An Ode to Severance’s Messieurs Milchick, Scout and iDylan G
Something that stunned me while watching Severance was the incremental increase in the attractiveness of two male characters – Mr. Milchick and Mark Scout, aka outie Mark.
The men themselves, and their characters initially were not particularly attractive to me. They weren’t unattractive either, just unremarkable. However, as the show progressed, their performance, not their acting performance, although that’s exactly what it is, but their performance of manhood imprinted on me.
What do I mean by this?
Milcheck comes across as a 1970s, blaxploitation character. Super thick mustache, low well-coiffed fro, fitted short-sleeved shirts highlighting broad shoulders, biceps and pecs. Honestly, he looks like an office version of Apollo Creed. A working man with a decent job. Nothing spectacular, nothing exceptional, nothing remarkable. Until he speaks or shares his smile. As time goes on, we witness his support of his staff. Before long, his effort to implement kindness initiatives against executive management’s guidance puts him in heartthrob territory.
Hollywood has been doing it wrong all these years with the sex appeal bit. Yeah, it’s nice to see half-dressed men jogging now and then, but the image fades quickly. I can’t think of anything more attractive than a self-aware, vulnerable man who prioritizes care for those in his charge. Severance gave this to us in multiple characters in different ways.
For middle manager Milchick, his expressed care for his employees made him a fan favorite for men and women.
Who knew that a man being present, available, approachable, supportive, kind, extremely articulate, and most of all being fully aware (and expressive) of his emotional state would be attractive?
We don’t know who Milchick is in his personal life, yet. But we can see shadows of his struggle. His shadows are overwhelmed by his belief in the dogma of the company he works for. We see him first as an assistant manager, then as a floor manager managing an unknown area of space, people, and projects. Despite the limited knowledge of Milchick, we know enough to admire and root for him. Also, what we know about the overall environment he’s operating in tells us he’s an exceptional human being. His treatment of the severed workers, people with no memory, knowledge, or understanding of who they are in the world, makes him stand out. They come to him as child-like charges, blank slates that he trains in their work life.
Perhaps he does see himself as a father figure of sorts….
He takes his responsibilities as a manager very much to heart. He wants to be friendly, but not a friend. He wants to be approachable, but not a pushover. He wants his team to enjoy the work and the environment they exist in. Milchick is trying to function differently within the space he finds himself in. That in itself is a beautiful thing. He’s not just a black man in a white world. He’s a black man in the white family-run corporate cult that’s attempting to dominate the world. His fallacy to them is his desire to be humane to everyone.
Throughout the second season, we see his need to express kindness is at odds with his need to assert his independent thoughts. The workers and executives make it clear he is not one of them. He’s in his own category, standing alone. As he becomes more aware of this, his personality, language, and tone begin to shift. The subtle way he’s riding the line of self-possession and company loyalist while asserting his manliness, blackness, and viewpoint within a corporate structure that is trying to belittle and demean him consistently in the performance of his duties, is art. [The way Tramell Tillman performs this role is art, and it’s magnificent to be able to see the subtle changes in face and body language as he navigates these scenes.]
What the company derogatorily calls his “kindness initiatives” are things that are being taken advantage of, unfortunately. However, that doesn’t reflect badly on Milchick. It doesn’t reflect badly on the people taking advantage of him either, because they are only trying to learn more about who they are. And why they are. Milchick’s kindness initiatives are the things that endear him to the audience, while making him more untrustworthy to his employees. No matter what his personal story becomes, viewers don’t want to hate him for being part of the Lumon conglomerate.
I don’t think there is a black person in America or any predominantly white country, who wouldn’t understand the dynamics playing out in Milchick’s story. The intentional disrespect from all directions within a corporate structure that doesn’t intend for him to excel beyond middle management is well known.
Everyone in the show thinks his kindness is weakness. They don’t care that he loves the company, its founder, and their values. He respects them. He honors them. He holds them sacred. In the second season, he learns they do not respect, honor, or hold him sacred. This is the source of Milchick’s shifting. The beauty of the character is his internal conflict, emotional conflict, self-awareness, awareness of environment, and awareness of nuance. His measured response to all of this as a fully functioning human is amazing to watch.
Mr. Scout / Outie Mark
Then there’s Mark Scout who’s drowning in alcohol and grief. He entered the Severance Program to avoid thinking about the death of his wife.
His sadness is overwhelming. His depression cries for relief, grace, assistance, and understanding. Unfortunately, his attitude is off-putting and prickly, so he’s mostly left isolated.
Initially, there’s nothing attractive or remotely interesting about the character, Mr. Mark Scout/outie Mark. Not his personality, presence, or interactions. Outie Mark was played so well, viewers didn’t realize how we were set up to want to fight for this man eventually.
All of season 1, outie Mark was just a depressed man struggling through his days. The first half of season 2 centered innie Mark and his blossoming life. Then we were gifted a flashback of outie Mark pre-grief. Chikhai Bardo (s2e7) is one of the best episodes of television ever. Amazing cinematography, imagery, storytelling, and world presentation. This one episode reset and repositioned the main character from a grieving grouch to a sympathetic bleeding heart. The episode told the lifecycle of Mark and Gemma’s love story from the moment they met to the evening she died, presented in the halcyon mist of a dream.
That Mark who met, loved and lived with Gemma, was a joyfully beautiful man. What made him so attractive? His openness to life and love. He was all in from the first moment. He was attentive, communicative, engaging, present, and somewhat bashful. He was alive, truly living in his joy.
Following that glimpse into outie Mark pre-grief, Mark’s whole character. was re-evaluated as someone who had actually been fully emotionally aware from the beginning of the series. In his deep sorrow, he was aware of what he could and couldn’t handle on his own. After a couple of years of grieving, he gave up trying to cope on his own. He knew the totality of what he had lost and he was sitting in it daily.
I saw his detachment differently. Rather than being an intentional grouch, his self-awareness and self-preservation are visible in his behavior. The audience can see how he understands himself and the world he occupies, as well as the stories he had accepted as truth. His belief in that truth led to the self-medication of alcohol.
Everyone experiences forms of detachment within their relationships. Few people are willing to confront themselves about the why, impact and solutions to emotional detachment. oMark eventually gets to a point where he confronts himself, his sister, and his boss. The way he confronts his understanding of the reasons behind his choices, is what led to that incremental perception of attractiveness of Mr. Scout.
Please note here, iDylan/Dylan G, innie, not the outie Dylan, pulled my heartstrings the most with one line.
SPOILER! Innie Dylan has the biggest, life-altering moments of emotional intelligence that alter his world perception and behavior. If you haven’t seen it by now, I’m sorry, but I’m trying not to give too much of the plot away. The innies know nothing of their outlie lives. The innie existence is basically Monday through Friday, 9:00am-5:00pm. All they know is their work, and co-workers. They don’t know if they have families, friends or anything about the outside world. They don’t know where they live, how they live, what they live for.
iDylan’s basic character is about being a top performer at work. He’s been awarded as such for multiple quarters. He’s super proud, cocky, and brash about his reward-worthy top tier performance.
He showed off his whole desk drawer collection of finger puppets during the first episode of the series. He talked about how winning games and toys was evidence of his superior skills in meeting department quotas. This acclaim defined him as a top data refiner. Yes, his job was sorting through data all day. And no one could tell him nothing.
At the end of season one, something happens where iDylan becomes aware that he has a child in the world. In that moment, he instantly begins rebelling against the system. Up to this point, his incentives at work were Inconsequential things with no value other than what he applied to them.
Milchick tries to pull him back by bribing iDylan with more meaningless things. “Dylan G, if you do this, I’ll give you things you can’t imagine! I have cozies for your coffee cup!. What about a waffle party? How does that sound?”
However, the moment he becomes aware that he is a father, his whole personality and outlook changed. He was no longer satisfied sitting in an office all day, earning a finger puppet for his time, skills, and outputs. iDylan screamed at Milchick from the pit of everything in him, “I want to remember my child being born!”
Unfortunately, that’s not part of the Severance Program. Remembering is not a benefit; not remembering is the benefit of Severance.
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Overall, I see Severance as men being men in varying relationships and situational dynamics. The sacredness and universality of men embodying manhood and emotional vulnerability, where they are. Undiluted maleness that’s not in doubt or watered down; that’s not commercial, shallow, or one-dimensional. Most importantly, it’s about everyday manliness that’s not predicated or framed by physical violence. For 95% of the series, there is no violence on screen.
There are hints of it, there’s speculation that things are happening in the background. There’s an understanding that that some physicality may have happened or will happen, but we aren’t seeing men beat up men or women. The maleness of this show is not based on overpowering physical forms. I think that’s one of the beautiful things about it. We aren’t seeing what Hollywood historically gives us as “manliness” – muscled arms, barreled chests, six-pack bellies, vain-popped necks. Half-naked men wielding guns and knives, pounding people to pulp. All that traditional Hollywood maleness is absent from Severance.
Severance gives us a range of emotional awareness and vulnerability in fully grown and developed men. How refreshing! Not men trying to be boys or superheroes. Men who care about their real identity, performance, showing up, being who they say they are, honoring their manhood, spouses, families, friends, and co-workers. They’re living the fullest lives they know how to live and striving to improve themselves as they become more aware of what’s missing.
Severance is showing the world men who hide to avoid pain. Men reaching in to pull the hiders out so they can be comforted in their pain. We’re shown men in the midst of realizing their true value is not as workers, but as husbands, fathers, brothers, friends, and mentors. Their true value is just being who they are. Existing fully in their skin.
We haven’t seen anything like this on television that I can recall. Well, maybe one exception – Tony Danza in “Who’s the boss?” I’ll have to re-watch the series to say for sure. But overall, the men of Severance show so many different stages of vulnerability, identity, personality, and humanity, it’s absolutely beautiful to watch.
Have you watched the first two seasons? What do you think?
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Source: https://harvest-life.org/2025/06/25/severance-the-attractiveness-of-character-and-performance/
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