From a Marxist perspective, what could be more frightening than not even knowing what you do for work, or what injustices are perpetrated on you there? What more villainous than an owning class who can’t be held accountable because they’re never seen or spoken to directly? What more ominous than an organization that refuses you all knowledge of the means and ends of production? Lumon is not just a Marxist nightmare, but a perfect one, one that refuses to be interpreted any other way.
Here is an alternative Internet Archive URL in case the original URL in the post title is inaccessible.
After reading this thought piece, I can see where Severance has some horror elements in it. But the most horrific element of Severance is that it’s marketed as a comedy.
A few of the people behind it have worked in comedy, most notably, Ben Stiller, who has producing and directing credits on Severance, and Adam Scott, the show’s lead, known from Parks & Recreation, and Step Brothers.
Even though as someone here pointed out, that this is ultimately a mystery box show, the weirdness is what we’re supposed to be making fun of (although in S2, the weirdness stops being fun and becomes scary). Also, it’s a comedy because most people don’t know what satire is. But really, this leads me to think of how comedy is used as a coping mechanism for dealing with the horrors of life, the pain, and esp. the fear and isolation the think piece talks about.
It seems that season 1 could be seen as a dark comedy, but season 2 ultimately turned into dark tragedy.