The Severance Season 2 finale included a confusing twist at its pulse-pounding core, the Lumon Marching Band appearing to celebrate a major moment in the series.
The hit Apple TV+ sci-fi thriller brought its sophomore effort to an exciting end, as Adam Scott's Mark S. finally found out what would happen when he finished the mysterious "Cold Harbor" file.
This thrilling conclusion included everything from goat sacrifices to the most bizarre instance of 'talking to yourself' perhaps ever seen on TV; however, there was no more surreal moment than the introduction of the Lumon Marching Band.
Why Was There a Marching Band In Severance Season 2?
Fans were confounded as a marching band came out of nowhere in the Severance Season 2 finale.
The last episode of Severance Season 2 featured the Lumon Marching Band as a major set piece, arriving in the series' central Macrodata Refinement (MDR) office as a part of a celebration for Adam Scott's Mark S.
This musical interlude came as a part of the MDR team's reward for completing the "Cold Harbor" file. This featured a full-scale performance by the group as well as a choreographed dance from Tramell Tillman's Mr. Milchick.
But why did the Lumon Marching Band actually appear? And was there any deeper meaning to their arrival?
The band was a part of Lumon's reward to Mark S. and the MDR team for completing their 25th file for the Machiavellian megacorp.
Fans had seen an instance similar to this last season in what was described a the time as a "Music Dance Experience." This musical bit of amusement was done, back then, to incentives a particular refiner for finishing 75% of a file.
It seems as though, the live marching band performance was only reserved for major milestones, like something as big as Cold Harbor being finished—a file that completed the reconstruction of Ms. Casey/Gemma's (played by Dichen Lachman) subconsciousness.
It is revealed upon their arrival that this marching band crew was not just any batch of musicians, but was made up of fellow severed employees from a department known as "Choreography and Merriment" (aka C&M).
They watch on, playing without pause throughout the climax of the episode, with Mark S. escaping to save his outie's wife Gemma (who is now in dire need of help following the completion of Cold Harbor), and Brit Lower's Helly R. trapping Mr. Milchick in the restroom behind the office vending machine.
The band eventually joins MDR's cause, as Helly (and eventually Zach Cherry's Dylan) convinced the severed musicians that they too are noting but insignificant cogs in the corporate machine in the eyes of Lumon.
This culminates as Mr. Milchick escapes from behind the vending machine to discover it is not just Dylan and Helly he is going to have to grapple with, but now an entire marching band of severed innies who have joined their cause.
A lot of Severance's more bizarre moments go completely unexplained, and, according to series creator Dan Erickson, that was the case with this marching band scene. Erickson confirmed what many fans have been theorizing about the whacky scene: There's no metaphor or deeper meaning to the sequence, it "just felt right" (via Den of Geek):
"It just felt right. Part of it was that it was funny to us. Usually, if you’re watching a marching band, you’re up in bleachers and looking down. The fact that Lumon would bring them in to perform in a building that has a ceiling that’s barely tall enough to fit them, we just thought that that was fun."
He said it was inspired by a moment from 1941's Citizen Kane where "a marching band comes in and performs for Charles Foster Kane," calling the scene so "weird and strange" that they knew they wanted to riff on it in some way:
"There’s a scene from Citizen Kane where a marching band comes in and performs for Charles Foster Kane. It’s just so weird and strange. There were a lot of considerations but I don’t know what a marching band is a metaphor for necessarily."
That is to say there is no bespoke deeper meaning, with the marching band representing the marching monotony of the 9-to-5 work day or something, instead, it was just something the series creators though would be fun to do.
Thankfully for fans, this may not be the last time fans hear from the Choreography and Merriment department as Severance Season 3 is already on the way (read about when Severance Season 3 could be released here).
Severance Season 2 is now streaming on Apple TV+.
