By Nick Nitkowski

Invincible Season One was one of the biggest surprises to audiences. What seemed like a typical run-of-the-mill animated superhero show, at least for those unfamiliar with the source material like me, caught everyone off guard with the mid-credit sequence of the very first episode. That one scene made me a fan and made me keep watching. Luckily, I was late in discovering “Invincible”, so I was able to binge watch all of Season One… twice.

It was definitely my favorite animated superhero show because of how unapologetically dark and violent it was. Especially that Season One finale! Unfortunately, animation does take a long time to create no matter how many animators are on the team. Season One of “Invincible” started streaming on Amazon Prime in March of 2021 and ended on April 30th of the same year.

Two and a half years later, we finally get new episodes of Season Two in November of 2023 and I could not have been more excited! But in a bizarre move by Amazon Prime, they decided to stop the show at the halfway point at Episode Four. Putting the show back in hiatus for an undisclosed amount of time until they surprised audiences by releasing Episode Five of Season Two on March 13th 2024. Resulting in audiences feeling more lackluster towards the show instead of excitement.

Thankfully, I was able to watch all remaining episodes of Season Two and I will be giving my honest and spoiler-free thoughts about it.

The overall plot of this season focuses on Mark Grayson, a.k.a. Invincible voiced by Steven Yeun, struggling to balance the life of a superhero along with the life of a college student. With his monstrous Viltrumite father Omni-Man missing, voiced by J. K. Simmons, Mark must become the hero that the world needs him to be and distance himself from the horrific actions of his father.

Season Two has a lot of promise. It’s still just as dark and violent as Season One was. However, the main issue with Season Two is that it has way too many different plotlines going on that it makes Season Two feel more like an episodic jumbled mess instead of a consistent flowing narrative. I’m not sure how closely this show follows the source material, but it felt like certain plot points went nowhere, others took too long to circle back, and they reintroduced characters that I didn’t even remember. One of the drawbacks of a prolonged absence.

This season does have its strengths, though. The animation is still well done and the action is still very intense. Especially Episode Four which might be my favorite episode of the season. They definitely did not short the bloody violence this season. The voice acting is also on point. Steven Yeun still does a great job as the voice of Mark Grayson. Sandra Oh is also great as Mark’s struggling mother and all of the side characters are good. J. K. Simmons is still perfect as the voice of Omni-Man despite his character’s limited screentime, but the biggest standout to me was Sterling K. Brown. Unfortunately, much like Omni-Man, his character also had very limited screentime and I really wish that he had more. Moreso, I wish that his character was the main focal point of the season.

Overall, the show is passable but doesn’t hold up compared to Season One. I also think that the hiatus hurt the show instead of helped it. Despite that, the show is still very serviceable for fans. There was one episode that really made me laugh, so there is definitely enjoyment to be found in this season. I just wish that the storyline was more precise and direct and less episodic making each episode feel more detached from one another. This would have made Season Two perfect and even rival Season One, but as it stands, it’s still good, just not as invincible as the title implies.

All Episodes have been reviewed Invincible Streams Weekly on Amazon Prime

3 1/2 stars