It has been three long years since the first Season of Russian Doll premiered on Netflix. This hit series brought a fresh spin to the time-loop subgenre, with its existentialism and Groundhog Day vibes proving to be incredibly relatable in the years since its premiere. With Season 2 finally on the horizon, here is everything you need to know about Season 1.
Editor's Note: The following contains spoilers for Season 1 of the Netflix series Russian Doll.
The Never-Ending Birthday
On Nadia’s (Natasha Lyonne) 36th birthday, she is hit by a cab and dies instantly. Except… she doesn’t really die. Nadia wakes up in the bathroom of her friends, Maxine (Greta Lee) and Lizzy (Rebecca Henderson), her 36th birthday party once again raging on beyond the door. Feeling a sense of deja vu, but unaware of the time loop she is now stuck in, Nadia returns to the party and tries to have fun. After a few drinks, she remembers her death and panics. Her ex John (Yul Vazquez) shows up, and she leaves with him to feel something normal and familiar again. However, she dies again after falling off a ledge into the water, once again waking up in the bathroom.
From this point forward, Nadia is set on figuring out why she keeps repeating the same day over and over. Her first theory is that Maxine gave her a tainted joint, and she’s just hallucinating. When that doesn’t pan out, she researches the building that Maxine and Lizzy live in, to make sure it isn’t cursed. Just as she starts to resign to her fate and the universe’s messed up plan for her, she meets Alan (Charlie Barnett), who is also stuck in a time loop.
Alan’s Loop
Before meeting Nadia, Alan had been reliving his day almost exactly as he did the first time. He brushes his teeth, gets dressed, and goes to meet his girlfriend, Beatrice (Dascha Polanco). Before the loop began, he was planning to propose to her on a romantic vacation, but she breaks up with him when he arrives at her apartment. Alan is a man who craves structure and routine, so despite it being one of the worst days of his life, the loop became comfortable to him.
When he realizes that he isn’t alone in the loop after all, he becomes obsessed with finding a way to break the cycle. He and Nadia compare notes on their deaths, trying to find a connection or pattern. At first, Alan doesn’t remember how he died the first time, but later realizes he died by suicide after jumping off his roof. Upon this revelation, Nadia remembers seeing Alan drunk at her local deli on the night of their first death. She acknowledges that she could have helped him, but didn’t. Alan acknowledges that if he wouldn’t have been so drunk, he could have saved Nadia from getting hit by the cab. This conversation leads them closer to breaking out of the loop — they agree to recreate their first encounter in the deli, this time saving each other. But before they can reset the timeline, the universe has one more test for them.
Working through Trauma
Throughout the season, Nadia and Alan each have issues that they have to work through. The source of Alan’s need for control isn’t explicitly disclosed, but he is apprehensive about talking with Nadia’s therapist friend Ruth (Elizabeth Ashley). He also has an encounter with a doctor where she assumes that he is skipping work and gets concerned, implying that Alan’s routine is necessary to keep him from a negative mental state. Before he is able to reset the timeline, Alan has to have a deep conversation with Beatrice about their relationship, her infidelity, and accept that it’s okay for both of them to move on.
Nadia’s trauma, on the other hand, is more explicitly depicted. She has always had a fear about turning 36, because her mother died by suicide at 35. Nadia blames herself for her mother Lenora’s (Chloe Sevigny) death because it occurred after Ruth gained custody of her. Through flashbacks, we see that Nadia’s childhood wasn’t the easiest. Lenora struggled with mental health issues, and while Ruth tried her best to treat Lenora while they all lived together, Nadia was being affected by Lenora’s unpredictable behavior. We see Nadia’s guilt affect her relationship with John. She avoids meeting his daughter Lucy many times, even in the loop where actions can be reset. In order for Nadia to reset her timeline, she has to first acknowledge that her mother’s death wasn’t her fault, and then she has to finally meet Lucy.
Do They Leave the Loop?
After Nadia and Alan make the personal steps they need to, they die one more time. They wake up in their respective bathrooms once again, but this time things are different. They go to meet each other at the deli, as they planned, only to discover that the other person no longer recognizes them. Alan has to convince the Nadia in his world that she can trust him so that she doesn’t get hit by the cab. Nadia has to follow drunk Alan in her timeline to make sure that he doesn’t jump again. She buys him cake, tucks him into bed, and convinces him that he won’t be alone. When their mission is successful, the two pairs of Alan and Nadia walk into the same costumed parade. The timelines then seem to converge, with a singular Nadia walking joyously until the credits roll. The ending never explicitly mentions that the time loop has been closed, but between the symbolism of the split screens converging and Nadia’s body language, one can only hope that Alan and Nadia are now free to live their lives linearly once again.
Horse and Oatmeal
Horse (Brendan Sexton III) and Oatmeal (the cutest cat) are background characters throughout Nadia’s loop. Horse is a homeless man that Nadia befriends. She gets high with him and lets him cut her hair, she protects his shoes from getting stolen at the shelter, and he is leading the parade that Nadia joins in the season finale. Oatmeal is a cat that Nadia shares with her friend at the deli, Farran (Ritesh Rajan). Nadia doesn’t believe in keeping sentient beings locked up, so Oatmeal is free to move between her apartment and the deli as he pleases. Nadia loses Oatmeal on her birthday, and searches for him multiple times throughout the loop. She finds Oatmeal right before her first and second death, and he disappears from her arms right before she falls in the river. Not that Oatmeal is a magical cat that is responsible for the loop (or is he?), but both Horse and Oatmeal seem to be aware of the weird things going on in a way that other characters aren't.