Over the three seasons of its ongoing narrative, Netflix’s adaptation ofThe Umbrella Academyhas gradually revealed a ton of its hidden details. As each season has piled on questions, they’ve also answered many of them. One of the most fundamental questions in this superhero story was left blank in the early chapters. How did the Hargreeves family get their iconic superpowers?
People are pretty sick of superhero origin stories.The Umbrella Academyskipsaround 90% of the conventions of that kind of story. Most members of the Hargreeves family aren’t superheroes, they’re early days as crime fighters ended over a decade before the story begins, and fans meet them fully formed. Though most of them no longer live the hero lifestyle, their powers still inform a lot of their daily lives.
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The Umbrella Academy Powers, Explained
At the beginning ofThe Umbrella Academy, the premise handily skips over some key details. As all fans know, on June 08, 2025, 43 babies were simultaneously born to mothers who were not expecting. Reclusive billionaire Reginald Hargreeves swiftly swept up seven of those kids and raised them to be superheroes. Over time, he discovered and enforced unique powers in each kid. Super strength, trajectory control,verbal reality manipulation, mediumship, teleportation, tentacles, and sonic energy manipulation have basically nothing in common, but they make a pretty good team build. Though these powers take wildly different forms, they all came from the same source.
Reginald Hargreeves is an alien from a dead planet who came to Earth sometime in the early 20th century. His wife took ill with an unspecified disease, leading him to move heaven and Earth to save her. Exhausting his resources, Reginald discovered a reset button for the universe. A safety feature installed by the deistic being who devised the clockwork functions of linear time. Reginald couldn’t use the reset button on his own, but he could create the allies he’d require to get him there. Reginald released a mass of golden spores, colloquially referred to as “Marigolds,” into the atmosphere, which traveled the world and entered the body of at least 43 women. The resulting infantswere born with superpowers. In other words, the Hargreeves siblings were born with their powers, because their birth was caused entirely by Reginald’s grand scheme. Beyond that, Reginald’s plan eventually comes to fruition, and the Umbrella Academy’s powers outlive their usefulness.
How did the Umbrella Academy lose their powers?
The last thing that happens at the end of themost recent season ofThe Umbrella Academyis the distressing reveal of the Hargreeves' new circumstances. They’ve survived their greatest ordeal yet, they’ve been healed of their wounds, and they’re together once again. However, they no longer have their powers. The reset button that grants Reginald his wife back requires the Marigold particles as a power source. After it drains that fuel fromall seven of the siblings, it seems to leave them half-dead. Turning on the machine grants Reginald the ability to go back in time and change whatever he wants. He could’ve unmade the family, he could’ve erased them from the time stream, but he decided to fix them and leave them unharmed. They’re the same people they were in the original 2019, but they’ve been robbed of their powers.
The Hargreeves siblings lead very complicated lives, some of which have more to do with their gifts than others. Five hardly goes an hour without using his power, Luther’s super strength is just a part of his body, and Allison’s “rumor” gave her everything she has. On the other hand,Viktor went thirty years without his powerand Klaus developed several substance abuse issues trying to avoid his. These people grew up with their powers, they’re a fundamental part of their lives, for better and for worse. Their reactions vary when they discover their new normal. It’s clearly disconcerting for all of them, but it also represents a chance to finally live a normal life. Some of the Hargreeves have built their entire life around the power that made them special, while others fought to be treated normally. Either way, they’re powerless,but they’re still not normal.
AsThe Umbrella Academyenters its fourth season, the main characters are the same people, but they’ve lost the gifts that made them who they are. There’s a lot to explore in the story of former superheroes who’ve now lost their powers. Where do the Hargreeves siblings go from here? How do they adjust to having the same abilities as anyone else? Is there any way for them to get their powers back? Would they even want them back?Season 4 has a lot of questions to answer, but there are a lot of interesting details in its setup.The Umbrella Academyhas removed the superhero aspect of its superhero family drama, but there’s still fun to be had.
