"Invincible": Teenage Superheroes Dealing with the Drama

 

The animated Invincible, on Amazon Prime, sounds like a standard "teen superhero juggles saving the world and ordinary high school drama" premise that we've seen on everything from Buffy the Vampire Slayer to Spiderman.  But listen to the user reviews: 

"Great until Episode 3 happened: 4th wave feminism to imperialistic white oppressors to our hero being loved for being a simp."

"Abusing the product for political pandering'"

"Quit pushing your political agenda!"

Sounds like some fanboys are objecting to gay and nonwhite characters.  I'm definitely watching Episode 3!

Scene 1: Middle-aged superhero Omni-Man (JK Simmons) presiding over a memorial service for fallen comrades like Darkwing, War Woman, and Martian Man (funny parodies of DC-world superheroes).  Standard funeral-in-the-rain.  The sinister Darkblood is investigating the case, but Omni-Man doesn't doesn't remember anything useful; they were ambushed in the dark, and he's the only one who survived.

Meanwhile, Cecil (Walter Goggins) approaches Robot (Zachary Quinto) and asks him to assemble a new Guardians of the Globe team.

Scene 2: Omni-Man and what I assume are his wife Debbie (Sandra Oh) and his son Mark, aka Invincible (Steven Yeun), go home.  He orders a pizza and cautions Invincible to "not bring the job home" and get all upset over his dead coworkers.  Debbie gets angry: "Mark is a 17-year old boy.  They break easily."

Meanwhile, the sinister Donald Ferguson (Chris Diamantopolous) has them under surveillance.

Scene 3:  Mark (Invincible) sulking in his room.  He decides to call Amber, who gave him her phone number -- on a piece of paper?  How retro!  He gets all stuttery and nervous, and ends up asking her for a study date.  She is disappointed, but accepts. An attractive 17 year old boy who hasn't had any experience with dating?

Scene 4: Superhero Atom Eve (Gillian Wilkins) arrives at Teen Team headquarters.  In the locker room, she sees Dupli-Kate coming out of the shower.  Suspicious, she checks -- yep, her boyfriend Rex Splode is in there, naked, with some other Dupli-Kates!  "Babe, I can explain!" he cries as she storms out.  

Scene 5: At the Pentagon, Robot is auditioning candidates for the new Guardians of the Globe: Burly, Pangea, Bug-Eye, and so on.  Mark can't audition because his Dad wants him to train at home, but he'll hang around to help his buddy. 

 First test: hand-to-hand combat.  Atom Eve from Scene 4 easily beats the Hunk.  Shrinking Rae defeats a gorilla man by shrinking and flying into his ear.  Black Samson defeats an Elf superhero.  When are we going to get to the constant political pandering?    

Rex Splode makes fun of Monster Girl, who retaliates by accusing him of having a small penis.  He attacks; she turns into a green male monster.  The other superheroes just stand by, not sure what to do.  Finally Mark intervenes, and the two apologize.

Robot announces the new team.  Atom Eve, Shrinking Rae, Black Samson, Rex Splode, Monster Girl, and Dupli-Kate. Uh-oh, drama!  Those three can't work together!

Scene 6: Atom Girl flies off in anger.  Mark follows to ask what's going on.  She vents about Rex cheating with the Dupli-Kates.  Mark obviously has a crush on her, so he's like the teen nerd trapped in the friend zone while The Girl dates an obnoxious jock.

Scene 7: Robot explaining the training schedule to the new Guardians team.  They bicker: Rex doesn't want to get up at 6:00 am, Black Samson wants to be in charge instead of Robot, Monster Girl can't transform often, and so on. 

Scene 8: Mark's room.  His fruity non-superhero friend William (Andrew Rannells) is helping him prepare for his study date: "Toss this...rearrange this...this has to go." 

William brought some books that Amber likes: Naomi Klein (a bestselling author on corporate greed), Margaret Atwood (The Handmaid's Tale), Ta-Nehisi Coates (a black journalist and comic book artist).  Is this the nonstop political pandering? Some nonwhite and female authors?  "She's also into spicy food, stand-up comics, and fourth-wave feminism."  Is this it?  A passing reference to fourth-wave feminism?  He's just trying to get with this girl! She could have been into country-western music!

Amber arrives.  William scrams.  She sees the books, which don't seem to be Mark's style, and he comes clean about William bringing them over.  "No problem: what are you really into?" Comic books.  His favorite is Seance Dog, about a Jack Russell terrier who is a master of the mystical arts.

While Amber is in the bathroom, Cecil from Scene 1 beams in: "You want to be a superhero, right?  Fame, glory, pretty girls?"  Mark objects: "That's sexist, but ok."  It's actually heterosexist, dude.  He's got a job for Mark -- who is still in training, when there are dozens of grown-up superheroes around? A rogue supervillain is threatening Mount Rushmore.  Eve is already on the way.

Scene 9:  As Mark and Eve fly toward Mount Rushmore, Cecil gives them the intel: an evil seismologist named Doc Seismic has invented "earthquake gloves," which he intends to use to destroy the monument.  Why?  Because it memorializes "Oppressors!  Racists!  Slave holders!  Worship me instead!"  Is this the political pandering?  This is a mad scientist talking, not the actual sentiments of the writers.  

Doc Seismic dislodges the Lincoln head and throws it at some innocent boy scouts, but Mark comes to the rescue.  Next he accuses Eve of being a pawn of the patriarchy: "Look at the costume they have you in."  How does a seismologist know so much about power structures?  "Doctorate seismology, undergrad in sociology and women's studies, minor in African Dance."  Is this the political pandering?  The social justice warrior is an evil supervillain?

He conjures a volcano that threatens some innocent campers, but Eve and Mark save them.  "Bah!" he says in supervillain-speak. Finally he gets lava-ed to death himself, in spite of their efforts to save him.

Scene 10: Mark rushes back to his study date to find Amber fuming: "I've been sitting here waiting for you for an hour!  Why did you even invite me over?"  He apologizes.  She moves in, hoping for a kiss.

Scene 11: The giant dinosaur-like kaiju that Omni-Man defeated while Mark was off saving Mount Rushmore?  He brought a piece home to cook for dinner.  He and his wife chat about their days.

Scene 12: Eve in her room, throwing out all of her photos of Rex.  Suddenly there's an explosion.  She checks it out: fireworks that Rex has conjured to impress her.  She forgives him for cheating, but doesn't want to get back together. Instead, she flies over to Mark's house, and is shocked to see him making out with Amber.  You had your chance, girl. 

Scene 13: Dinner time at the supervillain and monster jail. One of the Multi-Pauls (Kevin Michael Richardson) pulls his arm through the door-slot, killing the guard to free his clone and escape.  Then he feels regret: it's Thursday, chicken pot pie night, and now he won't get any.

Beefcake:  Some muscular superheroes, and Rex in a towel.

Gay Characters: William, and maybe Robot.

Heterosexual Romances: 3

Wokeness: Those were just jokes.

My grade: B+