From ’60s hippy cults to intricately choreographed sibling dance-offs, there’s never a dull moment for the dysfunctional superfamily of The Umbrella Academy, no matter the timeline. 

The fourth and final season of the superpowered drama, created by Steve Blackman and based on Gerard Way and Gabriel Bá’s comic series, ties up the hilariously chaotic timelines woven through the series. 

Throughout the mayhem, there’s one constant: the Hargreeves family. Luther (Tom Hopper) is an extra strong half-gorilla man. Diego (David Castañeda) manipulates objects and weapons in midair. Klaus (Robert Sheehan) sees dead people. Allison (Emmy Raver-Lampman) has the power of suggestion. Viktor (Elliot Page) turns sound and emotion into energy blasts. Five (Aidan Gallagher) can leap through time and space. Ben (Justin H. Min) has some vicious tentacles. When they aren’t bickering, they’re fighting crime and saving the world (and OK, fine, sometimes destroying it, too).

Over four seasons, the siblings have battled numerous world-ending events and faced weird foes, including murderous Swedish triplets, the sinister Temps Commission, and a pair of oddball Southwestern community college professors. They’ve caused and thwarted armageddon at least three times — and sometimes the siblings have even taken a turn to the dark side.

Honestly, it’s a lot. So to keep everything straight in your head, here’s the complete timeline of all the timelines in chronological order. 

1961

Klaus starts a hippie cult.
And it’s called Destiny’s Children. (Get it?)

In Season 2,  Klaus’ looks are a fluid mix of both men’s and women’s clothing. 

“It would just be a big party of madness whenever we’d have a fitting, and the more laughs we got during the fitting, the better the costumes got,” says costume designer Christopher Hargadon.

Allison joins the Civil Rights Movement.
She falls in love with Civil Rights campaigner Raymond Chestnut (Yusuf Gatewood).

1963

Diego is institutionalized.
After attempting to stop Lee Harvey Oswald from assassinating John F. Kennedy, Diego winds up in a mental institution where he meets Lila Pitts (Ritu Arya), a zany patient — and his future baby mama — with the superpower of mimicking the abilities of those around her.

Viktor meets Sissy.

After he gets hit by Sissy Cooper’s (Marin Ireland) car, Viktor suffers from amnesia.  The pair fall in love as Sissy cares for him.

Ireland was one of Page’s favorite guest stars.


“Working with Marin was absolutely a highlight for me and for the show in general,” says Page. “I loved our storyline and I really cherished having that time with her and doing those scenes.”

Ghost Ben sacrifices himself. 

Viktor regains his memories and powers and almost causes an apocalypse when he’s captured by the FBI, but Ben sacrifices himself to stop it just in time. 

Lila turns on the Handler.
Viktor inadvertently gives his powers to Sissy’s son Harlan (Justin Paul Kelly). Lila turns on the Handler (Kate Walsh), the woman who raised her, and the team uses the Temps Commission briefcase to travel back to 2019.   

The Handler’s looks were inspired by various periods and iconic pieces from Dior or Balenciaga, accented with subtle, freaky touches — including plastic spiders.

1967

Klaus goes to Vietnam.
Klaus escapes Hazel and Cha-Cha’s clutches in 2019, then time-travels to 1967, where he falls in love with Dave, a Vietnam War soldier who later dies in battle.  

1989

The super babies are born
Forty-three superpowered children are born to previously not-pregnant mothers worldwide. Billionaire Sir Reginald Hargeeves adopts seven of them and forms the Umbrella Academy. Elsewhere, in Oakland, California, Sissy dies of cancer.

Page said if he could’ve changed one thing about the show’s many timelines, it would’ve been to “bring Sissy back somehow. I would’ve loved it if that storyline had continued.”

Harlan kills the women who are pregnant with Umbrella Academy siblings.
When Harlan’s mother, Sissy, dies in 1989, he releases an energy blast that kills all the Umbrella Academy mothers before they’re born. 

1993

Viktor gets brainwashed.
Even as a child, Viktor’s abilities are powerful and unpredictable, so Reginald drugs him and has Allison use her mind manipulation to make him feel powerless. 

2001

Klaus is traumatized.
Reginald locks a young Klaus in a mausoleum, leaving him emotionally damaged for years to come.

2002

The Umbrella Academy debuts. 
Reginald introduces the crime-fighting Umbrella Academy — minus Viktor — to the world.

Way created a master document a long time ago that basically gave the breakdown of the whole Umbrella Academy story.

Five jumps to the future.
The youngest sibling uses his power to time travel and accidentally leaps far into an apocalyptic future. 

Harold Jenkins (Jesse Noah Gruman) tries to join the Academy.
Misguided, powerless kid Harold is unceremoniously shunned by Reginald. 

2006

Ben dies in the Jennifer Incident.
On a 2006 mission to Moldova, Ben discovers a young girl inside a crate. They touch hands and create a reaction. Before anything else can happen, Reginald shoots and kills them both, saying they would have been responsible for an apocalypse if they had lived. 

2019

The team reunites.
Reginald’s death brings most of the family, who’ve been out of touch for years, back together for his funeral. While they were apart, gorilla-man Luther has been living on the moon per his father’s instruction. Allison’s a relatively well-known actor. Klaus has been trying to numb his trauma with illegal substances. Five’s been stranded in the future. Diego’s a vigilante. Viktor’s a violin virtuoso. And poor Ben — whom only Klaus can see — is dead.

Due to Luther’s unique physique, five different prosthetic muscle suits were used to represent his body in various stages of undress.

Five arrives from the future.
Now a 58-year-old in an adolescent’s body, Five arrives from the future with a warning: The apocalypse is coming. 

Hazel and Cha-Cha show up.
Temp Commission assassins Hazel (Cameron Britton) and Cha-Cha (Mary J. Blige) arrive to prevent Five from stopping the apocalypse and ensure that the timeline proceeds according to plan.

Bá and Way’s only non-negotiables were Hazel and Cha-Cha’s masks. 

“It was one of those things that just made The Umbrella Academy so different,” said Way. “They’re really like when you go to TGI Fridays and all the servers have their flair.”

Viktor causes an apocalypse.
Viktor meets Harold Jenkins (John Magaro) posing as violin student Leonard Peabody. Harold romances Viktor but ultimately stokes his rage, causing the first apocalypse.   

Five blinks the team away.
At the very last minute, Five uses his time-traveling powers to save his family. The 2019 timeline is erased, and the apocalypse is averted.   

2019

Harlan kills the women who are pregnant with Umbrella Academy siblings.
When Harlan’s mother, Sissy, dies in 1989, he releases an energy blast that kills all the Umbrella Academy mothers before they’re born. This causes a grandfather paradox, which creates an alternate timeline in which the seven siblings never existed. 

The Brellies meet the Sparrows.
In alternate 2019, Hargreeves has adopted another set of super kids and has started the Sparrow Academy, which includes a different version of Ben. The Brellies get their butts kicked by the Sparrows and check into the Hotel Obsidian.

In Season 3, Castañeda and Min improvised by speaking in their native tongues — Spanish and Korean, respectively — during a Diego-Ben argument.

They didn’t think it would make the cut, but in the end the director went with it.

Lila introduces Stan.
Lila shows up to the hotel with a young man named Stanley (Javon Walton) and convinces Diego that he’s their son. In actuality, she’s pregnant with Diego’s baby and is testing his parenting skills.  

Harlan arrives at the Hotel Oblivion. 
An adult Harlan (Callum Keith Rennie) checks in at the Hotel Oblivion under the alias Lester Pocket and later uses the powers he derived from Viktor to kill members of the Sparrow Academy. 

The kugelblitz almost obliterates everything.
The Hargreeves’ presence in the new 2019 starts a kugelblitz apocalypse. Reginald said resetting the universe by means of a secret button at the Hotel Oblivion is the only way to defeat it. 

Allison resets the timeline.
Reginald attempts to use the Brellies’ energy to power the timeline-restoration machine, but Allison kills Reginald and presses the reset button so she can hopefully be reunited with her daughter from the original 2019 timeline.

2019

The team loses its powers.
The Hargreeves appear in another timeline at Season 3’s end. Here, they’re powerless and face an uncertain road ahead. 

2024

The Brellies go normie. 
Viktor owns a bar, Luther becomes a stripper, Diego and Lila settle down, Allison stars in commercials and raises Claire, sober Klaus is a germaphobe, and Five joins the CIA. Meanwhile, Reginald is alive (and thriving) and living with his wife, Abigail (Liisa Repo-Martell), in his skyscraper. 

Blackman considered making Luther one of the Abercrombie & Fitch shirtless models who greet customers at the store door, but ended up going with the stripper storyline.

Jean and Gene look for clues.
Community college professors Jean (Megan Mullally) and Gene (Nick Offerman) Thibedeau seek out any evidence of other timelines. They lead a shadowy timeline restoration group called The Keepers, who work to enact The Cleanse, a cataclysmic event that will reset the universe. 

 Mullally, who has a background in dance, choreographed Jean and Gene’s dance sequence in Season 4, Episode 3 herself.

The Brellies get their powers back.
The group goes to a hibachi restaurant and Ben spikes everyone’s sake with Marigold, the substance that gives them powers. The siblings regain their abilities — except Klaus who doesn’t drink the sake — but their powers are slightly modified. 

Colorist Jill Bogdanowicz changed certain aspects of the coloring to mirror the story in Season 4. 

“Usually, the blinks from Five are blue, but this season, they’re a purpley color,” she said. “Viktor’s is a little more red. Everything has shifted slightly … The vibrancy of their world without powers has also been sapped.”

The gang meets Sy Grossman.
Mild-mannered Sy Grossman (David Cross) asks the group to find his daughter, Jennifer(Victoria Sawal), so they all pile in Diego and Lila’s van to look for her. “Baby Shark” plays on repeat.  

Ben meets Jennifer.
Jennifer and Ben meet in a small town, where the residents turn out to be a security force to keep Jennifer contained. Klaus gets shot in a firefight and has to take Marigold in order to regain his immortality power. Jean and Gene kidnap Jennifer, who’s later freed by Ben. 

Grossman was one of Castañeda’s favorite guest stars. 

“I’ve seen him in so many things, and to have him in front of us, giving us exposition and making it really funny, was a treat to watch.”

Abigail explains Durango.
Abigail admits that when she created the Marigold particle, another antiparticle called Durango also emerged. If combined, the two particles would end the world in what is dubbed The Cleanse. The particle is inside Jennifer, and Marigold is inside Ben, which means their touch is apocalyptic. 

Season 4, Episode 4’s giant squid was crafted by the prosthetics team out of latex, rubber, and paint. It needed a custom set and a giant rig to hold it up.

Five discovers the subway.
Five leaps into a subway station that travels to various timelines. He boards and brings Lila along on a trip to 2006 to try and stop Ben from going on the Moldova mission. Five and Lila get lost in the subway system for seven years and reluctantly settle down in the most pleasant reality they can find. 

The subway sequences required 3D scanning an actual Toronto subway. 

The team then built a large section of the subway on a stage and brought in a train car for close-ups.

Five visits a delicatessen. 
Five finds a guide to get them back home. Lila returns home, but Five decides to stay. Later he meets the other timeline Fives in a diner. They admit they’ve been unable to find a way to avoid the apocalypse.

 Lila and Five’s greenhouse cottage in Season 4, Episode 4 is an actual location in Toronto. 

It’s an abandoned building on the property of the Toronto Zoo. The team brought in all the vegetation and planters to give it its dreamy secret garden feel.

Sy reveals himself.
Sy confronts and kills Gene with an alien-like appendage. He then rips off his mask to reveal he’s actually Abigail. She then dons Gene’s body as a disguise.  

Gene kills Jean.
Reginald and Viktor face off with Jean and Abigail, who’s disguised as Gene. After the couple begins to argue, Gene/Abigail kills Jean with a Samurai sword. 

The Cleanse begins.
Jennifer and Ben turn into a bubbling mass of destruction that the Academy struggles to control. Abigail reveals herself to Reginald and confesses to foiling all of his plans to keep Ben and Jennifer apart. She wanted to cleanse the world because she felt guilty for creating Marigold, which destroyed their planet. She also didn’t feel she deserved to be brought back to life by Reginald after she died. 

Across the final season’s six episodes, there are at least 1,400 VFX shots. 

(That number would be high even if it were 10 episodes!) There are approximately 500 shots in the finale alone.

The end.
The Hargreeves conclude that The Cleanse isn’t actually a bad thing and decide to let the Durango merge with the Marigold in their bodies. After sending their kids to another timeline via the subway, they allow themselves to cease to exist, realizing it’s the only way to prevent the apocalypse from ever happening. 

On Aug. 8, 2024, absolutely nothing out of the ordinary occurs — it’s just a normal day.  

Circa 2060

Having jumped forward from 2002, Five spends 45 years in the future before joining the Temps Commission at age 58. He's then sent back in time to kill JFK.

Stream The Umbrella Academy Season 4 now.