This article, “does Alma have time-traveling powers, or is she schizophrenic,” contains spoilers regarding Amazon’s Undone season 2.
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The end of the first season of Undone left us wondering if Alma imagined everything or if she had schizophrenia. For instance, was her father communicating to her from the great beyond, the visions, being able to travel to different timelines all real? Or was she imagining it? Common symptoms of this personality disorder include hallucinations and delusions. In the first season, she was on medication. She also had trouble sleeping and lacked motivation.
Undone season 2 – does Alma have time-traveling powers, or is she schizophrenic?
For instance, compared to the first and second seasons, Alma lacked the motivation to make something out of her life professionally. In the first seasons, she assisted at a daycare. When she joined the alternate timeline in the second season, her father was concerned about her dissertation because she was teaching and working on her doctorate. Suicidal thoughts and behaviors are also common, and Alma has had visions of her attempted suicide and being in a behavioral hospital on suicide watch in her original timeline.
She does not have incongruent behavior or disorganized speech, which can be common as well.
Is Alma imagining everything that has happened in the first two seasons?
Yet, all the evidence, especially the entire second season, would suggest this, her mystic powers are real. If there is a third season if the gears changed to this being all in Alma’s head, would the audience feel cheated?
However, let’s explore the possibility. If there is a third season, where could the show possibly go? Alma travels back to her original timeline so she can offer hope to her old self. This means she will immerse herself into that body again, much as she did in the alternate timeline. That means she will remember all the bad feelings and her content self she developed in season two.
If the series wraps after season two, which would be a perfect ending, I would say the timeline/mystic powers are not a hallucination or delusion. In fact, her actions could be a metaphor for Alma healing her behavioral problems and the loss of her father that has haunted her. For instance, her returning to her old self at the end of this past season could be a metaphor for her complete healing and letting go of the hallucinations/delusions she was suffering from.
If Undone returns for a third season, I expect explorations into Alma’s psyche and the revelation that everything was part of her psychosis.
You can watch this series with a subscription to Amazon.
