Keanu Reeve’s Severance cameo fits a grand theory perfectly

The Season 2 premiere of Apple TV+ sci-fi thriller “Severance” gave his dedicated fans plenty of things to obsess over. Did Lumon really celebrate the four core members of the Macrodata Refinement unit for trying to rebel against their masters and speak the truth about the Innie world? What exactly happened in the outside world when people learned what it meant to be separated? All of these questions feed into the various fan theories people have about Severance and what its intense mythology means. Are the Innies unknowingly working on a way to transfer human consciousness from one body to another? Perhaps the goats shown in the first season are bred to take on the role of humans in the outside world. And so forth. But there is a specific theory: that the Innies are cogs in a large simulation that can affect both Innies And Outies – may have been given a little more weight thanks to an unexpected cameo in the premiere.

As fans already know, an important aspect of the episode comes in the form of a claymation shown to Mark and his classmates by Mr. Milchick. The purpose of the short animation is to convince the Innies that their act of rebellion was respected and welcomed by Lumon in the late episodes of the first season, told from the perspective of the Lumon Industries building itself. The building is voiced by none other than Keanu Reeves in an uncredited cameo. (Although his name doesn’t appear in the credits, his voice is almost immediately recognizable thanks to his many years as an A-list star.) It’s a pleasantly jarring moment, in part because modern popular culture doesn’t exist in “.” is often mentioned directly. Severance,” and partly because the first season didn’t feature many unexpected cameos from well-known actors. But aside from the fun of listening to the former John Wick deliver corporate jargon with a smile, there’s something else to consider: If you think this show is about characters in a simulation, who could do that notion better promote as the star? from “The Matrix”?

The entire concept of The Matrix is ​​based on the harrowing idea that the main character, employee Thomas Anderson, gradually becomes aware that the world he lives in, although seemingly normal, is a complete facade designed to lull humanity to sleep away from their true dystopian setting. In The Matrix there is no cult-like figure like Kier Eagan – rather Anderson himself, who transforms into the all-powerful Neo, is the closest thing to a cult-like figure in the non-simulated world. But it’s hard to shake those early images of Thomas before he becomes Neo, in a sterile office environment that creates the feeling that all is not well in his carefully crafted world. There are undoubtedly key differences between The Matrix and Severance, not least of which is that the former film wastes little time in making it clear to the audience that the “real” world isn’t real at all. Severance is a bold and unexpected series, but it probably won’t reveal its bottom line anytime soon in its second season (if at all this year).

Instead, “Severance” provides tidbits, creative breadcrumbs that are both detailed and vague enough to allow for all sorts of theories (and it does that so well in its short story). It’s easy to focus more on the claymation video itself and what Reeves is talking about than why he was chosen for the brief role. The language used in the video is enough to make the Innies’ heads spin, as Lumon tries to put a positive spin on their actions while they (and all of us in the audience) assumed they would be harshly punished for what they did would do. Reeves’ performance sometimes leans slightly toward the menacing, but for the most part it is intended to be cheerful and optimistic, concealing Lumon’s true intentions. If nothing else, the casting here feels like the equivalent of Pixar hiring Sigourney Weaver in WALL-E to voice a motherly-sounding computer system on a high-performance space cruise; In “Alien,” she no longer rebelled against such a maternal computer, but had become that computer herself. And now we have the man who fights the system and becomes the embodiment of the system itself.

Severance has proven to be full of surprises, finally returning after a painful three-year hiatus. Like some of the great genre TV shows, from “Twin Peaks” to “Lost,” The series seems to thrive on its most passionate fans trying to figure out what their endgame is. It was easy to reel in joy and horror at the fact that one of Hollywood’s most enduring modern stars lent his voice to the show for a few brief minutes, and because fans tend to theorize based on the tiniest bits of information, that’s just how it is It’s easy to imagine that the “Matrix” star’s appearance here is just a happy, if intentional, coincidence. But it doesn’t feel like a real coincidence that when the show’s creative team planned this, they wanted to bring in Neo, of all people, to deliver a message of supposed goodwill to a group of rebels.

Could it mean nothing at all that Keanu Reeves showed up to be that messenger? (Or, failing that, could it just be a fun connection, similar to the “WALL-E” example above?) Of course, but of the various fan theories circulating online, the idea is that Mark , Helly, Irving, and Dylan are all part of a massive simulation that potentially spans the innie and outie worlds simultaneously and already felt believable enough before we heard about Neo. (It’s also worth asking: Is Keanu still as famous in the world of this show as Keanu is here? Does The Matrix exist in this world? That might also open a strange little Pandora’s box of ideas.) As with much of “Severance payment” could mean nothing or everything. The possibilities are endless, as are the implications of such a notable cameo.

New episodes of the second season of “Severance” appear Fridays on Apple TV+.