History NightmareFuel / Invincible2021

* '''''[[{{Gorn}} THE GORE]]. DEAR GOD, THE GORE.''''' The brutal fights from the comic are now animated in detail, showing the effects that the fantastic superpowers and technology in fiction have on the human body. And it's far from pretty. Also, it's worth noting that unlike ''{{Series/The Boys|2019}}'', where most of it was played for BlackComedy, here it's PlayedForDrama and PlayedForHorror all at once, giving it a very realistic feel.

*** [[BystanderActionHorrorDissonance It can't be overstated how horrifyingly tragic this scene is for nearly everyone.]] The very act of Invincible ''landing'' causes a surge of debris - cars, and pieces of the street go flying, crushing thousands of innocent civilians. When the building collapses, Mark desperately tries to save the civilians inside, telling them to hold on and that everything's going to be okay...and then the buildings collapses around them, killing everyone except Mark. When the dust settles, [[HeroicBSOD the only thing he can do is collapse to his knees in tears, overcome with guilt and trauma.]] It makes the final fight in ''Film/ManOfSteel'' look positively benign in comparison.

** He then kicks Mark through a cruise ship and holds him underwater while several passengers are dead in the water

* Once Nolan recognizes that Mark won't listen to reason, he decides to [[BreaktheCutie emotionally break him]] into realizing how meaningless humanity is by going on a killing spree. What follows is some of the most nightmarish and violent imagery in the entire show ([[UptoEleven which, given the show's history with gore, is saying a lot]]).

** Probably one of the episode's most harrowing and shocking moments. Nolan immediately goes down into the subway while holding Mark's head, standing in the middle of the rails with Mark in front, allowing a speeding train to CRASH RIGHT INTO THEM. Then we're given an extremely [[SarcasmMode pleasant]] turn of events of not only the driver being sent flying, but countless passengers crashing onto Invincible and Omni-Man, splattering into pure red giblets with ''Mark having a front-row seat'', Mark's ''screams of pure horror'' as he helplessly tries to stop it is just the cherry on top. Mark emerges from the carnage, numb with shock and soaked in all of the victims' blood.

* [[{{Gorn}} The gore]]. The brutal fights from the comic are now animated in detail, showing the effects that the fantastic superpowers and technology in fiction have on the human body. And it's far from pretty. Also, it's worth noting that unlike ''{{Series/The Boys|2019}}'', where most of it was played for BlackComedy, here it's PlayedForDrama and PlayedForHorror all at once, giving it a very realistic feel.

*** Red Rush attempts to attack Omni-Man at full-speed, except Omni-Man’s reflexes are ''faster'' than he is— he grabs Red Rush's head and crushes it (similar to [[NightmareFuel/JusticeLeagueDarkApokolipsWar Mera's death]] in ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueDarkApokolipsWar'' but even more gruesome). And the poor bastard is left punching Omni-Man's chest in a frantic, desperate bid to break his hold, to the point where he breaks his hands on him in the process. [[CruelAndUnusualDeath A quick death]] '''''[[AndIMustScream it is not]].'''''

*** It is possible that the difference is due to the Red Rush being actually more resistent than a normal human (which would be necessary to move that fast, and as would be shown by the fact his hands don't immediately break after throwing his fastet punches at Omni-Man). Doesn't mean it was less painful, but possibly it wasn't just Omni-Man being petty.

** By the end of the fight, Mark is once more covered in his own blood, has [[FacialHorror ripped skin on his nose, lips, chin and is completely covered in bruises]].

** Nolan continues to state how pointless and worthless humanity is and how he is above them and then crushes a father reaching out for his daughter. He then claims that he has been going easy on Mark, and starts punching him around helplessly through the sky.

*** Red Rush attempts to attack Omni-Man at full-speed, except Omni-Man’s reflexes are ''faster'' than he is— he grabs Red Rush's head and crushes it (similar to [[NightmareFuel/JusticeLeagueDarkApokolipsWar Mera's fate]] in ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeagueDarkApokolipsWar'' but even more gruesome). And the poor bastard is left punching Omni-Man's chest in a frantic, desperate bid to break his hold, to the point where he breaks his hands on him in the process. [[CruelAndUnusualDeath A quick death]] [[AndIMustScream it is not]].
*** What makes this even more chilling is how sadistic and spiteful Omni-Man is during this scenario. It's a whole lot HarsherInHindsight in regards to the last episode - Omni-Man crushes a pilot's head with a simple grab and clench of his hand, taking only a half-second to accomplish. This retroactively makes Red Rush's death worse, because Omni-Man was ''deliberately'' taking his time with the speedster's horrible death, aware of how his reflexes make him perceive time much more slowly than others. What was only a few seconds for other people was ''[[AndIMustScream hours of horrible agony]]'' for Red Rush.

*** War Woman gets her neck snapped by Omni-Man turning her head 180°, and her dying head vomits up blood before her body finally falls over.
*** Immortal gets a hole punched through his stomach, and is decapitated with a swift chop to the neck.

''Invincible'' might be a {{Reconstruction}} of the superhero genre, but as anyone familiar with [[ComicBook/{{Invincible}} the comic]] can tell you, if you're expecting that this show will be LighterAndSofter than ''Series/TheBoys'', then you're in for a nasty surprise.

* [[{{Gorn}} The Gorn]]. The brutal fights from the comic are now animated in detail, showing the effects that the fantastic superpowers and technology in fiction have on the human body. And it's far from pretty.

*** Red Rush attempts to attack Omni-Man at full-speed, except Omni-Man’s reflexes are ''faster'' than he is— he grabs Red Rush's head and crushes it. And the poor bastard is left punching Omni-Man's chest in a frantic, desperate bid to break his hold, to the point where he breaks his hands on him in the process.
*** It's a whole lot HarsherInHindsight in regards to the last episode - Omni-Man crushes a pilot's head with a simple grab and clench of his hand, taking only a half-second to accomplish. This retroactively makes Red Rush's death worse, because Omni-Man was ''deliberately'' taking his time with the speedster's horrible death, aware of how his reflexes make him perceive time much more slowly than others. What was only a few seconds for other people was ''hours of horrible agony'' for Red Rush.

** Finally, all is said and done, Omni-Man himself falls to his knees, bloody and bruised, a broken ThousandYardStare the only expression on his face.

* The fact that the GDA's 400 billion dollar KillSat only gave Omni-Man a ''nosebleed''. After hitting him '''twice.'''

* Nolan's encounter with William is tense, at best. He acts like a stern father but, with the fact that William sees blood on the hero's suit, [[AloneWithThePsycho it's becoming clear that Nolan is slowly shedding his facade.]] He flies down in front of Williams' car, walks up to the driver's window and sternly demands him for Mark's whereabouts. When he gets irritated enough by William's struggle to find an answer, he lightly crushes the roof of the car, demonstrating an intent to harm him if he doesn't cooperate. He thankfully leaves when William is able to point him in a direction.
* Nolan's encounter with Cecil is also tense. The gun he uses succeeds only in getting his attention, and all he has is his teleportation device to be one step ahead of Nolan. Cecil admits it's frightening that Nolan is always close to grabbing him and, after returning to the HQ, his tie is shown to have been torn in half from the teleportation field, showing how dangerously close Nolan is from actually killing him.

* Mark telling his parents about his powers gets a blank stare and awkward silence from Nolan, who takes a second to register what he just heard before asking for confirmation. Debbie even has to push him into properly responding positively. Innocuous and funny on a first run, FridgeHorror on a rewatch when you realize this simple little moment of thought was him realizing it was time to begin his murderous, manipulative plans that would shape the rest of the season.

*** Red Rush attempts to attack Omni-Man at full-speed, except Omni-Man’s reflexes are ''faster'' than he is— he grabs Red Rush's head and crushes it. And the poor bastard is left punching Omni-Man's chest in a frantic, desperate bid to break his hold, to the point where he breaks his hands on him in the process. Made even worse that the scene is shown in slow-motion to us because he's stated he experiences time slower than us. [[AndIMustScream A quick death it was not.]]
*** What makes Red Rush's death even more chilling is how sadistic and spiteful Omni-Man is. He could have easily squashed his head in half a second (which we see in episode 8 when he murders a pilot), but took the time to slowly crush his skull while Red Rush helplessly fought back. It's almost as if he did it because Rush had pissed him off by hindering him early on in the fight.
*** It's also possible Red Rush's hands flail because of brain damage from Omni-Man crushing his head. Since it was established earlier in the episode that Red Rush experiences time extremely slowly. Although Omni-Man might have crushed his head in less than two seconds, Red Rush felt every ''millisecond'' of that attack and he went out with his brain failing on the fly; it would probably be equivalent to dementia on overdrive. All he knew was fear and pain at the very last instant of his life. Horrible.

** This all takes place in a little under three minutes. The world's greatest protectors, betrayed by their strongest, ruthlessly slain in three minutes.

* Remember those two thugs Darkwing magnetized to a water tank? He surely won't come back to get them down.

*** Another thing should be noted. By the time the scientists open the portal, Omni-Man has grown a full beard. Due to Flaxan's accelerated time-flow compared to Earth, Omni-Man spent TEN YEARS tearing Flaxan and its cities apart.
*** Not to mention all the slaves that Nolan presumably murdered alongside their enslavers

** Mark futilely trying to crawl away from Battle Beast as he walks over to finish him off. A reminder that he's still a teenager who just got into superheroing.

** Arguably the most terrifying part about this situation is how ''random'' Battle Beast's appearance is. Imagine thinking you're ''only'' dealing with a supervillain crime boss. Super-powered goons are to be expected, but you'd never think that one of them would turn out to be a threat around [[PersonOfMassDestruction Omni-Man's level]]. And he's not there for payment, just for a fight. The thought of a being like that appearing in a story below his SuperWeight is terrifying.

** You can see [[OhCrap the fear]] in Art's face when the seemingly innocuous act of Nolan popping open a bottle of beer with just a thumb is angled in the scene to symbolize him [[HeKnowsTooMuch easily doing the same to Art's neck]] should it ever come to it.
** Then there's the final scene of him coming home to find Debbie drinking wine and confronting him about what he did. Nolan coldly dismissed Debbie as being drunk, only for her to spitefully tell him to fuck off before she heads upstairs, leading to him punching a hole in the wall in anger. We spent most of the episodes thinking that Nolan still has some semblance of love for Debbie, but it's starting to look like he didn't care about her at all and could possibly murder her at any moment.
*** What's more nightmarish is the fact that he ''doesn't'' murder her right away despite the fact that he easily could if only because of the ambiguity it leaves behind. As he slumps down in his chair, taking deep breaths, one has to wonder if he's trying to cool his anger down before it drives him to kill his spouse or if he's simply contemplating the pros and cons of murdering her.

* This episode reveals that Donald was terrified about Nolan killing Debbie, and had witnessed their fight from the previous evening thanks to the GDA's surveillance. The minute Nolan leaves after Debbie kicks him out, they undo their cloaking with guns aimed at the new hole in the roof and Donald kindly asks her to come with them to protect her from her husband, looking relieved that she's not hurt. Given that he later tears through them like tissue paper, it would have been a HopelessBossFight and Debbie might have died anyway.

*** What makes this even worse is that it basically confirms that Nolan ''purposely'' drew out Red Rush's murder, even if it was by just a couple seconds. Without any effort, he was able to destroy the pilot's skull in an ''instant'' with one hand, as opposed to how he used both hands to crush Red Rush's skull in about two seconds. Unlike what a lot of people assumed (that he was legitimately trying to kill the Guardians as quickly as possible), it seems more likely in hindsight that Nolan killed Red Rush ''just'' fast enough that the other Guardian's couldn't stop him, [[EvilIsPetty but no faster than that]].

* The ending reveals that even though Nolan abandoned his post, the Viltrumites will likely come back to Earth to take it over. Furthermore, while this is going on, the Sequids are taking over Mars, Battle Beast is still looking for a fight, the Flaxans have completely recovered from Omni-Man's destruction of their homeworld, Doc Seismic is still alive and has become the leader of Lava people. And even though they will hopefully be used as a force for good, Cecil having an army of Reanimen is unsettling.

''Invincible'' might be a {{Reconstruction}} of the superhero genre, but as anyone familiar with the comic can tell you, if you're expecting that this show will be LighterAndSofter than ''Series/TheBoys'', then you're in for a nasty surprise.

** Probably one of the episode's most harrowing and shocking moments. Nolan immediately goes down into the subway while holding Mark's head, standing in the middle of the rails with Mark in front, allowing a speeding train to CRASH RIGHT INTO THEM. Then were given an extremely [[SarcasmMode pleasant]] turn of events of not only the driver being sent flying, but countless passengers crashing onto Invincible and Omni-Man, splattering into pure red giblets with ''Mark having a front-row seat'', Mark's ''screams of pure horror'' as he helplessly tries to stop it is just the cherry on top. Mark emerges from the carnage, numb with shock and soaked in all of the victims' blood.

* '''[[{{Gorn}} The Gorn]].''' The brutal fights from the comic are now animated in detail, showing the effects that the fantastic superpowers and technology in fiction have on the human body. And it's far from pretty.

** Along with the lack of music, Nolan massacres the team without speaking a word, refusing to give his victims an explanation for his actions. At the end of it all, when Immortal is the last to die, he uses his final breath to quietly ask, "Why? ''Why?"''.

--> '''Immortal''': '''''WHERE IS OMNI-MAN!? WHERE IS HE!?'''''

** Probably one of the episode's most harrowing and shocking moments. Nolan immediately goes down into the subway while holding Mark's head, standing in the middle of the rails with Mark in front, allowing a speeding train to crash right into them. Then were given an extremely [[SarcasmMode pleasant]] turn of events of not only the driver being sent flying, but countless passengers crashing onto Invincible and Omni-Man, splattering into pure red giblets with ''Mark having a front-row seat'', Mark's ''screams of pure horror'' as he helplessly tries to stop it is just the cherry on top. Mark emerges from the carnage, numb with shock and soaked in all of the victims' blood.

** By the end of the fight, Mark is once more covered in his own blood, has ripped skin on his nose, lips, chin and is completely covered in bruises.

* Omni-Man's killing of Cecil's soldiers in his house, of which he's no less creative than he was with the Guardians of the Globe. He first notices them while they're cloaked from the sound of a floor creak and crushes one's head into the floor. Then he shoves one of their rifles through their face, [[HalfTheManHeUsedToBe pushes another against the cooking table so hard his upper body slides across it]], causally rams himself against another (they were thankfully still cloaked) and kills the last soldier (who was fleeing) by sending her flying across the street from his door, twisting her body up. Thankfully she dies from the injury before Nolan moved in to do anything else.

** Finally with an expression terrifying in itself, he throws Invincible to a mountain, causing an avalanche that takes out a village, and, still Mark seeing trying to resist, callously claims he can just make another kid after killing Mark, and that 17 years won't be a long time for him before beating him senselessly.

* Debbie has Art examined Nolan's battle-damaged costume, discovering evidence to prove that he killed the Guardians. Nolan meanwhile already seems to know or suspect this and goes over to have a beer with Art as an excuse to most likely silence him. Fortunately, he doesn't kill Art, merely bribes him because he overheard them agreeing to keep it secret.

''Invincible'' might be a {{Reconstruction}} of the superhero genre, but as anyone familiar with the comic can tell you, if you're expecting that this show will be LighterAndSofter than ''Series/TheBoys'', then you are in for a nasty surprise.

** Nolan continues to state how pointless and worthless humanity is and how he is above them and then crushes a father reaching out for his daughter. He then claims that he has been going easy on Mark, and starts punching him around helplessly.

** Finally with an expression terrifying in itself, he throws Invincible to a mountain, causing an avalanche that takes out a village, and beats him senselessly until Mark is once more covered in blood (his own), has ripped skin on his nose, lips, chin and is covered from completely in bruises. He then callously claims he can just make another kid after killing Mark, and that 17 years won't be a long time for him.

[[caption-width-right:350:[[BewareTheSuperman Beware the Omni-Man.]]]]

* After the title screen is shown in the first episode as pristine and clean with a triumphant music; each following episode has [[EvolvingCredits more and more blood being sprayed across it]] with a ScareChord out of a horror show. In "Where I Really Came From", a larger splash of blood almost completely covers the "Invincible" logo itself, signifying how dire a situation is going to be.

[[caption-width-right:350:[[BewareTheSuperman Beware the Omni-Man.]]]]]]