Major spoilers follow for The Umbrella Academy season 3.
It's official: The Umbrella Academy season 4 will time-travel its way onto Netflix in 2024. The popular Netflix show, which will meet its apocalyptic end on Netflix with a fourth and final installment, will launch on the world's best streaming service next year.
The announcement was made in a video posted on Netflix's various social media accounts, which showed the TV series' main cast celebrating their characters' joint birthday. That's because their characters were all born on the aforementioned date in 1989 in Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba's graphic novel series of the same name, as well as its TV adaptation.
on october 1, 1989, our extraordinary super-powered babies were born. in 2024, they return ☂️ happy birthday brellies 🖤 pic.twitter.com/Ubep3fUJpPOctober 1, 2023
On the surface, the fun-filled video doesn't seem to be out of the ordinary. It would be easy for fans to watch The Umbrella Academy's cast celebrate their characters' birthdays, revel in the fact that season 4 is coming next year, and hope that more information might be forthcoming sooner rather than later.
Netflix recently revealed the 2023 edition of Geeked Week – a free five-day virtual event at which Netflix makes big announcements about upcoming movies, TV shows, and games – was coming soon. Maybe, then, we'll hear more about The Umbrella Academy season 4 in the near future.
But that hasn't stopped 'Brellies' – The Umbrella Academy's fandom – from speculating on when one of the best Netflix shows' fourth and final season might debut. Equally, fans have employed their amateur detective skills to try and work out if the announcement video is hiding any clues about its highly secretive plot.
the whole umbrella academy twt rn pic.twitter.com/c51kiMvN8sOctober 1, 2023
First, let's speculate about a possible release date. The Umbrella Academy season 1 dropped on Netflix in February 2019, but the second and third seasons debuted on the platform in July 2020 and June 2022. By law of averages, then, season 4 is more likely to launch in mid-2024.
However, Netflix could also celebrate the main characters' birthdays by releasing it on October 1, 2024. That date falls on a Tuesday next year, though, which typically isn't a day on which Netflix releases new seasons of its most popular TV shows.
Additionally, filming wrapped on season 4 in May 2023. As long as the Hollywood actors strike is resolved by the end of the year – which would allow the show's cast to promote season 4 around its launch date – there's no reason why Netflix couldn't release it in early 2024, provided it's ready to go. In short: we're none the wiser about The Umbrella Academy season 4's launch date.
THE UMBRELLA ACADEMY season 4 has cast Katharine King So as Amy and Rachel MacMillan as Karen.The six episodes will be directed by Jeremy Webb, Paco Cabezas and Neville Kid. Final season not expected to land until 2024. https://t.co/uW0H5vbi2o pic.twitter.com/WTVpSlq05iSeptember 27, 2023
As far as story predictions go, fans are donning their Sherlock Holmes deerstalker hats to try and deduce if the birthday celebration video has dropped any plot teases.
For starters, The Sparrow Academy – an alternate reality version of The Umbrella Academy who debuted in season 3 – aren't present in the video. On Reddit, Golden_Pineapple07 noted it was interesting that none of them feature, but that isn't a major surprise, as all but one of them (Sloane Hargreeves) died. While Sloane wasn't in season 3's final scene, many fans still suspect she's alive and well somewhere.
Meanwhile, other fans are fascinated that Luther appears to have his superpowers again. In The Umbrella Academy season 3's finale, the universe was reset by Allison, resulting in the group losing their superhuman abilities. That included Luther, who also regained his human body (remember: he had a half-human, half-ape body due to the accident he suffered prior to the events of season 1). However, as Redditor lastseason (among others) noticed, Luther has his hybrid body again in the announcement video. That suggests the group, or at least some of them, will reacquire their superpowers.
Other fans have theorized that the Hargreeves siblings might have turned up in the 1990s after Allison reset the universe in season 3's final episode, with Reddit users BiscottiLeadings and Secret-Definition-40 claiming their new outfits have a late 80s / early 90s look about them. Given that the siblings were born in 1989, the universe has been reset, and that they've lost their powers, it's plausible that they've time-traveled to a reality just before they were born and obtain their powers, or to a dimension where they weren't born at all. The plot thickens...
Fortunately, there are things we do know about The Umbrella Academy's final season. It'll comprise six episodes instead of the usual 10 (per Collider), all seven members of its core cast are returning, and they'll be joined by some wholly original characters that have us worried about how the show might not only draw to a close, but whether it'll deliver a fitting end to a beloved Netflix series.
Here's hoping we're wrong, and its fourth season is better than its predecessor. Find out why we weren't totally enamored with the show's third installment in our review of The Umbrella Academy season 3 while you're here.
