Reintegration is the WHOLE point of the show (why reintegration is anticapital and Helena's actually best girl)

Starting from the first couple of episodes, I think season 2 is really making the point that the opposition of Innies and Outies has always been a lie. We were low-key led to think of it that way by the show, the same way the characters were led to that interpretation by Kier management.

That's the capitalistic way here, the moment where enterprises want their employees to fully internalize alienation from their colleagues (eg. the different departments) and themselves. But again, it's all bull.

Our main 4 were already severed before being severed.

That a pretty common analysis that's not gonna blow anyone out of the pool, but it's striking how much we got to see that with Helena recently. I think the personalities of the Innies emerged the repressed needs of already emotionally amputated people :

- Outie Mark = depressed, self isolating, sarcastic and sometimes aggressively on edge. Innie Mark = joyful, social, very earnest and sometimes meek when bossed around.

- Outie Dylan = almost estranged from the family he lives with, can't keep a job. Innie = will do anything to see his family, reliable when it comes to his friends, hard at work.

- Outie Irving (still missing infos as of ep 4 but...) = the most isolated characters, ex-military ? with possible PTSD ? Innie = finds love and friends, and most importantly he is fundamentally faithful to his institution, which makes me infer that he might have felt betrayed and abandoned by the military system and society at large.

- Helena (a bit of speculation and guessing on the point the show is making) : she is the paradox the hyper rich incarnated. Instead of being liberated by her money and power, her status forces her to fully be the hegemonic serviceable daughter. She always chooses and controls the emotions she presents to others, she accepted to mutilate her body and mind through severance, she went back to work after being almost killed by her innie. All in the name of her father seemingly. And she hates herself for all of that. She was unliving way before being severed. Half a woman, half alive, born from the seed of a scornful man who split himself in two between the primordial impulse and the corporate entrepreneur (Kier/Dieter).

Helly : naturally she came out as the archetypal rebel. Very frank, direct and inquisitive. She is somewhat impulsive too (which Helena could never...). She presents her object of desire outwardly and gives herself the means to get it quickly. "It" being self autonomy and human connection. These are the things that Helena, despite all the means at her disposal, could never get as an Eagan. So it becomes inevitable that Helly, someone who cannot be demoralized out of wanting a full life, would hate the shit out of a husk of a person like Helena.

The ultimate irony is of course that Helena unlovingly birthed a slave out of herself to be sent to what she knew to be soft Hell essentially. And yet she now finds herself longing for the isolated and uncomplicated life of an office work. Her life was so tightly ordered and alienating that even the prison that is MDR for the innies, feels like the most liberating experience for her. Even in her continuous impersonation she clearly has been expressing herself more candidly than anywhere else we've seen her.

But here's the catch. I think it also implies that Helly retained that hatred of Helena...from Helena.

So how could those two people ever reconcile ? By ending the lie of corporate cooperation between the two, between the innies and outies. There's no cooperation to be had if they are the same individual. But, as in real life, corporations benefit from their employees splitting their pseudo "work self" from their "actual self".

Ironically the split might have had at least the positive effect of giving them space from themselves to solve some stuff unconsciously. Severance can be turned on its head from a finite corporate-serving operations, to a self-serving and community-serving healing process. Not that it's a good thing to be severed in the first place obviously.

But anyway, that's why I'm having a hard time hating on Helena even though I really should (at least on moral principle). What we see from her is almost always vulnerable, unbalanced, sometimes cruel but only in the ways that allows her to desperately preserve that little piece of heaven. Think about it, at the slightest glimpse of a place that could allow her to live a real, no bullshit, no postures, emotional life; she went on an elaborated infiltration plan. It's as if, despite ALL her rich oppressive education, she viscerally cannot stop herself from wanting to be free, to live fully, to be a full pers... oh wait who is it reminding me of ? Right, Helly. It's a if Outies were just unhealthy, broken or alienated versions of their innies.

During season 1, we might have spent a lot of time wandering how they could ever find a happy ending with two DISTINCT personalities within a body and we were made to be scared of reintegration through Petey. (cool "misdirect" by the writers to be clear though). We might have also been scared to see one the innies that we love die by definitive deactivation or re-absorption probably.

I think it could a satisfying ending to have everyone ultimately reintegrate at the end of the show, both on symbolic and emotional level. Symbolically because that would signify the employees exiting the grasp of self compliant servitude from the dehumanizing mega-corporations. And emotionally because that would mean that the characters have finally healed the scars of their outie lives through their innies. They would have woken up, be re-birthed as their full selves (with hopefully not a too many complications now, like having 2 and a half girlfriends, lol can you imagine).

I believe we've actually started to see what it could look like with Mark in ep 4 s2. If Im not going crazy I think the actor is pitching his voice at healthy mid-point between his innie high pitch and his outie tired growlier voice. Same for his personality, Innie Mark had already started to be more biting and assertive while Outie Mark has slowly woken up from his misanthropic apathy. Both characterized as becoming more feisty, questioning and revolted against their current status quo. Finally, he now seems to find a balance between his joyfulness and his enjoyment of sarcasm. Also, his want for connection and his assertiveness in romance with Helly (/Helena...).

Last notes on my Helena "simp" rant : despite her whole, probably very fucked upbringing, Helly came out as generally pretty kind and empathetic. While Helena can be cruel to preserve herself as Irving pointed out, it's pretty fucking heartwarming to see that she still had a lot of repressed kindness that came out through Helly.

I also took her as an example because, to put simply, if she can feel alienation at her level, everyone of us can. We see that no one is fulfilled in Severance and that's the point, not MDR, not Ms Casey, not Miltchik, not Coble, not Natalie, not Helena. And I'd hardly call her zombie of a father as glowing here. Everyone gets humiliated (think Miltchik, Mark or Helena) and becomes either apathetic or hectic for it.

Thank you for coming my Ted Talk. Again I think most people on this sub will have made most of those connections without my input but I mostly needed to rant after ep 4. See you next time where I'll explain why Miltchik of all people needs to be the one the choke daddy Eagan to death.

Short edit : thanks for all your comments, main goal was to have people to talk to about my many thoughts and feels concerning one of my favourite show and you really allowed me to have that friendly intellectual feedback <3