Invincible (Amazon Studios)

Television

‘Invincible’ season 2 episode 1 ‘A Lesson For Your Next Life’ recap/review

‘Invincible’ continues to masterfully weave multiple plotlines and great characters into a highly entertaining series.

November 3, 2023

After what’s felt like forever (but was really only a year and a half) the second season of Invincible is finally here. A lot happened during the first season, so we’ll just break down the big stuff you need to know before jumping into the next chapter.

Mark Grayson (aka Invincible) is the son of Debbie and Nolan Grayson. Debbie is a human while Nolan is part of an alien species known as the Viltrumites. Nolan has lived on Earth for decades and acted as one of its greatest superheroes, going by the name Omni-Man. Despite appearing to have a heart of gold, Nolan is actually on a mission for the Viltrumites to ensure that Earth is ready to be conquered — a fact that is brutally made clear when he murders all of his Guardians of the Globe teammates.
Mark has a girlfriend (Amber) and best friend (Will) who know he’s a superhero hero. They are all seniors in high school and hope to attend Upstate University together. He’s also close with Samantha/Atom Eve, an extremely powerful fellow superhero who decided to leave the new Guardians of the Globe and make the world better on her own.

Speaking of the new Guardians, Robot/Rudy (their new leader) got himself a working human body via Rex Splode‘s blood cells. He also has a huge crush on Monster Girl.
After developing his powers, Mark began working for the Global Defense Agency, a secretive organization led by Cecil Stedman. During his early days as a superhero, he comes into conflict with Allen the Alien from the Coalition of Planets. After the two realize their dust-up is all a big misunderstanding, they become allies. Allen also realizes that Mark may be the key to saving the rest of the galaxy from the Viltrumites.
During a mission to Mars, Mark and the astronauts discover that the native Martians are in conflict with a parasitic species called Sequids. The Sequids are unable to take over the Martians due to their shapeshifting abilities, but can take over humans, hence why the Martians try to kill them before they can leave. Mark manages to get most of the astronauts away, but one stays behind and (unbeknownst to them) helps the Sequids take over the planet. They don’t notice since one of the Martians took that particular astronaut’s place (via shapeshifting) and decided to come to Earth.

Mark eventually learns the truth about his father, which leads to a brutal battle across the city of Chicago. In the end, Nolan finds himself unable to kill his son and flies away. During the conflict, Cecil’s righthand man (Donald Ferguson) is killed.
In case you didn’t realize Cecil was kind of shady, he utilizes the work/assistance of mad scientist D.A. Sinclair, who helps him create an army of cyborg ReAnimen as insurance against a Viltrumite invasion….and maybe Mark, as well.

Got all that? Good, because the season two premiere picks up right where everything left off.

As always, the recap portion of this review will contain plenty of spoilers. The sequence of events has also been streamlined a bit for the sake of clarity.

Now and Again

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

The episode opens with Invincible and Omni-Man fighting with the Immortal. After Invincible brutally murders the hero in a way even he can’t come back from, we learn that the battle is taking place on an alternate earth where Nolan convinced Mark to join him. They are also looking for someone who’s hiding in the smoldering ruins of Chicago.

Their target, a man named Angstrom Levy, heads inside a secret base housing a rebellion. The group is led by Robot (who does not have a body) and a battle-scarred Atom Eve. Levy was able to retrieve an energy source to potentially combat Omni-Man, but it barely leaves a scratch when he and Invincible locate their hideout. Omni-Man kills Robot while Invincible paralyzes Atom Eve — an act he believes to be merciful.

Before the father/son team can kill the rest of the rebels, a portal opens under Levy and takes him away.

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

Back in the reality we know and love, Mark visits the spots where his father almost killed him before going through the motions of superhero work. After joylessly saving countless lives throughout the recovering city, he heads home to be alone with his thoughts.

Later, Mark and his mother encourage each other as they prepare to step back into their normal lives.

For Debbie, it’s going back to selling real estate. For Mark, it’s going to high school with everyone believing that his father was killed during the Omni-Man attack. After an awkwardly empathetic welcome from Todd (the school bully), Amber pulls Mark away to see how he’s doing. He admits that he’s struggling while also feeling guilty for being involved in the deaths of so many people. Part of him thinks he should be out there helping save more lives to make up for what happened.

Amber tries to assure Mark that Omni-Man’s actions aren’t a burden he should carry, but it clearly still weighs on him.

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

Later, Mark meets with Cecil and demands that he and the Global Defense Agency start calling on him. Cecil tells Mark that he isn’t ready and should take some time off to get his head straight, which goes over about as well as you’d expect.

Cecil then heads back to GDA headquarters to monitor a situation involving a rampaging monster and the new Guardians of the Globe:

Robot/Rudy
Monster Girl

Rexsplode
Black Sampson
Dupli-Kate

Shrinking Rae

He’s immediately met by Donald Ferguson, who is nowhere near as dead as the last time we saw him. Ferguson explains that the Guardians could really use Invincible’s help, but Cecil refuses, explaining that he won’t make the same mistake he made with Nolan/Omni-Man. The Guardians end up besting the monster, but Robot is nearly killed after he freezes during the battle — an unexpected consequence of having his real body out in the field underneath the suit.

Meanwhile, Debbie arrives home from work that evening to find Olga, whose husband (Red Rush) was killed by Omni-Man, in her kitchen. After the two commiserate over their entangled grief, Olga gives her friend a mysterious contact card.

Best of Intentions

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

The Mauler Twins are broken out of prison by the appearance of two portals like the one that swallowed Angstrom Levy. After walking through, they find themselves on a ruined alternate earth. They are also greeted by a version of Levy who’s obviously different (and much more self-assured) than the one we met in the episode’s opening — and can open portals between dimensions.

This Levy explains to the twins that despite being a pacifist who wishes to use his powers for good, he needs their scientific expertise to help him with a project. The twins aren’t thrilled about working for someone else, but decide it’s better than being stranded in a dystopian wasteland and follow him through another portal.

Levy takes them to the dimension we’ve been watching, where he’s built a machine (based on their design) that can read and copy human minds. Unfortunately, he can’t seem to find a power source that can make it work for 100+ subjects. When asked why he’d need something like that, Levy explains that his powers allow him to travel to an infinite number of dimensions — most of which saw Invincible side with Omni-Man to take over Earth.

He’s also learned that each dimension has something unique to offer. In many cases, that includes solutions to major problems (cancer, famine, etc.) that still exist in our world. Levy used his abilities to gather other versions of himself from all over the multiverse so that their knowledge can be passed on to him. Once that process is complete, he’ll be able to save our world and countless others. In exchange for their help, he’ll promises to send the Mauler Twins to a dimension of their choosing.

Broken Resolve

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

Back at GDA headquarters, Cecil berates the Guardians of the Globe for their poor work — an issue he chalks up to a “failure of leadership.” As you can imagine, this does a number on Robot’s already fragile self-confidence. Cecil then announces that he’s bringing in the Immortal to lead the team and adding another hero named Bulletproof for extra muscle.

Bulletproof immediately goes to work putting Rexsplode in his place, which earns him some early bonus points.

Over at Reginald Vel Johnson High School, Mark walks outside and finds Samantha/Atom Eve waiting to see him. After catching up for a bit, Mark admits that he’s scared of one day becoming like his father. Samantha assures him that he’s not the same as Nolan before encouraging her friend to disprove Cecil’s doubts.

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

Mark takes Samantha’s words to heart and immediately flies to GDA headquarters, where he informs Cecil that he’ll work for him and follow his orders to the letter. Cecil is hesitant, but decides to put Mark back in the field after his team discovers a warehouse where the Mauler Twins are building a large device and powering it up.

Invincible arrives just as Levy is beginning to draw knowledge from his dimensional alternates (who are strapped into the machine) and others from across the multiverse — a process that can’t be stopped once it’s started. Levy pleads with Invincible to stop, but is unable to get him to listen. He then opens more portals and brings in a battalion of Maulers, who proceed to beat the crap out of Invincible. Upon realizing that they’re going to kill him, Levy takes off the device pouring knowledge into his mind, causing it to explode and killing nearly everyone inside the warehouse.

Invincible survives, but is physically and emotionally beaten. When the Guardians of the Globe show up, Cecil and Rexsplode assure him that his actions likely saved people despite the large loss of life that just occurred. Mark then goes home and has dinner with his mom — neither of them willing to speak about how much pain they’re in.

Mark also gets a letter from Upstate University, which he waits to open with Amber. The pair rejoice when they discover that they’ll both be going to college together. On his way home that evening, he’s confronted by the Immortal, who proclaims his distrust of him.

In a mid-credits scene, we learn that there were two more survivors from the warehouse explosion:

A badly scarred Mauler Twin.
Levy Prime, who now has a giant/deformed head and carries the memories of all his dimensional alternates…most of whom lost loved ones at the hands of a very different version of Invincible.

Levy also blames Invincible for what happened and vows to seek revenge.

The Verdict

Invincible (Amazon Studios)

While adding other dimensions and multiversal travel to a story may seem overdone (never mind that the source material did it almost two decades ago), Invincible used it to craft a truly gut-wrenching villain origin story. It also helped drive home Mark’s fears about who he could become.

Instead of using alternate Mark Graysons as a narrative crutch, the second season premiere does a brilliant job focusing on how he and his mother are dealing with trauma. It was a little shocking to hear that only a month has passed since the season one finale, but nothing felt unnatural or overwrought. Mark and Debbie are the same good people at their core, but with emotional wounds that aren’t anywhere close to healing. It would have been easy to show them embracing in a cathartic breakdown. Instead, we see the very real struggle they’re both going through that will make that inevitable moment even better.

Speaking of inevitable, you didn’t have to have read the comic to know where things were going with poor Angstrom Levy. Part of me wishes they’d drawn out things with him a bit longer, especially with the great job the episode did portraying what a good and brilliant person he was before the accident. Unfortunately, that made his decision to sic a herd of Maulers on Invincible pretty hard to swallow. There’s no way someone that smart was too dumb to realize what would happen to Mark — or to everyone else if he removed the helmet.

I also think Cecil was way too quick to put Mark in the field (although it did lead to a great moment). And you’ve also got to believe they won’t leave us wondering about Donald Ferguson for much longer. It was weird enough having just one episode where his reappearance was only half acknowledged in the opening recap.

Those minor complaints aside, though, “A Lesson For Your Next Life” was a great way to start the new season. In addition to all the fantastic character work, we got plenty of action along with some new wrinkles to a mythology that was already all types of interesting. This show continues to somehow juggle multiple complex plotlines and layered characters without it feeling cluttered. Part of that is due to the writers masterfully weaving common themes, but it’s also because the show is just so entertaining.

Let’s hope the trend continues as this undoubtedly become even crazier next week.

Next episode: ‘In About Six Hours I Lose My Virginity To A Fish’