Last week, Severance revealed more about what Gemma (Dichen Lachman) has been experiencing behind Lumon’s tightly controlled white walls. She has been subjected to a series of experiments, each linked to different projects that the Macrodata Refinement team is working on. However, no one fully understands what these experiments mean or what their purpose is.
At the same time, Devon (Jen Tullock) has been pushing to involve Harmony Cobel (Patricia Arquette) in their plan to help Mark (Adam Scott) reintegrate. Dr. Reghabi (Karen Aldridge) strongly opposes this idea, warning that Cobel is completely loyal to Lumon.
“She’s Lumon through and through,” Reghabi tells Devon. “She was raised by them, she’s a soldier!” It turns out that Reghabi’s words are more accurate than anyone realized.
Cobel’s Mysterious Trip to Salt’s Neck
Cobel takes a trip to a quiet, snow-covered town called Salt’s Neck. The area has beaches, rocky hills, and old, broken-down buildings. She makes a stop to brush her teeth and notices a man inside a ruined vehicle trying to stay warm. He appears to be inhaling something from a bag. Cobel ignores him and gets back in her car, refusing to answer a call from Devon.
She drives to a small, local coffee shop called the Drippy Pot Café. When she enters, the owner, a man named Hampton (James Le Gros), looks at her with shock and frustration. There is clear tension between them, but the reason is unclear at first.
Hampton approaches Cobel’s table and greets her with a sarcastic remark: “Harmony Cobel. Well, flip my toboggan.” Their conversation is short but intense. Cobel mentions that the town looks older and more rundown than before.
Hampton responds with a bitter explanation about the town’s economic struggles: “Well, with the market readjustment from a few years ago and the fluctuating interest rates, there was a retrenchment from some of the core infrastructure investments.”
Ignoring his irritation, Cobel tells Hampton she needs a favor. She asks him to meet her at “the factory” before leaving the café. Hampton reluctantly follows her in an old, battered truck, driving to an abandoned Lumon Industries factory. When they step out of their vehicles, the tension between them grows.
“You know how messed up it is to ask me to come here?” Hampton says angrily. “I need you to drive me to Sissy’s,” Cobel responds.
A Troubled Past Comes to the Surface
At first, Hampton refuses. However, Cobel points out that Lumon might be watching the house and would recognize her car. Her words unsettle him. He asks how much trouble she is in, and she simply replies, “Enough.”
Hampton reminds Cobel that Sissy, the woman she plans to visit, still follows Kier Eagan’s Nine Core Principles: Vision, Verve, Wit, Cheer, Humility, Benevolence, Nimbleness, Probity, and Wiles. Cobel already knows this. Hampton warns her that Sissy is considered an outcast in the town.
“You can stay in the truck,” Cobel says. “I just need to get something.” Hampton is reluctant. “Why would I help you with anything?” he asks.
Cobel straightened up and looked at him directly. “We were once friends,” she says. “Old colleagues help each other.” Hampton scoffs. “Colleagues? Child labor.”
Cobel glances at the abandoned factory and repeats an old Lumon saying: “Kier and Imogene met at the Ether Mill, you know that?” She and Hampton exchange more bitter remarks, but she refuses to argue further.
“You can help me or not,” she says. “But I won’t be your punching bag for old grudges.”
Cobel’s Confrontation With Her Past
Hampton drives his truck through the bleak surroundings of Salt’s Neck. Cobel hides under a blanket in the back, still ignoring calls from Devon. When they arrive, Hampton checks the area before helping Cobel out. “Tell her to drop dead for me,” he says as she approaches the house.
An elderly woman in white opens the door. She is Celestine “Sissy” Cobel (Jane Alexander), Harmony’s aunt. “You are not welcome here,” Sissy says coldly.
Cobel ignores her and walks inside. She enters a small, bare bedroom with height markings on the doorframe that stop at age 12. This was her childhood room. There is almost nothing inside—just a bed without sheets, a small table, and some old curtains.
Sissy shouts from downstairs, complaining about Hampton. “I don’t want that huff peddler on my property!” Cobel fires back. “You gave him that addiction!”
Cobel searches for something and tries to open a locked door. When she demands her old belongings, Sissy tells her they were given away. Cobel also asks if anyone has contacted the house. Sissy mentions a Mr. Drummond (Ólafur Darri Ólafsson), but refuses to say what he wanted. Instead, she asks Cobel, “What have you done, little mouse?”
Cobel grows furious. She pulls the phone out of the wall and demands the key to her mother’s room. Sissy refuses, saying, “The room stays shut until all who remember her sit with Kier.”
The two argue about their past, including how Sissy handled Cobel’s dying mother. Cobel accuses Sissy of pulling out her mother’s breathing tube. Sissy responds, “There was gratitude in her eyes to be freed from her suffering. If only she had been a believer, perhaps she would have found peace in the Nine.”
Cobel’s Shocking Discovery
Cobel finally finds the key to her mother’s locked room. Inside, she sees a simple bed, old clothes, and a framed picture of herself in a school uniform. Overcome with emotion, she pulls out a breathing tube she had been holding and places it back in her mother’s ventilator. She lies down, breathes through it, and cries in the dark.
Later, Hampton comes inside, arguing with Sissy. “You’ve no salvation here, you blighted snuff slave,” Sissy spits.
“Back off, or I’ll put you in the bay,” Hampton threatens. Cobel wakes up and says she needs to find something. Hampton sits beside her. For the first time, they share a moment of genuine understanding.
“You wanna get high?” Hampton asks. He takes out a bottle of ether, soaks a rag, and inhales. He coughs but starts laughing. Cobel inhales too. She doesn’t cough or laugh but admits, “I haven’t done this since I was eight.”
Cobel looks through the house’s storage and finds an old yearbook from the Myrtle Eagan School for Girls. She was valedictorian and the Goat Husbandry Club President. She also won the Wintertide Fellowship for the Year of Wiles. Inside the award, she finds a hidden journal filled with blueprints and formulas.
Cobel’s Role in Lumon’s Dark History
Cobel confronts Sissy one last time. She reveals that Lumon destroyed Salt’s Neck by shutting down its factory. Sissy disagrees, saying Lumon built the town in the first place.
Cobel then shakes the journal in Sissy’s face. “Mine! My designs! Circuit blueprint, base code, overtime contingency, Glasgow Block, all of it!”
Sissy insists that Jame Eagan was the real inventor. Cobel says she was forced to give up credit or be banished. When Sissy tries to burn the journal, Cobel saves it and wishes Sissy a painful death.
As Cobel drives away, Devon finally reaches her. Cobel is stunned to hear that Mark is reintegrating.
“Tell me everything,” she says, disappearing into the night. Now that her past is exposed, Cobel may be more than just a floor manager. She might become Lumon’s greatest enemy.
Harmony Cobel’s Dark Past and Its Connection to Lumon – Summary
In Severance Season 2, Harmony Cobel’s past reveals shocking truths about Lumon Industries. She visits her childhood town, Salt’s Neck, a once-thriving Lumon factory town now in ruins.
Cobel seeks help from an old acquaintance, Hampton, to visit her estranged aunt, Celestine “Sissy” Cobel. Their tense reunion uncovers painful memories of Harmony’s youth, where she was raised under Lumon’s strict ideology.
Inside her old home, Cobel finds hidden documents proving she helped design key Severance technology, including overtime contingency and Glasgow Block. However, Lumon erased her contributions and credited Jame Eagan instead. She also learns that Sissy was a devoted follower of Kier Eagan’s Nine Core Principles, further deepening Cobel’s resentment.
Emotionally overwhelmed, Cobel relives her traumatic childhood, inhaling ether—a drug linked to Lumon’s early experiments. She then confronts Sissy, exposing Lumon’s destruction of Salt’s Neck. When Sissy attempts to burn the hidden documents, Cobel saves them, solidifying her potential shift from Lumon loyalist to its most dangerous enemy.
Meanwhile, Devon reaches Cobel with urgent news—Mark is reintegrating. Cobel’s expression changes, and she demands to know everything. This revelation sets up a dramatic shift in her role. Will she continue serving Lumon, or will she help Mark and his allies take down the company?
New episodes of Severance Season 2 stream every Friday on Apple TV+.
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