binomech).

The After Hours, Turturro thematics

Sat, 15 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I keep thinking about Illuminata (when do I ever stop, tbh) and John Turturro’s decision to adapt and direct a whole movie about the earnest and harrowing realities of the performance as labor. Putting himself in the role of Tuccio, who is too out there in his work to ever get what he wants and can’t help but compromise, even when it makes him miserable and makes him frustrated at his work.

It’s also a movie where the whole cast were his friends in the business, including Christopher Walken. He played Umberto, a critic whose opinion matters enough to be a risk Tuccio takes, whose (explicitly homosexual) relationship with a member of the company ends with the latter’s edits once more unraveling Tuccio’s script. Tuccio’s work is entirely driven by love of performance, by the shared human subjectivity that joins both role and actor: there’s no superfluous fanfare in the play, and it’s agonizing that it results in no glory. To quote an unrelated lyric, “Being yourself while being other people is harder than it looks,” so the overlap between role-in-fiction and role-in-life is inevitable. I find myself thinking about how both the play in the movie and the actual movie faded into obscurity (like all the actors who don’t reach stardom, like the whores, like the faggots, like the badge-coves of performance art.)

I feel there’s a continuation of this pattern in Turturro’s roles in Miller’s Crossing and Barton Fink in particular: The “clockable queer (never explicitly on camera, thematically relevant, alluded to in derision and/or metaphor) entrenched in a web of historical violence that continues into their present” is kind of a typecast for him at this point (not unwelcome for me personally, but nevertheless there). Christopher Walken is openly bisexual, and he was John Turturro’s choice to play Burt because he believed completely that the love he feels for Walken would come through his performance of Irving so clearly. All the anecdotes from the set I’ve caught are about commitment to the story, to the characters, but most of all to each other as people who’ve been friends for decades, who love each other dearly, who are getting older and are perfectly aware of it, and what it means for their life and for their career.

A lot of queer men’s experience of their gender and sexuality is inseparable from repression and violence directed at themselves or others. I have a lot of friends over 60 in the scene that built both their sense of masculinity and its queering around (and within) the oppressive power structures they existed in (Franco’s fascist dictatorship for my friends, the US imperial military complex for Irving, and the Lutheran church and Lumon’s hitman jobs for Burt). There’s also a lot to be said about the dehumanization of anyone over 50 in both the acting industry and gay culture through either defanging any desire or painting it as predatory. In this plotline about two older gay men in the context of bodily autonomy, the nuclear family as an extension of capitalism, and the struggle to subvert inherited power relations, I’m 100% on board with the point where we’re leaving Burt and Irving in The After Hours.

But I don’t think that a sacrifice, an admission of desire, and a melancholy look out of a train window are all there will be to them. Life is never free of pain or grief or frustration, but that’s not proof of inevitable tragedy; I dare say that it’s kind of the point of Severance. That love takes work, that justice takes work, that you’re born with an expectation of the life you’re going to have, and sometimes you’ll fall into that and be miserable, but it’s never too late to change course; there’s no predestination. Good news about hell, yes, but also about heaven: Whatever humans can imagine, they can usually create.

What I’m trying to get at is I can’t imagine John Turturro would want anything more than to make room through his role in Severance for all these things he and Christopher Walken have been denied by the industry they work in for personal and artistic integrity reasons. I don’t believe Severance’s writing would shy away from it, given the historical evidence of them listening to the cast and giving the less marketable realities of the characters that they share with their actors the weight they deserve. Budget and time constraints aside, I trust Dan Erickson and the writing team to do a good job with Irving’s plotline if there’s a third season. But most of all, I trust John Turturro to give Irving (and Burt, and by extension Christopher Walken and himself) a story most of us would give a piece of ourselves woven into our fictions.

Two Marks in the Break Room

Fri, 11 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT

In the context of Miss Casey’s disobedience during Helly’s suicide watch and subsequent break room stint and his walking around with Helly, unsupervised, Mark S volunteers to do the break room time instead of Miss Casey just as he did with Helly’s first triggering of the code detector. Cobel asks him, “Who wouldn’t you go to the break room for?” One might wonder if the answer to that question is “his outie”, who put Mark S in this break room of an existence that turned out to be a life in its own right, drenched in love and grief just as much as Mark Scout’s. And yet, Mark S is going back to the proverbial break room that is the whole severed floor after having sabotaged the finalization of Cold Harbor for Mark Scout and his wife, Gemma, who is alive.

Gemma is outside now, and so is Devon, and so is Cobel, and so is Irving Bailiff, and so is Reghabi. These people have enough information to destroy Lumon (and in doing that, shut down the severed floor and kill all the remaining innies without a second thought if they so wish). Mark S accepts that possibility when he doesn’t leave with Gemma through the fire escape. But this isn’t a selfless sacrifice for the sake of Mark Scout; this is a declaration of personhood, of being a self and therefore capable of being selfish, for every innie he knows and all that he doesn’t. He’s coming home to the equator; this building becomes a continent for himself, and Helly R and Dylan G and Petey K and Irving B and Miss Casey, who is a person, not part of one, and still can’t be alive at the same time as Gemma. Mark S uses the power Lumon gave him by making him indispensable for the completion of Cold Harbor (Dylan was right, page 197 slaps: “Your work needs you, not the other way around”), to help, not harm.

And yet Mark Scout, despite his ostensible selfishness and because he thinks of Mark S as an extension of himself, sends him back to the severed floor even when their last words exchanged were Mark S telling him he doesn’t trust him. Mark Scout trusts his innie with this after two years of everyone else using using both of them by trying to make them each other’s worst enemy. Mark S returns the favor by using his one moment of real agency to give someone else their autonomy back. They’re both in the break room for everyone they know by the end of the Cold Harbor.

Unsanctioned relations (of the productive kind)

Thu, 06 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Hampton resents Harmony for leaving to work in the Kier branch of Lumon, for four reasons that work in tandem:

He knows Harmony came up with the designs for the severance chip, and that it was her work that allowed the Eagans to shut down the factory and restructure the company around the idea of a severed floor in a different, public facing building, which the ether factory could not be.
That company restructuring resulted in the factory being shut down, people being out of jobs and the employees who worked there suffering the medical sequelae of having worked since childhood in the factory without any help from Lumon’s pharmaceutical products.
He resents Sissy for encouraging Harmony to join the Myrtle Eagan school for girls, both because it took her away from him and because it ultimately led to the factory shutting down, with the whole town falling through the cracks except for Sissy, who was credited for Harmony’s upbringing. The only one still living by the nine (principles) after what Lumon did to them all.
Harmony references their friendship and puppy-love through Lumon language (chums), to which Hampton replies that [it was] child fucking labor. As Harmony talks of Kier and Imogene meeting as colleagues in the ether mill and taking to each other still as colleagues, Hampton replies cynically and with complicity “was she hacking up a lung at the time?” (possibly implying that part of the reason Harmony was encouraged to leave was the respiratory issues exposure to the chemicals gave her mother.)

It’s Harmony’s admission that she is not working with Lumon, that was she did was bad enough to be surveilled, that ultimately earns Hampton’s trust and makes him keep watch while she’s at Sissy’s. Sissy mentions selling Harmony’s childhood belongings to the poor, making the poor pay for goods that were not theirs to have in the first place, to use their meagre salary to pay for someone else’s things she didn’t even get to enjoy. The way the laborer at the factory makes the product, and the client has to pay to enjoy it, but this separation between maker and user is necessary for the generation of surplus for the patron. But despite Harmony’s pretense of disdain when she says it’s shameful that he sells the vitriol, she kisses him for it.

Hampton doesn’t sell drugs, he gives them away. He doesn’t charge for the coffee, he doesn’t charge for the huff. Lumon gave him and Harmony vitriol as child laborers to get through 8 hour vat-stirrings, even as they mirrored Kier and Imogene. Vitriol is a Lumon product that Lumon can’t cash in being used to mitigate the damage working for Lumon did for the people of the town, it’s an anaesthetic. Harmony says to Sissy “you gave him his thirst for (the huff)”, and it was Lumon who created a dependency, who cut them off of their payroll and safety and substance access when they sent their staff to Kier.

What do we know about Irving Bailiff?

Mon, 03 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

Anonymous asked: d'you ever think about irving waterboarding helena as a way to threaten her life without damaging helly too much in the process. how he must have known how long to keep her under and how much to let her breathe. and how irving bailiff was in the military. in the navy.

I do think about this quite often. About waterboarding (because yes, that was torture, whatever the ends were). Your outie can swim gracefully and well. Your outie values water. A photo of your outie with a trophy was once in a newspaper. The language he used (she’s a mole!). Ahow Milchick calls him with “stand!” to send him to his death, and the staredown is mocking and irreverent. How in season 1, Irving stood to attention the second Milchick entered the office. About his “lats” brag and ramrod-straight posture. His two visible refined filenames so far have been Pacoima (which I’m assuming is a little nod to Judy Baca, and it makes me super happy) and Montauk in his dream in Woe’s Hollow (Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind reference). about tying Burt’s hands together to reassure Dylan on the way to O&D.

Even when I frame the last one in the context of leather culture and bondage, a lot of gay men in the military and the police engage with kink subculture through power play, sometimes to subvert and deconstruct, sometimes because they can’t engage with their homosexuality without that mediation of violence as punishment, control, or affirmation of one’s place in an interpersonal dynamic, and (after)care as a polite expectation rather than an admission of need. We don’t know much at all about Outie Irving because the repression extends to the information we are given, and the single bed, the neat split between his Lumon clothing and his polish and leather gear, the encroaching blackness around him in every shot… It seems to me that this is an extremely lonely man. He isn’t necessarily alone (popular among dance attendees, it appears the Lumon investigation involves other people, and there’s a degree of familiarity in which he apologizes to the caller after the OTC, presumably because it triggered suspicion), but it’s wild to me how raw Innie Irving was in both joy and sorrow and how tall the walls rise around Outie Irving. having to drive to the other end of town during the OTC because there was simply no one else, not just because he sought out Burt; everyone else woke up surrounded by people, and he gets Radar (sweet, sweet Radar, aptly named for scouting his perimeter) and a photo of his dead dad hidden inside a uniform, and that’s that.

Ludwig Wittgenstein v Seth Milchick

Tue, 25 Mar 2025 00:00:00 GMT

I find it very interesting that in philosophy of language circles we deliberately separate the “first Wittgenstein” from the “second Wittgenstein,” consistently, like they’re two different people, because his theses changed so much between the publication of the Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus and the Philosophical Investigations that analytical philosophy struggles to establish continuity between the first and the second, but really, it’s mostly because analytical philosophy thinks of itself as separate from history, decontextualized, and truth-seeking. Of course it’s uncomfortable with what the Investigations have to say about our beloved Tractatus: that our endeavors of mapping epistemological truth to language are futile, that they’re a maladaptive coping mechanism for the horrors of life.

Wittgenstein wrote the Tractatus in the midst of volunteering in World War I, being captured as a war prisoner because he had a suicidal crisis while at the front after his brother killed himself (the third of his brothers to go that way), having decided to give away all his earnings and possessions to his family when he was released, and dedicating himself to teaching in an elementary school. Of course he focuses on the clarity of communication and workings of propositional logic; he’s teaching children in the hopes that they will not make the same mistakes his generation did. He has to believe in the idea that there is some truth and that that truth is good. that if you teach the right lessons, that if there’s no room for ambiguity when you define truth, then there is no room for suicide or war.

But the Investigations were written during another world war that his teachings could not prevent. After the disillusionment with the idea of a universal, logically ruled universe where the idea of good was a constant that we could angle ourselves towards, he just thinks abstraction is bullshit. that philosophy can’t change the world in the ways he hoped it would because it’s too far removed from the subjects it analyzes. And yes, he volunteers in the war again, but this time he’s not a soldier; he volunteers at a hospital. Philosophy was a comfort to the patients he nursed, those who knew death, who weren’t hypothesizing whether truth could save humanity from its own immolation. Of course the Investigations are about language in history. About how the same propositions he tried teaching as great truths didn’t prevent his students from going to war, but they comforted the people that were dying. That hope was only true when you accepted that there was war, suicide, and death, and yet people continued surviving. living, even. that language was a leap of faith between speakers, not some great magnifier of universal reality, and that these games we played with words were the most important thing in life: attempting communication when there’s still a possibility of failure and learning from that failure so that context may inform further attempts. Still imperfect, yes, but ever increasingly clear. not a universal truth to save humanity for generations, just a game to save one soul for a few decades. That’s as good as it gets. and it’s pretty damn good.

This ramble was entirely prompted by the framed duckrabbit in Severance, which is one of the thought experiments in Wittgenstein’s Investigations.

I’m thinking a lot about how Wittgenstein’s ideological shift happened in the context of a failed attempt at educating children, his faith in the gospels unraveling, being practically disowned by his own family, in a house he emptied in search of clarity, seeing his students go to war and die the same way his generation did, and how he decided to refer to the contextualization of logic as language games. how his maturity came through embracing the childhood folly he readily gave up to become a soldier, and how it was more of a kindness for those patients than any dogma.

I have high hopes for Seth Milchick, whose office is empty and utilitarian except for the duckrabbit and a reminder of Svalbard’s coastal landscape, who tries to be kind despite handbook rules and the promised order in a chaotic nightmare, who is berated for using a linguistic register that was not meant for people like him, and who rebels by playing with syllable count.

An Ancient Curse in the Modern Tradition

Sat, 12 Jul 2025 00:00:00 GMT