The Umbrella Academy Season 2 Looks A Lot More Promising

The first season of The Umbrella Academy was...fine. Decent, entertaining, fun. While the pilot was fantastic in dropping you into the crazy family, the rest of the season felt like it took things a little too slow and at times tried to ground the absolute bonkers story. It did feel like it was trying not to be too weird. Like a lot of Netflix shows, it could've told it's story in 6-8 episodes rather than 10. The finale picked things up and the oncoming apocalypse that Five had been trying to stop all season long eventually did come from his sister Vanya, who snapped after an entire lifetime of lies and manipulation from her family. When last we saw the team, Vanya was shot, possibly dead, and Five had gone back in time to turn all his family members into kids for the second season. 

The family as kids was not something I was super looking forward to, not to mention would probably never work by getting rid of most of the cast. Thankfully Netflix has released a trailer for season 2, which is dropping this month, and it looks like we'll be saved from that outcome. It also looks like the second season is really stepping up the weird and while we'll have to deal with trying to stop an apocalypse 2nd year in a row, there's a good chance this season will be the right mix. 

The best parts of The Umbrella Academy were this nuclear family coming together after years apart, trying to deal with their demons, and struggling to work together because of their past actions. There's comedy gold and real drama underneath a story about adults trying to move past childhood trauma and what that trauma does to them now. The best way to upend all of that is to throw them into a time and place where none of them are familiar with and the only thing they have, is each other, if they can get over themselves. 

It looks like that's exactly what the series has done as the family is now transported to 1963, 10 days before the Kennedy assassination, all characters will have a new start and a new journey in the 60's. I am curious about Vanya and how she will be with the team as those tensions and issues are still not resolved. The trailer has emphasized the weird and strange, some of the best bits of Umbrella Academy. I'm hoping this season will have better pacing and at the end we can possibly have a new story and it not just be the team trying to stop the apocalypse every year. 

Can You Tell Your Story In 4 Seasons Or Less?

Netflix recently announced some show renewals in a  "Good News, Bad News" routine. Critical and fan favorites, Ozark and Dead To Me, were renewed for new seasons, but at the cost of it being their final seasons. Ozark's fourth and final season will be split into two parts of 7 episodes each and Dead To Me will return for it's third and final season. They join a growing retirement community of shows that were cut off at season 4 for the streaming network. Ozark seems especially puzzling consider it's recent third season seemed to finally separate it from the Breaking Bad knockoff reputation the show had, and yet Netflix is only allowing it to go one more season. There's a number of shows on network, cable, and streaming, that really came into their peak either in or after their 4th season. Imagine if Breaking Bad ended in their fourth year. Yes, Season 4 of Breaking Bad was fantastic, but you would've also been robbed of the terrific 5th season. Can you really tell everything you need to about your story in 4 seasons or less and then get out? Or does your show end up feeling like it gains all the momentum only to hit a dead end?