UNDONE Season 1: Unlike Any Series You’ve Seen Before

Between BoJack Horseman and their new series Undone, Raphael Bob-Waksberg and Kate Purdy are breaking new ground in the realm of adult animation. Visually, BoJack and Undone couldn’t be more different. Undone‘s visual style is comparable to that of Richard Linklater‘s films Waking Life and A Scanner Darkly, thanks to the use of realistic rotoscope animation. However, like BoJack, Undone‘s protagonist Alma (Rosa Salazar) has a dry sense of humor and feelings of existential dread. But that’s about as far as comparisons go because Undone is unlike any other series you’ve seen before.

With only eight episodes, each clocking in at under 30 minutes, Undone is a breeze to sit through and doesn’t waste a single second of that time. There are no weak episodes; every single one effectively adds to the plot and enriches the character development. You won’t find any unnecessary subplots or filler, just a compelling story that never loses momentum. The short length of each episode proves to be a valuable asset because Undone is full of heavy themes and thoughtful details that make it worth watching multiple times.

Starting with a Bang

The series opens with Alma bawling her eyes out while driving. She sees something on the side of the road and then gets into an accident with another vehicle. We don’t know why she was crying, what she saw, or how she got herself into such a predicament in the first place.

Her car spins out of control and then…bang! She crashes into a pole. In apathetic voiceover, Alma narrates, “I’m so bored of living.” Then, before we’re able to find out what happens next, we’re immediately thrust into a montage of her monotonous daily life. The rest of the pilot then backtracks and fills in all of the puzzle pieces that lead to Alma’s accident. It’s a fantastic opening that’s intriguing enough to hook viewers within the first few minutes.

Alma is 28 years old, lives with her boyfriend Sam (Siddharth Dhananjay) in Texas, and works at a daycare alongside Tunde (Daveed Diggs). Her younger sister, Becca (Angelique Cabral) just got engaged, and Alma seems pretty judgmental of her life choices. Alma even asks Sam to promise her that they won’t “be like one of those boring couples who…gets married and settles down and has babies and is like all happy.”

The first episode fills us in on the fact that Alma’s father Jacob (Bob Odenkirk) died in a car accident nearly 20 years ago, creating an interesting parallel with the show’s opening scene. We also learn that her paternal grandmother Geraldine had schizophrenia. While rummaging through old photos with her mother Camila (Constance Marie), Alma stumbles upon a photo of her dad smoking a cigarette. She’s shocked that she’s never seen this photograph before. In fact, she never even knew her father was a smoker. This prompts Alma to ask to see the police report about her dad’s untimely death, but Camila refuses because she claims to no longer have the report in her possession.

Once the show fills us in on all the blanks leading up to the accident, we cut back to Alma crashing her car. This time around, we finally get to see what Alma saw just seconds before the crash. While the choice to use rotoscope might seem unnecessary to some viewers, this is the moment when the animated style truly begins to make sense. Alma notices a swirl of colors forming and molding itself. This amalgamation of swirling colors ultimately takes its final shape in the form of her father. Alma sees her dad standing on the side of the road with a cigarette in his hand, a spitting image of the photograph she saw earlier. Alma’s jaw drops. The sight of her dad distracts her, causing her to take her eyes off the road, and then…crash! What exactly was Alma’s father doing on the side of the road? The audience is left to wonder whether he’s a hallucination, a ghost, a time traveler, or something else entirely.

From Metaphysics to Mental Illness

The characters in Undone are multifaceted and feel like real people, which allows the audience to get hooked immediately. Alma, in particular, is relatable for anyone who’s ever felt stuck in a rut. The characters alone would make for an immensely watchable show, even without the gorgeous animation. Just as the show lures you in with its well-written characters, Undone takes an enigmatic turn and transforms into something completely surreal. The show bends the rules of time and space to make us question the nature of Alma’s reality as well as our own.

When Alma wakes up from a coma, everything is different. She can’t recall the details leading up to the accident and her surroundings alternate between dreamlike and nightmarish. Time starts to morph as she gets thrown through a loop and keeps reliving certain moments. The show’s editors handle these jumps in time wonderfully, using dialogue or visual cues to ease the transitions. The way the show depicts Alma’s distorted reality needs to be seen to be believed. Undone makes full use of its animated style to play with the ideas of time in bold, innovative ways.

Now, Alma can see and hear her father, but no one else can. He asks for her help and informs her that his death wasn’t an accident. Suddenly, Alma is propelled into a strange new world, or as her father describes, “A life that doesn’t follow a paint-by-numbers timeline. Or any timelines at all. A life where anything can happen, at any time. A life without limitations.” Alma begins training with her father so that she can hone her potential and use her abilities to figure out how he really died.

This mission to uncover the truth about her dad’s death is a reflection of Alma coming to terms with and confronting her childhood trauma. But is her father really there and can they actually alter time? Or is Alma seeing things because of a head injury from her accident? Does this mean Alma is schizophrenic like her grandmother? Undone raises more questions than it answers, and that’s the beauty of it.

Regardless of how viewers interpret Undone‘s many themes, the series is an absolute must-see for its depiction of mental illness. Many works of fiction perpetuate harmful stereotypes about mental illness, but Alma is genuinely likable and isn’t portrayed as violent or made out to be a victim. The series is also notable for the way it depicts mental illness from both insider and outsider perspectives. We can see, feel, and hear what Alma is going through, which makes it easy to empathize with her and makes her behavior feel understandable and justifiable. But we also witness how things appear from the vantage points of her loved ones and recognize Alma as an unreliable narrator.

A True Artistic Accomplishment

Undone is a brilliant showcase for Rosa Salazar‘s talent. Her remarkable performance shines through, even beneath the rotoscope animation. Between Alma’s sardonic wit and emotional trauma, Salazar really makes her character come alive.

The series is noteworthy for so much more than its visual style. Yes, it is the first series to use rotoscoping animation for every single episode, but that’s not just a gimmick. The show effectively utilizes this visual style to enhance the story.

The use of sound is also impeccable. In a flashback, Alma gets a cochlear implant, and viewers can hear how her ability to perceive sounds evolves as she adjusts to the implant. The sound also cuts out every time she takes off her audio processor, creating an immersive experience that allows viewers to gain a deeper understanding of Alma’s point of view.

Undone: Final Thoughts

Between its artistic merit, strong lead performance, and powerful themes, Undone accomplishes so much in such a short amount of time. Its use of rotoscoping animation is revolutionary, and its representation of mental illness is thoughtful and complex. The series is likely to fly under many people’s radars, which is devastating. Between all the different streaming services, there’s a constant influx of new TV shows. But none of them are quite like this one. Kate Purdy and Raphael Bob-Waksberg dared to do something different with their new series, and it genuinely paid off. Undone is unquestionably one of the best TV series of 2019.

Have you watched Undone yet? What did you think of it? Share your thoughts in the comments section below!

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