Invincible
The timeline of Invincible thus far, which instantly became one of the most-watched, most-memeable superhero properties outside of Marvel and DC (and even inside some of it), has been nothing short of extremely frustrating for fans who just want more.
Yes, it’s becoming common in the streaming age for more and more shows to spread out releases, but Invincible? It’s been a bit exhausting.
Invincible first aired on March 25, 2021 and ran through April. Then, it went dark until July 2023 when the standalone origin story Invincible: Atom Eve went live. Next up was the actual debut of season 2 (part 1) in November 2023 and now the saga ends, hopefully, with the release of the second part of season 2 here in March, four months later. The main issue here is probably the most recent one, all this hype for Invincible to return for season 2, only to have it disappear after just four episodes, only to reappear four full months later.
At long last, it feels like this schedule may finally be molded into something less disjointed. Steven Yeun says production has already started on season 3, and the idea is that they will shrink these enormous gaps between seasons. Here’s creator Robert Kirkman:
“I can't say [how far we are on season 3's development]. Far enough along that there won't be a similar gap between Season 2 and Season 3. This is the pain. This area right now is the pain for Invincible fans. So once we're through this, once Season 2 comes out, hopefully, it should be smooth sailing from there on. There won't be these big, large gaps, theoretically.”
I’m not sure I love the “theoretically” there, but at least it’s a goal of the team. It’s not all that uncommon for animated series to go for long stretches between seasons, just ask a ton of animes, but US sensibilities have a pretty low tolerance for this sort of thing, and things like working conditions and long hours for animators often don’t register.
If there is a healthy way to keep seasons flowing on a regular basis for a series both Amazon and Kirkman seem to want to exist indefinitely, I hope we can find that track. With how things have been, I think the correct move would have been to push back the first four episodes until now in order to prevent a half-launch that didn’t really satisfy most fans. And if more delays happen, don’t break things up again.
I’m looking forward to the last few episodes starting tomorrow. Given the source material it should be…intense, to say the least.
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Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
