Umbrella Academy Season 2: Love Under the Umbrella

Our favorite super powered adopted siblings land in Dallas, TX separated by time.  Each one landed in the same place, but spread over 3 years leading to Five’s landing as a Soviet Nuclear attack destroys the world…AGAIN!.  What caused it, how do they prevent it and how do they survive in 1960’s Texas?

Klaus becomes a leader of a cult with Ben in tow.  Allison gets married and helps lead a civil rights movement. Luther, pining for Allison, becomes the muscle for a mobster. Diego, wanting to be a hero, tries to save Kennedy, but lands in a psych ward where he finds romance. Vanya, who landed just a month earlier, gets hit by a car and becomes the driver’s nanny.  Five, having seen the apocalypse again, has 10 days to get his family together and prevent the end of the world.

In looking at the season in its entirety, it is really a story about love.  Klaus, tries to save Dave, the man he fell in love with during the Vietnam war in season 1.  This of course backfires and it forces Dave to join the military ahead of schedule (we don’t know if this could have some future ramifications).  Ben, having died as a child, finds love in one of Klaus’s followers and finally gets to experience it physically, by possessing Klaus’ body.  Allison meets a man and falls in love.  They are married and living a semi-normal life.  Well normal for a black woman from the future living in 1963 Texas.  Diego meets Lila, who is just as crazy as he is and is schooled in hand to hand combat.  Turns out she is the adopted daughter of the head of the commission (and she has powers too).  In the end, that does not matter because they love each other.  Vanya, having lost all her memories, falls in love with the woman that hit her with her car.  A lesbian relationship at that time was very taboo.  Can their love survive a jealous husband and the puritanical views of the old south?  And finally, Luther.  Luther is crushed when he learns Allison married and even though you can see she still loves him, Luther is heartbroken.  Even familiar love was explored both Lila’s relationship with her mother, and the sibling’s relationship with their father and with each other are much discussed and we see the family come together when Vanya needs help.  There is a touching moment where Grace leaves Reginald because he has to keep secrets from her.  And  even Ben giving up his “afterlife” and making the ultimate sacrifice to save Vanya when she almost destroyed the world….AGAIN!  Five seems to be the only one that didn’t find love, but he does have a great scene with his father that actually leads to saving all their lives.

This exploration of love gave Season 2 a bit more depth, in my opinion.  It opened up the characters to emotional ranges I don’t think we got to see in Season 1, and although the plot to both seasons were very similar, stop doomsday in “x” number of days, the character growth was surprisingly refreshing.  There was more humor, warmth and hope expressed both in the writing and in the performances.  Allison and Vanya having to say goodbye to their loves, Luther finally lightening up after years of trying to impress his father and Diego saving the woman he loves, even if it means being stranded in the wrong time.  I would have liked to have seen more growth from Klaus.  I thought his arch in season 1 was amazing, but unimpressed with his character’s journey in season 2.

There are some surprises in Season 2 that I found exciting and unexpected.  It wasn’t surprising that Lila was  part of the commission, but that she was “The Handler’s” adopted daughter and that she was one of the 43 children born on October 1^st, 1989 to mothers who were not pregnant was definitely a surprise. Who is AJ Carmichael and how did a fish learn to talk (wish we would have gotten more of this character).  Mother being based on an actual real person, Grace,  who father seemed to have loved dearly– enough to make an android representation of her.   We did know that father was mysterious and that he may have had a dubious past, but who and what he is explains some but leaves us with more questions.

What’s in store for next seasons?  In any show that involves time travel, anything done in the past has the possibility of changing the future.  The Butterfly Effect.  Our heroes saved the world, said goodbye to those they needed to, and traveled back to 2019, the day after the world should have ended in season 1.  Relieved to get home, but their past actions had ramifications and their present is no longer the present they remember as they meet, the Sparrow Academy!

This season rocked!  It was fun, funny, deeply emotional and moved at an exciting pace.  The story was well thought out and written with good character development.  I have not read the comics and it seems like they made some changes from the source material, but over all I found it a joy to watch.  In particular, I think Five, played by Aidan Gallagher is brilliant.  He is a grown man stuck in a 13 year old’s body.