Although the series "Invincible" has familiar superhero traits, it differs from most projects about people and beings with superpowers. In essence, it's closer to "The Boys" than to other projects, though there's plenty of "Spider-Man" in it as well....

The series isn't afraid to be strange and even shocking

In superhero stories, the main battlefield is Earth, and if the action moves elsewhere, it's brief and doesn't significantly affect the plot. In "Invincible," the geography of the main hero's travels is unlimited. Yes, Earth is considered the primary arena—after all, Mark fights to save it. But he actively visits other worlds and rescues inhabitants on various planets. For several episodes, we even watched him live on a distant planet where his father Omni-Man became king by marrying the ant queen, and they even had a hybrid child—a human-ant.

Robert Kirkman and company, thanks to the broad possibilities of animation, don't have to adapt the original and daring comic (by Kirkman himself) or ground down or simplify certain plot twists for realism. The thing is, they don't want to make "Invincible" realistic, unlike Marvel, which uses our modern world as one anchor so viewers can empathize more with the heroes and stories. By the way, this helped them win the race against DC, because it's much easier to feel Spider-Man's pain than to believe in your own invulnerability like Superman.

Interestingly, "Invincible" depicts a world far from realism, yet its characters are maximally relatable beings and people. Yes, even extraterrestrial beings are essentially more human-like. The result is that despite all its strangeness, "Invincible" has many more points of connection with our world because all metaphors are readable and understandable.

As a bonus, "Invincible" has an excellent sense of humor, especially considering it's a superhero story. The jokes and irony don't spoil the balance between action and drama, human characters and crazy galaxy travels.

"Invincible" doesn't smooth over rough edges or coddle viewers

Let's recall the first Marvel films they released when they decided to create the Avengers universe. It was child's play: lots of jokes, little realistic drama, and almost no violence in fights. Sam Raimi's Spider-Man or X-Men looked almost like horror movies in the superhero genre by comparison.

The thing is, Marvel decided to reach as wide an audience as possible, which meant lowering the rating. So the film "The Avengers" (2012) got a 12+ rating, which affected not only the level of on-screen violence but sometimes the antagonists' adequacy. In sum, the dramatic component suffered.

"Invincible" doesn't even try to smooth over rough edges; it discusses all topics honestly and directly, and thanks to the freedom of animation, the imagination sometimes soars. Therefore, the series has events of varying improbability, strangest marriages, and terribly brutal and thrilling fights with plenty of violence and gore (any action movie would envy the action in this animation). Moreover, this carnage works very well for drama, illustrating both the heroes' internal conflicts and their struggle against seemingly invincible evil. Hence the dark and daring animated series has an 18+ rating.

"Invincible" is a series that doesn't try to entertain or please

The peculiarity of "Invincible" is that it doesn't try to please anyone. While Marvel and DC (Warner Bros.) think about how to crack the code of success and attract the public, Robert Kirkman simply does what he likes, first and foremost. He often talks about this in interviews:

For the most part, I'm just trying to entertain myself. I think about the audience, but my main driving force is the question—do I like this? In that regard, I just do what I think is cool, and then I hope people will like it too. And from everything I've heard [about the series "Invincible"], this approach seems pretty effective.

The multiverse is not a way to please fans and use heroes from different films

Perhaps the main problem with the current Marvel Cinematic Universe is the multiverses, which initially helped create cool stories but ultimately turned the universe into a mess and fan service for fan service's sake. All because Marvel bosses became too concerned about viewers' opinions and wishes rather than how to make dramaturgically interesting films and series.

Robert Kirkman uses multiverses primarily to explore Mark's character, to discover those sides of his personality that we might not have learned otherwise. The series' writers strive to write a story based on their characters, not on fans' desires. Therefore, they won't bring in an "Invincible" from a 1990s cartoon into their project.

Overall, one of the superpowers of "Invincible" can be called self-sufficiency and originality. After all, the series avoids other problematic areas: the authors don't do crossovers (production multiverses) and don't resort to tricks like "dead/resurrected from the dead/dead again."

Deep character development

Wide geography of travels, violence, and interesting plots are great, but perhaps the main advantage of "Invincible" is its characters. Robert Kirkman and the writing team strive to create separate character arcs for each season while keeping in mind long-term continuity and the development of the characters' personalities over time. The authors provide enough space for characters to grow, to grieve, to suffer from unrequited love, or to struggle with doubts after a battle failure. The focus on the characters' personalities is one reason why "Invincible" is one of the best superhero series right now.

Moreover, this applies not only to the main characters but also to the secondary ones, who get quite a lot of screen time. The heroine Atom Eve deals with what it means to be a real hero, the restless Rex struggles with self-doubt, and the charming alien Allen (voiced by Seth Rogen, by the way) gets a whole episode for his story.

Interestingly, the series "Invincible" works as a satire on various (both good and bad) stories, many of which we've seen in the MCU. The most striking example is the relationship between Mark and his father Nolan (Omni-Man). Essentially, we see the most twisted version of problems in superhero father-child relationships. One in "Thor" wasn't the best father, but in the end, he didn't use Thor's or Loki's head to deal with subway passengers.

What's the bottom line?

"Invincible" is a series that is beautifully animated, superbly acted, and filled with witty dialogue and unexpected events. This animation shows that the modern world undoubtedly needs fewer crusaders in capes and infantile stories about good and evil.