#harmony selvig

[strawberry-macchiato]

Yeppppp she’s having the crashout of the century #cobelmobile #womeninstem

7/100 // print

[choreographyandmerriment]

Severance Character Name Anagrams

[despairhasitsowncalm]

"men will literally get severed" this, "men will literally get severed" that. finally, a woman who will literally invent the severance procedure instead of going to therapy

[fightclubrat]

thinking about ms. cobel saying "yes daddy" to mr. graner in that condescending, apathetic tone with her kubrick stare because she genuinely does not like graner but he's useful and controllable and she likes that

[eightw]

what if ms cobel is an innie that got out? like she was originally a severed employee, but proved to be fervently passionate about the company (like irving but 100x more intense) and so they promoted her to manager. that would make sense from lumon's POV - you have someone who has no prior memories and is loyal only to you. if you're worried about keeping secrets, or having someone do the dirty work, she's perfect, because she's already doing it.

some of this is inspired by another post i saw theorizing that the harmony s. in the control room is our ms. cobel; we already know that cobel is her maiden name. which, in my opinion, it would make total sense for her to no longer go by selvig, because in essence she's killed harmony selvig. everything she does on the outside, as wacky old mrs. selvig, is a pantomime of a woman she's only heard about, maybe seen recordings of. a wardrobe that was there the first day on the outside, maybe some old pictures of people she doesn't know. lumon would've given her all the info they had on her outie, but does it matter, when cobel's life is lumon? the shrine in the basement is an effort to bring the order she was used to on the severed floor outside, to make her world continue to make sense. even if she loves the job, that is an inherently miserable existence - not to mention that she knows nothing outside of it. cobel could literally be only ten years old or younger, for all we know.

and maybe harmony s. initially took the job because her husband, like how mark took the job because of gemma's death. but cobel can't remember this husband (or her mother, or family) at all - her obsession with both innie and outie mark comes from that empty space inside of her. a desire to understand what that love and that loss feels like, to understand the thought process of someone who would get severed because of it, and to understand how she feels about it. it would make her experiments on mark s. and miss kacey make total sense. she wants to see if you can make the innie remember.

if you wanted you could even connect her to reintegration - she knows it's possible because either she's looked into it herself or she started experiencing signs of it, after going without a switch for so long.

the theory that helly r. in s1e2 is actually helena is what started me thinking about this. if that's true, then they clearly have a way to alter the procedure somehow and make it so the brain doesn't switch. if they can do it one way, they can most definitely do it the other.

[gracefletcher]

So real

[hellyrossum]

i know we're basically all in agreement at this point post s2ep7 that lumon's ultimate goal with severance - which is to say, the current board's goal, led by jame eagan - is to eliminate all boring/uncomfortable/painful aspects of life from a person's concious/remebered experience, allowing them to live a blissful, unblemished life (a remedy for humanity)

and that obviously tracks with the initial premise of severing your time at work from the rest of your life, as well as the dieter story from s2ep4 (kier making up a twin to bear his shame)

but. i've been thinking about the saying embroidered on cobel's wall: "we must be cut in order to heal". an awareness that, yes, you must experience pain to become someone better. (she throws the cup at mark and says she hopes he learns from it.)

and, like, it's not that surprising if the evil cult corporation that's been around for nearly 200 years has contradictory principles/messaging. but, it's interesting that that counterexample comes from cobel, isn't it? when she is the one lumon person in s1 who believed in the possibility of reintegration? when she, in fact, seemed to be trying to trigger it with mark and gemma? gemma, who carries the burden of whatever cold harbor's completion will mean?

there's this interview patrica arquette gave where she suggested that cobel is loyal to an interpretation of the eagans' values that she feels jame and helena have strayed from. and now that we've seen the testing floor, and are about to get an episode focused on her...

maybe jame and the rest of those in power at lumon believe that an innie can take the cuts and the outie (the "real person") will benefit from the healing without ever having to know (how) they were hurt.

...but does harmony cobel believe that?

[whogirl42]

Me @ Ms Cobel all episode:

Honey sweetie babygirl LEAVE THE CULT!!!