The Umbrella Academy’s ending makes no sense. Somehow it works.

This publish accommodates spoilers for the ultimate season of The Umbrella Academy.

The Umbrella Academy, Netflix’s hit sequence a couple of household of superpowered misfits always tasked with stopping the world from ending, ends with every part hurtling towards one more apocalypse—solely this time, no person makes it out alive.

Within the closing season of the present, based mostly on the comics by Gerard Method and Gabriel Bá, the siblings pull out one final save, however none of them will likely be round to expertise it as a result of, because it seems, they had been the entire purpose the world stored ending to start with. The powers all of them acquired at start had been important for diverting catastrophe, however, because the quick run of six episodes explains, the sci-fi magic that made them superhuman was by no means meant to exist. That means: They weren’t ever meant to exist both. That means: Erasing them from the universe was the one actual resolution to all of it.

It’s messy and complicated, and giving any thought to how we acquired to this conclusion isn’t advisable. The earlier season sees the members of the staff divert their third apocalypse in as many seasons, after which they’re plopped right into a reset universe the place none of them are tormented by their pesky powers or by their eccentric and ruthless adoptive father Reginald Hargreeves (Colm Feore). Choosing up six years later, Season 4 finds the siblings in various states of powerless mediocrity, enduring mundanities they’d by no means had the prospect to expertise earlier than. Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman) stars in detergent commercials as a substitute of the blockbuster films she was used to; Luther (Tom Hopper) works as an unique dancer in a run-down strip membership; Viktor (Elliot Web page) runs a bar in Canada; and Diego (David Castañeda) is a supply driver, whereas his spouse, Lila (Ritu Arya), additionally previously superpowered, is a stay-at-home mother with three youngsters.

Everyone appears sad however resigned to their boring lives, apart from 5 (Aidan Gallagher), who works for the CIA, investigating a bunch known as the Keepers, who’re making an attempt to finish the world as a result of they’re satisfied that one thing’s hinky in regards to the present timeline. They’re on the hunt for a lady named Jennifer (Victoria Sawal), who was discovered inside a large squid at 6 years outdated and is one way or the other related to the world’s finish. Because the siblings reunite and regain wonky variations of their powers of their quest to cease the Keepers and forestall this looming doomsday, they discover themselves splitting off on private journeys that assist heal their childhood traumas and settle for one another extra deeply, but do nothing to cease the inevitability of the present’s cataclysmic endgame.

And that is the place issues begin to get a bit of off-kilter. Whereas the opposite siblings are off on their very own aspect quests, 5 beneficial properties the flexibility to teleport to a subway station that connects to all of the totally different timelines; there, he and fellow time traveler Lila begin using this prepare system in the hunt for their authentic timeline to cease all of the dangerous issues taking place within the current. This looks like a sensible clear up, at the very least till you begin pondering too laborious about its implications: If 5 and Lila pull off fixing the issues created earlier than the occasions of Season 1, then nothing that adopted would’ve occurred both.

This season is pocked with plot holes that would simply suck the viewer in and destroy the world prematurely if lingered on too lengthy. We by no means learn the way the Keepers know something or how Reginald is related to those youngsters if he by no means adopted them on this timeline. Even a way of place is not possible to determine with a group of cities and cities that really feel as incomprehensibly unmappable because the timelines 5 and Lila get misplaced in. It may possibly really feel sloppy, the dearth of precision that generates this tangle of questions and contradictions. That is what typically occurs with time-travel tales: both making use of a lot construction to the affair that it’s concurrently boring and headache-inducing or abandoning any semblance of group and counting on a imprecise driving power of vibes.

Watching a present like this and never discovering any strong floor to seize onto needs to be irritating, however The Umbrella Academy—each the sequence and the comedian—isn’t desirous about that strong floor; it has at all times been a sea of chaos, a haphazard enterprise that’s extra model than substance. That’s the place it derives most of its attraction. Its elastic actuality of sci-fi and fantasy desires us to really feel our method by means of the present, not assume it. We’re right here to expertise the household’s emotional journeys, witnessing Luther’s realization that he’s greater than only a meatheaded chief, and Klaus (Robert Sheehan) and Allison’s recognition that the anger and frustration they’d generated towards one another these previous six years exists solely due to the deep love beneath these emotions.

5 and Lila’s unsuccessful timeline-hopping journey on the subway, which spans greater than six years on the present, is just not meant to result in the answer they need, but it surely’s not completely fruitless both. It grounds them in earnest and painful feelings as they develop an intimacy that colours of their characters’ edges and creates a palpable damage once they lastly return to the household and face Diego, Lila’s husband and 5’s brother. It’s what permits Diego to lastly see his spouse, understanding how a lot he has missed along with her.

Through the closing scenes of the sequence, the siblings see the top coming and say their goodbyes, but it surely’s not maudlin; when Luther suggests all of them go round and share their favourite recollections, all people rightly reacts with eye rolls and disgust. It feels true to the characters—in any case, most of them didn’t actually like one another very a lot, however all of them liked one another essentially the most. From there, we get the ultimate apocalypse, adopted by a snapshot of the brand new world created after the siblings’ destruction. It appears a bit of too good to truly exist, with Lila’s household, Allison’s daughter, and all of the sequence’ aspect gamers who’ve fallen alongside the best way, collectively within the park, having fun with an idyllic summer time day. It’s a scene that is senseless in any respect, besides that it feels prefer it does.

If I had spent this closing run of episodes on a hunt for rationality, it will’ve been an unsatisfying chore, irritating me once I couldn’t determine the place we had been, how issues had come to be, or what had ensued past the margins of the display. However all these solutions would’ve been simply extra set dressing to the present that The Umbrella Academy by no means shied away from being, cluttering my view with the stuff that by no means mattered, making me miss out on every part that did. This was at all times a zany ball of discord that reveled in poking its characters and its viewers with hefty doses of snark and cynicism and tumultuous tales stuffed with trauma, unhappiness, and ache. However beneath all that beats a gentle coronary heart, heat and full.