Undone’s Creators On How The Show Is Secretly About Sisterhood And What’s Ahead In Its Future

Amazon Prime’s Undone, a rotoscoped journey into the complexity of humanity and the limitless nature of the universe, is one of the most unique shows on television. Coming from Kate Purdy and Raphael Bob-Waksberg of BoJack Horseman, Undone is an animated series that’s just as raw and ruthless with its characters, but it uses its rotoscoped nature to bring a science fiction slant to the personal, probing questions that it asks about Alma Winograd-Diaz (Rosa Salazar). It’s not only Alma who’s under the microscope, but also how she fits in with the rest of her family, their expectations of her, and Alma’s expectations of herself. The first season of Undone beautifully articulates this, but season two unravels the show’s themes in even more appealing ways. Most impressively, the series’ creators use this second season to highlight how Undone is covertly a show about sisters.

“I always felt like the show was secretly a show about sisters and that relationship between Alma and Becca [Angelique Cabral],” admits Bob-Waksberg. “Even in the first season, the very first conversation is these two sisters hashing it out in a bar and the very last conversation is them sitting together and waiting, or hoping, for something else to happen. So it was really fun in the second season to center that more explicitly and allow their relationship to go to new places.” 

“That relationship is so fascinating to me,” Bob-Waksberg continues. “They’ve both experienced similar traumas in their lives and the ways in which they react is so different, and yet they have this joint wound.” Kate Purdy further emphasizes that this dynamic is really what Undone is all about. “The family is such the heart of the show and we knew that we had to continue exploring that. As far as you can go with the sci-fi or fantastical adventure elements, you always need to come back to the emotional reality of these characters and that’s what’s really important in the end. We always wanted to make sure that we kept that the center of the storytelling.”

There’s a real finality to how the first season of Undone ends, but there were always plans for a second season and thoughts on where the show would go next were already underway as production on season one wrapped. “There were a lot of conversations about what season two would look like,” explains Purdy. “Raphael and I sat down and wrote out a spine for the season, which remained the spine for the season, but a lot of the specific elements shifted and evolved over the course of the season.” 

The second season of Undone concludes with an even greater note of resolution than its first year, but this story isn’t finished. Purdy and Bob-Waksberg have more to say on these themes and characters even if a season three has yet to be confirmed. The uncertain state of the show’s future is a poignant reflection of its title, Undone, and the ongoing mission that it presents about generational trauma and the power of family.

“What I love about the title,” explains Purdy, “is that it has multiple interpretations, just like the show does. Oh, she’s ‘undone’ like she’s crazy, or she’s ‘undone’ because she’s opening herself up emotionally and allowing herself to feel all of these things. The arc of the show deals with how Alma becomes free of societal pressures and dismantling all of that, which is another form of being ‘undone.’ I feel the looseness of that interpretation holds up through both seasons, but in different ways. Did she undo the timeline? Is she undoing her relationships?

“I have another interpretation too,” adds Bob-Waksberg, “which is that the story is undone. There’s a frantic, negative connotation to the title to some degree, but it’s also hopeful! This is ‘undone.’ We are all unfinished people and our stories are continuing to go on. I don’t know how many seasons we’re going to go. Maybe this is it for us, or maybe we’ll go for a few more. But even when we finished this season’s story we saw that there was still more to tell and experience. I found that very encouraging and optimistic.”

With any luck, Undone is only scratching the surface of this generational, existential time travel adventure and it will get at least one more season to dig even deeper into Alma, Becca, and the entire Winograd-Diaz family

‘Undone’s’ eight-episode second season is available to stream April 29, only on Amazon Prime