Gautam Anand
Netflix’s ‘The Umbrella Academy’ had wowed the audience with its engaging first season, but it gets bigger and all the better in its second run. The story gets more convoluted this time around as the factor of time travel comes into play. The finale brings war to the Academy and the siblings have to face their worst and most powerful enemy yet. What they discover changes everything they thought they knew about their origins as well as the truth about their father. Here’s what it means for them. If you haven’t seen the show yet, head over the Netflix. SPOILERS AHEAD
Plot Summary
The second season of ‘The Umbrella Academy’ begins with the six siblings falling off at different points of time in the early sixties. Klaus arrives in 1960 and ends up forming a cult. Allison arrives in 1961 and becomes a part of the civil rights movement. Luther lands in 1962, and after getting rejected from where he thought he’d always have shelter, ends up working for Jack Ruby. Diego arrives in September 1963 and decides to stop the assassination of J.F Kennedy. Vanya arrives in October 1963 with no memories of her past. Five finds himself on November 25, 1963, the new date of the apocalypse.
The Ending
From trying to find out the root of the apocalypse to trying to escape it altogether, the Umbrella Academy tries everything that they can to save the world, as well as themselves. It is revealed that Vanya, once again, loses control of her powers when she is bound and tortured by the FBI, who suspect her of being a communist. Diego discovers the truth by seeing the future at the Commission headquarters. He, Allison, and Klaus try to stop her, but it is Ben who sacrifices himself to save the day.
Meanwhile, Five and Luther try to retrieve a briefcase so that they all can go back to 2019. However, they fail at the task, and so does Diego at saving Kennedy. While all of them come under the radar of the government organizations who suspect their hand in the assassination, it is also revealed that Reginald Hargreeves is an alien.
Another problem emerges when Vanya realizes that she has transferred some of her powers to Harlan, who is now losing control of it. The Academy arrives at the farm to help him, but so does the Handler and Lila. A fight ensues between them, where they discover that Lila is just like them and had been manipulated by the Handler all her life.
In the end, they manage to contain the situation. The Handler is killed by the remaining Swede and Lila escapes using the briefcase. Vanya takes back her powers from Harlan, but as he drives away with Sissy, we see that some of it is left behind. Eventually, the Academy gets the chance to get back to their original time only to discover that it is not theirs anymore.
What is Sparrow Academy?
No one is insignificant, Five had told Vanya when she wanted to bring Sissy and Harlan with her to the future. No matter how unremarkable a person might seem in history, one way or another, their actions are bound the create a drastic change if they appear in a timeline where they don’t belong. The Umbrella Academy was not one but six people, all of them not unremarkable or insignificant in any way. Collectively, they spent three years out of their timeline, and the last six days of which were pretty intense. During this time they also met their father, and even though they managed to stop the apocalypse that was not supposed to occur in 1963 in the first place, they didn’t leave without creating an impact. They discover the repercussions of their actions in the 2019 timeline.
On returning home, they discover that it is not their home at all. It is not even the Umbrella Academy anymore. It is, now, the Sparrow Academy. And on top of that, their father is still alive, and so is Ben. The key to understanding what happened here lies in their father remembering them from the 1963 get together. Meeting the siblings must have changed his thought process, and might even have passed on to him the little detail of adopting children born on October 1, 1989. Perhaps, this is how he knew about these mystery children in the first place. Because 43 children were born on that day, it is also possible that in the changed timeline, Hargreeves adopted six different children. But that’s something that only the third season can clear up.
In any case, the Umbrella Academy left behind enough of an imprint in the past to change their presents considerably. The simple knowledge of their existence in the 1963 timeline could also have changed the course of events. After Kennedy’s assassination, all six of them had found their names in the most-wanted list. Then there is also the case of the people who know the truth about them. Raymond knows about their powers, and Dave knows when he is going to die. Sissy, too, is aware of their secrets, and above all, has Harlan with her, who still has a portion of Vanya’s powers left in him. It is the piling up of these things, some small and some big, that has eventually altered the original alignment of events and given rise to an alternate reality.
