Before season 2 of The Umbrella Academy drops on Netflix at the end of this month, we want to look back on what happened so far. The Umbrella Academy is based on the comic book series by Gerard Way (former singer of My Chemical Romance), published by Dark Horse Comics.
A word of warning: the following is a recap and will contain spoilers. So, if you have not watched the first season yet, then you either go over to Netflix right now or you’ll get spoilers reading from this point on. You have been warned.
The Beginning of The Umbrella Academy
“On the twelfth hour of the first day of October 1989, 43 women around the world gave birth. This was unusual only on the fact that none of these women had been pregnant when the day first began.“ Not having read the comics, this first spoken words awoke my interest. I was sitting on my couch thinking: “What? Why?” “How would I react if a baby popped out of me right now?” The next thing we see is the eccentric billionaire Sir Reginald Hargreeves (Colm Feore) reaching out to those new parents and offering them money for their offspring. Surprisingly, 7 of them said yes.
Like any loving father would do, Hargreeves gives his children numbers instead of names and takes surveillance videos of them. Thankfully, he programs a robot to act as the kid’s mother and “Mom/Grace” (Jordan Claire Robbins) is the one who finally gives the children names. Hargreeves aspire to use the children’s powers and turn them all into a superhero team to fight crime. While her siblings are being severely trained, Vanya (number 7, portrayed by Ellen Page) is distanced from them by her father. She shows no superhero powers but starts to learn to play the violin instead. Pogo, an intelligent chimpanzee, works as Hargreeves’ assistant and keeps an eye one the children together with Mom.
The Superpowers
Eventually, Hargreeves gets his dream fulfilled as his teenage children become famous superheroes. They are fighting in school-like uniforms as “The Umbrella Academy“ (“The UA“) and get their superhero names:
- Number 1/Luther/Spaceboy (Tom Hopper) has enormous strength.
- Number 2/Diego/The Kraken (David Castañeda) can curve the trajectory of objects he is throwing.
- Number 3/Allison/The Rumor (Emmy Raver-Lampman) can control other people’s minds by addressing them with, “I heard a rumor…”
- Number 4/Klaus/The Séance (Robert Sheean) can talk with the dead and also has the power to make them materialize.
- Number 5/The Boy (Aidan Gallagher) can jump through space and time but is continuously admonished by his father not to travel through time.
- Number 6/Ben/The Horror (Justin H. Min) can summon tentacles from his body to use as a weapon.
Unfortunately, Number 5 overestimates his power and gets missing at age 16, and his brother Ben dies during a mission. Growing up with no childhood, the siblings want to break free and get a normal life. One by one, they leave the team, their father, and the mansion until Luther is the only one left.
To the moon and back
In 2019, the siblings live their lives apart from each other. During one of his one-man-missions for his father, Luther gets seriously injured. To save his life, Hargreeves injects him with a serum. Luther survives but pays a high price. His upper body turns into the one of an ape, all hairy and very musculus. From then on he lives on the moon for 4 years, thinking he would protect the earth from afar from an unknown danger. Luther doesn’t know that his father only sent him away so he wouldn’t have to see the monster he had become.
When their father dies, Luther returns to earth and the mansion, where he meets his remaining siblings. Vanya also returns to the mansion for the funeral but isn’t welcomed. Her brothers are angry because of their portraiture in Vanya’s published book about her time growing up. Only Allison is giving an effort to be nice to her. It was stated that their father died of natural causes, but Luther thinks otherwise, as he finds the monocle that Hargreeves always wore to be missing. Klaus, who has the power to talk to dead people, is not of great use. He refuses to become sober to talk to his deceased father about his death. Later, it is revealed that in fact, Diego took the monocle from Mom to keep her secret from the others.
Number 5 comes back from the future to warn the Umbrella Academy
All of a sudden, a strange cloud of something energetic turns up in the garden, and the siblings see Number 5 falling out of it. He looks as young as the day he mysteriously disappeared. He claims to have come from the future and to be 58 years old. Together, they celebrate the funeral of their father in the backyard of the mansion.
As he can’t get strong enough coffee at home (and the siblings are arguing too much), Number 5 flees from the mansion. He visits a doughnut shop where he gets attacked by a handful of armed men. However, Number 5 can handle himself and ends up killing them all. He then removes a tracker that got implanted in his arm by “The Commission,” his former employer.
Number 5 tells his sister Vanya about the end of the world, but she doesn’t believe him. So, he drives off with Klaus to find the carrier of a prosthetic eye he found while he was in the future in the ruins of the mansion. He is certain that the owner will cause the end of the world. However, the eye hasn’t been produced yet, and therefore there is no carrier to be determined. Meanwhile, the two time-agents Cha-Cha (Mary J. Blidge) and Hazel (Cameron Britton) arrive in 2019. As Number 5 was able to defeat the previously sent men, it is now their job to kill him. During their investigations at the Doughnut shop, Hazel starts to develop romantic feelings for its owner Agnes (Sheila McCarty).
Time-travel murderers
Cha-Cha and Hazel hunt Number 5 down in a department store, but he is able to flee once more. He also saves “Dolores,” a mannequin who was his companion for thirty years while he was in the future. Meanwhile, Allison watches some of the old surveillance tapes her father recorded. She discovers that Mom was serving Hargreeves tea and assumes that it was poisoned. Although Mom states that she doesn’t remember anything, Luther and Allison suspect that she must be hiding something. So, they ask the other siblings to come in to take a look at the evidence together and to discuss whether Mom should be turned off or not. This is when Diego reveals that he has stolen the monocle to keep Mom out of it.
The next moment, Hazel and Cha-Cha break into the mansion and attack Luther, Diego, Allison, Klaus, and Vanya. As the siblings fight back, the time-agents flee but kidnap Klaus on the go. Before a vote can be held, Diego secretly turns off Mom, who is oblivious from the attack by Hazel and Cha-Cha. Sometime later, Pogo reactivates her and begs her to keep a secret from the children.
To give away information about Number 5, Klaus gets tortured by the time-agents. Klaus is starting to get sober and isn’t too keen about this, as he takes the drugs to suppress his powers. He doesn’t want to see and talk to the dead. Except for his brother Ben who he sees regularly but hasn’t told his siblings about. When Klaus begins to see the victims of Cha-Cha and Hazel, he tells them the things they want to hear out of fear to be killed. While Cha-Cha and Hazel destroy the lab for prosthetics, Diego’s ex-girlfriend and former partner, Detective Eudora Patch (Ashley Madekwe) approaches the motel. She is investigating the deaths at the doughnut shop and follows a new lead to the motel Klaus is being kept in. She can free him but gets killed by Cha-Cha on their return.
In a flashback to the future (well…to Number 5’s past to be precise), we get to know more about the life of Number 5 in the apocalyptic future. Only with Dolores around, he tries to survive and to return to his time. A woman called “The Handler” shows up, claiming the apocalypse needed to happen. Number 5 starts to work for The Handler and her company “The Commission.” His job description says to kill people throughout history to prevent or to guarantee certain events from happening. He spends several years doing so until he finds a way to get back to his own time.
Threads come undone for the Umbrella Academy siblings
Upon their first meeting, there is some chemistry between Vanya and her new violin student Leonard (John Magaro). For the first time, Vanya bonds with someone. Allison gets suspicious and tells Vanya her concerns about Leonard. Vanya gets angry with her and won’t let her take away the first good thing in her life. She also stops taking her pills she has been taking since her childhood “because of her nerves.” Vanya is relieved that the weaning of the pills seems to have no negative effects, when in fact they helped to control the mysterious power she has and that is now returning slowly. Vanya opens up even more and finally gets the first chair in her orchestra. Little does she know, that it was Leonard who killed the actual first chair so Vanya had the chance to audition.
On his escape, Klaus took a briefcase from the two agents with him. Instead of finding money to buy drugs as he hoped for, he travels back in time to the 1960s and the Vietnam war. During his military service Klaus fells in love with a soldier named Dave who dies in battle. When he finally returns to 2019, Klaus is traumatized by war and heartbroken due to the loss of the love of his life. He destroys the briefcase out of anger and frustration.
Number 5 takes the broken briefcase from Klaus and tricks Cha-Cha and Hazel into a meeting with his former boss, accompanied by Luther. He agrees with The Handler on his return to The Commission, with the guarantee that his family would be safe. Back in the time-agency, Number 5 manipulates the tasks he sends out to the agents, to prevent the apocalypse from happening. When he receives an order to protect a man called Harold Jenkins, he realizes he must kill him to stop the catastrophe. Number 5 manages it to steal a briefcase and leaves the agency with a blast (in terms of explosion). In the meantime, Luther told his siblings about the world ending, but they show no motivation to fight. Only when Number 5 goes back to alter the timeline, he rallies them to stop the end of the world.
When he learns about the upcoming apocalypse, Klaus seeks help from Diego. He wants to get clean to talk to soldier Dave once more before the end of the world. Luther finds out incidentally that his father has sent him to the moon for no reason other than to have him away. It’s relatable that he gets really mad. Luther seeks distraction by going to parties, drinking, and intoxicating himself. Klaus follows him and gets knocked unconscious in the club. Finally, he talks to his father, after a short encounter with god herself. Hargreeves confesses to him, that he has killed himself. However, before he can reveal the reason why Klaus wakes up.
The truth about ordinary Leonard
Vanya discovers her powers. We later learn that Leonard knew of her powers all along but didn’t tell her. He convinces Vanya to spend time away at his house in the woods to practice her powers exclusively. This is where Vanya discovers her father’s notebook and finds out that her father not only knew about her powers, but also that he suppressed them deliberately. She is blind to anger and won’t realize that Leonard is distancing her from her family on purpose, trying to bring up Vanya’s powers for his revenge.
Leonard was born as Harold Jenkins (yes, the same Harold Jenkins that Number 5 wants to kill) on October the 1st 1989. Unlike the children adopted by Hargreeves, Harold was born from a normal pregnancy. As he lives with an abusive father, he starts to idolize the Umbrella Academy kids. He starts to believe he is as extraordinary as them. Harold hopes to get out of his miserable situation, if only he could be a part of The Umbrella Academy. Hargreeves coldly rejects him for the Academy and teenage Harold then proceeds to kill his abusive father, as his dream is denied to him. After 12 years in prison, he is seeking revenge and starts to spy on The UA members. When Klaus disposes of his father’s old notes and journals, it’s Harold who picks them up and finds a way to get his payback.
Deadly powers
Diego learns that he is the prime suspect of the murder of his ex-girlfriend, Detective Patch. At the police station, Allison recognizes a picture of Leonard and realizes that he is Harold Jenkins and a threat to their sister. Together with Luther and Number 5, they break into his apartment. However, as we know, both are at his house in the woods. After a day of training her powers, Leonard and Vanya have a night out in a restaurant. When leaving they get harassed and 3 guys start to beat up Leonard. Vanya’s fear of losing Leonard turns on her powers and they explosively erupt, killing 2 of the 3 harassers.
Leonard survives and is rushed to the hospital, but loses his eye. Despite his injuries, he wants to leave. Consequently, both are already gone when Allison arrives at the hospital. Allison, let down by her brothers, convinces a policeman to help her by pretending that she is researching a new movie. She is allowed to talk to the third victim in the hospital. His confession is that they were paid to attack Vanya and Leonard. Eventually, she finds out about the house in the woods and informs her brothers but isn’t patient enough to wait for their arrival.
Allison finds Vanya alone at Leonard’s house. When she learns about Vanya’s powers she remembers and confesses that her father had asked her to use her mind-bending power on Vanya when they were only 4 years old. Her father kept Vanya’s dangerous powers a secret, so Allison had no clue why her father wanted Vanya to believe she was ordinary, as she thought she was anyway. Hargreeves found no other way of controlling Vanya, so he wiped her memory and drugged her. Furious about this “betrayal,” the power bursts out of Vanya again and slices Allison’s throat. Leonard returns and forces Vanya to flee and leave the bleeding sister behind.
Back at Leonard’s apartment, Vanya finds her father’s diary. She finally discovers what her friend has been up to. The realization of being manipulated by the only person she trusts makes Vanya raging and she kills Leonard furiously in cold blood. At the same time, the brothers arrive at Leonard’s house. Allison can be saved and recovers but loses the ability to speak. She reveals to them that Vanya indeed has powers, and that she can’t control them.
The siblings then make their way to Leonard’s apartment, but only find his corpse. Number 5 detects that it is indeed Harold’s eye prosthetic he was carrying around. It has the same color and fits perfectly. Glad that the apocalypse won’t happen now, the siblings return home. Klaus discovers the full potential of his powers. Ben hits him while Klaus tries to get high again. Not only can Klaus make the dead temporarily corporeal, but he can also connect with them so they can act physically.
Hazel struggles with his job for a long time now. He betrays Cha-Cha and runs away with Agnes. Eventually, he realizes there is still the apocalypse and heads back to support The UA. As Harold is already dead, there is nothing else for Hazel to do but to leave his and Cha-Chas guns with them, so Diego can be relieved. He drives back to the motel he left Agnes in, only to find her being threatened by Cha-Cha. They fight, but The Handler interrupts them. As she still wants the apocalypse to happen, she offers the agents deals. When they protect Vanya, Hazel might leave the corporation freely and Cha-Cha can get a new partner. Hazel pretends to accept, but after he left with Cha-Cha he incapacitates her and returns to the motel, killing The Handler and running away together with Agnes and The Handlers briefcase.
Still feeling guilty as she believes that she killed her sister, Vanya returns to the mansion. Luther locks her into an isolation chamber despite the protests of the others and especially against Allison’s will. Vanya is being distanced from the others again and gets heartbroken. Being overwhelmed by her feelings is what activates Vanya’s powers and she can break out of the chamber. She starts to destroy the whole mansion and Pogo tries to stop her. When he confesses to Vanya that he has also known about her powers, she kills him. The siblings can rescue themselves but have to look at Pogo being killed and Mom getting buried in the ruins as the house collapses. Standing in the ruins of the mansion, Number 5 realizes that it wasn’t Harold who would bring the end of the world, but Vanya, who just vanished from the scene.
The final act
The siblings come up with a plan to stop her sister during her concert in the Icarus Theatre. Vanya is fully dressed in black while she’s on stage playing the first violin. When her siblings try to stop her she uses her power, not only to hold them back but also to force the audience to stay and the orchestra to continue the performance. She eventually let them flee when soldiers from The Commission turn up to protect Vanya from her siblings. Klaus unfolds the full potential of his power for the first time as Ben manifests physically trough him. Now Klaus can use Ben’s powers, releasing the tentacles and killing the soldiers. Meanwhile, Vanya has reached the summit of her powers by using the vibrancy of her violin. She becomes “The White Violin” as her suit turns white as well as her eyes.
Allison interrupts her sister’s concentration so Vanya’s energy is redirected away from her siblings into space. The moon gets hit and destroyed by Vanya’s powers, parts of it head towards them. Waves of fire roll over the earth, destroying buildings and killing everyone. Right before the flames catch them, Hazel and Agnes can flee with the remaining time travel briefcase, Cha-Cha however burns. To survive, Number 5 suggests making a time jump. Right before they can be consumed by the fires, The Umbrella Academy travels back in time. During the jump, we see all of the Academy members reverting into their younger, teenage selves.
What am I expecting from the upcoming season?
I hope that there will be explained what exactly happened on the day of birth. How can the “pregnancies” be explained? I want more information about whether the other “siblings” have superpowers or not. What about Reginald Hargreeves? I only learned about him being an alien by scrolling through websites, as it wasn’t even mentioned in the series. Also, we still don’t know how Ben died and why he is hanging around with Klaus all the time instead of living a happy ghost life. I’m sure my questions are answered in the comics, but as I stated above, I didn’t read them.
If you look closely at this poster for season 2, it already gives away parts of what will happen in the new season. After their time-jump to escape the apocalypse in 2019, the siblings are scattered across the country. They do land in different places but also in different years. The reflection in each pair of sunglasses is a little preview of what we can expect for each sibling. We know from the trailers that they will eventually find each other again, but I am sure it will be exciting to watch how they manage to do that and how they spend their lives in the meantime.
The Umbrella Academy 2 will available to stream on Netflix beginning July 31st.
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