The Severance Detail That Makes Rewatching Way More Rewarding

The puzzle box that is "Severance" has kept fans locked in from the very beginning. Even when the ending of "Severance" Season 1 left fans with a massive cliffhanger, they waited years to see what the show's creative team could cook up. The next season turned out to be worth the wait. We thought "Severance" Season 2 was the best mystery on TV, and we're desperately waiting right alongside for the story's next installment.

Luckily, rewatching the series is a great way to pass time while waiting for Season 3. Every episode of "Severance" is full of small details that shed light on the show's many mysteries. Fans have pored over background details and agonized over certain characters' word choices, hoping to find answers to the mysteries left at the end of season 2.

One of the most interesting hidden details in all of "Severance" gets snuck into the show's very first episode. Fans have noticed some inconsistencies in the story's timeline that raise questions about Lumon's real work with Mark and the overall setting of "Severance."

"Severance" introduces us to Mark (Adam Scott) on his very first day as chief of Macrodata Refinement. Outie Mark cries in his car before work, then Innie Mark starts his day by finding out his best friend has left Lumon. He gets his big promotion, helps orient Helly (Britt Lower) during her first day on the severance floor, and then goes home. At least, that's what the show seemingly wants us to believe, but fans have noticed some details hinting that much more may have happened to Mark on his first day as department chief.

Fans have paid special attention to the watch that Outie Mark removes before going to work. When he takes the watch off, it displays the time as being roughly 9 a.m. on the 4th of the month. At the end of the workday, when Mark pulls the watch out of his locker, it displays the time as being roughly 5 p.m. on the 5th. The date could be a continuity error from the show's production team, but some fans think that it's actually a quiet reveal that Lumon kept Mark trapped at work for 24 hours.

There's at least one corroborating detail for the theory. Mark argues with his neighbor Mrs. Selvig (Patricia Arquette) about their trash and recycling collection. He thinks that Mrs. Selvig has the pickup schedule wrong, but perhaps he's a day off because of the lost 24 hours. The reveal that Mrs. Selvig is actually Harmony Cobel from Lumon overshadows that whole recycling conversation in the show, but presumably the writers included that detail for a reason, and the reason may lay in that possible missing day.

Mark's missing day is the tip of an extremely large iceberg in "Severance." There's something deeply strange happening with time in the show, and whatever it is goes well beyond the walls of Lumon's office building. Fans have been talking about the show's setting for years, and many of them have noticed that "Severance" seems to be set in a strange, non-existent time period. Lumon is full of anachronistic technology, and some of that bleeds out into the rest of the town. Fans have noticed that everyone in Mark's area seems to drive old cars, even though Mark's birthday — 1978 — seemingly puts the show in our modern day world.

Series creator Dan Erickson has obliquely addressed the show's strange setting, telling The Wrap in a 2020 interview, "We sort of intentionally kept a lot of ambiguity to the time and place." He went on to talk about where "Severance" is filmed and said that the show purposefully avoided setting itself in a real place, and fans think there's a deeper reason for that.

Some fans have theorized that "Severance" takes place in an alternate timeline as a way of explaining all the out-of-place technology. Of course, the show itself hasn't provided any definite answers, but rewatching "Severance" while paying attention to all the timeline details makes for a unique experience.