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I have just finished watching The Umbrella Academy and while I loved it and thought it was brilliant 2 aspects of the story seemed to be very similar to 2 different sources.

First the obvious one, the story arc of Number 7 seems to be very similar to the story of Jean Grey, in that her true potential is locked away and when it is let loose bad things happen.

The other story aspect that I instantly thought of was the story around Number 5 time travelling to the future and then trying to stop a major event. This seems almost identical to the story line of Hiro in the first series of Heroes?

I realise The Umbrella Academy was published as a comic but this was in 2007/2008 a year after the first season of Heroes premiered. Have the comic book writers ever discussed the similarities between these 2 story arcs and the original source material they appear to have been copied from?

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    I haven't seen it yet but from what you say these two story arcs just sound like common tropes. – TheLethalCarrot Feb 25 '19 at 12:09
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    tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ApocalypseMaiden: "When The Hero is in charge of preventing The End of the World as We Know It, imagine his surprise when he finds out the threat comes not from some Evil Overlord, but from one of his friends or family destined to bring about the end of the world." – Mark Beadles Feb 25 '19 at 19:22
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    To whoever voted to close, please explain how "have the writers discussed it" is primarily opinion-based. – Jenayah Mar 1 '19 at 13:38
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    Voted to reopen, the writers discussing it makes it not opinion-based. – Jenayah Mar 2 '19 at 16:31
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Yes they were influenced by X-Men, and specifically The Dark Phoenix Saga.

Here is an interview where the writers of the original Umbrella Academy state their influences and inspiration.

Like many of us, Way and Ba both came of age loving the X-Men. “I grew up with Chris Claremont and Mark Silvestri’s X-Men, which was a huge influence on me,” Gerard said. “Along with Grant Morrison’s Doom Patrol, which was a big part of what made me want to do comics again, so that DNA that is in there too. But it’s really X-Men. Especially Dallas, it feels like an X-Men story.”

He cites Chris Claremont as his influence...

During his 17 years as X-Men writer, Claremont wrote or co-wrote many classic X-Men stories, such as "The Dark Phoenix Saga" and "Days of Future Past". - wikipedia

There is nothing specific in that interview that mentions Heroes, although they do say they had strong influences from movies and television.

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  • Interesting, since in Chris Claremont's Dark Phoenix saga it was an external entity possessing Jean that made her so powerful, not any "locked-away true potential" (which was introduced for the X-Men 3 movie). – MartianInvader May 23 '19 at 17:43

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