I’ve been meaning to get around to The Umbrella Academy ever since its first season debuted in 2019. Its mix of the superhero genre with a dystopian and comedic flair made the show something that really stood out to me. Unfortunately, with life being what it is, The Umbrella Academy fell to the wayside entirely, until I rediscovered it with the release of the third season earlier this year. Determined to finally see what I was missing out on, I took the plunge and now that I’m on the other side and waiting eagerly for Season Four all I have to say is I can’t believe it took me this long to watch it.
On October 1st 1989 forty-three women across the globe spontaneously gave birth despite none of them being pregnant prior to this moment. Billionaire Sir Reginald Hargreeves (Colm Feore) successfully adopted seven of the children and brought them to the United States to be raised as trained killers under the collective title, The Umbrella Academy. Each child bore unique and powerful abilities that garnered the Umbrella’s a unique kind of infamy for their inability to work together. Now adults, reunited by their father’s death, the six surviving Umbrella children face an apocalypse level event. Can they put aside their differences and work together for the sake of humanity?
On October 1st 1989 forty-three women across the globe spontaneously gave birth despite none of them being pregnant prior to this moment. Billionaire Sir Reginald Hargreeves (Colm Feore) successfully adopted seven of the children and brought them to the United States to be raised as trained killers under the collective title, The Umbrella Academy. Each child bore unique and powerful abilities that garnered the Umbrella’s a unique kind of infamy for their inability to work together. Now adults, reunited by their father’s death, the six surviving Umbrella children face an apocalypse level event. Can they put aside their differences and work together for the sake of humanity?
I really only need to provide the synopsis for the first season as each subsequent season follows a similar structure, with the apocalypse evolving as the show does to fit the escalating tension. Whilst that may sound like a bit of a cop-out or as though it may get tiresome, The Umbrella Academy never does thanks to its fantastic characters and clever use of time travel that see our cast hopping time periods and dealing with issues prevalent in that era.
As for the Umbrella’s themselves, first up is Luther (Tom Hopper), a man who has super strength and the body of a gorilla. Luther was once the leader of the Umbrella’s and remained faithful to his father until his dying breath. Then there’s Diego (David Castaneda) who can control the path of projectiles. Having worked as a solo vigilante for many years, Diego is the most ruthless of all the Umbrella’s and has the shortest temper. Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman) can control the thoughts of others, a power that has landed her in trouble with her husband and daughter whom she is desperate to return to. Klaus (Robert Sheehan) a drug addict who is able to communicate with the dead, primarily his deceased sibling Ben (Justin H. Min) who was killed when the Umbrella’s were teenagers. Five (Aidan Gallagher) who is known only by his Umbrella number designation, can jump through time and space. A jump that went wrong when he was fifteen resulted in him being stuck in the apocalypse for seventy years where he worked for a shady organisation known as The Commission.
Then finally there’s Vanya/Victor (Elliott Page) who for the majority of their life has never shown any powers, but the recent discovery of them could spell disaster as she is unable to control them.
I love the journeys these characters go on throughout the show, and the chemistry the actors have with each other is completely brilliant. Klaus stands out as my favourite as he just embodies the show’s craziness so well. One minute he’s on a heroin induced trip, the next he’s talking to the dead, at one point he accidentally starts a cult…it’s just all pure gold. But despite his zany and over the top appearance there’s actually a really deep and damaged character underneath that begins to surface the longer the show goes on for. That being said though I adore Five, and Gallagher is arguably the best performer in the show. Being an eighty year old time travelling hitman inside a teenager’s body is a performance I can imagine being difficult to pull off, but Gallagher does it with apparent ease. He gives the air of a man who is genuinely hardened and wizened by forces beyond normal human comprehension, yet despite all this he’s forced to endure the end of puberty all over again and be treated like a child by his siblings and basically anyone he encounters.
As for the Umbrella’s themselves, first up is Luther (Tom Hopper), a man who has super strength and the body of a gorilla. Luther was once the leader of the Umbrella’s and remained faithful to his father until his dying breath. Then there’s Diego (David Castaneda) who can control the path of projectiles. Having worked as a solo vigilante for many years, Diego is the most ruthless of all the Umbrella’s and has the shortest temper. Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman) can control the thoughts of others, a power that has landed her in trouble with her husband and daughter whom she is desperate to return to. Klaus (Robert Sheehan) a drug addict who is able to communicate with the dead, primarily his deceased sibling Ben (Justin H. Min) who was killed when the Umbrella’s were teenagers. Five (Aidan Gallagher) who is known only by his Umbrella number designation, can jump through time and space. A jump that went wrong when he was fifteen resulted in him being stuck in the apocalypse for seventy years where he worked for a shady organisation known as The Commission.
Then finally there’s Vanya/Victor (Elliott Page) who for the majority of their life has never shown any powers, but the recent discovery of them could spell disaster as she is unable to control them.
I love the journeys these characters go on throughout the show, and the chemistry the actors have with each other is completely brilliant. Klaus stands out as my favourite as he just embodies the show’s craziness so well. One minute he’s on a heroin induced trip, the next he’s talking to the dead, at one point he accidentally starts a cult…it’s just all pure gold. But despite his zany and over the top appearance there’s actually a really deep and damaged character underneath that begins to surface the longer the show goes on for. That being said though I adore Five, and Gallagher is arguably the best performer in the show. Being an eighty year old time travelling hitman inside a teenager’s body is a performance I can imagine being difficult to pull off, but Gallagher does it with apparent ease. He gives the air of a man who is genuinely hardened and wizened by forces beyond normal human comprehension, yet despite all this he’s forced to endure the end of puberty all over again and be treated like a child by his siblings and basically anyone he encounters.
In fact, the only character I drew any kind of issue with over the shows three seasons was Allison, specifically in Season Three. At this point the Umbrella’s have travelled through time and rewritten history causing her to lose her husband and daughter, she’s understandably pissed and just wants to turn things back to the way they were. But she just spends most of the season lashing out at her siblings over petty things and purposefully messing things up under the guise of ‘helping put things back to normal’. It honestly feels like the writers didn’t really know how to make her a sympathetic villain so just made her a bitch instead and I feel it could have been handled better.
On the whole I loved all three seasons of The Umbrella Academy and I thoroughly recommend it to people who are after a good character driven series. There was rarely a dull moment, and I’ve barely scratched the surface in this review. With just thirty episodes at around forty-five minutes each, its perfect for binging, and the breakneck pace of the story really encourages you to watch it like that. But with Season Four only just starting production, it’ll be some time before we get to see the final fate of The Umbrella Academy.
On the whole I loved all three seasons of The Umbrella Academy and I thoroughly recommend it to people who are after a good character driven series. There was rarely a dull moment, and I’ve barely scratched the surface in this review. With just thirty episodes at around forty-five minutes each, its perfect for binging, and the breakneck pace of the story really encourages you to watch it like that. But with Season Four only just starting production, it’ll be some time before we get to see the final fate of The Umbrella Academy.