The first season of Undone was probably my favourite TV show of 2019. It was a trippy, sci-fi drama dealing with grief, trauma and mental illness, all beautifully told using wonderfully effective rotoscope animation. That style of animation provided a huge sense of realism while allowing for the more trippy aspects of the story to be woven in nicely, and the whole thing was made even better by some great performances. Especially Rosa Salazar and Bob Odenkirk as the father and daughter trying to undo a terrible event from their past. Season one ended with a cliffhanger but could also have been interpreted as not necessarily needing to be continued. Thankfully though, the story is now set to continue and season two arrives on Prime Video on April 29.
Rest assured, I am going to keep this review of season two spoiler-free, but it’s certainly going to be difficult. This season is littered with very important plot points right from the outset!
So, when Alma (Rosa Salazar) is reunited with Becca (Angelique Cabral) following the final events of season one, she discovers that Becca also has some special abilities of her own that she’s been keeping quiet about. Turns out Becca is able to enter the memories of those around her while they are thinking of them, finding herself standing on the sidelines, watching the memory unfold in front of her. Meanwhile, Alma seems to have lost control over the abilities that she refined throughout season one. She is able to join Becca within the memories she connects to, but whenever she tries any of the timey-wimey reality stuff, it simply results in her being surrounded by lots of fog and flying towards a closed door that she is unable to open. But what is the meaning of the door? And what lies behind it?
One of the memories that Becca experiences is that of their mother Camila (Constance Marie), meeting with an unseen stranger in a car parked outside their house when the girls were younger. When Alma and Becca learn that Camila also transferred a large sum of money to somebody in Mexico and has been receiving secret phone calls, they begin to investigate. And when Camila suddenly takes off without any word as to where she is headed, the girls take it upon themselves to try and unravel the mystery using their combined abilities.
Heading to Mexico, Alma and Becca meet up with close family to try and find out more about Camila’s earlier life there, accessing different memories in order to piece together her story. But as they dig deeper into the past, they find themselves becoming involved in trying to help their grandmother as well. You may recall during season one we learned from the girl’s father Jacob (Bob Odenkirk) that their grandmother suffered from mental health issues throughout much of her life, prompting him to begin the research which ultimately led to his untimely death. Now the girls realise that by healing past family trauma they can hopefully make all of their lives better in the present.
All of this build-up culminates in my favourite episode of the entire season, the penultimate episode. It’s a return to the time jumping emotional trippiness that I was beginning to miss a little from season one and it just had me gripped throughout. Up until then, while still hugely enjoyable, many of the episodes tend to lean more into family drama and are much less trippy than they were for the bulk of season one.
It’s fair to say though that if you loved season one, then you’re going to love season two. I certainly did. Once again, it’s 8 episodes of 20-25 minute easy watch goodness and with a final episode that throws in a few curveballs and ends on another cliffhanger, I’m hoping once again for another season.
8.2
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Web developer by day, with a movie and TV watchlist that continues to grow as much as my spare time reduces! My favourite movie is Inception and, despite what everyone says, I do not have a man-crush on Tom Cruise.
