MCR members inspired ‘Umbrella Academy’ characters, Gerard Way says

If you thought some of the characters in The Umbrella Academy took on familiar personalities, you might be right.  

In a feature with Rolling Stone, Gerard Way reveals that the “ dysfunctional family dynamic” in My Chemical Romance sparked the inspiration behind many of the characters in the original comic book series.

Read more: Frank Iero responds to ‘Umbrella Academy’ fans wanting Five to have his name

In the feature, Way says that he took bits of himself as well as some of the band members’ personalities and assigned them to various characters in The Umbrella Academy. However, the well-known MCR lineup were not the only driving forces behind the characters. In fact, Way explains that many personalities he met while on the road also had a hand in the characters’ creation.

“Being in a band is like being in a dysfunctional family and all these personalities are really distinct and really big, not just the people in your band, but the people you meet on the road or the crew that you work with and all this stuff,” Way says. “A band especially is a dysfunctional family, so there’s little bits of me in all the characters, there’s bits of some of the guys in some of those characters and the different roles that we would play in the band and how those roles would change sometimes.”

Following that, Way explains that just like the folks in The Umbrella Academy, MCR often felt a lot of pressure from their fame, even from their early stages.

“We were in a big pressure cooker of fame and notoriety and the characters experience that in the comic and the show,” Way continues.

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However, all of this may not come as a surprise; It was previously revealed that Way started working on the comics while on tour with the band. While being surrounded by the rest of the guys for many days out of the year, it’s easy to understand that they had an influence on the characters.

That said, many fans have recently begun noticing similarities between Number Five and Frank Iero. So much so in fact, some fans of want Aidan Gallagher‘s character to take on the namesake in future seasons.

Funnily enough, Iero doesn’t seem too opposed to the idea either. However, there is just one small catch; He jokingly asked for 15 percent of the royalties.

Which My Chemical Romance members do you think correspond best with the characters in the Umbrella Academy? Sound off in the comments below.  

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