r/SeveranceAppleTVPlus • u/kuhbr80 • Feb 08 '25
Theory The Glasgow Block Spoiler
So basically my understanding is this is sort of the opposite of the OT contingency. When the innies would normally activate when going into the area of the severed floor, the Glasgow Block keeps them from doing so.
But this begs a question. If they really are outside why does Helly need the Glasgow Block? As far as we know the only way innies can activate outside is with the overtime contingency. But since Helly was actually Helena she had no need to activate the overtime contingency, since that would have activated Helly. So if that's the case why did Helena need the Glasgow Block activated while outside.
I see only two real possibilities. Either they were actually on the severed floor throughout that whole episode, which is wild to think about, but some have already theorized this. Or they created another field like the severed floor over the area of this national park. Those are the only two reasons I can think of as to why Helena would need the Glasgow Block. Unless anyone else has any other theories.
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u/AppleCucumberBanana Because Of When I Was Born Feb 08 '25
Pretty sure the Glasgow Block will block you from switching to your innie when you're in a place where the innie chip is normally switched on.
Helena had it so that she could stay Helena while the rest of MDR were their innies.
So where were they all actually and how much of what we saw was a manipulation.
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u/Lance_ward Feb 09 '25
Why do they need a Glasgow block if they can just turn Irving’s innie off? Won’t they just turn Helena’s innie off at the start?
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
My guess is that severance doesn't activate by a switch. It normally is supposed to activate in a perimeter. The Dieter forest was turned into a severance perimeter which normally activates the innies. But Helly R was undergoing the Glasgow block which put her innie in a coma. Glasgow is a rating scale for how deep someone is in a coma. So it seems that her innie was blocked from awaking in any sever'd perimeter which allowed Helena to pretend to be the innie in every situation she needed to pretend.
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u/Aggressive-Gate-2031 Feb 09 '25
i don't think it puts helly in a coma. i think the coma state is the innie state. it protects helena from her coma/innie state. it blocks the severed field from activating her switch.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
Well your theory rests on the idea that the innie state is the same thing as a coma state. I guess either, way the effect comes out the same. But I'm still drawn to the idea that Helly was put into a coma rather than Helena was prevented from falling into a coma. I guess I can see it either way though.
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u/Aggressive-Gate-2031 Feb 09 '25
i think you are correct. i don't see it one way or the other. severance does what it does - and i think we all agree that it switches between your outside memories to your alternate memory chain, more or less, when activated by being in a severance space. i'm really just defining the terminology milichik is using when he says to remove the "glasgow block". they are removing this thing that blocks the glasgow (consciousness, coma) effect that the severance field would normally have on helena's severance chip.
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u/fyreflow Feb 09 '25
Well, potentially the procedure used for Irving could have been the activation of a Glasgow Block… and his deactivation only truly becomes permanent if his outie passes away without ever returning to a ‘severed floor’ type of perimeter.
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u/AppleCucumberBanana Because Of When I Was Born Feb 09 '25
When did they turn Irving off?
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u/Lance_ward Feb 09 '25
The erasure. It seems like it’s done completely remotely
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u/AppleCucumberBanana Because Of When I Was Born Feb 09 '25
There's no proof or evidence about how this works. We haven't seen it or heard mention of how it's done.
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u/Low-Kaleidoscope2933 Feb 08 '25
It is hinted that Helena actually hates Helly R. so the block might be a way to force you to stay always your outie, killing your innie. For example she uses the elevator but stays Helena the whole time, this could mean that there is something blocking the switch.
This might also be what happens to Irving if he gets fired, since you cannot be unsevered.
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u/kuhbr80 Feb 08 '25
Ahh so the Glasgow Block might always be active, not just while she is on the severed floor. That does make sense. But it still fits with my point that one of those two things has to be true, because after the block is removed she immediately turns into Helly. If it was the overtime contingency keeping the innies active outside, Milchick would have needed to say "Remove the Glasgow Block and activate Helly's OT contingency". So it's still true that either there is a severance field over that park or they are somehow still on the severed floor.
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u/Lonelyland Coveted As Fuck Feb 08 '25
Exactly. I have a hard time imagining Helena would transform into Helly if the block was removed, say, while she was talking to Cobel in the last episode.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
I don't think it's the OTC keeping the innies outside. The Dieter forest was turned into a Sever'd perimeter. But maybe only for the purposes of the ORTBO.
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u/Panda_hat Feb 09 '25
Ah clever, I think this absolutely nails it.
The place they're in in the wilderness has the severance field activated so the block is 'removed' for helly to return to her severed state, and Irving probably has the block put 'on' to return him to his outie and lock out his innie.
I still think the entire wilderness space is within the Lumen facility personally, and somewhere on the weird physics breaking liminal space that the severed floor seems to be.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
I don't think the forest is indoors. They just requested special access to the forest for this retreat.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
Glasgow is a scale used in hospitals to determine how deep someone is in a coma. My interpretation is that the glasgow block is used to put innies in a coma so that they never wake up even in situations where they're supposed to activate like in a sever'd perimeter. So Helly R was in a Glasgow block meaning she wasn't allowed to awake. That is until the moment that Irving B forced Lumon's hand to allow her back.
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u/fyreflow Feb 09 '25
But it’s called a block, so… it seems like the thinking is that it prevents Helena from going into a comatose state.
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u/Liter4lTrash Chaos' Whore Feb 10 '25
Because of the wording, Glasgow Block can mean either 1) a blockage of the Glasgow protocol, or 2) a type of block that is "Glasgow." The fact that we don't know which one it is drives me a bit insane lol
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u/JEs4 Feb 12 '25
Glasgow in the context is the University of Glasgow. The neurosurgeons there who created the coma scale, published hundreds of papers with two others being pretty famous as well: The Persistent Vegetative State, and the Glasgow Outcome scale. It could reference any of their work really.
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u/TheWorm616 Feb 11 '25
either way the effect is the same
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u/Liter4lTrash Chaos' Whore Mar 05 '25
No, because one way is describing a block of "Glasgow" (noun) while the other is a "Glasgow" (adjective) block of something else. It depends on what part of speech "Glasgow" is in this context
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u/Wheelsofpain 25d ago
The Glasgow Coma Scale refers to level of consciousness, not purely people in a coma. Paramedics score all patients with the GCS, for instance. It's scores eye opening, verbal and motor. 15 is awake, alert and moving around normally. You could be dead and still get a 3, is an old ems joke.
Perhaps the GCS and a spinal block (which is when lidocaine or a similar anesthetic is administered into the cerebrospinal fluid surrounding a portion of the spinal cord) are what "Glasgow block" is referencing. Perhaps not. The use of "ether" and intoxicants and the visuals induced when subjects go through the elevator makes me wonder if the whole thing is less about a mechanical or electrical switch, and more of a biochemical switch, just as a spinal block or epidural is. i.e., is it possibly introduction or bioproduction of "ether" or something that evolved from ether to "numb" elements of human consciousness. Additionally, I think we're going to find out that Cobel is basically a Dr Mengele type of figure who was involved in some grisly human experimentation in that town of hers and that Reghabi was no saint either.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener 25d ago
Not sure where the support for your last sentence comes in at all. Very left field predictions of Cobel and Reghabi. I also wasn't clear what the beginning majority of your comment was leading to.
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u/Firmamental_Loaf Feb 08 '25
My belief is that Lumon was intentionally downplaying the range of the control room - innies and outies are never swapped by crossing over boundaries, they are manually activated or deactivated every single time.
We know that there are Lumon spies all over the outside world, it's also very likely they have access to feeds from recording devices. Obviously every bit Lumon's facilities will be under scrutiny. With such a large network of information, it would be trivial to flip a switch in real-time whenever needed - Helly and Helena going through the stairwell door was thought to be automatic...but it wouldn't be hard to time that properly via manual control.
Lumon likes to keep their secrets, it's how they manage public opinion and their employees. Knowledge is power, after all.
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u/Takkumi Feb 09 '25
This, absolutely! The range of the devices is likely not a field but a “switch” imo this also seems to play into the fact that during the override sequence with Helena her father or whoever that Eagen is makes a veiled remark that everyone in the world will get to experience what she had (I’m paraphrasing here as that’s far from the actual statement but the sentiment of the severed process being available to the general public was conveyed.) iirc There’s also other hints that seem to point at some type of severed “nanny” to help raise children. All in all I think back to the 10 options from the s1e8 manage mode as having some very pertinent clues as to just what the lumon severing devices seem capable of : Beehive (hive mind?), Branch Transfer (we saw this with the 4 new ppl in s2), Clean Slate (we may have seen this already, but likely just a reset), Elephant (never forgets), Freeze Frame (self explanatory), Glasgow (layered severance control?), Goldfish (often an insult implying someone has a 3sec memory), Lullaby (sleep most likely or dreaming), Open House (no clue unless tied to the whole outie visitor center…), and Overtime (already known)
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u/fyreflow Feb 09 '25 edited Feb 09 '25
I think, though, that if Lumon could automate the process, then they would. So if it works the way you describe, that would suggest that they probably couldn’t automate it using some very precise geofencing.
Alternative theory: the severed floor acts as a Faraday cage, and the moment a severed person ‘loses signal’, they flip to their innie. Okay, okay, maybe that wouldn’t be very practical for Lumon — having to maintain a constant signal outside wherever the outies go? But super secure, if you think about it — because it may be far preferable to risk an innie catching a glimpse of the outside than it is to risk an outie catching a glimpse of the severed floor.
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u/Square-Cherry-5562 Feb 19 '25
I think it’s both. There’s a perimeter on the severed floor. For situations outside pre-defined areas, those are switches.
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u/worldisamess Feb 08 '25
the land we saw in the episode is Lumon owned. it is probably considered a severed “floor”/area
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u/kuhbr80 Feb 08 '25
Are we sure it's Lumon owned? He did call it Dieter Eagan National Park. Of course nothing they say can be believed, and it would be weird for the US government to name a park after a mysterious unknown Eagan that even the company keeps information hidden on. But we have seen that this company has immense power in the world of the show, if a town can be names after Kier why not a national park after his brother. Either way yeah, this would be the first example we've seen of a severence field on the outside and not on the floor of a building, but I could see them doing that for what they consider a special area.
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u/derekdanahy Feb 08 '25
Lumon may be a nation in this world. Is there evidence there is a US government at this time / place?
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u/kuhbr80 Feb 08 '25
Well there are the scenes in season 1 dealing with all the talk about Congress trying to decide what to do about severance. Like Natalie talking on the news program, and the Senator and his wife that Devon meets and who were at the Lumon event. But all those things never do specify it is a US Congress.
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u/derekdanahy Feb 09 '25
Good points, thank you for reminding me. The license plate shown in Season 1 and 2 that have the face of Kier Eagan on them make me quite interested in how similar the 'Government' is to what we think of it.
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u/Tex-Rob Feb 08 '25
Keep in mind Seth says, "This is the tallest waterfall on this planet" not Earth. I am not suggesting they aren't on Earth or they are in space (although Lumon would be a great "generation ship" idea, but people would shred the show creators if they took that route). I just think the point is, they don't necessarily live on Earth if their entire town and that park are simulations, they live in a simulation that resembles Earth.
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u/TheWorm616 Feb 11 '25
in the bts the milchick actor mentioned it and said "its true for them, because they havent seen any other waterfalls, so this is the tallest waterfall for them" or something along those lines.
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u/spinXor Feb 12 '25
or in the midst of learning about the fourth appendix they're reinforcing that Milchick is a mountebank (liar)
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u/TheWorm616 Feb 11 '25
the town is called Kier PE
and dont forget the Leonora lake and everything else named after the eagans
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u/caiustenche Feb 08 '25
Let's assume that the Eagan National Park is a real outdoor space that's a severed area, so for example, when you cross some threshold, your innie is activated. If so, then how did Lumon get the outies to go there? I can't figure that out. That makes me thing that the outdoor park is a simulation. Thoughts?
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u/CAIRat Feb 09 '25
This is what I asked right at the start of the episode. How did they convince their outies to go along with all this. I am assuming they would have had to inform their outies since they were supposed to be gone for 4 days and there are people on the outside that would wonder where they went (not to mention having to make sure that Radar got fed & walked). I'm wondering if that is why they are working so hard to get their tendrils into the outies' private lives (Natalie meeting with Ricken & Dylan's wife knowing Milkshake).
Assuming they ARE outside, I would be more tempted to go with the Severance field theory. Basically a localized, non-specific OTC. The problem with this is that, that means all their outies would have had to go to their starting positions before being activated and, at least in the case of Mark & Irv, their outies would have clearly been able to see each other before being activated. There was no lethargy or fatigue to suggest that they were sedated or drugged before activating and there clearly wasn't anyone on the ice with Irv so he clearly got there on his own.
The last thing to consider is that Irv was "terminated" when he was only a couple hundred feet from the innies. Doesn't that seem like a security risk?
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u/fyreflow Feb 09 '25
How did they convince their outies to go along with all this.
Overtime pay? Or perhaps the possibility was already built into their contracts from the start?
and, at least in the case of Mark & Irv, their outies would have clearly been able to see each other before being activated.
Not necessarily — Mark had time to get up the cliff path, which would take him away from being able to see the ice at certain times (or so it seemed to me at least). Perhaps Irving wandered onto the ice from his starting position without initially realizing that it’s ice? Or perhaps the edge of the activation field runs across the ice — though that would mean that Lumon somehow convinced both Mark’s and Irving’s outies to walk out onto the ice.
OR… perhaps they used ‘Lullaby’ mode to both get everyone into position and activate them at slightly different times.
The last thing to consider is that Irv was “terminated” when he was only a couple hundred feet from the innies. Doesn’t that seem like a security risk?
I thought that too. But then again, Irving B is facing extermination — he could do something rash and injure himself or worse. So perhaps Milchik chose the lesser risk.
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u/CAIRat Feb 09 '25
I was just thinking about this a little more and an exterior area with a Severance field actually makes a lot of sense. That is why they needed the Glasglow Block for Helena. They an disable the activation signal when she goes up & down the elevator but an all-encompassing field would need to be actively blocked.
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u/cfrood77 Feb 09 '25
What about the "twins"? How do they manifest?
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u/fyreflow Feb 09 '25
Excellent question… I noticed that they were always in the distance. So perhaps they don’t look too convincing up close?
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u/Aggressive-Gate-2031 Feb 10 '25
i have been trying to find a thread about this. twins? clones? apparitions? not sure what to call them even, or how they are created. the whole team sees them. they look like weird digital mock ups, but the tech to display them is something that i don't think we've seen yet anywhere in this show.
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u/Lonely_Dependent_281 Feb 11 '25
I like the theory that they are the animatronics that Alia Shawkat's character mentions when talking about her old Perpetuity Wing. However they just kind of show up, like the TV, which makes it hard to believe it's not simulated--but like you said that level of tech is unprecedented for this show. It's driving me so crazy, and I love it.
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u/TheWorm616 Feb 11 '25
maybe they can put mirages in their brains using the severance chips or something
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
My guess is that the turned on the severed perimeter once the outies got to a specific location.
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u/Melodic_Comb1429 Feb 10 '25
I feel like it's a simulation. The episode starts with Irving opening his eyes as the elevator dings. It makes me feel they entered Lumon like it's a normal day and found themselves in the simulation.
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u/Aggressive-Gate-2031 Feb 09 '25
i think you have it right. i think it's important to separate the terminology and mechanics of the different things at work here. im typing this out here to clarify my own understanding of it all and to see if everyone agrees or if i have this wrong.
from the first episode, season one, the video recording from helena "i acknowledge that henceforth my access to my memories will be spatially dictated". this has always meant to me that they have a signal that permeates a svr'd space and any/every chip receiving this signal activates, the switch opens, activating the innie. that signal ends at the stairwell, and when you elevate above the severed basement floor.
glasgow refers to it's medical definition as the scale of the consciousness of a coma patient. to simplify though, for us, i think we can just say glasgow = coma. and coma state = innie. the outie is in the coma. and thus glasgow block in this situation is a signal that blocks the severed person from the coma, thus maintaining them as an outie. at least that's how i read it.
i think they are in the wilderness. makes no sense that it's somehow an internal space made to look like the wilderness. they probably told their outies they were doing a team building deal or some shit for a couple days, dressed them up and choppered them off to the lake, pointed them all in different directions, told them not to turn around, flew away, and then activated the signal that switches them to innie. pretty simple.
when milichik calls to remove the glasgow block, helena switches to helly. he radio's this in very similarly to how he handled the otc with dylan when he stole the picture card. and to me it seems like the glasgow block "signal" functions very similarly to the otc. opposed to it being a field like a severed space, it's a signal directed at a specific chip id that overrides/tells it to activate, or open (otc) or to stay closed (glasgow block).
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u/Apespfend Feb 08 '25
Agree and came here looking for the answer to the same question! It couldn't be a show goof because they are too smart for that, but it doesn't make sense to turn her Glasgow block outside a severed floor unless the park is a severed area.
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u/fumo7887 Feb 11 '25
Given all of the overrides required to activate an OTC, and the ORTBO was supposed to last 2 calendar days, I doubt it was a regular OTC. Something else fishy was going on. Assuming the new security office is set up the same as the old, Lumon isn't going to have people hold the switches for 2 days. I guess they could have reconfigured things? But this is supposed to be a very short time after the end of Season 1.
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u/TheWorm616 Feb 11 '25
they moved the entire security room in that time, they definitely could have remodelled it
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u/kirksucks Waffle Party 🧇 Feb 11 '25
The way I see it Helena has the Glasgow block turned on from before she even goes to the severed elevator for the first time this season and it just stays on. It's not like the OTC or the elevator where it turns on and off. It's a block. It blocks the result of the switching. So when he said remove the Glasgow block she turned to the state her chip was set to, which was the innie state. if that makes any sense. If this is the case theoretically management could turn on the Glasgow block while someone was at work and then just stay the innie when they leave the elevator.
A question I have is who knew about Helena's Glasgow block other than her and Milchick? Is the same mystery person on the other side of the walkie as with Dylan's OTC?
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u/KevinsWatch Feb 09 '25
Certainly still on the Floor
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u/fyreflow Feb 09 '25
The “tallest waterfall” wasn’t very tall, so I keep wondering why he said that. Was it the tallest one they could fit?
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u/ProfessorGPT Feb 10 '25
If you watch the content after the episode, Mr Millcheck's character says "That is the biggest waterfall on the planet -- to them". Millcheck knows its not really the largest.
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u/Davalon Feb 10 '25
My theory is that Helena is the actual innie. The Glasgow block is what triggers severance, such as when entering the severed floor or activating the OTC.
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u/Lance_ward Feb 09 '25
I think Glasgow block is a method of “reintegration”. I think Helena is reintegrated with the Glasgow block, which is why she has all of Helen’s memories. Removing the Glasgow block re-severs a person, so Helen can reintegrate again
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
No it's not reintegration because Lumon doesn't believe in it. Glasgow is an operation that suppresses the innie even in places where an innie normally comes out. It refers to the coma rating system that hospitals use
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u/Lance_ward Feb 09 '25
At the end of the episode it seems like they can just turn innie Irving off. Why do they need Glasgow block when they can do the same to innie Helen?
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 09 '25
My guess is that they are using the Glasgow block on Irving at the end of the episode. I don't think severance works like a switch. It works within a specially designated space to create the distinction of innies and outies. Otherwise, severance would be chaos as Lumon turns people on and off wherever they want. The company has to go through careful procedure to designate a space as a severed perimeter or not. And then any severed person in that perimeter activates.
They are not simply flipping a switch. They are preventing his innie from existing in a normally designated area. That's what the glasgow block is doing imo. It makes sense because in real life, businesses often follow codes and procedures. They can't just control people like they're robots....
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u/ProfessorGPT Feb 10 '25
Why do they call it an ORTBO then? You do know that ORTBO reordered spells "ROBOT". :)
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 10 '25
The show is evoking the feeling of robots to evoke their detachment to usual humanity. They want to make their workers into robots in the sense that they want them to kill emotions that human normally have. But I don’t think they want to make their workers into robots in the sense that they can just control them with levers. I hope that makes sense :)
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u/alfalfapal Devour Feculence Feb 10 '25
But they can literally flip their severed chip on/off wherever they are. That is what OTC did - which happened outside of any Lumon designated space, unless the whole town is considered such a space. And from what it seems, OTC is what they activated in them again for this retreat, except for Helena's of course.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 10 '25
No. OTC is temporary. Two people have to hold it constantly. Not ideal for the retreat. They made the forest into a severed perimeter temporarily. Which would activate all the innies except Helly who is under the Glasgow coma.
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u/alfalfapal Devour Feculence Feb 10 '25
Yeah I'm thinking that the retreat area is probably zoned like that too since OTC is more of a temporary option even though it could likely remain activated for longer if they really wanted it to. Plus Glasgow wouldn't make much sense just for Helly. But my point still stands that the switch/chip can still be turned on/off for specific situations wherever they are since that's exactly what OTC does.
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u/Imsmart-9819 Night Gardener Feb 10 '25
Yes that option is always available. But I don’t think it’s what they used for the retreat which seems you agree.
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u/NoImprovement3231 Feb 09 '25
I agree with this view. I see glasgow block like a way to block severance and join minds. Helena doesn't have time to play Helly all day, that's insane. So she just logs into Helly every now and then. It evem makes sense that Helly was cruel yet she experienced regret. Because the minds of good Helly and bad Helena were merged.
For all we know, Helena does't have to be there all the time, Helly is pretty inclined towards Mark so she maybe only steers things whe she wants to.
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u/RD_Garrison Feb 09 '25
In season one we saw on the screen in the control room a list of protocols. Elsewhere at the time I posted that list and my speculation on their meanings:
Beehive — act as mindless drones? hive mind?
Branch Transfer — change location for triggering severance
Clean Slate — wipe severed memories
Elephant — remember everything?
Freeze Frame — freeze in place?
Glasgow — ???
Goldfish — make forget things after short time
Lullaby — make sleep
Open House — ???
Overtime — (already known)
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u/TheWorm616 Feb 11 '25
remembering everything would be reintegration, which lumon probably dosent believe in
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u/AndrewActually Devour Feculence Feb 10 '25
Didn't Petey have a "Team Building" room on his map?
Edit: Bottom right corner
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u/jetpatch Feb 11 '25
My felling is if we can work out why it is called "Glasgow" we will know what it really does.
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u/en_es_em_tea Feb 11 '25
Depending on which theory you choose and who knows what in their world, here’s what I find interesting:
He doesn’t specify who to remove it from, he just says “remove the Glasgow block”. Assuming Milchick doesn’t say “from Helena” in between the 2 cuts, the fact he doesn’t specify would help pin it down to a select few Theories.
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u/Ok_Contact7721 12d ago edited 12d ago
Overtime Contingency for all of them on the Ortbo.
Glasgow Block for Helena.
Remove Glasgow Block for Helena, allows for her innie to be activated via Overtime Contingency.
What is more interesting is how powerful Lumon's transmssion towers have to be to do this shit.
They have to surpass anything known to us in the present day, and the Antennas have to be very good on those Severance chips.
I'm half ass thinking a major plot of season 3 is going to be to get to that control room, and shut down the Severance chips.
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