A Recap Of Some Hidden Details In ‘Russian Doll’ Season One (From Inside A Questionably Decorated NYC Bathroom)

Hey! How ‘ya doin’? Yes, that’s right — I’m currently stuck inside that bathroom with what looks like a giant blue vagina on the door. It’s great! Great great great, life’s one long party in a cramped New York City apartment with people you only sort of know and stairs just waiting to kill you. Oh, and you’re stuck in a bathroom with some unsettling Rorschach shapes and a doorknob that’s literally a handgun. Great. Super.

Season two of Russian Doll is almost coming out — or as I like to call it, “1000 Ways To Die That’s Not Smoking” — so I thought I’d revisit the show, do a quick catch up, fill you in on what happened in season one … and now I’m stuck in this godforsaken bathroom. By choice, yes. Of course. Why? Because I’m too damn scared to go outside and die all over again, what do you mean ‘why?’ Have you already forgotten the whole stairs thing? 

Oh, you think I should just do it, do you? You think I should pull that trigger and simply walk out of here like I'm not an existential wreck right now? Okay, buddy. I hear you, pal. Let me just open the door, step outside, greet this lovely looking fella with the gigantic butcher’s knife …

Hey! How ‘ya doin’? How’s your life choices been turning out lately?

So There Was This Horse

Remember Horse? Not the carrot-eating animal, although Horse would probably not mind a carrot since he lives on the streets, but that’s not the point. Yeah, that guy Horse, who doesn’t look like a horse but at the end he wears this big horse mask that I guess kind of makes him look like a horse. 

Nadia (Natasha Lyonne) gives Horse some shoes in episode 3, but if you look closely you’ll see Horse is already shoe-less in episode 1. Sure, it’s not the biggest detail but I had to explain Horse to you somehow. Mission accomplished! Break out those Israeli joints!

Oh and about those…

Count The Jewish Jokes

Every episode is filled to the kippah with Jewish jokes and references. It’s as much a part of the show as is this insufferable “Gotta Get Up” song that I can’t get out of my throbbing skull.

It’s why Nadia uses the distinct Jewish pronunciation of “cock-a-roach,” it’s why there’s an irritable bowels joke, and it is why I so obviously already tried to use this time travel vibe to go back somehow and find Hitler — only this is not how the show works and that bathroom vagina immediately snapped shut at the mere mention of his name. 

Rotting … Stuff

Time works in strange ways in Russian Doll (and most all time loop movies, I guess), and there’s this whole thing about food and other stuff rotting while Nadia and Alan loop their lives over and over again. In episode 2 there’s already some wilting flowers making their appearance…

…but they’re also shown in the background in episode 1 — still fresh, like a baby newly thrust into the world before its inevitable corruption and degradation begins. Free will that, baby! 

Finding Alan

At the end of episode 3, Nadia meets Alan on a (fatal) elevator and the two realize that they’ve both been experiencing this strange time loop conundrum. The rest of the show is basically about all the things that need to happen for two people to align and not just simply end up together, but end up truly wanting to be together. Yes, the show is very deep and I am very smart. 

Anyway, Alan can be seen all over episode 3 in the background of frames. Heck, in one scene he walks right past her. Man, I’m glad those two ended up finding each other, eventually. They’re so great togeth-

Well, horse poop. Here we go again. Choices, what a concept.

Zanandi is on Twitter and also on that other platform.

Top Image: Netflix