Saving The World: The Umbrella Academy Review

Nelson Acosta

The Umbrella Academy focuses on how the Hagreeves family was brought back together by the death of their adoptive father Sir Reginald Hagreeves. The show starts with the birth of 43 children on October 1, 1989, but all the moms were not pregnant that morning. That day seven of the special kids were adopted by Sir Reginald Hagreeves, and he learned they had supernatural powers. The kids were known as Luther, Allison, Diego, Klaus, Vanya, Ben, and Number Five. The show takes place after the children’s father dies and they are brought back together to prevent the end of the world. The show is focused on creating dynamic sibling relationships, and forming a background on how the characters grew up with each other and their dad. The children grow up with a strict father, robot mother, and a monkey butler named Pogo. Season one starts off with Number Five coming back to the present time. In this season Five and his siblings work together to prevent the apocalypse. But as they are working together the transport to the 1960’s and then the season ends. Then season two starts, and since they went back in time the season focused on fixing the past so there would be no future apocalypse. When watching the second season the show took a political turn. This season dealt with the assassination of John F. Kennedy, the civil rights movement, and accommodations for children with mental health issues. When watching The Umbrella Academy the change in character importance stood out to me. In the first season Number Five was the character who knew everything, and was ready to save the Earth. Then at the end of the season we learned that Vanya was capable of learning her powers, so when season two starts Vanya is a focus as she does not know who she is, and her family worries about her as they don’t know what she is capable of. We also learn that there are two Number Fives in the 1960’s timeline, because adult Number Five is there to prevent John F. Kennedy’s assassination. At his post he learns how to get back home and succeeds. That is what happened before season one when Five came back home.
The show’s plot is well driven but the show has a slow start at the beginning. The show grasps the audience’s attention with action packed scenes, and a deep development of characters. The show’s original focus is on the character Number Five, who is played by Aidan Gallagher. Number Five’s powers let him teleport and then time travel. Five traveled too far forward and got stuck in a post-apocalyptic timeline where he was the only person left on Earth. He became a professional hitman and traveled throughout the Earth time-line to change the original outcome of Earth. He was assigned to prevent the assassination of John F. Kennedy, but had other plans. He figured out how to get back home and made it back to meet with his siblings after the death of their father. The show then starts with the family back together, and figuring a way out of this mess, and undoing the apocalypse. When watching The Umbrella Academy the music choice really stood out to me. They chose songs from the late seventies through the nineties. The use of this style of music would help create an atmosphere for what problem was happening during the show. Such as in the fight scene with Hazel and Cha-Cha fighting the Umbrella Academy. In this scene Klaus is unfocused listening to the song “Sinnerman” by Nina Simone. This scene grasped my attention due to the fact that the song made the fight scene better. The upbeat tempo of “Sinnerman” helped make it more action packed, even though Klaus was unaware and focused on the music. The music choice of this show made it stand out, and created moods that affected the enjoyment of the show. It was great, the plot was interesting and the use of music was creative, I would recommend it to anyone.