Nolan, meanwhile, has what is somehow the gentler time of it. Sure, Debbie’s still pissed off at him, instinctively recoiling in fear when he starts to let his entitlement to her forgiveness show. (J.K. Simmons gets a few chilling echoes of the old Nolan tonight. The demand implicit in “You need to give me a chance to make things right,” mixed with him using his powers to keep her in a tense conversation, has all kinds of nasty undertones.) But Debbie’s also a kind human being, susceptible to arguments about second chances and possible redemption. More practically, she wants to see and support Oliver, who’s recuperating in a space hospital somewhere. So she deigns to let her ex-husband carry her off into space, where his charm offensive will presumably continue. If Debbie Grayson was a real person, and I was her friend, I’d be screaming at her for this choice, playing her videos of that time, not all that long ago, when her ex-husband beat her son to a mangled pulp while calling her his pet dog. But she’s not, and I’m not, and Invincible has done a decent job of grounding her decision here in ways that make sense to her character. (I’m less convinced by Paul’s argument that she’s simply too embroiled in cosmic concerns to have a normal life—Oh has done an incredible job for four seasons now of playing this character as wonderfully grounded amid the fantastical—but her wonder at seeing Earth from space is a genuinely lovely note to leave her on this season.)
It helps that all this talk of contrition is neatly contrasted with a scene I found myself craving tonight, and was delighted when the show served it up: a confrontation between Nolan and Cecil, held at the spot where Mark saved the world by letting his dad savagely kick his ass three seasons ago. Besides serving as a reminder that this show is simply better when Walton Goggins is around to matter-of-factly cut through bullshit, the conversation is a necessary antidote to some of the show’s more figurative touches in a way that’s worth digging into for a minute.
Invincible, like a lot of superhero fiction, is built on metaphors, with monsters and superpowers standing in for all sorts of day-to-day problems of mundane existence. The show has mostly treated Nolan’s past crimes through that lens, with his language, and Simmons’ performance, acting like he was an abusive, possibly adulterous father, the “can fly at supersonic speeds” equivalent of a man with a secret second family. Whereas, as Cecil pointedly reminds Nolan tonight, what he actually is, in-universe, is a man who killed more than 2,000 people on a whim, less a repentant bad dad than one of the 9/11 hijackers trying to make good. Cecil’s line about needing to “nearly die 2,341 more times” to start making up for that is a great touch; even better are his interrogations about whether Nolan actually regrets the widespread harm he did or simply the hurt he applied to his own family. It’s harsh, but necessary, because the Nolan redemption arc, which I have no issue with in theory, needs this kind of thing to stop it from descending into pablum. People can change, yes. But Nolan’s change, as shown onscreen, has had much less to do with regretting his role as Viltrum’s planet-to-planet executioner and more with deciding he loves his ex-wife and kids more than his empire. When Omni-Man responds to Cecil throwing orders at him with that growled “Yeah…” that used to precede a massacre, it’s a reminder that there’s no magic switch that’s been flipped between “good” and “bad” in this guy’s head. When he relents at the reminder that he’s not owed forgiveness in the face of the scope of what he did, it’s one of the show’s most effective sales pitches on the idea that he might someday earn it. Maybe his time on Earth really did change him, at least a bit.
All of which brings me, a bit indirectly, back around to the final (pre-credits) scene of the season. Having done pretty much everything right since getting back to Earth—supporting Eve beautifully when she tells him about the abortion, reassuring his mom, and even, blessedly, telling Cecil he’s ready for therapy—Mark Grayson is rewarded for all this good work by having his worst nightmare suddenly come instantly, horrifyingly true. Flying through the sky in an effort to relax, he runs smack into a literalization of that old Philip K. Dick line about reality being that which persists even when you stop believing in it: Thragg, floating in the skies of Earth. Turns out Mark didn’t need to worry about his father’s people showing up on the planet one day, because the Viltrumites are already here.
“Let me explain your future to you,” the regent purrs, Lee Pace’s understated vocal performance being an asset here for once. As he explains, the 37 surviving Viltrumites have infiltrated Earth, where they intend to live, hide, and, of course, breed. (Despite the conciliatory nature of the offer, Thragg doesn’t drop the “All is ours” bullshit while discussing this, phrasing the arrangement as “using” humans and dropping a not-very-veiled threat of forced breeding as the alternative.) In exchange, the aliens will not “influence, affect, aid, or endanger” the planet. It’s peace, of a sort.
There are some extremely complicated ideas nestled in this ultimatum, many of them pretty ugly. (Like some of the conspiracy shading in last year’s Superman, it’s essentially an anti-immigration fearmonger’s worst nightmare brought to life: the lurking specter of the enemy within. At the same time, Mark himself is proof that Viltrumite ideals may not hold up as strongly under the forces of cultural assimilation as they might expect.) What it is, in the moment, though, is a choice. Regardless of how long they can actually stick to their pledge of non-interference—what with being “Super Space Nazis” with obvious impulse control problems—the Viltrumites lurking among humanity will never not be a threat, a potential manifestation of the sudden, horrifying violence that Mark Grayson now finds himself worried about all the time. He can either choose to learn to live with those feelings, process them, and survive them for the sake of the things he loves. Or he can reject the deal, and let it all be destroyed. It’s to Invincible’s credit that it makes Mark’s hesitation, his misery in this moment, feel genuine; it’s also to his credit that when he finally chooses to live (flashing to Eve before relaxing enough to give his answer), it feels earned. Thragg actually gives a tiny sigh of relief before flying away, promising that Mark will never hear from him again. We’re left with a distant shot of our guy, no costume, no armor, no allies, simply floating and still in the upper atmosphere. The last sound of the season is that of Mark Grayson exhaling: fear, exhaustion, and just a touch of relief, all mixed into one.
This, then, is the TV show I’m thinking about when I get pissed off at Invincible for killing time or feeling rote or for throwing weightless, meaningless punches around when it could be doing something that actually matters with its story. This isn’t a perfect episode of television. (I’ll get to the Allen stuff down in the strays, and there’s too much going on here for the show to sell its time-jump element as well as it could.) But at almost no point while watching “Don’t Leave Me Hanging” did I find myself wondering “Why the hell are you showing me this?” Subtle when it needs to be, bombastic when it’s called for, and wonderfully in sync with its characters’ minds and needs, this is the material that keeps me convinced this show is still worth caring about: Strongly drawn characters making interesting decisions, without getting bogged down in theatrics at the expense of actual drama. And I don’t think this is strictly a factor of the finale of it all, either; this richer material is always lurking under Invincible’s surface, which is what makes it so frustrating when the show refuses to mine it. The upshot of it all is this: This is a fantastic end to a middling, and maybe even a mediocre, season of television. That’s frustrating and exhilarating all at once—not least of which because it’s a reminder that you can never quite write a guy, or a show, like Invincible off.
Stray observations
- • The opening hallucination of the Viltrumites attacking Earth is the only one that actually got me. Wordless and haunting, it’s a great way, right at the top of the episode, to establish the stakes.
- • Tech Jacket doesn’t do a lot here, but she does get to be annoyed at Mark and Nolan for brooding and have a nice little reunion with dad Bobby Moynihan.
- • The show resists any urges to make fun of Eve for gaining weight while Mark was away. (Looking at some pages from this bit in the comics, I feel genuinely grateful that the show treats it as a normal thing instead of something to make a big, weird deal out of. Invincible the show generally does a great job of making stuff that was treated really goofily by 2000s-era Robert Kirkman much more palatable.)
- • The payoff to this season’s “cracking glass” intro sequence is a flash cut back to blue and white colors and a slightly less somber tone.
- • There’s a silly little joke where a bus is headed to “Curtis Cliff,” which feels like an acknowledgement that Cliff Curtis’ time on the show, as Paul, is probably coming to a close.
- • Okay, so, the Allen stuff: He’s feeling insecure about running the galaxy! (Rightly so, because he’s not actually very smart.) He gets talked over in meetings until his girlfriend tells him to be tougher! Seth Rogen isn’t given much to do, and somehow still does even less! It consistently feels like a waste! The thing is, I really liked Allen as an initial joke character, but he’s a strong demonstration of the fact that you can sometimes only take a joke—”What if a badass alien warrior talked like Seth Rogen?”—so far.
- • The animation of Debbie’s decapitated head in Mark’s nightmare was convincingly, upsettingly fucked-up. (Having the eyes be off-kilter is a really gnarly touch.)
- • The little digression of Cecil, Donald, and Sinclair summoning a tentacle monster while searching for Robot and Monster Girl was fun.
- • Eve gets slightly short shrift here due to the time jump. I get the reasons for the disconnect, but it leaves her big decisions as a thing happening to Mark, not to her. But the scene of her telling him about the abortion is both realistic and moving.
- • I have really missed Cecil. Between “I will never not be afraid of you” and “Earth is not your therapy couch, Nolan,” it’s like they’ve been saving all the really good lines for Goggins.
- • “The universe is strange. In a way, you’ve become our savior. Willing or not.” Does Thragg even know if he’s taunting Mark here? Pace and Steven Yeun both kill it with that final scene.
- • Except it’s not the final scene, of course, because we have to have some mid-credits fun: Thedas developed a better version of the Scourge virus that will kill anybody with any Viltrumite DNA (and might even target those with sufficiently compatibility, like regular humans). His video will tasks Allen with using it to exterminate the threat for good. It’s a good enough hook, but Yeun’s ragged final breath should have been the season’s final note.
William Hughes is a staff writer at The A.V. Club.
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