Serialized storytelling sometimes requires an episode that is less about resolving things than preparing for a resolution. This can mean resolving side-storylines before the main ones can be addressed, but it can also mean throwing in the new elements before we can get to that proper conclusion.
These sorts of episodes often don't get a lot of love, but to an extent, they're really the meat of storytelling. Climaxes and finales are always important, and they're kind of the make-or-break of a story, but they can only exist if we've been taken along with these kinds of episodes.
So, what happens here?
Well, we can sort of go character-by-character.
Dylan's wife, Gretchen, confesses to his outie, her husband, that she kissed his innie. Dylan clearly holds the view that he and his innie are completely separate people, and considers this a betrayal, threatening to quit the job just to end Innie Dylan's existence unless Gretchen agrees to stop seeing him. It's utterly heartbreaking for Innie Dylan, who has only, through these visits with Gretchen, begun to understand the potential of what life has to offer. Desperately proposing to the woman he's already technically married to, he must face her rejection, and decides, in an act tantamount to suicide, to request a resignation. Granted, his outie must approve such a request, but Dylan decides that, having glimpsed the other side, the personalized erasers and finger-traps are just not enough to motivate his existence anymore.
Irving comes home to discover, rather disturbingly, that Burt is there, waiting for him. Burt insists that he and Irv go for a ride, and on this ride, he explains that he didn't ever hurt anyone working for Lumon, but he drove people places and pointedly didn't ask what was done to them when they got there. His choice to undergo severance was, it seems, an opportunity to escape that guilt. Unwilling to harm Irving, he instead buys him a train ticket to the end of the line, and tells Irving (who has his dog Radar with him) to get off at a random stop so that Burt won't know where he is. Even in their brief time together, the outies share a moment of potential tenderness that their innies knew, but it's just not right. Star-crossed lovers part, and Irving heads off into the sunset.
Now, it's a very strange thing, because Milchick is, in most scenarios, a villain on this show (we see him unceremoniously transferring Ms. Huang to fucking Svalbard as a premature completion of her fellowship,) but in a confrontation with Drummond, who is on his ass because Mark hasn't been coming into work, Milchick stands up to him, suggesting to his superior that, as he is the manager of the severed floor, Mark's absence is not his responsibility, and furthermore, that he can use all the fancy words he wants, suggesting that Drummond "devour feculence," (i.e., Eat Shit). Milchick might not actually be a good guy, but seeing him stand up to the dehumanizing Lumon enforcer was profoundly cathartic and satisfying. (Especially as someone who also enjoys playing with unconventional vocabulary choices.)
We get a brief scene with Helena as she prepares to go to work, eating a hard-boiled egg on the most bizarre decorative plate (I know that eating eggs is not in any way unusual, but as someone who finds them disgusting unless fully mixed into some kind of dough or batter, this scene added a certain visceral disgust for me, especially when her father, Jame, suggests that he would prefer she eat them raw... which is so, so much nastier, and just the idea of a father caring that much about how his adult daughter eats her breakfast is... look, there's never been anything about Jame Eagan that hasn't skeeved me the fuck out). Even as Helena manages to disappoint her father just by eating her eggs cooked, Helly, now aware of her status on the outside, tries to leverage it with Milchick. Ultimately, while Dylan has faltered in his mission to follow Irving instructions to find the Export Corridor, Helly has taken it up, but as she attempts to memorize the directions so that if she's caught, she won't be holding onto them, Jame shows up on the severed floor.
Finally, Mark and Devon meet with Cobel, and while Mark hesitates, he ultimately agrees to follow Cobel's instructions. While he initially tries to call in sick, he ultimately tells Milchick instead that he's just taking a personal day, presenting to his boss the notion that "work is just work," which is kind of a glorious counter to the entire Lumon vibe. Cobel tells him it's crucial that they rescue Gemma before Cold Harbor is completed, at which point she will effectively be dead. What it actually is remains a big question mark. Cobel sneaks Mark into the Birthing Lodges in the back of her truck, claiming Devon is one of "Jame's," and thus is off-the-books (guess Helena might have a bunch of half-siblings running around). Innie Mark wakes up inside one of the cabins, and the work begins.
I don't know what this means in the long-run. Irving's story could just be over, and Dylan is at least moving toward the exit. I hope they aren't leaving the show, though - the MDR Crew is this show's central "found family," after all. But we've got some big balls up in the air, building toward what I hope will be some serious meeting of both Marks.
It's sad to think that we've only got one more episode this season. I'm hoping that we'll get another season, and hopefully one that we don't have to wait quite as long for. But we've got that finale to come, which is sure to have some big reveals, but also probably a lot of big questions raised.
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