Leonard Peabody is the main antagonist of the first season of the Netflix TV Series The Umbrella Academy and the posthumous antagonist of the second season.
He originally went by the name Harold Jenkins and was born at the same time as the Umbrella Academy (while not having any powers). As a child, he idolized the Umbrella Academy, seeing them as an escape from his difficult home life with a dead mother and an abusive father. However, he soon grew spiteful towards them after Sir Reginald Hargreeves rejected him when he asked to join along with humiliating him in front of the onlooking bystanders.
He is portrayed by John Magaro.
Moral Ranking[]
What Makes Him Close to Being Pure Evil?[]
- While his backstory is tragic, the Umbrella Academy themselves had nothing to do with it as it was their father who rejected him.
- He murders his own father in cold blood shortly after his rejection, leading to him receiving 12 years in prison.
- He kills the first chair who Viktor (known as Vanya at the time) was the backup for so he would get the part.
- He lies to Viktor about who he is in order to use Viktor's dormant powers to slaughter the rest of the Umbrella Academy.
- He steals Viktor's medication that suppressed his powers.
- He hires 3 thugs to beat on him so they would provoke a reaction out of Viktor, causing one of them to be hospitalized and the other two to be killed.
- He hunts down and kills the surviving thug who was hospitalized.
- He smiles upon believing Viktor unintentionally killed his sister, Allison.
- If he ever had any care for Viktor, he subverts it when he verbally abuses him to coax him into using his powers.
- While his death is brutal, it's also cathartic as it was his goading that caused Viktor to lash out against him, making it poetic justice.
- He has the posthumous effect of causing an out-of-control Viktor to destroy the world.
- Unlike most villains on the show, he is taken 100% seriously and has no comedic moments.
What Prevents Him from Being Pure Evil?[]
- He has a tragic background of being raised by an abusive father and was overcome by loneliness. The only solace in his life was his dream of joining the Umbrella Academy, and that was thrown out the window when Sir Reginald Hargreeves publicly rejected him, finally pushing him to murder his father. It’s shown that even years later this still affected him in his speech to Viktor about his past.
Trivia[]
- He, alongside Cha-Cha, is the one of the two characters from The Umbrella Academy to be Near Pure Evil.
