5 – Umbrella Academy Season 2

This is a really good show. I have liked both seasons quite well, I think that the second season is the better season of the two as it is more consistent across the board. All of the stories work well for the characters and it goes deep on issues during the time period they were in and that still linger today. However, it isn’t higher on my list, because I feel like season 1 has higher highs, more memorable moments. In season 2, it is more consistent and good across the board, but the standout moments feel like they are are lacking to me. With that said, I’m ready for Season 3 to come out because it’s a really good show.

4 – Ragnarok

This one was kind of a surprise for me. I thought that the premise looked interesting, kind of a Norse mythology set in modern times and I’ve had solid luck with the European shows on Netflix like The Rain and Dark. This was a very good show. The plot line was interesting throughout all of it, and while not all of the twists were shocking, some of them were very well done. And the story just felt like it had a lot of heart to it that you don’t always get in shows. It’s a short series but it leaves you feeling like they’ve wrapped it up in a solid spot, but also that you could see more story ready to be told.

3 – The Order Season 2

The Order was one of my favorite shows from 2019, so I was glad that it was getting a second season. I will say, I’m not sure that the second season quite lives up to the first season. I think that the plot doesn’t have as focused a bad guy as the first one does. But you still get all sorts of good moments and funny moments in it. Jack Morton is still somehow likeable and unlikeable all that the same time, and the Knights of St Christopher are still a lot of fun in this season. I think that it gets bogged down in trying to play too much with a middle ground and too much with Jack and Alyssa when it would have been better served keeping some of it’s wonder. Overall, really fun still and really such a B movie style for the plot still.

2 – Lucifer

A show that’s been around for a while, but Netflix kept recommending that we check it out, and clearly, I’m glad that I did. Tom Ellis is amazing in this show as Lucifer, and while the theology is all over the place, no one is watching it for that. They are watching it for a snarky Lucifer and his long suffering partner as they solve crimes. There is so much going on throughout the seasons, and all of them are really good. And there’s more of it coming, which is nice. Netflix got this after Fox dropped it, so there is still fun story to tell with a lot of really good characters in it. This would be just another procedural show if it wasn’t for how good the characters are in the show.

1 – Locke & Key

Finally, we have Locke & Key, and I feel like I’m about ready for a rewatch of this. This is one of my favorite shows of all time. It is a young adult show, kind of, but it is more than that, as it delves into a really weird and unique world where there is a magical door and magical keys that can do all sorts of crazy things, however, not everyone wants to use them for good, nor is everything around them good. I feel like they did a very good job of adapting what isn’t a YA comic book into a YA show while still keeping a lot of the sense of whimsy, almost, that comes from the keys in the show and still even keeping some of the horror along with it, it is just tamed down a little bit. Again, a show that really gets it’s casting right and the character development right.

So yes, I was able to come up with five shows, and I realize there are even more. The second season of Disenchanted came out this year, and I watched The Dragon Prince, plus shows like Another Life, Nightflyers, The Witcher, Agents of SHIELD, and Into The Badlands were ones that I watched this year as well, so I had plenty to choose from, could have even done a top 10. But I really like those top 5 and would highly recommend all of them.

What are some of the best new to you shows from 2020 (doesn’t have to be released in 2020, just that you’ve watched for the first time this year)?

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Umbrella Academy is based off of a comic by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba. The main premise of the show and comics are a family of super powered young adults who grew up in The Umbrella Academy. A weird household where their adoptive father trained them into a group of super heroes. But things didn’t go well for long. In season 1, their father has passed away and Vanya is starting to remember what her powers were, meanwhile, Five, one of the siblings, figured out how to time travel and eventually finds out that the apocalypse is about to happen. They have to find a way to put their differences aside so that they can stop the apocalypse. It’s a really fun season and they don’t do that well at stopping the apocalypse. In fact, Five has to jump everyone into the past and they get separated along the way. They find themselves in Dallas in the 1960’s with a number of them landing right around 1963, and Five, of course, finds out that because of something they’re going to do, the apocalypse is going to happen again, just way sooner. They have to figure out how to come together again so that they can stop the apocalypse yet again, and for some reason, their father is in Dallas as well.

Overall, I think that this season is stronger than the first season. The first season starts off quite rough with introducing all of the characters and not much happens for a few episodes. However, I think that the first season maybe had a few more highlight moments. This one tells a great story, but has less that stands out as being quite as fun as a some scenes and characters in the first season. Another way to put it is that while season two is more consistently good across the board, I don’t think there’s really anything bad about it, season one had some higher highs but a bunch of lower lows as well. I do miss Hazel and Cha-Cha though, they were a real highlight from Season One for me.

They did a good job of keeping the characters true to who they were in the first season. I don’t think that anyone has changed massively, though some of them who have been there longer in the past do adjust slightly. I think that Five who is kind of a wild card in season one still maintains that which makes him very lovable and such a good character. I think that Klaus actually takes a little bit of a step back in this one, he was the standout character from season one, and in this one, I think that he’s given less of a role in order to let some of the other characters shine, one in particular, but that’d be a major spoiler. I also think that they gave Diego and Luther more to work with this season, so while Klaus took a step back, you had everyone else maintain or take a step forward.

Final thing I do want to talk about quick is the music. There are some shows that get the music spot on, and this is one of those shows. Everything worked so well in season two, and you get some montages with music that you just don’t expect. And that makes it stand out even more. There are again some spoiler moments that just so work incredibly well. It makes sense that the music is good since the comics were created by Gerard Way, but I’m not sure how much he’s involved in the show. But I’m glad they kept a strong musical influence on the show and I think that they just nail it for this season.

So, is this worth checking out? You need to see season one first, and that can be a bit of a slog, especially early on. I think that if you can get through two episodes of season one it does become more consistent, and I’d say that it’s worth it. But without watching that, season two won’t make that much sense, so just be aware of that. I really enjoy the show and I think that season two is one of the better seasons of a Netflix original show, they go deep with it while still having fun. So, yes, I’d say that it’s worth checking out, just be aware that the show as a whole is a bit goofy, so while it can be serious, it tends to be more goofy than serious.

Did you like season 2 of the Umbrella Academy?

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