Last week in Invincible Season 2, Mark returned home with Nolan and Andressa’s baby (who is named Oliver according to the comics), thereby surprising and angering Debbie a lot. While they decided to take care of it together, Cecil dropped by to suggest that the Global Defense Agency can do the same because they’ve got experts who are best suited for the job. And his offer was promptly denied. Donald and Cecil had a heated confrontation about his human brain being put into a state-of-the-art endoskeleton to keep him alive. Mark’s reunion with his friends and family was cut short by the arrival of a ship full of Sequids from Mars. A team of superheroes went interstellar to deal with the Sequids, while Shrinking Rae, Rex Splode, and Dupli-Kate stayed back to deal with the Lizard League. So, let’s find out who survived the respective ordeals and who ended up biting the dust.
Spoiler Alert
Dupli-Kate is buried
Episode 6 of Invincible Season 2 opens with King Lizard blowing Rex Splode’s brains out. While it does seem like he is dead, he somehow manages to regain consciousness and uses the exposed bones of his severed arm to bludgeon King Lizard to death. After doing this heroic task, he collapses, but the GDE officers arrive in time to take him to the medical bay and help him recuperate. Surprisingly enough, Shrinking Rae crawls out of the Komodo Dragon’s carcass. So, it’s confirmed that Dupli-Kate is the only one who is actually dead. Up in space, Rus Livingston (under the control of the Sequid hivemind) wreaks havoc on the Guardians of the Globe. At one point, Rudy and Eve’s minds are taken over by the Sequids. But, largely with the help of Mark, they manage to rescue Rus, Rudy, and Eve.
While the Guardians are on their way out of the ship, they are stopped by the Martians, who want to keep Shapesmith so that they can kill him as punishment for essentially destroying Mars. Mark refuses to let that happen and takes Shapesmith along with the rest of the Guardians and gets out of Dodge (while incapacitating the Martian spaceships). Immortal seemingly acknowledges Mark’s abilities and prowess on the battlefield, and it seems like Rudy and Monster Girl are still having an argument about getting an exoskeleton so that Monster Girl doesn’t have to transform all the time. Cecil tries to convince Debbie to put Oliver in the GDE creche, but Debbie refuses Cecil’s offer yet again. After returning to Earth, the Guardians learn about Dupli-Kate’s death and the injuries that Rex Splode and Shrinking Rae have suffered. Mark reunites with Amber, Oliver, and Debbie. The GDE organizes a funeral for Dupli-Kate, and Immortal confesses that he loved her a lot.
Mark and Amber share their feelings
Amber and Mark have a very awkward date, and they realize that things are not going well between them. Amber doesn’t blame Mark for the superhero life that he is leading, and she knows that going away to save lives is what he needs to do, or else what is the use of his superpowers? Mark knows that his work as a superhero is important, but he also realizes that he is doing the same thing to Amber that Nolan did to Debbie, and he thinks that is wrong. Mark goes back to his room to find Donald in there, along with William and Rick Sheridan. In case you don’t remember, D.A. Sinclair was creating something called the ReAnimen, and he had abducted Rick and turned him into one of his mindless robots. Mark had rescued him and William from Sinclair’s clutches. Rick was sent away for surgeries, and Sinclair was employed by Cecil for a ReAnimen-inspired project, which crumbled before his eyes because of Omni-Man. Rick’s return means that his reconstructive surgery has been successful.
That said, Donald warns Mark that Rick probably has PTSD, and it can spike randomly. Mark notices that Donald’s hand is shaking while conveying this information, probably because he knows that that is not actually Rick but a version of Rick made of the same kind of endoskeleton that he is made of. Why is the GDE spending so much money bringing all these people to life? Are they really that generous? Are these endoskeletons equipped with something that can be weaponized by the GDE? I don’t know, and I hope the next few episodes of Invincible Season 2 come with some answers.
Mark meets Rex Splode, who is now realizing that he is a misogynist. Then, Eve comes to meet Rex Splode, and he tells her that Mark and Amber are probably breaking up. Debbie deals with a GDE spy masquerading as a nanny, who seemingly manages to convince Debbie to let her work for her because, even though she is employed by Cecil, Debbie is her boss. Cecil meets Eve and asks her to officially join the GDE. Eve rejects his offer but assures him that whenever the Guardians need her, she’ll be there. Then, Amber visits Eve to talk about her relationship woes. Mark goes to Art to talk about his relationship woes. Both Eve and Art advise Amber and Mark, respectively, to spend the time that Mark is on Earth with each other instead of getting relationship advice from other people.
Did the Guardians defeat the Sequids?
Mark tells Art that Nolan told him to “read his books” before being arrested by the Viltrumites, but since Debbie threw them all away, all he has are his travel books, which aren’t of much help. Art gives Mark all the sci-fi novels that Nolan has written. William takes Rick to the memorial where Sinclair’s victims died, and Rick seems to piece together what happened, and that makes him feel sad and guilty. Mark starts going through Nolan’s books. He reads about a gun called the Infinity Ray (which is apparently capable of destroying the sun) and a planet with shifty gravity and horrid creatures. Mark finds them to be interesting even though these books never sold, and Art didn’t even read them. At the Guardians headquarters, we see Cecil advising Immortal to take a break because he is clearly distraught after Dupli-Kate’s death. However, as soon as he learns that there’s a signal coming from deep space, Immortal ignores Cecil’s advice and launches into space because he thinks that Omni-Man is here. But the entity near Earth isn’t Nolan, but Allen.
When Allen telepathically communicates with Immortal, he assumes that Allen is trying to mind-control him. So he attacks Allen, and Mark has to intervene to stop them from killing each other. Immortal goes back home, and Mark takes Allen to his dorm room for a chat. We briefly see Amber not really enjoying herself, even though she is at a party, before going to Mark and Allen’s conversation. Mark tells him about Nolan’s incarceration, and Allen tells Mark about Thaedus being a Viltrumite and that he wants Mark to join the Coalition of Planets and end the Viltrumites’ expansion program. Mark rejects the offer because he is barely maintaining a healthy work-life balance. Allen, being the good guy he is, decides to return to Thaedus and relay this sad information to him. Based on a hunch that Nolan’s books aren’t fictional stories but based on real-life events, Mark gives Nolan’s books to Allen, and Allen confirms that Nolan’s books are factually correct. Mark theorizes that these stories are packed with details about how to defeat the Viltrumites, and Allen thinks that the Coalition should decipher them and see if Nolan’s stories have any substance.
Since Mark is concerned about Nolan’s whereabouts, Allen tells him that he is going to find out about the Viltrumite prison and inform him about it. Mark promises Allen that when the final fight between the Coalition and the Viltrumites happens, Invincible will show up. Talking about Nolan, we see General Kregg demeaning him in a prison in the middle of nowhere because Nolan has become so soft. Nolan doesn’t cave in, psychologically speaking; instead, he caves in the floor of his cell. At the end of Invincible Season 2, episode 6, we see Rus Livingston cleaning the apartment because it’s a mess, thanks to Shapesmith. That’s when he feels sick and pukes out a Sequid, which goes on to take control of his body again. This obviously doesn’t bode well for Earth. Although we didn’t see Rus going through any kind of health check, it’s frightening that this Sequid didn’t show up in any kind of body scan because it can stealthily get into anybody’s body and then reveal its existence later on (yes, I’m talking about Eve and Rudy).
By the way, the Alien franchise has been teasing a Xenomorph takeover of Earth for ages, and nobody has greenlit that idea for reasons that are beyond my comprehension. However, if a Sequid (which functions like the face huggers) takeover happens in Invincible, we can treat that as an Alien movie. Anyway, during the mid-credits scene, we see Angstrom Levy buying a formal suit, traveling through multiverses, and ending up on Earth, i.e., the one that Mark (the one we are familiar with) lives in. Is it safe to assume that Angstrom has successfully neutralized every single Mark Grayson in the multiverse? We’ll have to wait till next week to find out.
