Men and women are taught differently during childhood. They are socialized to meet different standards according to the concept of masculinity and femininity as approved by the society. This leads to them adopting different culture of communication where men?s world is said to be hierarchical and they are more concerned with status while women?s world is built on egalitarian principles and they invest more in connections. Oftentimes, this distinctiveness causes problems due to the failure to understand each other?s intention, which can be very distressing for both ends. Members of a dysfunctional family generally face similar problem when they try to communicate with each other since neglect, misbehavior, conflict, and abuse run on a regular basis.
The present research was conducted to explore the differences in man and woman?s language in sibling-to-sibling conversation within a dysfunctional family as portrayed in a superhero-themed television series entitled The Umbrella Academy. The story revolves around the struggles of six siblings with special powers who grow up in a dysfunctional family to prevent an impending apocalypse from happening while saving their deteriorating relationship. The difference theory proposed by Deborah Tannen (1990) was applied to analyze how the male and female siblings use language differently within their conversation in episode 1, 3, and 5 of the said series. Apparently, the six contrasting characteristics of the way men and women use language were found in the  siblings?  conversations.  Ranging  from  the  most  frequent  to  the  least are
„status?, „intimacy?, „feelings?, „order?, „conflict?, „information?,  „independence?,
„proposals?, „compromise?, „support?, „understanding?, and „advice?. While it is true that the way the male and female siblings use language generally confirms Tannen?s difference theory, deviations were also found. The male siblings tend to explore more on woman?s language as the episodes progress compared to the female siblings on man?s language.

Keywords: language and gender, difference theory, dysfunctional family, siblings, television series