#tua couples

[just-b-wilde]

The Umbrella Academy: the concept of second love, finding yourself, a little controversy and loss

I've noticed a very similar concept recurring with characters in TUA, and I'd like to break it down for each character individually. I'll take them by their numbers.

#1 Luther

First Love: Allison

Controversial relationship (adopted siblings)

Partially unrequited love - he was never as important to Allison as she is to him + later manipulates him (a sign of toxicity)

Still, she's very important in the development of his story and they have some nice moments and she's important to his character development, though mostly it's about him agonizing over his love for her (he falls for Sloane all the more quickly in my opinion, as he thirsts for true love)

Second Love: Sloane

Romantic relationship, despite the obstacles their feelings for each other are very pure and they have some very cute scenes together

Luther has found in her someone who understands and accepts him for who he is

Found and lost thanks to the time jump (reboot)

#2 Diego

First Love: Eudora

Ex-partner

Partial cooperation

Tragic loss: Eudora's death - partially helps his character development

Second love: Lila

From his point of view, an initially casual yet intense relationship

Controversy: Their relationship is built on Lila's lies and manipulation (she was interested in him because it was her mission, kidnaps him to the Commission and later lies to him about "their son")

Even though they are later married and have three children together, their marriage is dysfunctional

Relationship loss: Lila wants a break because she is unsure about their marriage, later falls in love with Five

#3 Allison

First Love: Luther

(Yes, it's probably appropriate to mention Patrick, but he was never really in the plot, so I won't mention him even though they were married and had a daughter together.)

More of a childhood crush

She valued him most when she didn't have anyone else around

(See Luther's points)

Second love: Raymond

Her true love

He knew the truth about her and accepted her

Found and lost thanks to the time jump

#4 Klaus

First "love": Alcohol and drug addiction

An unexpected and controversial choice? Perhaps, but this "love" was very devastating and made Klaus do many crazy things

His eternal affairs can't be considered love.

Second love: Dave

The only man Klaus loved more than himself (his words)

Found and lost thanks to the time jump

Klaus got rid of his addiction thanks to him (which then came back thanks to him, but he was definitely able to help him from his "toxic love")

#5 Five

First Love: Dolores

His fantasy created through loneliness and trauma

She helped him through his years in a post-apocalyptic world

Despite not being a "healthy relationship" it had a place in Five's story and was important to his development (among other things, it foreshadowed how sensitive Five could be when he fell in love)

Second Love: Lila

His first true love

Lila was the only one who ever truly understood him and understood what he was going through + he had the happiest moments of his life with her (finally)

Controversy: she was still his brother's wife at the time, yet we know that, given the circumstances, she hadn't been with Diego for years (and wanted a break before that)

Love found through being lost in time and "lost" through going back in time

Tragic ending: erased from existence

#6 Ben

First love: Jill

One-sided crush (Jill didn't really know Ben existed)

He had partially distorted ideas about her

Jill reminds me partly of Dolores, since Ben as a ghost had very limited options

Second Love: Jennifer

A fateful yet devastating love

Feelings affected by other circumstances (Marigold and Durango)

Tragic ending: death

#7 Vanya/Victor

First "love": Leonard

A relationship built on a foundation of manipulation and lies

Yet Vanya herself mentioned the feelings she had for him, even if they were based on lies

Killed by Vanya, part of the reason for the apocalypse

Second Love: Sissy

Her/his true love

Controversy: A married woman with a family

Found and lost thanks to the time jump

Part of the reason for the apocalypse (Harlen)

#8 Lila

First Love: Diego

Their relationship had a very toxic foundation, from my perspective it was also based on Lila's rebellion against The Handler

An intense relationship, especially sexual

Their relationship gave her the family she wanted

See Diego's points

Second Love: Five

A romantic relationship

A collaborative partnership

Controversy: the killing of her family (who later live again)

Concept: enemies to lovers

See Five's points

It is very interesting from my point of view that their relationships often have common points. Usually the first loves carry a trace of a certain toxicity and only the second love is the real one (though this point is slightly moot with Diego, as his healthier relationship was definitely with Eudora and Ben wasn't entirely lucky in that regard either).

Also, they all found their loves based on the time jump and also lost them based on another time event. Death is also a very common part of the story.

I also find it interesting that most, for the sake of their relationships, opposed their family (in various forms) no matter what it brought - everyone would be very selfish for their happiness.

What do you think about this?

[everythingyoulikee]

First Kiss + details

[nataliescatorccio]

THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY Season 4 Episode 2, Jean and Gene

[nosolaceofastraightanswer]

netflix: got some straight gas 😛🔥 this strain is called “tua s4” 😳 you’ll be zonked out of your gourd 💯

me: yeah whatever. i don’t feel shit

5 minutes later: dude i swear i just saw five “i did it for my family” hargreeves fucking his brother’s wife

tua fandom pacing: steve blackman is lying to us

[supporter-of-my-fav-ships]

I know some won't even want to read it, I get that.… I understand why. What everything about it was kind of wrong or weird. But I really don't know, Five and Lila are the only ship that really caught my attention in TUA. Like sorry, but they were really cute together.

I've been waiting for this couple? Absolutely not, I didn't even think about it. But now it's really hard to get them out of my mind.

Yeah, Lila and Diego have always been the hot couple of the serie. It was so passionate and wild between them. But in the new season, it was obvious they weren't happy together. (Yeah, it was a script decision, but I still didn't get any feelings about them. And honestly, never before.) But with Five, it was just so… naturally nice? I just found their relationship to be based on feelings, on friendship (and yes, also on the circumstances that they couldn't go back and only had each other) but they seemed so happy together. It wasn't just based on s*x and physical attraction.

Haha, but that doesn't mean I doubt they sleep together. I'm sure they did and many times. I'm sure they both would have been able to f*ck each other's brains out, but I'm sure it was often just cheesy romantic, just like when they first kissed. Because did you see how soft they were for each other? It was insane! They're both trained killers and this was just so damn romantic. Just good old-fashioned love(making).

And yes, I'm sure they loved each other. But her kids and her guilt in front of Diego. Well, it was still complicated. But it was Five who was with her at those crucial moments. And who she looked up to before the end came. In fact, it was almost painful to watch Five watch Lila and Diego and dread her every answer. But damn. It was there! Their chemistry hit me.

I love them.

[clownwritesfanfic]

The honeymoon phase would go insane with Five.

When you first start dating he’d be so gentlemanly and sweet but the longer you’re together the more he does not give a shit cause he knows you’re in deep.

He still loves you and shows you he does but he’s no longer spacial jumping to open the car door for you before you can even undo your seatbelt.

He’ll open doors for you always but he doesn’t need to impress you anymore cause he knows y’all are locked in

[c0ffeeb1ack]

five should've had a cat. i know i know mr. pennycrumb blah blah blah but imagine him finding a stray in the apocalypse and digging it out from the rubble bc he thought it was a human survivor or something, and then he's like goddammit just a cat :/ but the cat starts following him around regardless of how many times he tries to shoo it off and chews on delores's shirt buttons and gets into his canned tuna and is generally super obnoxious in typical cat fashion. but then on one of those endless cold lonely nights the cat creeps up to him where he's sitting slumped against the ruins of his favorite library and he doesn't have the heart to scare it off this time, and it climbs into his lap and starts to purr.

anyway this post was sponsored by the cat person gang

[crispy0nion]

honestly i think the main issue with tua s4 is that steve blackman produced something that was exclusively aimed at himself. he is the target audience. "i felt like five needed a love story" you felt? so you didn't consider the opinions of all the people who are actually behind the success of this show, aka the fandom? it's actually not surprising at all, seeing as he also didn't take into consideration the actors' opinions.

season 4 is bad because he didn't make it for us, he made it for himself.

[sharkneto]

I'm kinda loving the slightly petty energy of fic writers resharing older works of Better Written Umbrella Material in this trying fandom time

[itriedimhighandreadytodie]

So no Horrance?

[franklyieros]

the first thought i thunk when lila and five kissed was "BUT... DELORES... NO." that mannequin and fives relationship has an embarrassingly large place in my heart

[fivelila]

Five and Lila are the endgame ship for me.

[everythingyoulikee]

slow soft kiss

[laurrelise]

anyone else feel something when he said this or am i just fucking insane

[just-b-wilde]

I was gonna take a break and watch the next season of TUA? Yeah. But instead, I wrote two new chapters today because I've apparently become obsessed with their story in my fanfic.

Survival Chapter 21: Who's going to give up first?

[confoundedluna]

thinking about TUA s4 again and the ending

and I know it's been long enough now that most people have said their piece and other people have probably said what i'm gonna say but it's just. argh

things worked about this season! remove them from the wider context and they make sense! Diego and Lila struggling in a regular world regular marriage because neither are used to that life? yes! the fuck ass way they went about that? no!

the ending in particular, people have pointed out how shitty the overall message ends up being of 'you are the fault/cause for your trauma and the pain you've inflicted on others across your lifetime and it's better you never even existed so at least they can be happy' but like. a bittersweet ending with the group sacrificing themselves Could have worked! it's just. the entire tone of the season needed to be different for it to work.

the group needed to have Got their happy ending and gotten to be happy for Once, so even if they were leaving it all behind, it happened! they got what they had all been looking for this whole time! and they got to leave the world a better place!

instead we get Luther reduced to a stripper joke, basically no mention of his wife (or most of the Sparrows at all), and his body mutated again even though that had No link to his marigold powers, living in a condemned building and trying pathetically hard to keep what he has left of his family together and cared for only to lose them all again in the end

Diego gets reduced to a fat joke when his actor is in Insanely good shape, he gets turned into a guy who would dump his problems on his family even after his own upbringing and how good a dad he was last season (at least from what i remember), and a guy who loses the family he finally got through his wife cheating on him with his brother and not being able to properly say goodbye to his children, dying not knowing whether she would choose him or them

Allison's husband walks out on her again, her kid that has been her main motivator seems to have a better connection with Klaus than her, her career has barely gone anywhere, and she dies having just sent her daughter alone to an unknown fate and not knowing if anyone would remember her

Klaus just Has to be reduced to a junkie that gets kidnapped and used and ignored by the rest of the group, except this time with no impact on the main plot, he doesn't have his connection with Ben anymore, and his fairly reasonable turn from immortal to paranoid germaphobe seems played as a joke, plus there's only just a Passing shot of the dog tags, no mention of Dave or his time at war

Five seems the happiest of the group at the CIA (LOW bar), but even then he's stuck back in another organisation like The Commission, and he gets absolutely character assassinated into some pathetic lovesick puppy who would enter an affair relationship with his brother's wife and hide a way home to the family he spent Decades in an apocalypse trying to get back to, and almost abandon them in the end because his BROTHER'S WIFE would dare to choose her family over him

Ben loses all sense of character and becomes only 'I love Jennifer', doesn't really have any real moments with the Umbrellas and barely mentions the Sparrows, eventually mutating beyond recognition and not even getting to die with his new makeshift family that he probably hasn't seen in the years he was locked up, beyond maybe Luther

Viktor distances himself from his family and can't hold down a relationship with anyone after Sissy, is forced to forgive Reginald for the abuse he went through because 'that wasn't me! it was the Other me!' and barely gets any moments with his family that has finally welcomed him before dying

Lila gets watered down and her character assassinated into some housewife that would cheat with her brother in law that she has seen looking like a child, no delving into the dynamic between her and her now-living family, and dies showing affection to her affair partner in front of her husband

making their lives miserable and then having the solution be that they all die and everyone else gets a happy ending is Not a good way to end a show like TUA - imo, it should have been either they're miserable throughout and finally get their happy ending, maybe getting to live just normal lives either separately with their 'birth' parents not knowing each other or what their lives used to be, or all together either with or without memories, OR they get to be happy, just for once, so that they can leave the world behind knowing that even if no one else remembers them, they got to experience happiness

Luther should be the definition of a perfect marriage with Sloane, living that stereotypical dreamlife

Diego should be doing Some kind of active work, maybe martial arts or self defense classes or Something, and getting to come home to his family happy and fulfilled with the life he has

Allison should have her husband and her child, and a career that, big star or not, she's happy in

Klaus should be in THERAPY, and he should be with Dave, finally independent from his family and not needing them to save him but sticking around anyway because he loves them and they love him

Five should be either alone romantically or with some Delores substitute, getting to live out his old man life in peace surrounded by the family he Platonically worked so desperately to keep together

Ben could be with Jennifer or not, but either way, he should have the Sparrows And the Umbrellas, with connections to all of them, even if he is still a bit of an ass - they love him anyway

Viktor should be with Sissy, finally fitting in to the family dynamic, finally in a relationship that's healthy, that he gets to keep, not sidelined or isolated but just another part of the gang

Lila should be a working mom in some way, either doing something like Diego or as part of an organisation, but still coming home Happy to her family at the end of the day, no cheating

whether that's their ending, or just what they get temporarily and have to choose to sacrifice for the greater good of the world, these characters that have spent So Long being traumatised and fighting for a sliver of happiness should get to experience it properly, not spend every minute tired and sad and even hating each other before they have to die no matter what