Fair Warning, This Is Gonna Be A Ramble!

Vanya’s mind

9 Days

Cool Beans

can you imagine living in 1963 Dallas and you're just minding your own business, probably on the way to do errands when you find the largest human being you've ever seen in your entire life being yelled at by a child in a fancy school uniform, and said child just blurts out I'M THE DADDY HERE with all the conviction in his tiny body, and later on, just when you think things can't get any weirder, you find out on the news that the man is a suspected terrorist/kidnapper/killer with four other accomplices and the child is apparently their hostage, i mean really what a wILD DAY

Angels with silver wings Shouldn’t know suffering

Depeche Mode — Precious

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((REQUESTED BY ANON))

Vanya Hargreeves Was Completely Valid In Everything She Did

Ok. So.

Vanya Hargreeves—I’m just gonna say it, is the most relatable character I’ve ever seen. Specifically Ellen Page’s adaptation. Here’s why.

Vanya is what happens when somebody doesn’t respect themself, gives too much, and gets hurt.

In her childhood, Vanya was raised to see herself as nothing. To place everyone above her—her siblings, specifically. She was supposed to be small, of course so that she wouldn’t be dangerous. However, that just made her incredibly depressed.

She didn’t just crave connection and respect though. She wanted to give it to others, because that’s what she was taught—that others deserved it, not her. That’s why she left the lights on for Five. That’s why she reaches out to him again. That’s why she talks to Allison. That’s why she reaches out to Leonard. Why she talks to the first chair violinist in the bathroom. Because she wants to be needed, to be useful, and loved in the only way she knows how. For others.

Which brings me to my second point. Vanya Hargreeves is not a selfish person. A lot of people seem to think that because she is shy and anxious and self defeating that she’s self centered, but that’s not the case. She reaches out multiple times to people, tries to do what they would need, because she cares. She genuinely cares.

So what happens when someone takes advantage of that low self respect, and that need to love and be loved?

Leonard fucking Asshat Jenkins.

Leonard was raised by an abusive father, and boy oh boy did he learn a few tricks from him. He molded himself into everything Vanya could need, and she took the bait, because she was desperate. She’d tried multiple things already—attempting to validate herself and her experiences by writing a book, giving lessons to children, taking medication, reaching out. So why not let this man be a good thing in her life? If he ever treats her wrong, it’s her fault, right?

Then Allison tells her her secret. Vanya didn’t remember being rumored—a very close parallel to how a lot of people deal with trauma. Indeed, being locked in a cage and treated how she was was traumatic. Vanya is angry. She’s been shown that she’s worth something, and now someone who’s repeatedly let her down and only recently been a better sister to her has turned her back on her by telling her this gut wrenching truth from her past. Remembering trauma alone is huge. But hearing it from one of the people who unwittingly hurt you? Can you really blame her for lashing out? Of course, it was an accident how far it went, but her anger, if not right, was still understandable.

And then Leonard. Leonard, the person who she trusted, was just out to hurt her too. Vanya recognizes this—this isn’t the first time she’s been used for her powers. So for the second time, she becomes angry not at herself, as she’d always done in the past, but at someone else. She lashes out. This man who’d filled her with such happiness, happiness that turned to poison. Someone she’d been intimate with. Someone she loved.

Then as a cherry on the fucking cake, her siblings lock her in a cage. Imagine going through an abusive relationship, discovering past trauma, and also discovering you have fucking super powers—then the only people you have left, the people who are supposed to help—lock you up. They’re scared of you. They’re just like everyone else. There’s no hope.

So yeah, Vanya Hargreeves at that point was hurt, confused, lost, and oh, sooo angry. And I think she had some pretty fuckin good reasons. She had no reason to hold back. She’d been holding back all her life.

While trying to kill the world is really shitty, look into Ellen Page’s lifeless glowing eyes and tell me Vanya Hargreeves wasn’t just a puppet being controled by her hurt. Her illnesses. Her trauma, her grief for her past and the loss of trust she’d endured. Tell me she was evil. I’ll tell you she’s me.

Fair warning, this is gonna be a ramble!

So I was just thinking about Vanya, and how sort of sweet and polite she was in the first season, and that got me thinking.

I fully believe Vanya is autistic, and from my own experiences, I was thinking about growing up. When I was a child I didn’t really know how to interact with the world. I grew up watching a lot of TV shows and movies (mostly ones that my sister would put on) but before I mirrored TV shows characters, I mirrored her. But Vanya didn’t watch TV growing up, so she didn’t have Disney Princesses or Thomas the Tank Engine or Arthur like I did. (For anyone who doesn’t know, mirroring is one of the ways that autistic kids may learn to interact with the world, through watching how NTs interact and then mimicking it to fit in or at the very least to be able to communicate with someone.)

The only people Vanya had to mirror were her family, and given their general attitude towards her it seems unlikely that she did. When I was a child I recognised which behaviours I never wanted to mimic: my parents screaming at each other or us, my sister telling me if I didn’t do what she wanted she’d never love me again/she’d hate me for the rest of our lives. I knew those things made me feel bad, so I knew they weren’t things I wanted to do to others.

In the same way, I think Vanya knew she didn’t want to mimic the negative behaviours of her siblings. So I think the person she mirrored most was Grace (and maybe Pogo a little). Grace was their mum, she was loving and nurturing and exactly the kind of person I would have wanted to mirror as a child. Except Vanya has added insecurities. It made me realise that growing up, Vanya was often softly-spoken and polite, because that’s how Grace was. But we never see Grace get angry... So Vanya never learned a healthy way of dealing with her anger, especially given that she was drugged up a lot of her childhood.

If anyone can word this more coherently than I did, or come up with a better analysis, please do, because I’m not sure my argument made much sense (or even had a point to it...?)

TL;DR - Autistic!Vanya mirrors Grace, and that’s why her personality is somewhat reminiscent of Grace’s.

The best thing the Umbrella Academy ever did for me was Allison and The Gays™

The Umbrella Academy as Vintage Book Series (aka if the Umbrella Gang stayed in the 60s and got book deals)

the umbrella academy season 2 + who needs context?

Did you know: After Ben’s death, Sir Reginald Hargreeves punished his children by confiscating the only brain cell they shared. He forgot to return it, resulting in their questionable life choices as adults.