In this piece · 6 sections+
The single closest show to Severance is Tales from the Loop on Prime Video — not because of the memory split, but because it nails the exact thing Severance nails: quiet, dread-soaked sci-fi where the horror is ambient and the camera refuses to rush. Same Nordic-brutalist production design, same long hallways, same Philip Glass-adjacent score doing the heavy lifting, same sense that something is slightly wrong with the building itself. If what you loved about Severance is the feel — the fluorescent lighting, the unsettling calm, the silence in an office — Tales from the Loop is the closest thing on television. If what you loved was the corporate satire, scroll down to Mad Men. Below: 11 picks, ranked, with where to start.
The Closest Matches
1. Tales from the Loop (2020, 1 season, Prime Video)
Tales from the Loop is the show Severance fans should watch first and argue about later. Based on Simon Stålenhag's paintings, it's a small-town anthology about a machine buried underground that bends time and identity, shot with the same patient, wide, anti-TV framing Ben Stiller uses in Severance. Same Philip Glass score, actually — he did both. Start with episode 1, "Loop." If you bounce, you'll bounce by minute 15, and you'll save yourself eight hours. What's different: no office, no satire, no plot engine — it's moody vignettes, not a serialized mystery. You're here for atmosphere, not answers. Status: one season, quietly cancelled, ends fine. Eight episodes, roughly an hour each. A long weekend.
2. The Capture (2019, 2 seasons, Peacock / BBC)
The paranoid-conspiracy DNA of Severance — you cannot trust what you're seeing, and the people in charge are worse than you think — lives here. A British thriller about deepfaked CCTV footage being used to frame people, which in 2019 was sci-fi and in 2024 is Tuesday. Holliday Grainger plays the detective with the exact clenched-jaw "something is deeply wrong and nobody will listen" energy Britt Lower brings to Helly. Start with season 1, episode 1 — pilot does the work. What's different: it's a proper thriller with chases and stakes, not a slow-burn mood piece. Things happen. Quickly. Status: two seasons aired, a third announced but stalled in BBC development hell. Twelve episodes total. A week.
3. Mad Men (2007, 7 seasons, AMC+ / Prime Video)
If what hooked you on Severance was the office — the rituals, the hierarchy, the way a fluorescent-lit workplace becomes a cathedral and a prison at the same time — Mad Men is the masterclass. Don Draper is an Innie. He has a whole other life the office doesn't know about, his identity was surgically severed in a foxhole in Korea, and the suits and the secretaries and the glass walls do the same work Lumon's hallways do: make you feel that labor is a performance of being a person. Start with season 1, episode 1, "Smoke Gets in Your Eyes" — one of the best pilots ever made. What's different: no sci-fi. No mystery-box. Just the slow erosion of a man by capitalism and his own lies. Status: ended, seven seasons, 92 episodes. A commitment. Worth every hour.
4. The Institute (2025, 1 season, MGM+)
Stephen King adaptation about kids kidnapped into a secretive facility that tests them, drugs them, and lies to them about why. The Lumon-ness is right there on the surface — sterile corridors, benign cruelty from mid-level managers, kids trying to figure out what their own building is for. Start with episode 1 (the King novel it's based on is also on Amazon). What's different from Severance: pulpier, faster, more plot, less tone poem. King is not interested in mood for mood's sake; he wants you turning pages. Status: one season aired in 2025, renewed for a second. Eight episodes.
Strong Matches (Different Show, Same Itch)
5. Rabbit Hole (2023, 1 season, Paramount+)
Kiefer Sutherland plays a corporate-espionage guy framed for murder by a shadowy cabal that manipulates populations. In other words: Lumon, if Lumon had a budget for helicopters. The show's thesis — that reality is being edited by people you'll never meet — is pure Severance anxiety translated into a propulsive thriller. Start with the pilot, which pulls a genuinely impressive twist before the first commercial break. What's different: loud, twisty, fun. Severance whispers; Rabbit Hole shouts. Sutherland is doing a slightly disheveled Jack Bauer. Status: one season, eight episodes, cancelled. Ends on a cliffhanger — consider yourself warned.
6. Mr. Mercedes (2017, 3 seasons, Peacock)
Another King adaptation, this one closer to Severance in pace and character work than plot. Brendan Gleeson plays a retired cop being tormented by a killer, and what makes it belong on this list is the show's patience — it lets scenes breathe, lets actors sit in silence, and treats suburban dread the way Severance treats office dread. Start with season 1, episode 1. What's different: it's a detective story, not a mystery-box. You know who the killer is by minute five. The tension is psychological. Status: three seasons, ended, wraps up cleanly. Thirty episodes. A real commitment but the payoff is there.
7. Extraordinary Attorney Woo (2022, 1 season, Netflix)
Hear me out. This Korean legal drama about an autistic attorney navigating a corporate law firm shares more with Severance than you'd think: a protagonist whose brain works differently from everyone else's in the building, a workplace that both protects and exploits her, and a visual language that makes the office feel like a small strange country with its own rules. Park Eun-bin's performance has the same quality of watchful interiority Adam Scott does. Start with episode 1. What's different: it's warm. It's kind. Severance is cold; this is a blanket. Sometimes that's exactly the palate cleanser you need between Innie traumas. Status: one season, 16 episodes, ended. Season 2 announced for 2025.
8. Behind Her Eyes (2021, 1 season, Netflix)
A limited series about a woman who gets entangled with her psychiatrist boss and his mysterious wife, and by episode six you're in a genre you did not sign up for. The Severance connection is the ending — specifically, the willingness to pull the rug in a way that forces you to reconsider everything you watched. Few shows swing that hard at the fence. Start with the pilot; do not read anything online. What's different: it's a domestic thriller for five and a half episodes before it becomes something else. If you're impatient you'll quit before the good part. Status: limited series, six episodes, ended (and it actually ended). A single weekend.
Tangential — Only If You're Chasing a Specific Thing
9. Citadel (2023, 1 season, Prime Video)
Spies with wiped memories try to figure out who they used to be. On paper this is Severance with guns. In practice it is a $300 million Russo brothers production that feels like it was assembled by a committee of people who have never met a human. Included here because the memory-wipe premise is the closest literal match to Severance on this list, and some of you will want that regardless of execution. Start with episode 1 and lower your expectations a full floor. What's different: everything that matters. Severance is written; Citadel is assembled. Status: renewed for a second season that has been in "production issues" for two years. Six episodes exist.
10. Emergence (2019, 1 season, Hulu)
A small-town police chief finds a child with no memory at the site of a mysterious accident, and the investigation widens into a conspiracy. The memory-loss-plus-conspiracy engine is the Severance hook, and the show is better than its low vote count suggests. Start with the pilot. What's different: network-TV pacing (this was ABC), which means commercial-break cliffhangers and a slightly more procedural rhythm. Status: one season, 13 episodes, cancelled. Wraps up enough of its story that it's not infuriating, but don't expect closure.
11. Hanzawa Naoki (2013, 2 seasons, various)
A Japanese drama about a mid-level bank employee fighting his corrupt bosses inside a system designed to crush him. If the part of Severance that hit hardest was Mark S. navigating Lumon's absurd hierarchy of waffle parties and performance reviews, Hanzawa Naoki is the spiritual cousin — pure workplace revenge fantasy, filmed with theatrical intensity. Start with season 1, episode 1. What's different: no sci-fi whatsoever. It's a banker yelling at other bankers and somehow it rules. Also, you'll be reading subtitles. Status: two seasons aired, ended. Twenty episodes.
What to skip from the "similar shows" lists
Algorithms keep suggesting John Doe (2002), XIII: The Series, and A Time Called You as Severance-adjacent because they share keywords like "memory" and "identity." They are not alike. John Doe is a canceled-too-soon Fox procedural from the Bush administration. XIII is a Canadian-Belgian co-production nobody asked for. A Time Called You is a lovely time-travel romance with no interest in corporate dread. All three are fine at what they do. They are not shows like Severance. Streaming recommendation engines are garbage and the fact that three of these were on "official" similar lists tells you everything about how little the machines understand what makes Severance Severance.
FAQ
What's the single show most like Severance?
Tales from the Loop, without much debate. Same composer (Philip Glass), same glacial pacing, same anti-TV cinematography, same quiet-dread atmosphere. It's not a mystery-box show and it doesn't have a corporate satire layer, but the feel is closer than anything else on television.
Is there anything as good as Severance?
Mad Men, yes. It's playing a different sport but at the same level — arguably higher, since it did it for seven seasons without a dip. Beyond that you're choosing between "this one captures the mood" (Tales from the Loop) and "this one captures the plot mechanics" (The Capture, Rabbit Hole). Nothing hits both at Severance's level. That's why Severance is a big deal.
Did the Severance creators make anything else?
Dan Erickson is a first-time showrunner — Severance is his debut, which is obnoxious of him. Ben Stiller directs most of the episodes and previously directed Escape at Dannemora (Showtime, 2018), a true-crime limited series with Patricia Arquette that is genuinely excellent and shares Severance's slow-burn restraint. Watch that if you want more Stiller-behind-the-camera.
When does Severance season 3 come out?
Apple has confirmed a third season but hasn't dated it as of writing. Season 2 took three years. Assume 2026 at earliest, 2027 realistically, and plan your life around it accordingly. The rest of this list is for the 18 months in between.
Start with Tales from the Loop, episode 1, this weekend. If the opening 20 minutes don't land, quit — it's a vibes show and the vibes either hit you in the first reel or they don't. If they do hit, you've got eight hours of the closest thing to Severance on television, and you'll understand why half the crew went on to make Severance itself.
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