How Umbrella Academy Season 2 Pays Homage To Luther's Cut Comic Storyline

The second season of Netflix's The Umbrella Academy is even more full of action, danger and colorful characters than the first, but the show doesn't lose focus on its main characters, and gives each of the super-powered Hargreeves siblings a compelling arc as they try to navigate the early 1960s Dallas and prevent yet another version of the apocalypse. One of the beneficiaries of this narrative is the super-strong Luther Hargreeves (Tom Hopper). In most superhero stories, Luther would be a capable and heroic team leader. In this one, a lifetime of problematic relationships with his adoptive father and siblings has rendered him a conflicted and insecure man, prone to depression. To make things worse, the gorilla-like body he gained after Sir Reginald Hargreeves (Colm Feore) injected him with a life-saving serum doesn't exactly help his self-image ... especially after he discovered that Sir Reginald then sent him to the moon for a completely meaningless four-year mission simply to get him out of the way. 

This being an ensemble show, The Umbrella Academy doesn't have time to delve in every aspect of Luther's personal difficulties. As such, at least one significant Luther storyline from the comics was largely cut from season 2. The show likes its easter eggs, however, and eagle-eyed fans of the comics might notice something familiar about Luther's behavior. Here's how The Umbrella Academy season 2 pays homage to Luther's cut comic storyline.

As fans of The Umbrella Academy comics know, the characters in the Netflix series look rather different from their print counterparts. Notably, the comics incarnation of Luther is considerably bulkier and more gorilla-like than the show's version. This is because the injuries the comics Luther received were so great, Sir Reginald opted to transplant his head onto the body of a massive Martian gorilla. 

During the comics' "Dallas" arc, Luther's physical size expands even further when he depression-eats his way to humongous proportions. As Tom Hopper told Den of Geek, however, that particular storyline was problematic thanks to a little-known movie called Avengers: Endgame, in which Chris Hemsworth's Thor packed on the pounds in a very similar plotline. "There's certainly a nod to that in this season," Hopper says. "There was a question mark over the fact that Thor did the whole thing already."

As such, instead of strapping even more prosthetics on Hopper, The Umbrella Academy season 2 simply shows Luther turning to food whenever he feels emotionally vulnerable. In "The Swedish Job," his first instinct after finding out Alison (Emmy Raver-Lampman) is married is to start munching on the chocolates he brought her. In "The Majestic 12," we see the crestfallen Luther tearing through a truly impressive amount of BBQ. Likewise, "Valhalla" pays a lot of attention to the mound of scrambled eggs he cooks and consumes, and again shows him eating at the end of the episode. It's a nice way of showing the character's unhealthy tendency to eat his feelings away without turning it into an actual plot point, as well as a neat nod to the comics.