I’m sure by now if you’ve spent any amount of time on the internet, or alternatively if you hang around men ages 16-27, you’ve heard about the hit show “INVINCIBLE.” This show has taken the world by storm ever since it aired in early 2021, truly redefining the superhero genre for the third time in a row since “The Boys” did it two years before that, and the MCU did it first. What’s interesting about “Invincible” is that, while it is an adaptation like most comic book media, the plot (which is almost one-to-one with the comic) hasn’t been changed. Instead, it opts to change the characters — mainly the women. This stems from the fact that the author and creator of the comic and show, Robert Kirkman, had a solid 5 years to rethink his writing choices involving those characters and chose to give them a fresh coat of paint. So let’s take a deep dive and find out what makes these characters … well, you know the rest.
ATOM EVE: THE SECOND MOST IMPORTANT CHARACTER
Atom Eve is widely regarded as the deuteragonist in the show about Debbie’s son. She’s so important, in fact, that she managed to score her own hour-long special separate from the regular seasonal release format. The show has gone to impressive lengths to give Eve more agency in her actions and characterization than her comic counterpart.
Giving her more scenes that flesh out her home life and her own experiences as a superhero accomplishes two things: firstly it demonstrates that Eve’s parents FUCKING SUCK! Seriously, when Eve’s father is more hated than the literal genocidal fascist that is Omni-Man, that’s a sign of some major suckage. The second thing this does is flesh out Eve as a whole and gives nuance to how she reacts and interacts when faced with conflict separate from Mark. Within the original comic, Eve is done a lot dirtier — most of her scenes are either with Mark or in reference to Mark. This holds her character back regarding how she confronts her own problems, since we only see her confronting problems that somehow relate to Mark. In the show, however, she faces issues getting along with her parents, a problem I imagine is very relatable.
This additional characterization gives context to the type of hero Eve wants to be, since her powerset is more suited to supporting people and giving aid than it is for battle. The show features several scenes of her helping to rebuild communities, irrigating farms, and assisting people in ways that don’t involve punching a giant monster. This shows the audience that being a strong punchy guy isn’t the only way to be a hero.
DEBBIE GRAYSON: THE REAL HERO IN A FAMILY OF HEROES
At first glance, Debbie Grayson seems like a relatively minor character, but that’s just not the case. In fact, Debbie is by far the MOST important character in the show as she’s very different from how she appears in the comics, where she’s treated as a glorified prize for Omni-man (or simply Nolan) to win after he has fully redeemed himself. Within the show Debbie, like Eve, is given far more agency. She’s one of the first to become suspicious of Nolan after his murder of the Guardians of the Globe in the first episode, and she actively seeks out answers. This is the biggest difference between the show and comic, since it serves to make her a much more complex and interesting character, rather than the generic mother figure she was in the comic.
Additionally, what makes Debbie so important is her relationship with Mark. While the comics just sort of imply that Debbie was a good mother, the audience actually gets to see how good of a mom she actually is in the show. We get multiple scenes demonstrating her kindness as she listens to Mark’s problems and empathizes with his struggles, while also making it known when he does things she disapproves of. This is best exemplified in a scene soon after Mark receives his powers, where Debbie confronts him about sneaking out at night. When Mark challenges her to “make him,” knowing full well she cannot, Debbie calls him out on this behavior and notes that just because he has powers and she can’t physically stop him, it doesn’t mean he can do as he pleases. In the end, Mark listens to her. This shows what Mark COULD be versus who he really is — in fact, in season 3 we find out that most Marks that exist within Invincible’s multiverse are evil. The Mark we follow is the exception, and it’s all thanks to his mother raising him the way she did: with love, care, discipline, and respect — the way a real hero should treat others. And only the Debbie Grayson of the show could ever pull that off.
WE NEED TO TALK… ABOUT WILLIAM
I understand how bad it looks to advertise this article as talking about women, and then talk about a male character! I agree that I should burn at the stake for this, but before you grab the firewood and matches, let me get this out.
William is a relatively minor character in the grand scheme of the plot. He mainly exists as a way to tie Mark, the main character of the show, back into the human world, which he does pretty well. However, there is an EXTREME difference between him and his comic counterpart, that being William’s queer status. William is gay within both mediums, but the way this is handled between the two is crucial. Comic William is very much in the closet for most of the comic’s runtime. It’s no surprise to me that it took 8 years to confirm he was, in fact, gay, which serves as an accurate representation of the social climate that the comic was written in. The show’s William, however, starts out of the closet from the get-go, which I appreciate a lot. I think it shows a lot of growth that Kirkman decided William should be out from the beginning. It was clearly easier to simply push William off to the side and say he’s gay later on in the show — after all, they do exactly that in the comic. Instead, they choose to simply have him exist as a gay man. This highlights the differing social climates that both mediums came out in. Where one could hardly acknowledge an arguable main character being gay until halfway through its run, the other allows him to simply exist as he was meant to be.
Now it may confuse you as to why I put William into this article, especially since he’s clearly not a woman, but I have a reason for this. I believe that a character like William existing as he does is a product of how [TITLE CARD]’s writing actually has improved. Not just in relation to women, but to almost every character involved, including queer ones. The progress that’s been made to give almost every character more depth, not just the men and the superheroes, but the ordinary woman and queer folk as well couldn’t exist without a lot of reflection and observation on how to improve these characters. It’s clear that in the time between the comic’s end and the show’s beginning, Robert Kirkman took the effort to understand and portray these characters in a better light. That is truly commendable for him to do, especially for a story that’s already ended since it would have been much easier to simply reuse the existing characters and face minimal backlash. But none of these changes could exist without the original comic’s stumbles. At the end of the day… this show, and even this comic, really are… INVINCIBLE.
