Invincible: An exploration of parental trauma
How Invincible teaches us how trauma has long-reaching effects, and the importance of parental figures.
A disclaimer!
In this article, I will be discussing sensitive topics such as childhood abuse (both physical and mental), sexual assault and mental health topics. If you are sensitive to any of these topics, please be mindful of how you want to progress with this thinkpiece.
Also, spoilers ahead for comic and show discussions about Invincible Season 1.
An abstract of sorts
When I first watched Invincible after the many memes of “Think Mark, think!” and along with my partner’s urgings, I was taken aback by the depth and brilliance of this show. As someone who has an extensive history of liking Marvel religiously and enjoying watch one to five hour long YouTube video essays about different philosophical topics, this show was perfect to me as it struck a perfect balance of being a fun, action packed and raunchy adult animation show infused with some serious themes that covered heavy topics such as genocide, assault, mental health issues, and most importantly, the extensive effects of trauma.
During this period of my life when I binged Invincible, I was diagnosed with major depressive disorder as a senior in college, then PTSD as a working adult. The diagnosis made a lot of sense, but also proved to be infinitely challenging to deal with.
Watching Mark/Invincible getting beat into shreds while getting berated by his father, OmniMan, unlocked the vast space of forgotten memories that my brain locked away to protect me. Every punch Mark was hit with, I felt my mother’s hands beating me into a pulp. Every jeer Mark had to listen to, I heard my mother’s voice screaming at me, leaving scars that I still struggle to stitch closed. It was painful to watch, even more traumatic to experience. What truly broke me was when Mark, despite getting beaten into a bloody mess on top of the mountain that he and his father played around in, despite his father looming over him with bloody fists, answered his father’s question about his immortality with gasping breaths.
“You, Dad. I’ll still have you, Dad.”
I sobbed as I watched Mark take ragged breaths, calling out to his father one last time as Omniman soared into space. Nevermind the near genocide Earth faced; the most gut-wrenching moment of the show was focused on the broken bond of father and son. And I felt the weight of that bloody and broken bond.
1. Unpacking my childhood
My first bully in my life was my mom. I can only remember a handful of praises she gave me while I can recall a lifetime of beatings, screaming matches, and manipulation. She punished my averageness, especially when my grades showed how average I was. As I grew older, my mom’s physical abuse became more severe.
For a period of time, my body was like a palette of green and purple, my head growing knots everywhere. My eyes were always puffy and bloodshot, my mind fragmented.
But despite the beatings, the mental abuse and sleepless nights, I loved my mom. I hated what she did, but I had no choice to call my mother “Mom”. Time and time again I would blame myself, urge myself to get back up and continue fighting for my own survival. That one day, my mom will come back to me and love me for who I am. This intense dicotomy wore me down, but I didn’t know how much damage I took until I left for college.
2. Who am I?
As a twenty something year old navigating college, I felt like a metronome. On some days, I knew who I didn’t want to become. On other days, I didn’t know just what I was. Was I truly what my mom thought I was? A failure? A stain on my family’s impeccable academic history of doctors and scientists? All I knew was that I survived, but I didn’t know how to live. What was my identity as a person?
The bruises and knots faded but the the mental effects of my abuse started to rear its ugly head. I struggled to maintain my grades as I was struck with spells of intense depression that rendered me catatonic in my bed. Still, I continued to trudge through my classes as I needed to retain my student visa. Most of all, I knew failure and moving back home was not an option. I couldn’t go back to my mom, who magically turned into a weeping, loving mother the moment I left. So back to surviving it was. When I graduated and so did my obligations to appease my parents, I felt lost again. I felt lonely and I couldn’t make sense of the symptoms I still felt from my childhood abuse. That was until I watched Invincible.
3. Who is Mark Grayson/Invincible?
To give a brief character summary of Mark Grayson/Invincible, Mark is the son of Nolan/Omniman and Debbie.
He discovered that he has powers like his superhero dad and takes on the name Invincible. Mark wanted to save people like his dad, so he begins to train and save people from powerful villains. However, trouble was across the horizon when Omniman murders the Guardians of the Globe, a superhero group. This culminates in Omniman revealing to Mark that he is a Viltrumite, belonging to a race of aliens that conquered planets and killed those who protested.
Mark rejects this idea and his Viltrumite identity, choosing to protect Earth and his loved ones over joining the cause with his father. This results in an intense fight between Mark and his father, and his father leaves Earth. The season delves deeper into how this affects Mark tremendously, which only adds on to already growing pile of trying to save the Earth, his college life, and his relationship with his family and girlfriend.
4. Season 1: Mark’s first exposure to physical harm
Before I continue with this section, I want to say that I have read the comic and know broadly what the storyline will be. However, since the show seems to improve and cut down on different storylines from the comics, I will solely be focusing on the show Mark, not the comic Mark.
In Season 1, Mark and Nolan start to train together after Mark gains his powers. One thing that truly stood out to me during this adorable father-son flying training montage was the obvious respect and love Mark has for Nolan. He sees his father as a hero, a role model he aspires to be ever since he was a kid. Now that he gained the same powers, Mark wants to save the world and be useful as well. However, Nolan approaches Mark differently; while it is evident Nolan loves his son, Mark’s powers kick Nolan’s plans of taking over Earth into action as he thinks Mark would understand his Viltrumite heritage. Therefore, instead of encouraging Mark to use his powers benevolently, Nolan emphasizes who to save and who not to save, and how Mark should think about “the greater good”.
During the flying montage, Nolan teaches Mark how to fight mid-air, and humorously tells Mark to hit him. Mark is obviously taken aback, but punches Nolan with all of his strength. Nolan scoffs and punches Mark, which surprised me greatly.
The audience can clearly see that Mark grew up without any use of physical force, so Nolan punching Mark was shocking. This can be seen when Mark looks angry and sad when he comes home, looking a little worse for wear. The next day, when Mark is harrassed by his bully, he does the same thing Nolan did to him.
He tells his bully to hit him, and when his bully does, we can see Mark be in pain, but demands to be hit again. Mark wants to be tough and blames himself for being weak, unlike his father. The bully eventually gets scared off, afraid of why Mark was asking for more punishment.
Later, Nolan catches Mark doing vigilante work and reprimands him for causing a large mess, that he needs more training before he goes back into the field. Again, Mark asks resolutely for Nolan to hit him. Nolan is now shocked by Mark, and asks him why. Mark then bursts into a small rant:
“Dad, I want to be just like you!”
Nolan looks conflicted, but eventually agrees to train Mark more and takes him to get a new suit together, cementing Mark’s identity as Invincible.
The first boundary parents teach their children is one that is physical. We are taught to keep our hands to ourselves, that we must protect our bodies because our parents created us in their image. However, for victims of physical abuse from their parents, when this boundary is broken forcibly, the boundaries around their bodies also falter. But children cannot fathom blaming the parents they love and depend on for survival. Instead, they internalize it, berating themselves for not being stronger, for not appeasing their parents.
We see this happen in Mark when he is punched by his father for the first time. He cannot fathom blaming his superhero, and instead blames himself for being weak. His boundary around his body fails, and welcomes violence from his bully, villains, even his own father. He wants to be stronger, to be able to withstand the pain of the punches thrown at him. He doesn’t respect his body anymore and instead, trains himself to be stronger, to be invincible.
I used to blame myself for not being good enough, that I deserved to get beaten up for being stupid. So I gave up my social life, hobbies and creative interests to study, to get A’s and full scores on practice SAT and ACT questions. My physical boundaries also became nonexistent, so I was subject to cruel comments about my developing body. I also became vulnerable to male attention, something that I had to learn the hard way from failed relationships. In fact, it wasn’t until I was in my twenties that I learned that I should protect my body, to love it and treat it with respect.
The most graphic scene from Season 1 was when Nolan beats Mark into submission out of frustration on top of Mount Everest, one of the spots Nolan and Mark shared for their father-son, hero to hero discussions.
We do not see Nolan punching Mark for the last few scenes, but we hear the thuds as his blows land on a bloodied Mark. On the last thud, the scene smash cuts into a flashback of Nolan watching Mark play baseball. As a Viltrumite, Nolan complains about the uselessness of just standing still and not saving the world. Debbie then points out that they’re watching their son, someone they created with so much love together discover how to play baseball. As Mark steps up to the plate, we see Nolan’s face soften, even cheering on his son to run. Mark runs to Nolan and Nolan holds him up to the sky, smiling at his son, missing his front two teeth but grinning with joy and excitement.
The scene smash cuts into present day Mark, missing his front two teeth. His face is bloodied beyond recognition, his blood splatter on Nolan’s same hands that lifted him up as a child. Despite all this, Mark is still looking at his father, his eyes focused on Nolan.
This scene made me choke up as this was clearly from Nolan’s perspective. A parent gets to watch their child grow up before their eyes, and they still see their teenage/adult children as if they were babies, filled with love and wonder. Yet, the very same parent can bring forth destruction and despair in the child, who has no choice but to still cling to their parent for some semblance of love. Mark’s stare is pleading, mixed with disbelief and desperation. I know as I looked at my mother with the same eyes on particularly bad days, silently begging for the beatings to stop. To look for some love my mother felt for me as her daughter.
What happens after Nolan realizes the extent of damage he has done to Mark, he starts his famous tirade.
“Why did you make me do this? You're fighting so you can watch everyone around you die! Think, Mark! You'll outlast every fragile, insignificant being on this planet. You'll live to see this world crumble to dust and blow away! Everyone and everything you know will be gone! What will you have after 500 years?” -Season 1, Episode 8
It stood out to me that Nolan blames Mark for forcing him to use violence. Of course no sane parent would beat their child so viciously, so they must find a reason to warrant such a reaction. My mom would also do the same, blaming me for making her into a monster, pleading with me to let her be a good mom for once. From a child’s perspective, this is devastating to understand.
You start to think that you are an awful child, that your loving parent has no choice but to use physical violence to enforce their parenting skills. You blame yourself and internalize that you are deserving of hatred and pain. We see that Mark throughout the series, internalize this as well.
Betrayal from a parent that you love and feel a special connection with is guttural. It truly throws your whole world upside down. You start to ask yourself, “How can someone who created me do this? How can someone that loves me so much destory me like this? How can they hit their flesh and blood without a second thought of my wellbeing?” These thoughts never really leave you and leaves behind scars that bleed incessantly. You feel unloved, dirty, pathetic, but most of all, afraid.
You start to fear becoming like your parents.
4. Conclusion…for now
Season 1 did an amazing job establishing the groundwork of Mark/Invincible’s character. The plot was paced well and the characters were well fleshed out. For this article, I mainly focused on the dynamic between Mark and Nolan and the beginning roots of physical trauma by a parent. In season 2, I want to explore the mental consequences of such parental trauma and the reactions you have as you try to recover.
This was a very personal article to start out with, but I felt strongly compelled to write about it. If you enjoyed reading this and have some advice to offer as a first time blogger/writer, please leave comments and feedback. I would also like to hear about your thoughts and perspectives. Thank you for sticking with me and letting me yap!