For four seasons, fans have been waiting for the multiple timeline–spanning mysteries in The Umbrella Academy to unravel.
Luckily, by the time we reach the end of the series, the timeline has finally aligned and we get some answers. Like, how did Ben (Justin H. Min) die? What is the Jennifer Incident? And where do the Brellies — Luther (Tom Hopper), Diego (David Castañeda), Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman), Klaus (Robert Sheehan), Five (Aidan Gallagher), Ben, Viktor (Elliot Page), and Lila (Ritu Arya) — end up? (For all your lingering questions about the series finale itself, check out Tudum’s ending explainer.)
But Tudum and series showrunner and creator Steve Blackman are keenly aware there are still some burning questions fans are dying to know the answers to (especially for OG fans of the Dark Horse graphic novel series, created by Gerard Way and illustrated by Gabriel Bá, on which the TV series is based). Like, will Five ever get his cup of coffee?! Below, Blackman (with some help from Way, and cast members Millie Davis and Jordan Claire Robbins) addresses what happened to Sloane (Genesis Rodriguez) and Ray (Yusuf Gatewood), why Christopher is a cube, and more.
First off, what exactly happened to Sloane and why does she never come back?
Steve Blackman: It’s a tough first question. OK. We love Sloane. I think Sloane exists in the timeline, but she has never found Luther, and Luther never found her. We’ve also left it open to the idea that the reset at the end of Season 3 possibly wasn’t completed before Allison (Raver-Lampman) brained Hargreeves. [Since he] didn’t get to finish, [Sloane] may not have existed. She may be out in the world, but we left it unknown. If you ask me what I think, I think she’s somewhere out there. But she may not remember anything, and she may be so far away from Luther that she can’t get to him.
Why did Ray (Gatewood) walk out on Allison, and why didn’t we see him in Season 4?
Blackman: We love the character of Ray. We also love the actor. So, in the backstory that really isn’t told, Ray and Allison just couldn’t make the marriage work because Ray actually felt out of time. He didn’t ask to be pulled into this timeline. And he didn’t feel he fit. So it wasn’t that Allison did anything wrong or her daughter Claire (Millie Davis) did anything wrong. I just think Ray struggled to fit in this timeline and eventually he just said, “I have to go it on my own,” and he left her.
How are Allison’s daughter, Claire, and Lila (Arya) and Diego’s (Castañeda) kids still alive? If their parents technically don’t exist at the end of the season …
Blackman: So it’s a question of how you deal with understanding time. I think physicists will argue all different versions of time. The writers in the room and I have argued about time over and over. We’re saying that because of the special portal, the subway portal, they were able to be put into this timeline in a way that no one else could be. So they exist. I believe they have memories of their parents, that they’re the only ones who really remember that their parents existed, that no one else ever knew of the Umbrella Academy or their existence. But they do. They still share these wonderful memories in their heart and their minds about their parents and their uncles.
Millie Davis: Maybe things would have been easier if she forgot everything, but I’m so happy that she’s with her family. This season is all about family and coming together. So, I think it’s a sweet ending.
Why didn’t Klaus get sick like the others when he got his powers back?
Blackman: Klaus didn’t take the Marigold orally like the rest — it was poured into his body. And more importantly, he was doing drugs so quickly afterwards [that] he didn’t have time to get sick. The drugs are masking the sickness.
Was Lila gifting Five (Gallagher) instant coffee a nod to fan theories?
Blackman: Yes! So the idea is he can never get a good cup of coffee. And even in the deli, he’s about to drink the coffee and [the other Five he’s talking to] says, “You’re not going to like that.” I think if we did our job right, he never drinks a cup of coffee. All the times he picks one up, we never in four years let him drink the coffee. It’s a running joke from the very beginning that he can’t get a decent cup of coffee.
What was the deal with Ben (Min) on the train at the end of Season 3?
Blackman: So, the idea was that that is the same Sparrow Ben that we meet in Season 4. He was starting to work on his Bitcoin plan already and he started overseas. We make reference to the fact that his Sparrow coin went very big. It was worldwide for a while. We figured he started in the overseas markets. He was in Korea, Singapore, moved to London, and then eventually became a gazillionaire for a few seconds until he was accused of running a Ponzi scheme and then went to prison. But that is the same Ben.
Does Five have a name? And is it Max like the name of the deli we see at the end of the season?
Blackman: No. Five’s name is Five. What we came up with was that — and I think this also has to do with Gerard Way telling me this — as the kids grew up, they got to pick their names and Grace (the Brellies’ adoptive robot mother, played by Jordan Claire Robbins) helped pick their names. Five could never pick one. He just was that kind of stubborn kid who didn’t know what his name was yet. And when he was 11, he disappeared and got lost in the future. So he never got back to be able to have a name. So he just kept Five. So Five’s name is only Five. There is no other name for Five.
Gerard Way: He was basically like, “Fuck you!” That’s the way it was in the comic, even though you haven’t seen it yet.
So all the Brellies picked their names?
Blackman: Yes, Grace helped each kid pick a name that they felt was right for them.
Way: Yes, that is true.
Jordan Claire Robbins: I did not know that. That’s amazing. I’m going to buy into that!
Why is Christopher a cube?
Blackman: Now, that is a very, very hard question. One that I don’t know if I can answer. In the alternate timeline, there was a way to develop a life form that was Christopher. We had a backstory that never made it in that Christopher was once one of the siblings with powers and his powers went out of control and it trapped him within this cube. That never made into the series, but that was the sort of backstory for him. But he was a family member. He was a sibling trapped in his cube that they could only hear through telekinesis that he could [use to] communicate with people, and he was a very rude, foul-mouthed guy.
Why are the alternative academies named after birds, like Sparrow and Phoenix?
Blackman: That’s funny you should ask that. I never thought of it that way. I just think one of them came out of Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá’s [illustrator of the Dark Horse comic series] brains. They always had the notion of the Sparrow Academy. And then I wanted to extend that idea to the third one, which is the Phoenix Academy. I felt that worked and followed through — but I give them credit for that.
Is there romantic closure for Luther and Allison, or do you think they just moved on with their respective partners?
Blackman: Theirs was only really puppy love. It wasn’t real grown-up love between them. We have the episode in Season 1 called “The Day That Wasn’t” where they had that brief kiss. But I think had they really wanted to, I don’t think it would’ve ever gone anywhere. I think they’re wonderful friends and they love each other that way, but they were never destined to be together.
Why does Alphonso (Jake Epstein) look the way he does?
Blackman: So Alphonso’s ability is that you can punch him as hard as you want, you can kick him as hard as you want, and whatever pain he gets, you feel. He’s the pain magnet, so if you punch him, you feel the punch. If you shoot him, you feel the pain in your shoulder. But it takes its toll on his body. His body’s breaking down over time from all the fights and all the other things — it’s a reflection of all the fights, all the things he’s done.
One of the examples is when he fights Diego in the pharmacy [in Season 3]. Every time he punches Alphonso, Diego feels it. Finally Alphonso says, “Now you’re getting this. You punch me, you feel it, pal.” The idea is that he still takes some of the damage so his body’s all broken and beaten up.
Why does Grace worship the Kugelblitz [in Season 3], and what does she see or hear when she looks into it?
Blackman: Grace being a machine, we think there’s some kind of electromagnetic thing that is actually affecting her mind. She’s hearing from the signal in that it’s some sort of pattern in the chaos. She’s hearing more than anyone else can hear, and she’s starting to believe that it’s actually speaking to her and it’s some kind of deity. But it’s also breaking down her programming at the same time every time she gets close to it.
If Luther was watching over Abigail (Liisa Repo-Martell) on the moon, why didn’t Reginald (Colm Feore) ever have Klaus (Sheehan) communicate with her?
Blackman: She was in the stasis, right? And not technically dead. It's more like a cryogenic thing. She died, but she was kept just on the verge of death. She died from [the] disease that wiped out their planet, but I think he kept her on the cusp of death. He only trusted Luther because Luther's a bit of a simpleton and honest, and would do exactly what he said, which was to “watch the Moon.” Luther never knew that he was actually protecting the thing that was most important to Hargreeves: his wife who he loved.
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