'Invincible' Season 3 (and beyond) have a big problem
Season 3 is finally here and brings about a new era for Mark as he dons the black and blue suit, and fights villains new and old that test his strength to see if he’s truly…
Season 3 sees Mark Grayson/Invincible (Steven Yeun) become at odds with Cecil (Walton Goggins) for keeping enemies captured by heroes around the globe outside of bars either in secret containment or employment.
The bulk of the episodes mostly deal with character relations such as Mark and Eve/Atom Eve (Gillian Jacobs), Mark and Oliver (Christian Convery), Allen the Alien (Seth Rogen) and Nolan Grayson/Omni-Man (J.K. Simmons) and more (there seriously is too many to list them all).
Most of these names are familiar as they play the prominent characters, but new names have appeared this season such as Convery who does an amazing job as Oliver. I was worried Oliver would be annoying throughout this season but he’s rather enjoyable to watch.
Another standout is Aaron Paul as Powerplex, a new villain introduced this season seeking revenge on Invincible for his actions during previous seasons.
The voice acting and characters are tied so closely together to where it’s no longer a matter of listening to voice actors but rather watching the characters from the comics brought to life.
A benefit of making this a show is that there is room to expand and fix things from the comics that never made sense or weren’t fully expanded, something particularly seen by Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Conquest.
In the comics, Conquest doesn’t have a lot of depth but over the two episodes the character appears in, we come to understand how he is treated in his personal life and see how truly sadistic he is.
The brutal and gore-filled fights during the Invincible War and between Conquest and Invincible are some of the best the entire show has to offer, if not the best the show has to offer.
And none of it would be possible without the show’s animation, despite its flaws.
In my review for Season 2, I pointed out an animation error in Invincible’s costume where the loop over his chest would sometimes become completely solid and swap between the two designs from scene to scene.
I have since learned that Invincible’s mask is a cowl similar to that of Batman which forms the half circle we commonly see. It’s a relatively small thing I can forgive now that I understand it better, but other same animation errors appear this season like Conquest randomly getting his second eye back in one shot before it being greyed out again right after, PNG characters in the background and the reuse of backgrounds during motion.
These issues make it seem as if the animators are being lazy with their work as these errors are making it into the final product. However, there is hope.
The final three episodes (Invincible War and Conquest) of the season have some of the best animation in the series up until this point as the Conquest and Invincible fight highlights the talent the animation team possesses.
While the animation here is good, it still makes mistakes such as a Captain Underpants style Flip-O-Rama appearing during the Conquest and Invincible fight that reuses the same two frames multiple times.
These final episodes prove the animation team knows how to cook, but simply can’t do so for an entire season. While the smaller errors are laziness on their part, I don’t think the animation quality overall is their fault.
Amazon MGM Studios gave “Invincible” a flat rate budget that’s reportedly less than the $250 million budget of “Arcane.” This budget pays for everything from voice actors, animators, compositors and so much more.
Until the budget improves or more animators are hired, I fear the show’s animation quality will forever remain flat and only occasionally look like it did for the last three episodes of this season during important moments in the show.
Unfortunately, “Invincible” cannot be a 5/5 show again until something with the animation is fixed. The storylines are lifted directly from the comic panels and feature stellar voice acting, but struggle in the animation department with laziness and corporate complications.
Until something changes to fix the animation problems, “Invincible” will only ever be rated a 4.5/5 from me at most which is a damn shame as the final episodes of the season were my favorite of the entire show thus far.
Invincible (Season 3) — ★ ★ ★ ★ ½
Release Date: February 6, 2025
Creator: Robert Kirkman, Ryan Ottley, Cory Walker
Runtime: 50m
Rating: TV-MA