- “Severance” star Patricia Arquette said that Cobel has a “complicated relationship” with Mark and Gemma.
- She said her character’s interest in them is “more than just scientific.”
- “There’s been a sentimental underpinning in that relationship that I think motivates her,” Arquette hinted.
Warning: Major spoilers ahead for the “Severance” season two finale.
Season two of “Severance” is over, but there are still plenty of lingering questions yet to be addressed — like why Harmony Cobel is so fixated on Mark and Gemma Scout.
“I think it’s a very complicated relationship that she has with Mark and Gemma, and she has always had something that’s more than just scientific,” Patricia Arquette, who stars as Cobel, told Business Insider’s Samantha Rollins in a recent interview.
“There’s been a sentimental underpinning in that relationship that I think motivates her,” she continued. “That doesn’t mean it can’t be eclipsed by other things, or she minimizes that. I think there’s been a lot of conflict she’s had within her about Mark, and Mark and Gemma and Lumon.”
In the Apple TV+ workplace thriller, Arquette portrays a mysterious and icy former floor manager of the severed division at the equally shadowy company Lumon.
Early in season two, it’s revealed that Cobel was fired from Lumon in part because she posed as Ms. Selvig, Outie Mark’s (Adam Scott) neighbor, and meddled in his personal life, which is against severance protocols.
Why exactly Cobel chose to defy the rules and be so involved, while likely aware of the consequences, has yet to be explained.
After being fired, Cobel spends much of season two with a chip on her shoulder. The Cobel-centric episode “Sweet Vitriol” fills in some gaps in her backstory, revealing that she invented the severance procedure, among other Lumon practices, but Jame Eagan took credit for it.
“To flesh out that part of Harmony that I think explains the coldness of Harmony, how her needs were not met in childhood, how much was taken from her, and how deep her relationship with Lumon goes,” Arquette told BI of the episode.
Later, when Mark’s sister Devon (Jen Tullock) calls Cobel for help after an issue with his reintegration process, which was intended to merge Innie Mark and Outie Mark, Cobel immediately springs into action.
Near the end of the season, she sneaks Mark and Devon into Lumon’s severed birthing retreat so they can talk to Innie Mark and convince him of a plan to save Gemma (Dichen Lachman).
Although Innie Gemma is known as Ms. Casey, in the real world, she’s Mark’s wife who was believed to have died in a car crash. Instead, Lumon has been holding her hostage for two years and using Innie Mark and the Macrodata Refinement (MDR) team to code multiple severed versions of Gemma.
Like fans, Arquette said she still has plenty of questions about Cobel and Lumon as a whole. Whether she’s bluffing is unclear, but “Severance” creator Dan Erickson was just as tight-lipped about Cobel’s interest in Mark and Gemma and whether their bond is potentially familial.
“All that I’ll say is I think it’s a big question throughout the series how earnest her affection is for Mark,” Erickson told BI.
“I think that Cobel is somebody who’s had to wear a lot of masks in her life and she has had to sort of spin a certain identity for herself given her place at Lumon,” he said. “And when we see her in season one as Mrs. Selvig, she is playing a role, but the question is always sort of which ‘mask’ is more real, which mask is more true to who she actually is? And Mrs. Selvig really cares for Mark and Ms. Cobel doesn’t seem to.”
A third season of “Severance” is already confirmed to be in the works, and would likely reveal more about Cobel’s true motivations.
“I think that who we care about in life is a big reflection on our identity and who we are,” Erickson said. “So this question of does she actually care for Mark on a personal level or is it a professional thing, pokes at the question of who she is deep, deep down inside.”
The “Severance” season two finale is now streaming on Apple TV+.
