‘Severance’ brought us the love story Adam Scott was made for
Adam Scott is television’s greatest yearner and Severance is no difference. But in season 2, episode 7 titled “Chikhai Bardo” we got to really see how Scott’s years of television work led to his best role yet.
I can say that as a woman who has a cat named Benjamin Wyatt the cat. As much as I love Scott’s work in comedies like Party Down and Parks and Recreation, I do love when he gets to take a more serious approach to a character. That’s where he gets to shine in Severance. In “Chikhai Bardo,” we get to see a flashback of Mark Scout’s relationship with Gemma (Dichen Lachman) and what led to him at Lumon.
What worked for me about this episode wasn’t just answers that we’ve been waiting for but more that we got to see Adam Scott as his charming and quirky self, the man so many of us fell in love with way back on Boy Meets World and beyond. But what made this episode so special to me was that it showed how Severance was using Scott’s appeal in the past.
Seeing Adam Scott completely clean shaven and with longer hair was jarring to me in season 1 of Severance. That’s not what I’m used to with him and even in films like The Vicious Kind, when Scott had longer hair, he still had a beard and had moments where he looked like the Adam Scott I’ve loved for more than half of my life.
Severance was giving us something completely new from him both in appearance and when it came to the type of roles Scott usually takes on. So when season 2 of Severance kicked off, I was used to “Mark S.” as he was. Then came episode 7.
Oh you sneaky little devils
I’ve written in the past how the Helly R. (Britt Lower) and Mark S. romance got ruined for me with the Helena Eagan meddling. I was fine with the idea of Mark S. finding love while Mark Scout was grieving but then Helena knowing she was not Helly R. and sleeping with Mark made the entire thing icky to me.
This episode reminded me that the ick I felt with the Mark/Helena/Helly side of things was, in part, intentional and that we were supposed to be grieving Mark’s loss of Gemma with him. There was a lot to unpack within this episode about love, loss, and everything that Gemma and Mark were going through as a couple.
But to me, all of that worked because they allowed Scott to play Mark as a charming man who would flirt and smile and tease the woman he loved and those are all qualities that Adam Scott characters from the past had that made me love them. There is a smile that Adam Scott reserves for his characters falling in love and it took these moments between Mark Scout and Gemma for me to recognize it.
So this episode of Severance meant a lot to me and is just another example of why Adam Scott is and has always been one of our best actors. No one shows a man falling in love quite like he does and it means the world to me!
Have a tip we should know? [email protected]
