The Umbrella Academy
Netflix
In my daily journal I noted that I was on the last episode but that “unless the last hour perks up this is going to get a disappointing review from me”. Until that point I had found the series something of a joyless chore. Bickering families is not automatically fun or funny and there was so much uncaring and casual violence that it seemed meaningless and our heroes seemed to face failure at every turn.
Gone were the great “moments” of the earlier shows, nothing to rival that fantastic montage shot of the library, or the “Dancing in the Moonlight” scene, or even the meme-worthy Five glaring from the window of a stationwagon. Amongst all this bleakness, where was the fun?
When the final 30 minutes did roll I for one expected Five’s heartache to be “just” unwinding the timeline of the years spent with Lila, little did I suspect that his, and everyone else’s heartache was to be so much greater still, and that the meaningless violence was meaningless for a reason.
But still not a great season - I like to take a message away from a show and its hard not to take away from this one the fact that we’ve all invested time and care watching four seasons that were ultimately pointless but maybe it is just a story about the trials of being a family, biological or adopted, who knows?