• Dichen Lachman has theories about Gemma on "Severance" just like fans do.
• But Lachman told BI she's wary about reacting to any of the theories she sees online.
• As for what's ahead for Gemma in season three, Lachman says "the possibilities are really endless."

Yes, Dichen Lachman sees your "Severance" theories. And no, she won't be responding to any of them.

"Up until now, I've been scared to 'like' it in case they might think that that's a confirmation that they're correct or something," Lachman told Business Insider.

Keeping tight-lipped is tough work, especially when your character plays one of the most pivotal roles in Apple TV+'s hit workplace thriller. As Mark's (Adam Scott) wife Gemma, who is being held in captivity and experimented on at Lumon Industries, Lachman holds the key to the show's core mysteries.

Season two, episode seven of "Severance" finally showed us what was happening to Gemma on Lumon's mysterious testing floor while her husband's innie was toiling away at his "mysterious and important" macrodata refinement work on the severed floor: Mark was refining 25 different severed consciousnesses for his wife. After he's done, there will be no need for her to exist anymore.

The season two finale revolves around the rescue mission to free Gemma from Lumon, which seems successful in the end, with one major twist: After depositing Gemma outside Lumon's doors, Innie Mark opts to say inside with his love interest, Helly, rather than become his outie and join his wife.

The ending was a surprise to Lachman, who said she didn't even know that Gemma would ultimately escape Lumon at the start of filming "Severance" season two. Whereas the cast had scripts for all the episodes in season one in advance partially thanks to COVID shutdowns and other issues that stalled filming, much of season two "unfolded a bit more as we filmed," Lachman said.

But Lachman said knowing only what her character would know at any given moment was a good thing for her performance.

"Severance" creator Dan Erickson, the keeper of all Lumon's secrets, is "really good at just telling me what I need to know in order to be able to achieve what I need for the scene and the performance," she said.

"He's generous in telling you stuff that might not be on screen that's in the future," Lachman said of Erickson. "But then he also doesn't tell you things you don't really need to know, because they haven't happened yet, so it's not really serving the purpose of the scene."

For example, Lachman doesn't know exactly what would have happened to Gemma if Mark didn't rescue her after completing the Cold Harbor file — because Gemma herself didn't. Ditto what Emile the goat had to do with any of it.

She does, however, suggest that Gemma might not necessarily have been killed in a physical sense.

"In our show, death can mean different things. For example, when Ms. Casey walks out the door, she effectively dies. And Dr. Mauer calls out to Mark, 'You'll kill them all!' as he's trying to escape with Gemma," Lachman said. "Whether or not they were going to actually kill her physical body or not, I don't know if that was so important for me to understand, because the character doesn't know."

As for where Gemma goes from here in "Severance" season three — now that she's presumably freed from Lumon but without her husband, Lachman is as in the dark as everyone else.

"The possibilities are really endless," she said. "I'm sure it's something I haven't even possibly considered."

One thing she has considered is whether we'll see Ms. Casey, the Gemma innie we met first in season one, again. Lachman hopes so. "I love Ms. Casey," she said. "She was a very sweet character and I feel so much sadness for her."

She's also happy that Ms. Casey made a brief appearance in the finale when Gemma shifted back into her as she was kissing Mark in the elevator.

"I'm glad she got a little moment there to feel like she belonged, even though it's a peculiar situation for her," Lachman said. "She got a little excitement and a sense of belonging in those last few moments."

The first two seasons of "Severance" are now streaming on Apple TV+.

• "Severance" star Patricia Arquette said that Cobel has a "complicated relationship" with Mark and Gemma.
• She said her character's interest in them is "more than just scientific."
• "There's been a sentimental underpinning in that relationship that I think motivates her," Arquette hinted.

Warning: Major spoilers ahead for the "Severance" season two finale.

Season two of "Severance" is over, but there are still plenty of lingering questions yet to be addressed — like why Harmony Cobel is so fixated on Mark and Gemma Scout.

"I think it's a very complicated relationship that she has with Mark and Gemma, and she has always had something that's more than just scientific," Patricia Arquette, who stars as Cobel, told Business Insider's Samantha Rollins in a recent interview.

"There's been a sentimental underpinning in that relationship that I think motivates her," she continued. "That doesn't mean it can't be eclipsed by other things, or she minimizes that. I think there's been a lot of conflict she's had within her about Mark, and Mark and Gemma and Lumon."

In the Apple TV+ workplace thriller, Arquette portrays a mysterious and icy former floor manager of the severed division at the equally shadowy company Lumon.

Early in season two, it's revealed that Cobel was fired from Lumon in part because she posed as Ms. Selvig, Outie Mark's (Adam Scott) neighbor, and meddled in his personal life, which is against severance protocols.

Why exactly Cobel chose to defy the rules and be so involved, while likely aware of the consequences, has yet to be explained.

After being fired, Cobel spends much of season two with a chip on her shoulder. The Cobel-centric episode "Sweet Vitriol" fills in some gaps in her backstory, revealing that she invented the severance procedure, among other Lumon practices, but Jame Eagan took credit for it.

"To flesh out that part of Harmony that I think explains the coldness of Harmony, how her needs were not met in childhood, how much was taken from her, and how deep her relationship with Lumon goes," Arquette told BI of the episode.

Later, when Mark's sister Devon (Jen Tullock) calls Cobel for help after an issue with his reintegration process, which was intended to merge Innie Mark and Outie Mark, Cobel immediately springs into action.

Near the end of the season, she sneaks Mark and Devon into Lumon's severed birthing retreat so they can talk to Innie Mark and convince him of a plan to save Gemma (Dichen Lachman).

Although Innie Gemma is known as Ms. Casey, in the real world, she's Mark's wife who was believed to have died in a car crash. Instead, Lumon has been holding her hostage for two years and using Innie Mark and the Macrodata Refinement (MDR) team to code multiple severed versions of Gemma.

Like fans, Arquette said she still has plenty of questions about Cobel and Lumon as a whole. Whether she's bluffing is unclear, but "Severance" creator Dan Erickson was just as tight-lipped about Cobel's interest in Mark and Gemma and whether their bond is potentially familial.

"All that I'll say is I think it's a big question throughout the series how earnest her affection is for Mark," Erickson told BI.

"I think that Cobel is somebody who's had to wear a lot of masks in her life and she has had to sort of spin a certain identity for herself given her place at Lumon," he said. "And when we see her in season one as Mrs. Selvig, she is playing a role, but the question is always sort of which 'mask' is more real, which mask is more true to who she actually is? And Mrs. Selvig really cares for Mark and Ms. Cobel doesn't seem to."

A third season of "Severance" is already confirmed to be in the works, and would likely reveal more about Cobel's true motivations.

"I think that who we care about in life is a big reflection on our identity and who we are," Erickson said. "So this question of does she actually care for Mark on a personal level or is it a professional thing, pokes at the question of who she is deep, deep down inside."

The "Severance" season two finale is now streaming on Apple TV+.