‘Russian Doll’ Delves Deeper Into Its Maniacal and Tangled Plot With Season 2
'Russian Doll' Season 2 has a tangled time travel plot with Nadia's messy and questionable ideas.
Natasha Lyonne in Russian Doll season 2.
(Photo Courtesy: Twitter)
The second season of Russian Doll has returned, and while it is not as trippy and complex as the first season, it has its own crazy time-traveling, soulful, messy plot with themes of generational trauma. The show has always been about its vibe, with Nadia's (Natasha Lyonne) satirical, overconfident, and chaotic character juxtaposed against Alan's (Charlie Barnett) diametrically opposed, sincere, and meticulous one.
Natasha Lyonne in Russian Doll season 2.
Nadia and Alan were trapped in a time loop in the previous season, where Nadia found herself at her birthday party and Alan found himself on the day his girlfriend broke up with him.
It's funny how nonchalant Nadia is after finding out she can travel back in time by getting onboard train 6. She just rolls with what is happening. The time travel portion is associated with her mother; and the viewer gets an insight into this when she travels back in time and finds herself in her mother's body.
Later, Nadia transforms into her grandmother, Vera, a holocaust survivor from Hungary, as she delves deeper into her family's past.
Alan's arc, on the other hand, isn't given that much attention. While Nadia and Alan's stories are connected in the first season, the second has them connected, but not in a deeper way. Nadia's three-generation Krugerrand heist overshadows Alan's arc. Alan seems truly happy when he travels back in the past and is transferred in her grandmother's body. He seems more cheerful than usual with being in her grandmother's body and going on dates with men, but this isn't explored to its full potential.
Charlie Barnett in Russian Doll season 2.
Nadia's arc makes a lot of emotional sense. She did, after all, learn something. She spent the entire season trying to change the past in order to change the present.
But she must learn to accept that the past is what it is, that fixating on it will not change what happened, and that the only way to change the present is to be in it and live your life there.
Through the whole plot, Nadia tries to change her history so that she can have the Krugerrands (south African gold coins) which might help her in the future. The coins might be a metaphor for "what might have been."
She couldn't be with Ruth the way she wanted because she was stuck in her childhood trauma, wishing she could change it. And while she can't change that or how she acted, she can return to the present and be at funeral, stop living in the past to live in the present, where she can make change herself and be with the ones who are there for her.
Natasha Lyonne and Annie Murphy Russian Doll season 2
Schitt's Creek's Annie Murphy is introduced in this season as Ruth's younger self and you known what she is perfect for the part. We can see a deep relationship between Ruth and Vera. we see Ruth in mourning her husband's recent death.
Although not as good as the first season, throughout the first and second seasons, we saw Nadia bruised by generational trauma, but this season, we see her mature and recognise people in herself rather than living in the past. Alan appears to be more carefree now.
Even when compared to the first season, Russian Doll's second season is a truly thrilling ride, but it's the looseness and free-flowing exploration of the past that makes this season so remarkable.
By freeing this season from a specific pattern and through time travel, Russian Doll is able to explore much more open territory and expand this world in ways that the first season could not.
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