#invincible s2e1

[bubblegum-and-ciggarettes]

Genuinely glad they said something because it was all I could focus on when he was being all emo

[beeclops]

[invincible-selfxmade-punk]

The use of Karma Police in the beginning of the latest episode of Invincible was absolutely inspired!

[loki-who-remains]

Today I’ve seen not one but a number of posts about Mobius’ possible death/sacrifice by the end of s2. (Here a great analysis of Mobius arc by @kiteblue42 part 1 and part 2)

And on one hand I kinda see it too. Like, explanations and analysis make sense, totally. Frighteningly so. I love Mobius and I want no one else in this role but Owen Wilson. He’s brilliant, funny and consistent. He’s also very handsome but it’s not my point

But on the other, when something slowly becomes obvious to a part of viewers, will it really happen?

I mean, for example, the time loop stuff is very on the nose. We don’t need any deep symbolism or details to pick that up. By 2023 everybody has seen a bunch (or at least a couple) of beautifully developed time travel stories with all sorts of outcomes and combinations, paradoxes and ways of t-travelling. Will a time loop happen? I guess so. it has to, otherwise it would be impossible to save Loki in s2e1. But since we already know a certain part of what happens, it would make sense to have a twist that no one (or only very few) could think about. Something that will make this particular time travel story memorable, and worth viewers’ anticipation and time.

Timely’s connection or becoming HWR has been also pointed out. This one is a bit less easy to see. But there are still plans for Kang’s dynasty phase, regardless of Majors being recast or not, and they will have to do an explanation, so the movies can be watched separately from the series and still make sense. What I mean is, they might postpone confirming/debunking this bit till later in the current mcu phase, so Timely might stay Timely till the end of s2.

Mobius’s death theme is even more subtle. Here you have to dig and ponder a bit. But his thinking about problems at hand and enjoying small things on the go kinda give the vibe of someone who lives fast. Or is it just me? He doesn’t wear protective gear (he did once during Roxxcart mission in s1e2) and is so vulnerable but evades danger. For how long? Will there be a heart breaking scene where Loki tries to save Sylvie and Mobius at the same time and has to make an impossible choice? Let me grab some cracker jacks 🍿

In s1e4 he is pruned but is actually alive in the void, in s2e1 he survives the Loom experience (purely by chance at that point), so viewers would (intuitively) think, he had fatal adventures, survived and now he’s invincible to all harm by the laws of cinema. But, when he put on that chunky suit and it had a crack in the visor, and all of it was made basically into a joke, I thought to myself, also jokingly, well, that’s it, Mobius has been marked by death but is temporarily healed with a piece of duct tape; now just wait till the duct tape falls off!

[pbaintthetb]

Invincible s2e8

spoilers ahead

angstrom's anger with being "just some guy" makes perfect sense but also for him to be just some guy to mark

oliver crying :-( he so little, does he even know what's going on?

I really thought mark was going to circumvent levy's expectations and instead of going for him drag his family out of there but now mark is in a whole new dimension

DINOSAURS???

okay so like oliver's ages and develops wayyy quicker than mark so like... are his powers gonna come through?

too many memories

Yellow and black suit? damn damn dang very ominous- and the tone and the lines, feels eviller than s2e1 evil mark although

heh it was the walking dead dimension

go debbie!?!

debbie joins up sometimes too? firstly damn but scondly debbie's character aside- Nolan lets her?

"Not me, I raised the boy who defied his father and saved this planet" YES you tell him Debbie!

feck Debbie's arm

mad max world? and why he shirtless

oh jeez louise mark

"You have no idea what I've been through! How much I am holding. back!" -> again, gret line but JEEZ LOUISE mark

mark omg no pls stop you're beating him to death lease noo (and other than I feel you may regret this even though yo've been heading for a snap, if you do this you also can't get home)

holy fucking shit

I thought you were stronger.

the rationalisation, that's not gonna help you sleep any better at night Mark

oh, ok the evolution of mark's desert rambles are fantastic

oh so they are mark's guardians- interesting there is no Rex then,

was half way through a thought about eve's new look when robot took his helmet off and REX? (or is it just rudy aged and with his hair styled to look like rex, sounds like rex though (and i know they have the same vocal chords but like it soudns like rex but also the tech reads robot)

it is rex??????????

debbie hugging mark :-(

bad guys, good guys... indeed mark, how do you tell, and if breaking an arm is bad what is beating someone to death. Mark and Cecil have different... views

You weren't there.

dang there is a kate prime

guyyyyyyys ladies look perhaps it is sexist but maybe just take it as a win that you won't be posessed today and don't argue about it

just noticed the episode title llol adhfakdjfalskdfj

"I wanna do what you do! I want to be just like you." -> "You will be son." feels uh more like a threat than a promise now, the looming cliff over head oH GOD. Dont like the music though

Amber!!! :-((((((

I love the Debbie and Mark roof scenes

also yeah, thought mark was gonna quit college after the amber scene and he probably does need the break- but also the "why would i do any of that" please mark please don't do a dick grayson, have a life outside of heroics

Allen time

anyway overall really really incredible episode, but of course, end of season sadness cos now long time, but it was great and I shall have thoguhts for a while

[portraitofadumbassonfire]

Getting into Invincible s2e1.

[alexwatchesshows]

Black Sails IX (S2E1) review

Spoilers for up to and including E9.

"Great men are made great by one thing and one thing only— the relentless pursuit of a better world. They don't give up that pursuit; they don't know how, and that's what makes them invincible"- Miranda Hamilton/Barlow

We start with a cold open, much like the beginning of E1, with a pirate crew boarding a merchant ship. The captain of the merchant ship is a bit of a pirate stan, and also basically runs us through all the stuff we thought we'd learnt about pirates in S1: "these are men not monsters", fear is only used as a tool for surrender, if they surrender easily they shouldn't be hurt, etc. Basically all the stuff that proved that pirates were just men forced into a violent job and further demonised by "civilisation"'s propaganda. Then that's all turned on its head by Ned Low. To be honest, I don't like Ned Low (obviously not as a person, but even as a character), he does nothing for me. I guess he's useful to add some complexity to the whole pirates thing, but inherently bad/evil characters do very little for me personally. Then we get a little hint of plot with Abigail Ashe, a girl presumably of the british upper class, who was drugged and kept on board the merchant vessel. Nothing's come of that yet, though.

Then Ned Low heads off to Nassau, which could honestly already do with less of whatever the hell he's trying to sell. I feel like Ned Low would be a customer service worker's nightmare. He gets fined for blood-soaked property, then goes to flirt with Eleanor to get a refund or whatever. Eleanor, meanwhile, is a bit done with men. Vane seems to be loving the idea of having control of the fort and, therefore, Nassau, but, as we saw with his crew in S1, he can't actually be bothered to do anything to, you know, control it. He's got his power and now he's happy to let the world fall apart around him. Then he goes on a random rant comparing himself to Eleanor and just making a bunch of assumptions that don't necessarily ring true. Eleanor is not having a good day with men imposing their emotions/experiences on her, so it tracks that when Ned Low comes and tries to do basically the exact same thing she tells him to leave. I've never loved her more.

Over in the brothel, Jack is having a shit time of it. The one thing he truly cares about is his name, and Vane has well and truly ruined that for him. Anne is sympathetic, but unfortunately the only form of comfort she knows how to offer is murder, which wouldn't really work in these circumstances. It probably also doesn't help that it was partially her murdering that got Jack into his current situation. Max tries to smooth things over with both of them, which doesn't really work to begin with, and is definitely worsened by her just fully owning up to selling leads without Jack or Anne's knowledge (even if her reasoning was sound), then we get that scene with Max and Anne. We had hints of this coming up, and anyone who knows much about Anne Bonny as a historical figure knows that she wasn't straight, but I didn't fully expect this specific relationship. I also didn't fully trust Black Sails to do such beautiful queer representation (the only previous sapphic relationship felt very directed towards the male gaze and generally pretty awkward, not quite forced, but it didn't feel natural like this did). This, though, is emotional and beautiful and soft. The way Anne goes from holding the knife to Max's throat to dropping it as the kiss goes on, the way Max doesn't seem worried by Anne's holding the knife. This is quite possibly the most romantic show of intimacy on the show so far.

The main focus of this episode, though, was the Walrus crew and their attack on the Spanish warship. Flint looks like he's had a haircut, which is a very relatable way of responding to his life falling apart, but is also unlikely given that this picks up right where season 1 left off, so it's probably just the good old nearly drowning treatment. Silver still calls him captain, which is interesting, but maybe that's just how he sees Flint or he's trying to stay in the man's good books; to be fair, Dufresne calling him "Mr. Flint" just sounds wrong. Dufresne's logic, combined with Flint's ability to manipulate people (the whole "fucking warship" speech was very effective) manage to win him and Silver a loose kind of pardon. Obviously being executed isn't ideal, but Flint clearly hates the idea of being removed from the crew of the Walrus (or I guess the unnamed Spanish warship now) almost as much. Silver, on the other hand, is just happy to take any chance at survival that anyone offers him, much to Flint's anger.

I'm going to be honest, I didn't really expect Flint and Silver to just... swim out to the ship. I guess if it works, it works, but something about the simplicity of it took me by surprise. To be fair, I guess the virtue of that whole plan was that it was so simple that there was little room for it to go wrong. It's also a fun little moment for the development of Flint and Silver's relationship. Although Silver has recognised Flint as the one person who doesn't want him dead (and tells Flint that the reverse is also true), he's also one of the few people who hasn't really fallen to Flint's bullshit yet. He even goes as far as fully calling Flint out on his tendency to control everything he can when he tells him "we're both better off now than we were two minutes ago, yet you're angry about it because it didn't happen your way", which does, unfortunately for everyone probably, ring very true. Still, the two of them muddle their way through the taking of a massive fucking warship surprisingly well (honestly, parts of that scene feel almost like a comedy), and the rest of the crew comes to the rescue just as things are starting to properly go to ship.

Then we get my favourite new aspect of the show: Flint's backstory (or, as I coined it at some point in season 1, Flintsight*). In this one episode, we learn more about him than we did over the entirety of the first season. We learn that he's a rising star in the navy, despite his working class background (which would have put him at a massive disadvantage). We see the beginning of his friendship with Thomas Hamilton, and Miranda even comes onto the scene towards the end. This is also the first time we actually see civilisation first-hand, and, I'm going to be honest, it's not a good look. It says something that the second civilisation scene we get is a hanging, complete with McGraw's "civilisation needs its monsters" moment. I'm glad to see that the disillusionment remains consistent across his timeline. Anyway, the key players are all set up in London. We know (roughly) where this ends, now we'll see how they get there.

*I'm not proud of that, but I do like it

[shakesposting]

Old Supa Strikas Shorts

first off, subscribe to ssanimated! i’ve linked the channel's 2006 1-minute clips and provided each a brief description for convenience and reference purposes

keep in mind these were uploaded 10-11 years ago, so low resolution is only to be expected! if the link doesn’t work, hover over the hyperlinked episode, left-click to Copy Link, and paste it on your search engine. alternatively, select Open Link in New Tab. delete “https://href.li/?” and re/enter

Supa Strikas: Cup Final Survival Skills (Season 1)

S1E1- Skarra prevents Shakes from entering “the Zone”

S1E2- Invincible United thwart The Shark’s goal

S1E3- Skarra attempts to injure Shakes

S1E4- Chippa is infuriated by Skarra’s bullying

S1E5- Coach encourages the boys not to fight fire with fire

S1E6- Skarra eggs Shakes into playing alone

S1E7- Skarra pretends to have been fouled and scores a penalty kick

S1E8- [Unnamed substitute] frets after Invincible United scores

S1E9- Shakes is unable to land a goal after two attempts in a row

S1E10- Shakes equalizes 3-3

S1E11- Both teams score under the 8 final minutes

S1E12- Supa Strikas and Invincible United are at a 3-2 for Penalty Shoot-outs

S1E13- Shakes’s ball hits Spenza

Supa Strikas (Season 2)

S2E1- The opposition analyzes Blok’s capabilities

S2E2- The fans score a goal

S2E3- The team train for the Cup

S2E4- Jomo trains Shakes

S2E5- Shakes pulls a move from another sport

S2E6- Shakes has a nightmare

S2E7- Shakes sneaks a peek into Coach’s Secret Training Manual

S2E8- Shakes’ “six-pack of steel”

S2E9- Shakes and Skarra audition for a place in the team

S2E10- Tiger, Shakes, and El Matador learn to trust their instincts

S2E11- Shakes enters the Zone

S2E12- Shakes scores with a handstand

S2E13- Big Bo blocks a ball against a 3-player attack

[bubblegum-and-ciggarettes]

Spoilers For S2E1!

(Some of Comic Spoilers too)

I said I would probably most a more spoiler discussion post so let’s go!

Alright let’s start with the intro. In the intro we’re introduced with a Mark that eventually saw his dads view and helped take over Earth with him. I wonder, how long did it take to convince him? Was it before he got beat by Omni Man? Was it after? How long has it been since he took his dads side?

We know that The Immortal went straight after Omni Man once he was resurrected, and I assume the events of Omni Man killing his coworkers were the same. Or maybe he didn’t kill them yet and that’s why Mark was more susceptible to join him? It’s just weird it would take so long as we’re led to know an underground bunker has been made and that Rex died fighting already. Plus Eve has a new look which shows the passage of time.

Its very curious to me how Mark acted in this universe. He seemed just like ours and yet was so cruel. He genuinely thought he was in the right and wanted Eve to join him so bad. He didn’t even kill her, just paralyzed her and said he would visit. Did he see her as a pet? The way Omni Man claimed he did with Debbie? What even happened to Debbie? Was this one in favour of Omni Man and that’s why it seemed much easier to get Mark to be on the Viltrimites side?

What also surprised me was the fact that the act of Mark being good, of not taking his fathers side, was rare in the multiverse. Usually the main character is good in most other universes and is bad in a few. Like Superman for example, who’s a hero in most, but still feels like he’s a monster for being a villain in a few. Usually I’m not a fan of the hero mc being upset over being a villain because it’s not that many universes and obviously they wouldn’t be good in all of them, but for Mark it’s different. In his world, him being good is in the minority. He’s so worried about turning into his father and now he has actual proof that it’s so easy for it to happen. I feel like the fact he’s mostly bad in different universes works wayyy better and actually let’s the audience not roll their eyes over one or two evil versions.

The bit with The Immortal being wary of Mark will definitely show up again once all his other selves join the fight. I wonder if that’s what happened in the version we saw at the beginning too; if that Mark was trying to move on like ours, but in this case he actually did follow his fathers path.

Loving Angstrom so far too. I love how you can already see the complexity and insanity in his character. We know that Marks killed many in the different universes where he exists. We know he knows this. We also know he knows that our Mark is good. And yet, after he WILLINGLY sabotages himself he blames our Mark for everything. For killing so many people. We even see how he went from cool and collected, from being a pacifist who knows that Mark is good and doesn’t deserve to die, to be a cold bloodthirsty genius wanting revenge.

It wasn’t even that Mark was brutal towards the Mauler Twins and co. We don’t see him draw ANY blood from them, even though he easily can as we see him crush The Immortals head in the intro. He’s intentionally holding himself back to not actually hurt them, and Angstrom can see this. I think this was done intentionally to show the viewer how not-at-fault Mark was, and how he doesn’t deserve whatever’s coming. He doesn’t even fight anyone else until the end. I can just tell Mark is gonna have a rough ass time in this season. Boy is just suffering and is gonna face hell itself only a month after his dad tried to kill him.

I know some plot points of the comics, but not much than knowing the events, and so I know there will be a big Invincible fight, but I don’t know what will make them all agree to try to kill our Mark. I also know that Mark gets a new suit eventually; a black and blue suit. The new title card starts with covering the whole thing in blood, and then we see a crack of blue starting. I think what they’re gonna do is reveal the title card in the color scheme of his new suit by the end of the series. I don’t know when exactly he gets his new suit, but I think it’ll probably be in the last episode. You can kinda see the lettering on his name being black in the title card, and I think it breaking away to reveal his new suit scheme will be really cool.

This episode, while not super exciting, was great at setting up the atmosphere and feelings Mark and Debbie are going through. It’s good at showing how much everyone else has moved on compared to them, because they were the most effected. It also handled the main villain lead up super good. Villains being unhinged is always amazing. Especially when we can understand why he wants to kill Mark in general, but doesn’t have any reason to kill our Mark specifically. Can’t wait for the new episode next week!

[beeclops]

[fabulouslyphryne]

Parallels Part 2

S2E1 - The Heart of the Matter

Lucien: Li was taken in by a lovely local family. She’s 23 now. Of course, it’s funny. In my mind, even though the years have marched on, she’s always been a little girl. Anyhow, she, um... she really didn‘t want to see me. She asked me to leave. I don’t know if I will ever see her again.

Jean: Oh, surely you will. 

Lucien: Well...

S2E10 - An Invincible Summer

Lucien: Jack’s gone, eh?

Jean: Yes.

Lucien: He’ll come back.

Jean: No, I’m not so sure about that. 

Lucien: We can’t give up on them, can we? They’ll always be our children.

Nice dovetail between the end of Episode 1 and the end of Episode 10 of Season 2.

[beeclops]

[beeclops]

[beeclops]