The second season of Netflix's hit series The Umbrella Academy is rapidly approaching, and as the excitement builds it's easy to remember how fun and entertaining the first season was. The show is based on a series of comics by Gerard Way (yes, of My Chemical Romance fame), and although the show is a great adaptation, it does make a significant number of changes from the page to the screen.
Some of those changes were clearly for the better of the show, it's story, or it's characters, but some were not. Here's 5 ways the changes from the comics were a good thing, and 5 ways in which they weren't.
Good: Leonard Peabody
Leonard Peabody is the main villain of the first season of The Umbrella Academy, and he makes for a very interesting one. He's really nothing more than a disgruntled man who always dreamed of being a part of the Umbrella Academy, who rightly deduces that Vanya actually does have some kind of superpowers, and thus develops a relationship with her to coerce her into becoming the White Violin.
The villains in the comics are a shadowy group called the Orchestra Verdammten, but their motives are a mystery and they're not well developed as a character or collection.
Not Good: Hazel And Cha-Cha Are Way Less Badass
Hazel and Cha-Cha are actually great characters, and portraying them as these overworked and underappreciated employees is both relatable and entertaining. But the characters in the comics are vastly different.
They are a pair of hyper-aggressive sociopaths who are the scariest assassins in the Temps Comission (called Temps Aeternalis in the comics), and they seem like more worthy adversaries for the Hargreeves family.
Good: The Commission
In the comics, the Temps Comission was known as Temps Aeternalis, but their mission statement of maintaining history as it exists and eliminating any threats to the timeline is pretty much the same.
There isn't a lot of backstory provided for Temps Aeternalis though, and the decision to essentially transform it into the Temps Comission, which seems like every other mundane office job in the world, was a clever one.
Not Good: The Family's Exclusion From The Temps Comission
In the TV series, at least so far, the only connection between the Hargreeves family and the Temps Comission is really Number Five.
But in the comics, it's not just Five who gets roped into working for them, both he and Allison are forced to go on a mission for them, and the rest of their brothers (not just Klaus) go back in time to the Vietnam War era in an attempt to help them.
Good: Patch Shows Diego Has A Heart
In the comic books, Diego works alongside a cop named Inspector Lupo as a vigilante, helping to solve crimes and punish criminals, but in the series Lupo is switched out for Detective Patch.
In pretty much every interaction with his family, Diego is aggressive, uncaring, and downright mean, so it was smart to give him a relationship with someone like Patch to prove that despite all of his inner rage, Diego has a heart.
Not Good: The Banality Of The Apocalypse
The fact that the organization that is the driving force behind ensuring that the apocalypse comes to pass seems to be the most mundane and normal organization in existence definitely has it's charms, but ultimately it's a gag that is kind of a one-trick pony.
It's funny for sure, but ultimately when a show is tackling the end of the entire known world it feels like there should be a bit more grandeur behind it.
Good: Ben's Constant Presence
The Ben of the comic books and the Ben of the series seem to have pretty similar superpowers, childhoods, and ultimately tragic fates. But the Ben in the comics isn't given anywhere close to the attention that the Ben in the series gets.
Having their deceased brother as a constant presence in Klaus' orbit is a lot of fun, and making Ben a true Hargreeves character instead of a footnote is a good decision.
Not Good: Klaus' War Trauma
While Klaus does go to the Vietnam war era in both the comics and the show, the results of that time traveling is extremely different. In the show he goes to war, falls in love, and watches the man he loves die.
But in the comics, he just seemingly lives a normal life. Given that Klaus has already gone through extreme trauma, it seems a little unnecessary to add even more on to the pile.
Good: The Series Feels Grounded In Reality
Probably the most fun aspect of the series is that it really does feel like watching what the world would be like if a few regular people happened to have superpowers.
These kids may have been born with the powers of superheroes, but they're hardly the Supermans or Wonder Womans that most people imagine superheroes to be. Making these extraordinary characters so relatable definitely helped the show.
Not Good: Who Wants Realistic Superheroes?
But on the other side of that coin, the characters of the comics are much more traditional comic book characters. And if a creator wants to invent a world where all things are possible, then who wants to see a world where even people who are the most extraordinary humans alive are still kind of boring and normal?
The show does get a little more extreme in the end, but it would have been cool to see more supernatural fantasy elements throughout the entire series.