Over the last two weeks or so, my daily routine has gotten to the point where I can afford to watch a little television every night, and chip away at the queue of shows and programs that I’ve wanted to watch over the last year. Obviously, this will come back to a screeching halt once #2 comes into the picture, but for the time being, I’m trying to enjoy the feeling of a little bit of expendable downtime again, and soaking in all the stories that I’m hearing good about, and getting to experience them myself.
Among the things recently watched would be Amazon’s Invincible; I’m so long out of comics, I had no idea what this property even was, but from what I can tell it’s by Robert Kirkman, the guy who made The Walking Dead, and it seems to be something of a lampooning of lots of popular superhero comic stories, while having its own cohesive storyline.
As a whole, I found season 1 to be pretty enjoyable. It’s fairly obvious what properties are being emulated in some characters, and there’s something about the general goriness of the series that kind of takes the veil of the sidelines off of traditional superhero stories, because obviously there is such a thing as collateral damage, and whenever any invasion or attack occurs, there are going to be people negatively affected.
But a comprehensive review isn’t the point of this whole post; it’s the answer to the question in the headline of this post, because I think it’s pretty obvious where Invincible’s overall superhuman aspects originate from, and it’s most definitely not because he’s a half-Viltrumite.
Like I said, I went into this as blind as Ray Charles’s long-decomposed remains, so I had no idea that Mark Grayson’s mom was Korean, therefore making Invincible half-Korean in addition to being a Viltrumite. That said, it becomes clearer than crystal to why Invincible is basically invincible, warranting being a mega super hero worthy of his own comic and television series.
Frankly, the only thing that gives it away is this little piece of framed artwork in the background of the Grayson’s household. And then I notice the way Debbie Grayson is drawn, and then the black hair on mother and son makes some sense. Also, the fact that both characters are voiced by Stephen Yeun and Sandra Oh, actual Koreans, and the animation credits are basically a rollcall of a Shinsaegae employee roster, and it all makes perfect sense to just how inherently of a Korean operation this whole thing is.
Either way, Korean or not, I enjoyed Invincible. The fact that it’s so very Korean in the roots only makes it that much more enjoyable for me, and I look forward to seeing how the story unfolds in future seasons.