Russian Doll: A Brilliant Metaphorical Drama That Rides On Dark Comedy

By Mojisola Delano Last updated Jul 26, 2019

I just finished Russian Doll and I loved it.
This Netflix original show consists of 8 episodes of about 30 minutes each, making it it an easy one watch and finish in good time.
It stars Natasha Lyonne, Nicky Nichols of the Orange Is The New Black-OITNB fame who also serves as executive producer and co-director, co-creator of the critically acclaimed TV series.

The show is a psychological dark comedy/drama which enters around Manhattan resident Nadia Volvokov( Lyonne) who is caught in a short loop and continues to die on her 36th birthday. Along the line she meets a complete stranger, Alan( Charlie Barnett) who is similarly caught in a death loop too and the two try to help each other demystify their dilemma. The story unfolds from there.

At first I was a bit confused about the title of the show, because it appeared not to have any direct correlation to what it was about. But I later got to understand that the title references Russian Nesting Dolls and serves as a metaphor for the peeling back Nadia had do to attempt to reprogram the loop and take back control of her life .

When I saw read the synopsis, I wasn’t interested in giving it a shot because it reminded me of Netflix’s Naked– a movie starring Marlon Wayans which was an epic FAIL. But then the 100%(now 98%) on critic site rotten Tomatoes and 8.1/10 on IMDB caught my eyes. Then I began to see people talk about it on social media which prompted me even against my better judgement to give it a try. I did not regret the decision, at all.

Russian Doll is a different. It is psychological, and employs a lot of metaphors and is also very figurative. With each episode, new facts emerge to give perspective and depth and as the characters develop, you will began to feel deep empathy for them, especially Nadia played by Lyonne.

By the final episode, the show ended in a crescendo that led to a strong epiphany for me. Nadia wasn’t just a character, she was anyone dealing with trauma and baggage from the past and needed to heal. Oh! I don’t want to give too much away, because the beauty of the show will be for you to make your own independent discoveries and conclusions so I’d just leave it at that.

For acting, Natasha Lyonne delivered a humdinger of a performance as expected playing Nadia, a character she said in a recent interview wasn’t too far from her own life at some point. While she was impressive, the character reminded me a lot of Nicky her Orange Is the New Black persona and in fact the two have a lot in common, so I wasn’t completely blown away in this regard. However, I couldn’t think of anyone who would have done better with the interpretation of the character so she really was brilliant. In future, I look forward to seeing Natasha play something completely different from the wild, self depreciating but kind hearted, blunt, opinionated, character we are used to. It would be very refreshing and interesting to see.

Aside the storyline, the theme music, the dialogue are some of the other things that makes Russian Doll tick. I particularly loved Nadia’s lines, her use of not everyday words like they were regular, and on one or two occasions I found myself checking the dictionary for context of usage of the word ipso-facto for instance. Another thing that puts this show in a class of its own is the various themes of mental health, addiction, self love, death but not literally, but more in the sense of living but not necessarily living etc. Little wonder the show took about 7 years to see the light of day, according to Lyonne in a recent interview.

In conclusion I’m still very shocked that I didn’t get bored watching similar scenes replay it self in Russian Doll. In fact, I was just pleasantly surprised by how refreshingly deep it was and how much I enjoyed watching it.

I highly recommend this show if you want something cerebral, funny, and different with just a little bit of horror( nothing serious, just the various ways she kept dying and how real it was) . I’d rate it 70%, maybe even higher, because it got me to think, and despite my initial skepticism, proved me wrong.

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