Invincible (comics)
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Invincible (Mark Grayson) is an Image Comics superhero. Created by writer Robert Kirkman and artist Cory Walker, the character first appeared in Noble Causes: Family Secrets #3 (December 2002).
Invincible is the teenaged son of Omni-Man, an extraterrestrial superhero of the Viltrumite race, recently revealed to be more than he seems. Invincible inherited his father’s superhuman strength and ability to fly and he has sworn to protect the Earth. He has had trouble adjusting to his newfound powers and coping with the reality of his origins.
Invincible was a debut title in Image's new superhero line, one reminiscent of the Golden and Silver Ages of comics, as opposed to the more modern and dark comics, such as Spawn and Savage Dragon, which Image is known for. Several well-known heroes in the Invincible universe are based on popular Marvel and DC characters, with Invincible himself featuring many of the powers of Superman and personality traits of Spider-Man.
After several months of attention from the comics media, Invincible became the most popular and best-selling title in the Image Comics line since Spawn. Wizard: The Comics Magazine has given the book its coveted Book of the Month award for best monthly comic. Invincible has recently been picked-up by Paramount for a possible full length motion picture[1] and Kirkman recently announced on G4's Electric Playground the he has been writing the screenplay.
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[edit] Character Biography and Synopsis
Mark Grayson is a teenage superhero who calls himself Invincible. He was a normal high school senior with a normal part time job and otherwise normal life, except his father Nolan is the superhero Omni-Man, the most powerful superhero on the planet. At the age of 17, Mark begins to display superpowers, which come from his father being a member of the Viltrumite race, who, according to Nolan, pioneer the galaxy on a mission of benevolence and enlightenment. As Invincible, Mark begins working as a superhero, with his father acting as his mentor, and meeting other heroes. Mark worked occasionally with a superhero team called the Teen Team, where he met and flirted with heroine Atom Eve, who eventually quits superhero work.
Everything changes when the Guardians of the Globe, Earth's premier superhero team, were all killed by Omni-Man. Omni-Man soon reveals the truth to Mark: instead of bringing peace, Omni-Man is supposed to prepare the earth for the coming invasion by the ever-growing Viltrumite empire. After Mark refuses to go along with his father's plans, his father nearly beats him to death, but then suddenly abandons the fight and flies into space.
Mark Grayson is now in college, while also working for a clandestine government agency under Cecil Steadman, who was formerly his father's liaison with the government. He is currently dating his high school girlfriend Amber Bennett who knows he is Invincible. His roommate/best friend named William is also aware of his superpowers. His mother is working towards a Real Estate license.
While Mark works with Cecil to stop various threats, a man named Angstrom Levy, a genius with the power to teleport between dimensions, devises a plot to assemble every version of himself in other dimensions in order to absorb all of their knowledge in order to benefit mankind. He is aided by the Mauler Twins, recurring villains in the series, to build the device. Upon the completion and start of the machine, Invincible intervenes due to Cecil receiving information that the Mauler Twins were operating in the vicinity. During the fight with the Mauler Twins (and every version of the pair from alternate dimensions), Angstrom pleads to not kill Invincible while removing himself from the machine, causing it to explode due to interupting the process. Mark is rescued from the rubble by the Guardians of the Globe. Only one Mauler from this dimension survives to discover Angstrom Levy, who claims that the process was a success although it left him hideously defigured. Before escaping to another dimension for medical treatment, Angstrom vows revenge on Invincible, "the one who interfered" (although Angstrom doesn't remember that the malfunction was his own fault).
Later, when meeting his father on another world, Mark learns he has a little half-brother and that his father has moved on. When a contingent of Viltrumites arrives on the planet, he and Nolan fight them to the best of their abilities. In the aftermath, Nolan is taken prisoner. As he is taken away Nolan tells Mark to read his books. The Viltrumites who take Nolan give Mark the assignment that his father had, believing he will fulfill it due to his heritage. Mark has a deadline of 100 years. Cecil has suggested this could be a trick to lure them into a false sense of security before an impending Viltrumite invasion. Mark also brought his half-brother to Earth (at the insistence of the baby's mother), and Mark's mom has agreed to raise him.
Mark takes Amber to visit Eve in Africa, who has been using her powers to help the locals while learning more about them. Eve is annoyed by the fact that Mark brought his girlfriend with him as she had been hoping to get closer to him, and even tries to convince Mark that Amber is not right for him but he remains oblivious to her motives.
The night before they plan to leave, Mark receives a threatening phone call and rushes home to find his mother and half-brother in the clutches of Angstrom Levy. Levy uses his powers to plunge Mark through a series of dangerous alternate realities in the hope of weakening him enough to be able to kill him (it is at this point during the storyline where Invincible is teleported to the Marvel Universe and meets Spider-Man and the New Avengers in Marvel Team-Up #14). By the end of these events and seeing the injuries Angstrom has inflicted on his mother, Mark is so angry that he brutally assaults Levy as they fall through various dimensions, ultimately killing the villain, leaving Mark in shock as he believed him to be stronger, and able to take such punishment. Stranded in a wasteland, Mark is discovered by a version of the Guardians of the Globe from 15 years in the future who have traveled back in time to rescue him.
It has also been revealed that Robot of the Guardians of the Globe, is in fact a drone to a deformed being who has been gathering DNA from the Guardians in order to create a new body for himself with the aid of the Mauler Twins.
[edit] Supporting Cast
[edit] Non-superpowered
- Debbie Grayson: Mark's mother
- Oliver Grayson: Mark's alien half-brother
- Amber Justine Bennett: Mark's girlfriend
- William Francis Clockwell: Mark's roommate and best friend
- Cecil Stedman: Government liaison
- Donald: Cecil's assistant, Guardian of the Globe contact, and robot/ ex-superhero
- Art Rosenbaum: Superhero tailor and family friend
[edit] Superheroes
- Omni-Man: Mark's father, former greatest super-hero of Earth, and current political prisoner
- Atom Eve: Former classmate of Mark's and member of the Teen Team; currently working in Africa
- Allen the Alien: A Champion Evaluation Officer who works for the Coalition of Planets. He travels on a tight schedule and tests the skills of various powered heroes on each planet in order to determine if there is a suitable "champion" to defend that planet.
- The Shapesmith: A Martian, disguised as human Rus Livingston, who uses his metamorphic powers to change his shape
- The Guardians of the Globe
- The Immortal: Unkillable member, both past and present, of the Guardians of the Globe
- Black Samson
- Robot: Mechanical former leader of the Teen Team
- Rex Splode: Teammate, with the power to make things explode
- Dupli-Kate: Teammate, who can duplicate herself
- Bulletproof: Teammate, who is bulletproof
- Shrinking Ray: Teammate, with ability to shrink
- Monster Girl: Teammate, who can assume the form of a monstrous creature
[edit] Enemies
- The Mauler Twins: An evil scientist and his clone, whom both continuously argue as to which is the original. After both Mauler twins die, it is then argued who is the first and second generation clone.
- Angstrom Levy: A disfigured genius with the ability to leap across dimensions. Accidentally beaten to death by Mark.
- The Viltrumite Empire: Invincible and Omni-Man's people. Initially, Nolan told Mark that the Viltrumites travel the galaxy, helping to improve other planets, when in actuality, they conquer planets.
- Titan: A thug who formerly worked for Machine Head. Helped Invincible defeat Machine Head, then secretly took control of the crime organization. Titan can encase his body in super-strong, nearly invulnerable rock.
- Battle Beast: One of Machine Head's several henchman. Notable for putting Black Samson into a coma after fighting him, and nearly killing Invincible and the Guardians of the Globe, until he left due to becoming "bored". Even Cecil was shocked by his power.
- The Flaxians: Aliens from another dimension, in which time passes at a dramatically higher rate. This causes them to physically age what appears to be several decades in only a few minutes when they enter our dimension. First seen in Invincible: Family Matters, where Mark and Omni-Man fight off their invasion. When they returned, having developed devices to counteract the rapid aging they experience in this dimension. Mark and the new Guardians of the Globe fought them off, with considerably less ease. Once the anti-aging secret was revealed and exploited against them, the Flaxians began to age even more rapidly than before, and they again retreated. While individual soldiers seem to give heroes no particular trouble, the strength of Flaxian invasion forces seem to be based in their almost limitless number of soldiers.
- Machine Head: A crime boss with a robotic head. Titan and Invincible arrived to take him down, but were defeated by six super-powered henchman, including Battle Beast. All seemed lost until the new Guardians of the Globe arrived and assisted. Battle Beast, after defeating Black Samson and Bulletproof, deemed the people of this world no challenge to defeat and simply left. About this time, all the other henchman were defeated and Machine Head was brought to justice. Machine Head's assistant was Isotope, a sleazy-looking business man with the power of teleportation, who abandoned him and then sided with Titan in the aftermath.
- D.A. Sinclair: A reclusive scientist at Upstate University, is the creator of the "Reanimen", robotic zombies intended to be "the soldiers of the future". He is responsible for kidnapping Mark's friend, Rick Sheridan, and has turned him into the first living Reaniman.
- Rus Livingston: An astronaut accidentally left on Mars, he's been attacked and made a host of the psychic Sequids. Livingston and the Sequids have set their eyes upon Earth.
[edit] Trade paperbacks
[edit] Vol. 1: Family Matters
ISBN 1-5824-0320-1 collects Invicible #1-4
- Mark Grayson finally starts developing his superpowers and his father, Omni-Man, begins mentoring him to be a superhero. Mark meets heroes like Team Teen. Mark knows Atom Eve goes to his school. Mark becomes a superhero, known as Invincible, and quits his part time job. Later Omni-Man is sucked into a portal and disappears for six months. Over the course of investigating suicide bombings, Mark discovers it is the work of a teacher at his high school, who is kidnapping students and turning them into living bombs. With the help of Eve, Mark manages to thwart the teacher's evil plans.
[edit] Vol. 2: Eight is Enough
ISBN 1-5824-0347-3 collects Invicible #5-8
- Mark Grayson meets Allen The Alien, Champion Evaluation Officer, who thinks Earth is a planet named Urath. Mark goes to an appointment to upstate University with his best friend William, who finds out Mark has superpowers. Atom Eve now knows Rex Splode is cheating on her with Dupli-Kate. The Guardians of the Globe, the Earth's premier superhero team, are all killed.
[edit] Vol. 3: Perfect Strangers
ISBN 1-5824-0391-0 collects Invicible #9-13
- A new Guardians of the Globe is started. The Immortal comes back to life and is killed by Omni-Man. Omni-Man tells Mark a different story about his extraterrestrial origins. Instead of bringing peace, Omni-Man is supposed to prepare the earth for the coming invasion by the ever-growing Viltrumite Empire. After Mark refuses to go along with his father's plans, his father nearly beats him to death, but then suddenly abandons the fight and flies into space.
[edit] Vol. 4: Head of the Class
ISBN 1-5824-0440-2 collects Invicible #14-19 and Image Comics Summer Special
- Cecil tells Mark that a leak has resulted in the world hearing everything that transpired between Omni-Man and Invincible. Omni-Man uses Mark's first name in the recording, but Cecil argues that his secret identity is still safe. His mother takes the public disclosure very badly, and begins drinking heavily. Another consequence of the leak is that Aquarius' undersea kingdom demands custody of Mark. Their law states that whoever kills their King (Aquarius) must marry the Queen and assume the throne. Since Omni-Man was not available, they opted for Mark. Mark manages to escape this fate by conspiring with the Queen's advisor so that he can be worthy of marriage. While Mark was recuperating from his fight with his father, William and Eve began dating (it doesn't last very long). The new Guardians of the Globe fail to meet with Cecil's expectations. This comes to a head when an alien invasion causes a massive amount of destruction.
- Angstrom Levy, who can travel through parallel dimensions, is introduced. His mission is to collect a massive number of his parallel Earth counterparts and download their memories into his brain. Cecil sends Mark with a group of astronauts on a mission to Mars. While there, he saves them from some very angry Martians. It seems that their slave labor force is a hive mind needing access to solid bodies in order to be fully sentient. This makes the astronauts a threat. One Martian (a shapeshifter) manages to stow away on the ship disguised as an astronaut. Unfortunately, the slaves are able to bond to the astronaut they left behind. Titan, last seen in the first trade, tricks Invincible into helping him take control of a vast organized crime empire.
[edit] Vol. 5: The Facts of Life
ISBN 1-5824-0554-9 collects Invicible #20-24 plus #0 and the origin stories from the back of #25
- This begins as Eve is telling Mark that she no longer wants the super hero life, stating that it is her powers, and they are wasted. She tells him she plans on using her powers to help others in need. (For reference, she has the ability to change objects into other objects.) She leaves for Africa. Next we see the Mauler Twins assisting Angstrom in building a massive machine to channel the thoughts of his "doubles" into himself, giving him vast knowledge of the Multiverse. Mark is also starting college, and is attacked by ANOTHER Reaniman, the half robot/half zombie that attacked when he visited the college previously. He runs off to change into his costume to combat the monster, and then destroys it. His girlfriend (who at this point does not know of his secret identity) dumps him, claiming he thinks only of himself. Back to Angstrom: the machine is complete. We see countless Angstroms sitting down, and one sitting in the center. He is about to absorb the knowledge of the Multiverse, when Invincible breaks through the ceiling, and defeats the Mauler twins fairly easily. Angston summons the other Maulers from different universes to fight him. They begin to be over powered, when Angstrom takes off the helmet which gives him the knowledge. This disruption of the process makes the machine blow up, incinerating most of the Maulers, save the (presumably) original one in the current time line, who is left with half of his body badly burned. Angstrom appears from the ash, badly deformed around the back of his body. He opens a portal, and travels to an advanced Universe, seeking medical attention. Mauler walks away. Mark and William's friend, Rick Sheridan ends up being kidnapped by D.A. Sinclair, a reclusive upstart scientist who is revealed to be the creator of the Reanimen.
- In this story, we also see where the rest of the Guardians came from, and Allen the Alien. Allen returns to his home planet after his meeting with Invincible, and he is greeted by his superiors. He tells them of Invincible, and how he is unwilling to help the Viltrumite empire, giving them the idea that maybe Viltrumite offspring do not share the same mindset as them, and they may be able to work this in their favor. Allen goes home, to seek his girlfriend, and they trade conversation, and in the middle of their conversation, Allen is attacked by a group of three Viltrumites, and is interrogated. Allen then tells them that they all look the same, and is nearly killed. His eye is punched out of his head, they punch through his stomach, and one of his arms are ripped off, among other, less serious injuries. We last see him in critical condition, but he will survive. His boss tells him there is a mole in the government. It seems that Allen is one of the most powerful warriors in the universe, only marginally below the Viltrumites. Allen is a result of extensive experiments to create the perfect warrior. He is the only one to survive without any mental or physical flaws.
- The origin of Monster Girl and Rex Splode, Dupli-Kate, Atom Eve and finally, The Immortal.
[edit] Vol. 6: A Different World
ISBN 1-5824-0579-4 collects Invincible #25-30
Mark finds himself on a strange alien world populated by humanoid insects. He soon discovers that the planet is under the benevolent control of his missing father, Nolan, who soon reveals that he has another son with one of the insectoids. Unluckily, the planet is soon under siege by Viltrumites, and Mark and Nolan must face the most powerful villains in the universe to save the planet and Nolan's new family. Although they put up a brave fight , Mark is injured very badly and Nolan's Back is crushed by a group of Viltrumites (3 in total) who die afterwards. Later, Mark sees himself bandaged up and his father being taken by the Viltrumites to their planet so that he can be executed/given sentence. His fate is unknown. Meanwhile Mark is given a chilling notice that he has 100 years to convert Earth into a Viltrum colony or else they will come and kill everyone including him. Mark returns home with his half brother.
Meanwhile on Earth, the surviving Mauler Twin decides he needs to clone himself again, resulting in an unscarred clone, which finally ends the debate between the two as to which is the clone, and which is the original. In turn, the clone realizes that no actual work is done with a dominant Mauler, and proceeds to poison the scarred Mauler and clone himself. These Maulers now no longer argue as to which was the original, but as to which one is the clone of the clone.
[edit] Vol. 7: Three's Company
ISBN 1-5824-0656-1 collects Invincible #31-35 and The Pact #4
The Shapesmith makes his first appearance, Mark & Amber visit Africa, but their vacation is cut short due to Anstrom Levy attacking Mark's mother & younger brother. Levy sends Invincible through several alternate universes until Invincible kills him, thinking that Levy was stronger. Stranded in an alternate universe, Invincible is visited by a version of The Guardians of the Globe from 15 years in the future. These Guardians of the Globe send him back to his own universe, but not before the future version of Atom Eve gives him an important messege, unworried about affecting the past. Mark later learns what his father meant about 'read my books' when he goes through them. William Mark`s friend decides to go and search for Rick. Willaim dresses up like a hobo and is carried into the sewers by a reaniman Mark follows him into the sewer and is attacked by many reanimen, one of them is Rick the ending scene is the evil college student with the blue skin telling William he will be a reaniman soon!
[edit] Other Collections
- Invincible Ultimate Collection Hardcover Vol. 1 (collects #1-13, plus extras)
- Invincible Ultimate Collection Hardcover Vol. 2 (collects #14-24, #1/2, #0, parts of #25, plus extras)
- Invincible also appeared in Marvel Team-Up Vol. 3 #14, which was collected in Marvel Team-Up Volume 3: League Of Losers ISBN 0-7851-1946-9. This story occurs "between the pages" of Invincible #33.
- In November 2006, the Official Handbook to the Invincible Universe will be released. This two-issue series will tell the origins of all of the characters seen in the book so far, and will be done in the style of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe, including similar covers.
- In December 2006, Image Comics plans to release the "Complete Invincible Library Vol.1", which will contain both "Ultimate Collection Hardcover" Vol.1 and Vol.2. The Complete Library will come in a standard edition and a limited signed edition.
[edit] Creators
While Robert Kirkman has been the sole writer of the series, Cory Walker and Ryan Ottley have contributed the art. Cory Walker co-created the book and provided art from #1 to #7. Ryan Ottley assumed art duties with issue #8 and has been pencilling since. Kirkman has provided back-up space for a few aspiring comic creators, most notably Benito Cereno and Nate Bellegarde.
[edit] Trivia
- Every one of the trade paperbacks is named after a sitcom.
- In the first issue on page 20, the first panel features the street outside the Savings & Loan about to be robbed. Walking on the street is a man wearing the jacket Kaneda wore in the movie Akira, (red jacket with a blue/pink pill on the back)
- Steve Urkel, (a character from Family Matters) made a guest appearance in the first trade paperback as Steve White, a combination of Steve Urkel and the actor who portrayed him, Jaleel White. Mark Grayson's alma mater is Reginald VelJohnson High School, named after the actor who played Carl Winslow on Family Matters. The principal of the school (B.H. Winslow) bore a resemblance to VelJohnson himself and shared his character's last name.
- In the 3rd comic, on page 5, there is a boy in the background of the middle frame. The boy closely resembles Bill S. Preston Esq. of Bill and Ted and is wearing a "Wyld Stallyns" cap. "Wyld Stallyns" is the name of Bill and Ted's band. In the next panel, a background character can be seen wearing Ted's smiley face jacket from Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey.
- In Issue Two, on page 21, two characters closely resembling Jay and Silent Bob are seen next to the boy on the bench. In addition, a young, bald kid can be seen with the t-shirt that Charlie Brown wears in the second and third panels. This scene take place in the Twin Pines Mall, named for the mall featured in Back to the Future.
- In issue 9, Allen the Alien helps a ship in distress. The ship's crew bears a strong resemblance to the crew of the USS Enterprise in Star Trek: The Next Generation.
