Spoilers for Invincible Season 3, Episode 8, “I Thought You’d Never Shut Up"The Season 3 finale of theInvincibleTV adaptation premiered last week, delivering the nonstop action that fans have come to expect. Much like the season one finale,the episode teased what’s to come next seasonincluding thereturn of the parasitic alien Sequidsand fan-favorite character Battle Beast. While these storylines are taken directly from the original comic series, the episode also sets up the return of another character from the first seasonanda storyline completely original to the animated series that never occurred in the comics.
After being banished back to Hell in Season 1,demon detective Damien Darkblood reappearedin a mid-credits scene of the most recent episode “I Thought You’d Be Stronger.” After summoning a mysterious elderly demonic being simply named “Demon” in the credits (voiced by none other than Bruce Campbell), Darkblood promised his demonic lord a means of restoring him to his infernal throne by conjuring a"surface dweller of great power"to Hell and binding him to his service.
This is the beginning of a storyline that co-creator Robert Kirkman always regretted not including in the original comics - now, it’s finally coming to life, making the TV show even better with the benefit of hindsight.
Invincible’s Original Name for Omni-Man Was Perfect, But DC Made It Go Away
Omni-Man and Superman’s similarities are hard to miss, but Invincible’s alien father was originally an even more obvious copy of DC’s Man of Steel.
Invincible Is Going to Hell
A Storyline That Robert Kirkman Couldn’t Fit into the Comics
According toInvincibleco-creator and showrunner Robert Kirkman in an interview withVariety, this new storyline has its roots in an idea he had during the original comics run that never saw the light of day:
There’s a storyline from the comic that I never got around to doing. Every superhero story has some chapter where they go to hell and they fight the devil. It happens in DC and Marvel comics. It’s a big deal. I never got around to doing anything like that in “Invincible.” I kept getting sidetracked and there was never a good time. So it’s entirely possible that we may be doing something like that in the show, and that scene at the end of that episode is setting that up.
Like any adaptation, theInvincibleanimated series has made occasional changes to the source material, but mostly it hews fairly close to the general and overall story beats of the comics. However, in this instance, the animated series is venturing into completely uncharted territory. However, it’s notquitea new idea, but rather Kirkman’s chance to incorporate a concept he could never fit into the original,with Damien Darkblood kicking things off.
Damien Darkblood Is Out For Revenge!
A Joke Character in the Comics Gets Elevated
When Damien Darkblood first appeared inInvincible #8by writer Robert Kirkman and artist Ryan Ottley, he was little more than a running gag character - a pastiche ofWatchmen’s Rorschach with a bit ofHellboythrown in. The animated series has elevated Darkblood, voiced by Clancy Brown, to a more serious and credible investigator trying to solve a mystery surrounding the murder of the Guardians of the Globe. Now, his role increases even more, as Invincible is set up to be dragged to Hell.
AsInvinciblecomic fans are well aware, there are some major storylines on the horizonincluding the epic Viltrumite War. Given this recent development, it seems like the battle between the Coalition of Planets and the Viltrum Empire might not arrive as soon as viewers had expected, as Mark Graysonfinallyheads to Hell, bringing this oldInvincibleconcept to life for the first time.
