In a nutshell:
Invincible battles Omni-Man.
Synopsis:
Omni-Man knocks Invincible through several buildings, killing hundreds and demonstrating how meaningless life is to him. He tries to appeal to logic, explaining to Mark how Earth will benefit from the Viltrumites. Invincible never falters, appealing to his father’s human nature and his love for his family. Omni-Man doubles down on his Viltrumite loyalties and savagely beats Mark through subways and snowy mountains. When Omni-Man explains that Mark will live far longer than anyone on Earth and asks what he will have after five hundred years, Mark simply says, “You, dad.” Omni-Man can’t bring himself to finish Mark and flies off into space.
Favorite moment from the fight:
The increasing severity of these punches always gets me.
Review:
This is an issue where I feel like if you’ve read it, there’s not much I can add to it. The art does a pretty great job displaying the brutality of a fight between two super-beings. They don’t shy away from the fact that such destruction would take thousands of lives (and the show animates those deaths pretty brutally as well), immediately raising the stakes of this confrontation. And the result is that Mark isn’t ready. He’s not a world defender yet, he’s still in his early superhero days, and he’s also thrown off emotionally by the fact that it’s his father he’s facing to the death. It’s one thing to watch a hero get beaten down, but at the hands of his own father makes the stakes more emotional as well.
I always think of Darth Vader when I read this fight. This is essentially the same story as that, a young boy being tempted by the dark side by his own father. It’s a conflict as old as time, and it’d be unrealistic for Mark to overcome his father through something cliched like being too angry and full of rage. He can’t beat his dad through strength because he’s not experienced enough yet. It’s more of an emotional and philosophical battle where all Mark has is appealing to his dad’s feelings and memories. And in that way, Mark actually wins, because he DOES stop his dad from taking over!
If we can delve into spoilers for a bit in this last section, I always find it interesting that there are so many evil versions of Mark that appear later in the series. As a result, I’m always speculating on what makes this Mark so special. I said in my review of issue #1 that Mark was a bland character and that that was an advantage, and I think that works here. He is just a generally good guy. If he favored his father even just a little more, things might’ve turned out differently, but he has an inherent goodness to him that can’t be corrupted in this universe. I really like that, as it always kinda makes me project a little if I’m being honest. Who hasn’t had a dispute with their father, where the two sides just can’t reach an understanding because of the age gap and experiential differences. I think Kirkman always gets the core relationship of this series, between a father and his son, down pretty well. I think of conversations they have later in the series about growing up, and this seems like a crucial step in cementing their relationship going forward. They have their difficulties, but at the end of the day, they love each other and will try to work things out.