The Umbrella Academy-1: Great Characters! But Unused ...
- Story Doctor
- Aug 12, 2020
- 2 min read
Talking-the-plot ...
Place-holder conversations ...
All characters musing about ...
Personal Rating: 2/5
Script: 3/5
Character Development: 4/5
Plot: 2/5
Engagement: 2/5
Acting: 4.5/5
Background Music: 5/5
Cinematography: 5/5
Theme: 2/5
Satisfaction: 2/5
A found family of outcasted and gifted kids born suddenly out of the blue. The kids were raised by an ambitious workaholic man somewhat opposite of Charles-X, who is always reading, shutting himself in his study. The one who raises the kids is an AI; they call her mother. And the father who found them cares too little about them that he's named them with numbers.
A complex family issue, that keeps showing on the 'issue' part rather than the actual story. Here, you might get confused about who is the main character at first. You'll think Vanya, the only one who isn't gifted is the protagonist since you'll expect her to be the one who will develop the most. And she does. Except, she doesn't do much for episodes after episodes. In fact, no one does many things except Hazel and his partner.
If you get past all their rambling and musing about ...
... You'll see, you're liking number Four. And then you might absolutely like Hazel's development the most who starts as an anti-hero, faces inner conflicts, combined with his brilliant acting, you'd say Hazel should be on the movie poster.
And then, you may like number Four with his great and believable acting, but again that musing about for five episodes! If you're still not tired, you'll wonder why they didn't make it a movie, instead of a TV series with so little story to show, since nothing really happens.
Then comes Five--his character had the most fighting scenes, struggles, and conflicts--but so repeatedly without any progress that, at one point, it'll feel like a carbon-copy of one event: Chasing. As if the series is trying to deliver a shooting and fight scene in every episode because they 'have to follow the structure'. Five's acting, however, may not feel like a man who is 50 years older.
The rest of the characters felt covering too much screen time with too little to portray. With silly plot-moving-conflicts, at the end, by which time you'll forget there's Vanya, too, who once you've thought is the Protagonist, you'll find she suddenly really is the Protagonist!
And somehow, no one even thought of what she might be doing! A forced plot-device, this one.
Overall, it's full of forced plots, that didn't flow naturally.
While, it had a good theme, beats, great music, some great acting, and incredible-but-unused-characters.
Did you watch it, too? Do you feel similar? Or do you disagree? Let's discuss as fellow story-lovers!
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