Russian Doll is a tightly plotted, high-concept puzzle-TV comedy

Slate

Natasha Lyonne plays Nadia Vulvokov, who dies on her 36th birthday, on her Netflix series. In Nadia, says Willa Paskin, "Russian Doll has exactly the sort of jaded, bright, allergic-to-sentiment kind of personality you want to walk you through this kind of story. Russian Doll turns out to be—don’t they always!—about change and connection, and Nadia, thankfully, is extremely allergic to hooey ideas about change and connection." Paskin adds: "Change is a loaded topic for TV comedies. Seinfeld was famously a show where no one ever changed, and though, over many, many seasons, most sitcom characters do change, they rarely transform because audiences want the same people to show up in the same place week after week (or binge after binge). Russian Doll takes, I think, a different view on this question, not considering change as a dramatic problem for a TV show, but an essential question for human beings."

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• Russian Doll is both surprising and affecting, and it neatly dodges the standard tropes of its familiar premise
• Russian Doll is a darker, druggier Groundhog Day
• It's one of the best-ever stories about the cost of fighting against your own brain
• Russian Doll is eight short, acerbic, wittily profound episodes with a richly satisfying ending
• It's a brilliant mix of satire, sci-fi and sincerity
• Part of what makes Russian Doll so special is how it’s meticulously constructed
• It's a philosophical exploration of grief, fate, and morality
• Russian Doll is so great it shouldn't come back for a second season
• Why Russian Doll uses Harry Nilsson's "Gotta Get Up"
• Russian Doll is Natasha Lyonne's "autobiography wrapped in a mind-bending concept"