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The superpowered Hargreeves siblings always find themselves leaping from one apocalyptic disaster to another. Since they’ve averted doomsday for a second time, however, The Umbrella Academy season 3 (which is yet to be made official by Netflix), is set to hand them an entirely new dilemma to deal with, based on the last episode of season 2 – a completely new reality (spoilers for season 2 follow).
With the Handler’s plan to take over the timeline controlling Temps Commission thwarted, The Umbrella Academy season 2’s finale saw Luther, Diego, Allison, Klaus, Five and Vanya heading back to their original time. Or so they thought…
This version of the present was subtly different to the one they remembered, with their surrogate father Sir Reginald Hargreeves still alive, and an entirely new supergroup known as The Sparrow Academy in residence at his mansion. What can it all mean?
The Umbrella Academy season 3 seems inevitable, and will hopefully answer all those burning questions about parallel timelines, alien visitors, and how the Hargreeves kids got their powers on that fateful day in 1989. Read on as we speculate on what you can expect to see when The Umbrella Academy season 3 arrives…
The Umbrella Academy season 3 release date: when we expect it (if it happens)
Netflix is yet to give The Umbrella Academy season 3 the official green light, but it’s surely only a matter of time.
While the streaming platform hasn’t announced official figures for the Hargreeves family’s second TV adventure, the first season was one of its most viewed shows in 2019. And with reviews on aggregator site Rotten Tomatoes giving season 2 even higher critical and audience scores than its predecessor, it’s reasonable to assume the new run has bagged around the same number of viewers. If that is indeed the case, cancellation seems much less likely than a third season.
Netflix usually waits at least a month after a new season’s debut to confirm a renewal, so we’d expect to expect a third season to be confirmed around early September. An 18-month gap between seasons has become the norm for Netflix shows, so we’re likely to see The Umbrella Academy season 3 in early 2022 – though if coronavirus restrictions hold up production, we may have to wait a little longer.
Cut to the chase
- What is it? The third season of Netflix’s hit adaptation of Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá’s Dark Horse comic about the dysfunctional superheroes of the Hargreeves family.
- Where can I watch it? Like the two previous seasons of The Umbrella Academy, a third season would be available exclusively on Netflix.
- When can I watch it? If Netflix follows previous form, the likely ETA for The Umbrella Academy season 3 is early 2022.
The Umbrella Academy season 3 trailer: is there one?
With season 2 only just launched, it’s a little early for a The Umbrella Academy season 3 trailer – in fact, we probably won’t see one until the second half of 2021. But don’t be surprised if we get some kind of fun video to announce the show’s renewal – the recap that prefaced season 2 was a typically quirky affair, and we’d expect something in a similar vein when confirmation comes.
What can we expect to see in The Umbrella Academy season 3?
With two world-ending apocalypses already averted, there’s a good chance that preventing some kind of armageddon will be on the agenda in The Umbrella Academy season 3. Anything else would feel like anticlimax.
Beyond that, we don’t know much, aside from the fact it’ll plunge the Hargreeves siblings into another unfamiliar world.
Having spent the first season in their native 2019 and visited the early 1960s for the duration of season 3, the Hargreeves will now find themselves in a parallel version of their original present. While they’ve seemingly got over many of their issues with one another, however, their lives aren’t about to get any easier.
In this reality, Sir Reginald Hargreeves – the surrogate dad whose death brought the siblings together in season 1 – is still alive. “I knew you’d show up eventually,” he says when Luther, Diego, Allison, Klaus, Five and Vanya materialize in his mansion. And it doesn’t take long for his famously cold style of parenting to come to the fore, as he reveals that the familiar-looking house “isn’t your home”, and that what they’d assumed to be the Umbrella Academy is actually the Sparrow Academy.
It turns out that Hargreeves Sr has been running this alternative group of superheroes. Normally a floating green cube being one of their number would be the attention grabber, but the bigger surprise is the identity of the leader of the group – it’s Ben ‘Number Six’ Hargreeves, the deceased sibling who belatedly passed over to the other side in season 2. Turns out he’s back in one piece, the new team’s Number One, and not particularly welcoming to newcomers in his home: “Dad, who the hell are these assholes?” he asks. Don’t expect happy families in The Umbrella Academy season 3.
One positive for the original Hargreeves clan is the fact their powers are seemingly getting stronger – as hinted by Diego’s newly discovered ability to stop lots of bullets in season 2 finale “The End of Something”.
“They’re all sort of growing up. I like to think as we go forward that their powers are also evolving,” explained showrunner Steve Blackman (reported by ScreenRant). “They’re learning new things. They were trained until they were 14 or 15 by a very dysfunctional dad but then the family blew apart before they could finish their training. They might even discover in the future that their powers are stronger when they’re together.”
It’s one hell of a change to the timeline, so the Temps Commission – now being led by the kindly Herb – will presumably need to get involved at some point. Indeed, perhaps the Commission will now be asking the Umbrella Academy to help them restore reality, rather than directing their efforts at eliminating them.
What questions does The Umbrella Academy season 3 need to answer?
Over the course of just two seasons, The Umbrella Academy has built up an intriguingly complex mythology, and that means plenty of questions to answer.
We still don’t know, for example, why 43 children were unexpectedly born on October 1, 1989, to mothers who weren’t pregnant when the day began. Or even what happened to most of those kids.
We know about the original seven members of the Umbrella Academy, of course, and there’s another six new members of the Sparrow Academy – assuming the same kids were born in both timelines, and that the aforementioned floating cube is a member of the group. We also know that Lila, who did a runner in “The End of Something”, is one of the 43, leaving 29 (possibly superpowered) offspring unaccounted for. Presumably they’re waiting to be discovered by Hargreeves and/or his kids.
But why doesn’t Ben recognize his siblings from the old timeline, even though Sir Reginald does? And why is Ben no longer a spirit? “He’s alive and not a ghost,” confirmed Justin H Min (who plays Ben) at a Cable Telecommunications Association for Marketing panel (reported by Syfy Wire). “Hopefully, if we get a season 3, you’ll get to see he has quite a different personality and appearance.”
Elsewhere, we need to know why this new timeline is similar, yet so different, to the original. Could it have anything to do with the calculations Five made to send his 50-something self forward to 2019 while still maintaining his adult form? Or has a new antagonist from the Temps Commission been meddling with history? Does Claire, the daughter Allison longs to be reunited with, even exist in this version of reality?
And surely we’re not the only ones wondering why the supergroup is now known as the Sparrow Academy – there may well be clues in the 43 sparrows Netflix strategically hid throughout season 2 as an epic set of feathered Easter eggs.
Spoiler alert: There are 43 sparrows hidden throughout Season 2 of @UmbrellaAcad. Bet you can’t tell us where they all are. pic.twitter.com/YFM4WiapBTAugust 6, 2020
Then there’s the question marks over the other big reveal of the season 2 finale. Since he removed his human mask, we now know that Sir Reginald Hargreeves is some kind of alien. Surely his extra-terrestrial backstory is going to play a major role in season 3 – if you want some pointers, you could check out the Dark Horse comic book series that inspired the TV show. We’re also assuming that the shadowy Majestic 12 organisation that wanted President John F Kennedy dead remained a thorn in Hargreeves’ side over the course of the subsequent half century.
There are also a few key players from 1963 who are likely to crop up. Harlan, the kid given telekinetic powers after Vanya saved his life, would now be in his sixties, and is presumably out there somewhere. His mum, Sissy, may also still be alive – how would Vanya feel about meeting her lover as a much older woman?
Beyond that, did the surviving Swede assassin find a happy new life with the members of Klaus’s cult? Will Allison be reunited with an older version of her husband, Raymond? And could Klaus have his happy ending with Dave? In this alternative version of history, maybe the love of his life survived Vietnam?
As for the cube… Well, it seems we will find out more about its identity. “I think [the cube’s purpose] will be revealed in Season 3, if we’re lucky enough to be picked up,” Blackman told TV Guide.
The Umbrella Academy season 3 cast: who we expect to return
It goes without saying that the six surviving members of the Hargreeves family – Tom Hopper as Number One/Luther, David Castañeda as Number Two/Diego, Emmy Raver-Lampman as Number Three/Allison, Robert Sheehan as Number Four/Klaus, Aidan Gallagher as Number Five and Ellen Page as Number Seven/Vanya – will be back in action.
Thanks to the new timeline created in the season 2 finale, it’s also a safe bet that Colm Feore will be back as Umbrella Academy founder Sir Reginald Hargreeves, with Justin H Min as the newly corporeal Ben Hargreeves. This should also restore talking chimp Pogo to the mix, meaning that Adam Godley will have considerably more to do than the bit-part he played in season 2.
With eighth sibling Lila having escaped in the season 2 finale, it would seem a waste for Ritu Arya not to play a major role in season 3 – especially as her relationship with Diego needs to be filed under “unfinished business”. Blackman confirmed as much to Syfy Wire. “She has unfinished business with the family. So we can safely say, that’s not the end of Lila Pitts.”
Over at the Temps Commission, we reckon Ken Hall will be back as kindly agent Herb, now that he’s the head of the organization. Season 2 Big Bad “the Handler” came back from a bullet in the head in season 1, so the character’s apparent death in season 2 doesn’t necessarily mean Kate Walsh’s involvement in the show is over.
The biggest season 3 casting news will surely hinge around who’s going to play the grown-up Harlan, and the five new human members of The Sparrow Academy who were strategically hidden in shadow during “The End of Something”.
As for that floating cube… We reckon a Borg spacecraft from Star Trek is made for the role.