The Umbrella Academy: The Final Countdown

At the end of season three, our heroes are trapped in an alternate reality without any of their powers and season four begins six years later.  Viktor (Elliot Page) whose ability was to convert sound waves to physical force, now owns a bar; Luther (Tom Hopper) who had super strength is a very bad stripper at a run down strip club; Diego (David Castaneda) with the telekinetic ability to curve the trajectory of moving objects, like knives and bullets is a delivery driver who dreams of being in the CIA; Diego’s wife Lila (Ritu Arya) who’s power is to mirror other peoples powers, pretends to be a good wife, but is actually a secret agent; Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman) who had the power to control minds by whispering in their ears is struggling to regain her acting career and raise her daughter; Klaus (Robert Sheehan) was a gay drug addict who could see and talk to the dead and at times make them temporarily corporeal but is now sober, living with Allison and germophobic; Five (Aidan Gallagher) who could jump through space and time and who spent 60 years in a post-apocalyptic world now works for the CIA; and Ben (Justin H. Min) who is an alternate version of the Umbrella Academy’s Ben who was killed on a mission.  Ben has the ability to summon horrific tentacles from his body.  This version of Ben has no love for the other members but has spent the last four years in prison for crypto currency fraud and needed Luther for a permanent address.  Also in this alternate reality is a group called “The Keepers” who have shared memories of the real timeline before it changed and artifacts from the original timeline begin to surface meaning that this timeline “reset” did not fully implement.  A man whose daughter has disappeared asks the team for help in tracking down his daughter and Five agrees at the dismay of the rest of the team. A way for the team to regain their powers surfaces, but the majority of them opt not to go back to their old lives and want to remain “normal”.  They have convinced themselves that this life is better, but none of them seem really happy. Ben, thinking they are all crazy tricks them, and at the end of the episode it is hinted at that they all will have their powers back.

For the first of only six episodes, I was a little disappointed in the lack of action.  I don’t like it when shows take away character’s powers, because I watch superhero shows because they have superpowers, but at least this only appears to be the case for one episode, which mainly focused on what the team has done to adapt to being normal.  There was no big fight scene but instead there was the subtle indication that the cult organization calling themselves, “The Keepers” are going to be trouble and the cult leaders Gene and Jean Thibodeau, wonderfully portrayed by Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally, are not the good and righteous people they pretend to be.

The show’s production value remains high, and the cast is strong with great performances from everyone.  The show also retains much of its quirkiness that sets it apart from other superhero programs.  As is Netflix’s normal MO, they dropped all six episodes on their platform at once available for streaming beginning August 8, 2024 and the short season is perfect for binge watching.  I, unfortunately, only had time to watch the first episode before writing this article, but the show is interesting and inventive with a good cast and with a complex and compelling story.  I look forward to being able to finish watching the other five episodes.