The Entire Invincible Timeline Explained

Amazon Prime Video's "Invincible" has become one of the most beloved superhero series ever made. Based on the Image Comics series by Robert Kirkman, Cory Walker, and Ryan Ottley, it tells a familiar story of capes and costumes but with a unique willingness to explore how people in such a world might behave and grow over time.

Even just three seasons in, the show's chronology has become incredibly complicated, technically spanning from the dawn of man through to some distant potential future with a mad king (and this is before we address the various alternate realities introduced in season 2). As we await the arrival of season 4 sometime next year, we've taken another look at the series as a whole to piece together the story so far. Grab your Burger Mart, cause this might take a bit. This is the entire "Invincible" timeline, explained.

Contains major spoilers for "Invincible" on Prime Video.

The first point in our story, beyond the big bang and the creation of planets and such, happens thousands of years in the past on Earth. A wandering caveman warrior encounters a strange, glowing, blue light. Upon interacting with it, he is bestowed with gifts of superhuman strength, speed, agility, durability, and immortality.

He would outlive everything and everyone he knew — through the Middle Ages to the American Revolution, and served as President of the United States during the Civil War under the alias Abraham Lincoln. When the time was right, he would then emerge as the world's first superhero, publicly embracing his eternal life and adopting the alias "The Immortal" (Ross Marquand).

For an unknown amount of time, the warriors of the planet Viltrum thrive, until they choose to violently cull the weakest of their race through combat. The survivors of this great purge are trained as part of the planet's world-conquering imperative. Having successfully rebuilt their society on pure might, the Viltrumites continue sending agents to other planets so that their empire can expand not through the unchecked growth of their own, functionally immortal population, but the addition of subjugated planets and their peoples. The survivors — also by default the strongest and most brutal of the Viltrumite race — would likely see this opportunity to perpetually wield their strength over weaker beings as the only meaningful use of their power and, by extension, their lives (one could argue that acts of heroism provided a certain other Viltrumite who survived the Great Purge a healthier outlet for his relationship to his own great power).

One of the many planets the Viltrumites invade is Unopa, a "peaceful and thriving world" that had "achieved harmony with nature and technology" (an important distinction made by the narrator of the "Invincible" episode "This Missive, This Machination!," which undermines the Viltrumite narrative that forced assimilation to the Viltrum Empire brings about utopian conditions not otherwise achieved). 

Unopans resisted their oppressors, but only survived extinction by fleeing the planet and developing a breeding program with the intent to make the next generation of Unopans a genetically modified super-powered fighting force capable of defeating the Viltrumites. Though this project was ultimately unsuccessful — producing only one viable candidate, Allen the Alien (Seth Rogen), who was still unable to defeat a Viltrumite — it caught the attention of the Viltrumite defector Thaedus (Peter Cullen), who thus offered the Unopans a home on Talescria and a place within the burgeoning resistance group the Coalition of Planets.

Around this time, a young Viltrumite named Nowl-Ahn is quickly surpassing his peers on Viltrum, where he is training relentlessly to become a member of the planet's elite world-conquering force. Despite an inauspicious start, he was eventually selected as one of the leading conquerors. He hand-delivered hundreds of planets to the Viltrumites before he was assigned the planet Earth (not to be confused with Urath).

When he arrives, he is met by two imposing beings: a massive kaiju (which he kills with little difficulty) and a young Cecil Stedman (Walton Goggins). Stedman had recently been promoted to director of the Global Defense Agency (GDA) after serving time in a GDA prison for killing two supervillains they converted into assets. Though Cecil does not trust Nowl-Ahn, he decides to wait and observe for the time being. Nowl-ahn adopts the name "Omni-Man" and collaborates with the superhero team the Guardians of the Globe, which is led by the Immortal.

Soon after, the Viltrumite — now living as a travel writer named "Nolan Grayson" — meets a young woman named Debbie (Sandra Oh). They date, marry, and eventually have a child named Mark (Steven Yeun). When Mark is old enough, Nolan tells him about Viltrum, but paints their shared heritage in a favorable, heroic light.

As Mark Grayson is being raised by his seemingly perfect parents, several other young people destined for greatness are experiencing very different childhoods. A young girl named Rachel discovers that she has the ability to shrink herself to a tiny size, and her family immediately begins training her rigorously for hero work; Paul and Kate Cha, twins cursed with the ability to copy themselves an infinite amount of times, are taken from their catatonic father and given to a government facility for training; Rex Sloane, having been sold to shady scientists for a low sum, is being physiologically modified with bio-tech, enhancing his physical capabilities and granting him the power to blow up anything he touches.

But young Samantha Eve Wilkins (Aria Kane and Jazlyn Ione) had it particularly rough. She was born through a science experiment conducted by the Pentagon's superhuman research division. Her creator, Dr. Elias Brandyworth (Stephen Root), secretly gave her to two normal parents to prevent the Pentagon from turning her into a super soldier under their control. This left Eve with no resources to help cope with her powers, leaving her socially ostracized and mistrusted even by her own parents for most of her childhood.

At 17, Mark accidentally hurls a trash bag into space and discovers that his Viltrumite powers are at long last beginning to manifest. Though Nolan is initially unsettled by this development (unbeknownst to anyone else, this event compels him to begin his conquest of Earth in earnest), he accepts his responsibility to train Mark in the ways of being both a Viltrumite and a superhero.

Mark's first days of training are rough and discouraging, and his initial attempts at crime fighting don't go much better (he nearly takes down a city block fighting Titan for the first time). But after some reassurance from his parents (who individually remind him that his powers will only amplify the things about him that are already special), he embraces his new life and adopts the superhero alter ego "Invincible." Art Rosenbaum, a close friend of the family, as well as the preeminent tailor for superheroes (voiced by Mark Hamill), designs him a blue, yellow, and black suit with a subtle "I" insignia built into the design.

However, as Invincible finally soars into the light, Omni-Man descends into darkness. Luring the Guardians of the Globe to their secret base with a false distress signal, Nolan brutally murders them one by one. Exhausted from the fight, Nolan collapses on the scene immediately afterward. When the GDA arrives to clean up and recover the bodies, Omni-Man is assumed to be one of the victims, and an investigation is opened by Cecil Stedman into who or what might have defeated him and killed the Guardians.

With Omni-Man out of the game indefinitely, Mark feels the need to step up in his father's place. Cecil, concerned by the loss of Earth's strongest heroes and intrigued by the possibility of having a peer (or even a contender?) to Omni-Man's power in his corner, encourages this as respectfully as possible.

Invincible is given his first major test when portals to an alien dimension are opened in downtown Chicago. When he arrives, he's confronted by a race known as the Flaxans, who possess advanced weapons and a massive military force. Try as he might, Invincible is overwhelmed by the speed and brutality of such an onslaught, and is able to do little more than evacuate a single, mortally injured old woman from the chaos. And while he is quickly assisted by the Teen Team — a group of young superheroes, consisting of an older Atom Eve (Gillian Jacobs), her explosive boyfriend Rex Splode (Jason Mantzoukas), the duplicitous Dupli-Kate (Malese Jow), and unfeeling android leader Robot (Zachary Quinto) — they, too, are overpowered. In the end, it's the Flaxan's own physiology that undoes them, as they rapidly age the longer they remain on Earth. They retreat, but vow to return.

Time in the Flaxan dimension moves much faster, so when they do ultimately return (multiple times in the span of a few days), their weaponry has advanced by decades. The Teen Team and Invincible grow as heroes through their encounters with the Flaxans, but are never strong enough to decisively beat them. Only a revived Omni-Man, having healed from his wounds in the GDA hospital, is able to send them packing. Further, he chases them back into their dimension and disappears for some time — potentially years, if not decades from his perspective, though mere hours or days on Earth — and nearly wipes out their entire civilization single-handedly before returning home.

With Omni-Man recovered — enough to beat back the Flaxans but (apparently) not enough to face Allen the Alien when he mistakenly arrives to evaluate Earth's defenses for the Coalition of Planets (he confused it for Urath) — and making public appearances, the GDA officially announces the deaths of the Guardians of the Globe and their intent to form a new team. At a private funeral ceremony for the heroes' families, Nolan spots the demonic detective Damien Darkblood (Clancy Brown) lurking in the shadows. While he may be able to fool Cecil and his primitive Earth tech, Darkblood's mystical methods could very well uncover him as the murderer, and from the tense interaction the two share, it's clear Darkblood is already too close to the truth.

Cecil, meanwhile, puts Robot in charge of assembling and leading a new team of Guardians. After a rigorous audition process, he selects Rex Splode, Dupli-Kate, the size-changing hero Shrinking Rae (Grey Griffin), a depowered but technologically enhanced veteran of the old Guardians team named Black Samson (Khary Payton), and Amanda (also voiced by Griffin), a 24-year-old shapeshifter cursed to swap between a constantly de-aging body and the form of hulking demonic beast dubbed "Monster Girl." Robot seems instantly connected to Amanda, for reasons that will become clear later. He also extends offers to Invincible and Atom Eve, though both decline (the former wanting to focus on training with his father and the latter still angry after discovering Rex had been cheating on her with Kate).

Amidst all this, Mark begins dating Amber Bennett (Zazie Beetz), a normal girl at his school. Though he's clearly smitten with her, their first date is interrupted by Cecil, who demands Invincible's help fighting the eco-terrorist Doc Seismic (Chris Diamantopoulos) with Eve. Mark returns afterward and wins Amber's affections for the time being, but she makes it clear she won't stick around long if he continues to blow her off.

Unfortunately for Mark and Amber's blossoming romance, however, Cecil calls to ask for Invincible's help once more, this time with discreetly escorting a spacecraft to and from the planet Mars. Mark agrees against his father's wishes. On Mars, the humans quickly run afoul of the local Martian people, who are terrified that any of them could be infected by the parasitic Sequids that plague their planet and turned into a vessel for total Sequid domination. 

The stakes are apparently apocalyptic, and the Martians are prepared to execute the astronauts to prevent a Sequid uprising. With the help of Invincible, they escape and make a hasty retreat back to Earth — that is, except for the American astronaut Rus Livingston, who is knocked unconscious and left on Mars unbeknownst to the crew due to a shapeshifting Martian stowaway (Ben Schwartz) who stole Rus' appearance. While this imposter travels to Earth and unsuccessfully attempts to step into Rus' life, the real Rus is infected by a Sequid on Mars and used to conquer the planet.

With Mark out of the house, Nolan and Debbie try to regain some normalcy in their marriage. The death of the Guardians hinders this in a number of ways, not least of all because Damien Darkblood is dangerously close to proving Nolan's involvement in the crime. Using his super speed and the samples of blood on his destroyed costume, Nolan questionably frames Darkblood for his crimes. Though Cecil doesn't believe Darkblood is the true culprit, he still uses a ritual to banish the demon back to hell as punishment for interfering with his own investigation. As for Nolan, his efforts seemingly came too late. Darkblood has already left his notes to be discovered by none other than Debbie Grayson.

Finally back on Earth, Mark is on very thin ice with Amber. In fact, he's about one missed date away from getting dumped. But when forced to choose between helping her at a community kitchen and helping a seemingly remorseful and morally justified criminal called Titan (Mahershala Ali in season 1; Todd Williams in season 3) take down the crime lord Machine Head (Jeffrey Donovan), he puts his relationship at risk and does what he thinks is right. Machine Head, capable of essentially predicting the future, thanks to a cutting edge microchip Titan previously stole for him, is more prepared for the team-up than either of them expected, and ambushes them with a team of powerful supervillains that includes the unstoppable feline warrior Thokk — aka Battle Beast.

The new Guardians arrive to help, but the combined might of the villains is too great — Invincible, Monster Girl, and Black Samson are all nearly beaten to death. Recognizing the clear imbalance of power, Battle Beast deems the battle beneath him and voluntarily leaves. The remaining Guardians and Titan exact their vengeance on the remaining villains and defeat Machine Head, whose predictive chip is ultimately taken by Cecil Stedman once the GDA shows up to recover the bodies.

Eve (also a friend of both Mark and Amber's from school) tells Amber that Mark missed their charity date because he was in a car accident. Meanwhile, in the literal rubble of Machine Head's now-empty headquarters, Titan moves in with his family and takes his rival's place as the city's new crime boss.

Disheartened by his defeat and scared of losing his girlfriend and what else remains of his normal childhood, Mark decides to take a vacation from being Invincible to visit Upstate University with Amber. They were invited by Mark's best friend William (Andrew Rannells), who was himself visiting to reconnect with his one-time boyfriend Rick Sheridan (Jonathan Groff in season 1; Luke MacFarlane in season 2).

Mark is unfortunately forced to jeopardize his relationship with Amber for good when cyborg-zombies created by the pompously deranged science prodigy D.A. Sinclair (Ezra Miller in season 1; Eric Bauza in season 2) begin attacking the campus. Invincible is able to stop him, but not before Rick is kidnapped by Sinclair and turned into one of his monstrosities.

To make matters worse, Amber breaks up with him and his identity is uncovered by (a thankfully sympathetic) William. The trio drive home in near-silence, and when it comes time to drop Amber off at her house, Mark tries to smooth things over by telling her the truth. Surprisingly, she already knows Mark is Invincible, and is instead insulted by his condescending treatment of her. She asks Mark to leave, and after William proves to be less than helpful, he disappears in search of the one friend who can truly understand him.

Having turned down Robot's offer to join the new Guardians of the Globe (and with no Teen Team to return to, as its membership had been entirely absorbed into the aforementioned super team), Eve is trying to figure out what exactly she wants to do with her life — a fairly normal way for most kids to spend their final year in high school. But while Amber and Mark are looking at colleges — and Invincible is practicing his heroism by defending students before he's even made it to campus — Eve isn't sure higher education or superheroism are for her. And when her discouraging and undermining parents offer no support, she leaves home.

She flies to a nearby wooded area where she uses her powers to construct a tree house, which serves essentially as her home and base of operations as she begins saving the world her own way. Rather than punching through the bad guy of the week, she travels the globe helping to solve all manner of disasters. It's exhausting, but seemingly rewarding.

When Mark arrives to ask for advice on what to do about Amber (having flown to her straight from William's car), Eve shares her own doubts about balancing the desire for a normal life with the immense responsibility their powers give them. (It's also potentially a tricky subject for Eve, as she almost went to him for comfort weeks earlier after finding out about Rex, but stopped herself when she saw him on a date with Amber.)

While forming and leading his new Guardians of the Globe, the android Robot has been secretly working on a project in the background. After breaking the Mauler Twins (two hulking clones of a scientific genius, voiced by Kevin Michael Richardson) out of a GDA prison, he brings them to a secret laboratory where he asks them to put their cloning and memory transference expertise to "good" use. Seemingly unknown to the Guardians, Robot is actually a vessel remotely controlled by a man named Rudy Connors who was born with so many severe ailments that he can't survive outside of a stasis tube. In exchange for the schematics for a collar that will allow them to control any superhero they want, the Maulers transfer Rudy's memories into a clone of Rex Splode's 12-year-old body (which they grew from a biological sample he took without Rex's knowledge). The procedure is successful, after which the new Rudy Connors (Ross Marquand) mercy-kills his original self.

Rudy makes good on his promise, but immediately tries to recapture the Mauler Twins. He's nearly successful, but is called away on a Guardians emergency before he can finish the job. Left with the schematics, the Maulers depart the facility to dig up the grave of The Immortal. Over the next several hours (as the world deals with the biggest threat it's ever faced), they reassemble his body — said to be capable of regenerating on its own — and build the collar to fit him perfectly, preparing one of the strongest heroes on Earth to be their personal servant.

Meanwhile, since the banishment of Damien Darkblood and the discovery of his investigation notes, Debbie has been unable to shake the suspicion that her husband knows more about what happened to the Guardians he's told her. Desperate, she manages to get him out of the house just long enough for her to find the Omni-Man suit that was nearly destroyed during his battle with the Guardians (having recalled how strangely insistent Nolan was about having the suit returned to him by the GDA hospital).

While Mark is at Upstate University, she takes the suit to Art, who uses his lab to run a panel of tests. Heartbreakingly, he determines that, based on the blood patterns and oxidation, Nolan was fighting the Guardians when the suit was destroyed, and it was more likely than not that Nolan was the first to strike. Debbie returns home to confront Nolan, who admits to killing the Guardians of his own free will but asks her to trust him. She orders him to leave, and — though angry — he does. Debbie is immediately escorted to GDA HQ for safety, as Nolan disappears to prepare to reveal the truth to his son when he returns from his college visit.

When Nolan returns home the next morning to talk to Mark (who had unexpectedly taken a detour to see Eve), he instead discovers a squadron of GDA agents waiting for him, as well as a secret base of operations hidden in a house across the street. He makes quick work of the agents and heads to the base, where Cecil's right-hand Donald Ferguson (Chris Diamantopoulos) sacrifices his life to blow the building up with Nolan inside. Nolan is unscathed, and flies off to find Mark. After intimidating William, he heads off in search of Eve's treehouse. On the way, Cecil throws every GDA asset he can at him, including Sinclair's ReAnimen and a powerful space-laser (the Guardians, on Cecil's orders, are to remain safe at HQ until called, lest he give Omni-Man the chance to clear the roster a second time).

The latter occurs during Mark and Eve's heart-to-heart, and creates an explosion big enough to call their attention. Though Cecil successfully gets Eve to stand back, an ear-piece-less Mark heads unwittingly into battle with his father against Cecil, who deploys a behemoth Kaiju to take Omni-Man down. Invincible and Omni-Man are able to vanquish the beast, but in the process are confronted by an unexpected third-party — The Immortal. Having been successfully revived by the Maulers (but unsuccessfully controlled by them, as Robot had secretly sabotaged the schematics), his first impulse was to track Omni-Man down and kill him. After a brief scrape, Nolan guts him in front of Mark, revealing himself as the Guardians' true assassin.

Nolan explains his true origin to Mark, and enlists his help in conquering Earth while diminishing its people as insects — and Debbie as a "pet." An enraged Mark tries to fight him, but he's no match. Nolan intentionally destroys most of Chicago, kills thousands (including the family of Aaron Paul's Scott Duval) during the brawl, and nearly kills Mark as well. Before he can, however, he is suddenly moved by memories of fatherhood, marriage, and life on Earth. Overwhelmed, he flies into space in tears.

As he would later explain, fighting his own son began to reveal feelings within Nolan that were not allowed on Viltrum. The impulse to protect those weaker than oneself, to grow attached to them even, was strictly taboo in his culture. At the same time, he had publicly betrayed the same world he had grown to love for an empire he was beginning to despise, and had turned his family against him in the process. Unable to live with this guilt, he flies to the nearest black hole and prepares to drift in but is stopped when he sees a nearby ship in distress.

Nolan saves the vessel, piloted by people from the planet Thraxa. He's invited back to their planet, where his strength, heroism, and incomparable lifespan (Thraxans only live for around nine months and age extremely quickly) compel them to essentially elect him emperor. During this time, he meets a Thraxan woman named Andressa (Rhea Seehorn), and together they have a son. This child, a mix between Viltrumite DNA and a "lesser race" (lesser apparently than humanity), is an abomination in Viltrumite culture, and Nolan fears the child will be hunted and killed when his people learn of his existence.

After healing from his battle with his father, Mark does what he can to help clean up the city of Chicago. Still overwhelmed by grief, he begs Cecil to let him work for the GDA, which Cecil very reluctantly agrees to do.

At the same time, a scientist named Angstrom Levy (Sterling K. Brown) possesses the ability to create portals between dimensions and has begun collecting as many alternate versions of himself as possible. Seemingly unbeknownst to him, many of these versions of himself come from realities where Invincible agreed to conquer the Earth with his father, or otherwise turned into a fascist overlord. This Angstrom's plan is to transfer all of their memories — with the help of the recently jail-broken Mauler Twins — into his mind, so he can use their collective knowledge to help save the world. Unfortunately, Cecil calls in Invincible when he notices the amount of energy this procedure creates, and Invincible doesn't stop to ask questions when he sees the Maulers are involved.

Angstrom tries to subdue Invincible long enough for the procedure to finish, but the Maulers (and their multiversal counterparts called by Angstrom) nearly kill him. Wanting to save his life, Angstrom removes his helmet too soon, causing the machine to malfunction and explode, seemingly evaporating the facility and everyone inside, save Mark. In reality, one of the original Maulers survived, as did Angstrom — though he has been turned into a monstrous mutated version of himself, overwhelmed by his new memories of Invincible's villainy. He leaves to travel the multiverse to prepare his revenge.

Mark's new life working for the GDA is going pretty well. He easily takes down villains like Doc Seismic and Darkwing II (the psychologically deranged former sidekick of the Darkwing killed by Omni-Man, voiced by Cleveland Berto) and does so while managing to graduate from high school and maintain his rekindled relationship with Amber. It certainly helps that the Guardians are beginning to become more reliable, especially with the additions of the Invincible-esque hero Bulletproof (Jay Pharoah) and the mysterious shape-shifter Shapesmith (secretly the Martian invader who took over astronaut Rus Livingston's life).

Additionally, The Immortal has been reinstated as leader of the Guardians, as Rudy is too distracted by his new human body — and his feelings for Monster Girl — to be an effective leader (it also didn't help that he cloned Rex without his permission and broke the Maulers out of jail). Immortal wastes no time getting them up to speed... and, awkwardly, starts dating Dupli-Kate, much to Rex's chagrin.

The only thing the Guardians can't do is make amends with the Atlanteans for the murder of their king — one of the Guardians of the Globe killed by Nolan. Per their custom, Mark must face judgement in his father's place, leading to a battle with a sea beast capable of disarming him with a special call. Seeing this, Cecil secretly has this call replicated by the GDA to be used against Mark if he ever turns on them.

On Talescria, the Coalition of Planets is getting both nervous and excited. On the one hand, Nolan's flight from Earth and Mark's rejection of the Viltrumite way has inspired hope that their resistance has a real chance of taking hold. On the other hand, neither Mark nor Allen the Alien nor any of their number can physically compete with even one Viltrumite, and Thaedus is growing concerned that they may have installed a mole within the Coalition.

He tasks Allen the Alien with investigating this matter for him. Before he can, Allen is abducted from Talescria by Viltrumites and interrogated about his encounters with Mark and Nolan. Unwilling to cave to their torture, he is beaten seemingly to death and left in space. Thaedus recovers his body and takes him to their med bay. There, Allen spends an unknown amount of time recovering, eventually and surprisingly restoring himself to a state more physically advanced than he was before.

Mark, Amber, and Will — having all been accepted to Upstate University — enjoy their first weeks at college together. Mark's is cut short, however, when a Thraxan visits him and asks for his help saving their planet from an existential threat. Against Cecil's wishes, Mark travels to Thraxa, where he reunites with his father. Though Mark is still furious and hurt, his feelings for Nolan are complicated. Nolan begs him to stay on Thraxa so they can finish his training and protect the planet and his new half-brother from an impending Viltrumite invasion.

Mark refuses, but is compelled to act when the planet is ambushed by the Viltrumite Elites Lucan (Phil LaMarr), Thula (Grey Griffin), and Vidor (Chris Diamantopoulos). Though they put up a good fight, Mark and Nolan are overwhelmed by their might. Viltrumite General Kregg (Clancy Brown) descends on the planet to take Nolan aboard his ship to be executed for his crimes against the empire. Mark, on the other hand, has actually proven himself worthy by surviving the battle, and Kregg orders him to return to Earth to finish his father's mission.

Once they leave, Mark spends the next two Earth months helping rebuild Thraxa. Nolan's partner Andressa convinces him to return home, and to take his brother with him, as his Viltrumite blood will make him outlive her care.

Mark's two-month disappearing act causes fractures in his relationships, especially with Amber (who, despite trying hard to be supportive of Mark's work, is struggling to love someone who's never there) and Eve (who needed Mark for support, as a discouraging struggle to find her path forced her to quit being a hero and move back in with her parents). Now home, he tries to make more time for the people in his life — but, of course, duty (read: Cecil) calls.

A Martian spaceship is headed toward Earth. Shapesmith admits to being Martian himself (everyone already knew), confesses to attacking and leaving Rus Livingston stranded on Mars (they did not know), and rightly theorizes that Rus' body was used as a vessel for the Sequids to conquer the planet (they definitely did not know). Cecil enlists Invincible, as well as the Guardians with invulnerable skin (Immortal, Bulletproof, Robot, Monster Girl, Black Samson and Shapesmith) to deal with the threat. Rex Splode has the idea to involve Atom Eve and convinces her to come out of retirement.

The team is successful in stopping the invasion and rescuing Rus. But their departure has left the heroes of Earth vulnerable to another threat.

Back on our little blue planet, an evening of leisure for the less vincible (or more vincible?) Guardians — Rex Splode, Dupli-Kate, and Shrinking Rae — is interrupted by none other than the Lizard League. After an internal shake up of their organization, the League is led by King Lizard (Scoot McNairy) to invade a U.S. Government facility and take control of the nation's nuclear arsenal.

Perhaps underestimating the villains somewhat, the trio of Guardians fight them to a near-pyrrhic victory. Shrinking Rae is crushed when she tries to basically "Thanus" the invulnerable Komodo Dragon by allowing herself to be eaten by him — though she is recovered after the battle, she is taken to the GDA's hospital with severe injuries. Rex, too, leaves the battle half-dead, his altered physiology allowing him to just barely survive a point-blank gunshot to the head long enough for him to win the day. Tragically, however, Dupli-Kate is crushed while trying to make a copy of herself, seemingly killing her once and for all.

The Immortal is devastated by Kate's death, so much so that he tries to resign from the Guardians entirely. Instead, he is put on sabbatical, and leadership of the team is returned to Robot/Rudy.

Recovering from the taxing encounter with the Sequids and the Guardians' tragic battle with the Lizard League, Mark catches up on some light reading by heeding his father's last words on Thraxa: "Read my books!" Mark initially believes this is in reference to the travel books written and published by Nolan Grayson, but a visit to Art reveals that Nolan also wrote numerous science fiction novels that never saw the light of day.

Mark quickly deduces that these books are thinly fictionalized memoirs of Nolan's perilous adventures in space, presumably when he was conquering the hundreds of planets he invaded before traveling to Earth. In them, Nolan wrote about ferocious beasts much stronger than himself, from whom he barely escaped with his life — as well as a mysterious, legendary space nomad with a gun powerful enough to destroy anything in its path. Recognizing this as evidence of potential threats to Viltrumite power, Mark passes the books on to Allen the Alien and assures him that when the Coalition of Planets prepares for war, he will fight on their side.

Elsewhere, at the GDA headquarters, Donald — donating his spine to the fight against Omni-Man and somehow alive after blowing up a house with him inside it — confronts Cecil about why he's still alive. Cecil reveals that, at some point in the past, Donald voluntarily requested a protocol where he would be revived from fatal injuries by any means necessary so long as the traumatic memory of his death was erased.

This has left Donald with a confused and incomplete memory of his own life, and few remaining organic body parts (potentially just his brain). Cecil says that Donald has "died" 39 times at this point. Given that Donald hasn't visibly aged since Cecil was promoted to director, it's possible the protocol was in place before they met.

Donald is deeply disturbed by the revelation, but requests the restoration of his memories. Coming to terms with his personhood through memories, relationships, and actions, he even helps an in-crisis Rick Sheridan (traumatized by his own life-saving cybernetic reconstruction at the hands of the GDA) understand this as well.

Mark's two-month absence from Earth has played a large role in exacerbating the growing divide between him and Amber. Determined to make things work and win back her trust, he takes her on a lavish date where he recommits to his normal life.

However, reality comes crashing when a Viltrumite appears almost out of nowhere. Anissa (an elite member of their ranks, voiced by "The Boys'" Shantel VanSanten) orders Mark to leave the date to speak with her privately, threatening to kill Amber on the spot if he doesn't. Mark fearfully acquiesces to her demands, leading to a surprisingly civil conversation in which Anissa earnestly tries to sell him on the mission General Kregg charged him with on Thraxa. Conquering Earth, as he has been ordered to do by the Viltrumite Empire, will ultimately be a benefit to humanity, she argues, and will save more of the lives of the humans he loves so much. She even helps him defeat a kaiju serendipitously attacking nearby to prove that Viltrumite conquest isn't about bloodlust or genocide.

But when Mark refuses to commit to the mission, she viciously beats him, proving just how unprepared he still is to face a Viltrumite. He only survives because Anissa allows it, presumably because she knows how few Viltrumites remain in the world. She leaves, but threatens the arrival of another elite soldier in her place. Mark returns to Amber, both of them horrified by the encounter. Feeling threatened and irreconcilably out of her depth, Amber breaks up with Mark.

Shortly after Mark and Amber's breakup, he is contacted by Angstrom Levy. Having fully internalized his inter-psychological, multi-dimensional vendetta against Invincible (fueled in part by some classic comic book misdirection of blame for "causing" his grotesque mutation), Angstrom has spent his time since the explosion traveling dimensions to prepare for a confrontation with his archnemesis. In addition to learning Mark's secret identity and preparing a few dimensions to trap and weaken him in, he's had his body physically enhanced by the multiverse's best scientists so that he can win in a one-on-one fight.

Or that's the plan at least. Though Angstrom has a decent run throwing him into various dangerous (and Easter-egg-filled) dimensions while keeping his mother and half-brother hostage, the eventual fist-fight is relatively short-lived. An enraged Invincible beats the absolute doors off of Angstrom in a desolate dimension. From the mangled look of his un-moving body, Invincible is fairly certain he accidentally, brutally killed the man. Stranded and quickly losing his grip on his sanity (a moral dilemma like committing second-degree murder can do that), Mark is saved by future versions of Monster Girl, Robot (conspicuously going by the name Rex instead of Rudy), Bulletproof, and Eve, who all travel to him via time machine specifically to send him home.

They imply that, in their timeline, Invincible was forever changed by being stranded in this dimension for so long, and created the dark world in which they live. Before he goes home, however, the older Eve tells Mark that her younger self loves him and has always loved him, and urges him to tell his Eve whether or not he loves her back. Stunned, Mark returns home. Unbeknownst to anyone, Angstrom survived the attack and teleports himself to a dimension where his body can be repaired by a race of beings called The Technicians.

From here, things move faster than they ever have for Invincible. Guilt-ridden over killing Angstrom, losing to Anissa, and leaving his mother to raise his half-brother (now named Oliver, after his grandfather, and voiced by Christian Convery), Mark chooses to drop out of school and devote his time to training with Cecil and the GDA. Together, they dramatically improve his physical capabilities, estimating that he would now be strong enough to defeat Anissa. Mark also makes quick work of the mysterious twin thieves Dropkick and Fightmaster (Xolo Maridueña) and Dupli-Kate's multiplying brother Multi-Paul (now an international assassin voiced by Simu Liu).

The situation with Multi-Paul (who was trying to kill Rex Splode for failing to protect Dupli-Kate from the Lizard League) is almost quelled peacefully when the Immortal arrives with Kate herself, revealing that she had been living through a copy of herself long before her "death." Invincible — with a harsher code of justice in the wake of his killing of Angstrom — denies her pleas for leniency and takes him to jail.

In his personal life, Mark finally decides to ask Eve out. She initially says yes, but is offended and humiliated when Mark accidentally tells her about the future version of her.

They're awkwardly forced to help the GDA against Doc Seismic once again, though he is now able to overpower them with the help of subterranean super creatures. Backed against the wall, Cecil calls in reinforcements — Sinclair's ReAnimen and the rehabilitated Darkwing II. Though they help win the day, Mark is fiercely against integrating criminals like Sinclair and Darkwing into the GDA and angrily confronts Cecil about it. Cecil tries to reason with Invincible, but throws more ReAnimen at him in order to prevent him from exposing these secrets to the Guardians.

During their confrontation, Cecil reveals that he had a chip installed in Mark's head that allows him to activate the Atlantean Sea Beast's call anytime, anywhere. Mark manages to get to the Guardians HQ, where the team is appalled at Cecil's actions. Mark threatens to kill Cecil if he ever comes near him or his family again, and asks for Robot's help removing the chip. Later, Bulletproof, Rex Splode, Shrinking Rae, Monster Girl, and Robot resign from the Guardians and move back into the Teen Team HQ; the remaining Guardians — Immortal, Dupli-Kate, Black Samson, and Shapesmith — are joined by Darkwing II.

Now freed-up to spend more time with Oliver, Mark tries to train him in the ways of being a superhero like Omni-Man did for him. Mark is troubled, however, when Oliver tricks Art into designing a costume for him with an "O" insignia, as he intends to go by Kid Omni-Man. Though Mark tries to explain his dad's complicated legacy on Earth, Oliver just doesn't understand.

In subsequent encounters, Oliver fails to heed Invincible's orders and often acts impulsively, further troubling Mark. Still, he allows Oliver to join him when he's called in to help the Guardians stop the newly re-cloned Mauler Twins. Oliver loses control when Mark leaves to stop a nuke the villains fired into the air and kills both twins. Cecil is the first to see the carnage and tries to counsel Oliver, but a furious Mark takes matters into his own hands on his return. At this time, Angstrom Levy — having somehow survived Mark's assault — begins spying on the Grayson household through remote-controlled drones.

In space, Nolan is being held prisoner and awaiting execution on a prison barge run by the Viltrumites. Believing him to be a potential aid to their cause after speaking to Mark on Earth, Allen the Alien allows himself to be apprehended by Anissa so that he could be placed in the same facility.

He manages to befriend Nolan on the inside while proving himself invulnerable to most methods of execution. When it comes time for Nolan to be killed, Allen stages a prison break with the help of the near-unbeatable Battle Beast. Outside, Nolan commits to their cause, and reveals to Allen that there are only 50 Viltrumites left in existence.

Back on Earth, Mark tries to keep his life under control in the wake of his split from the GDA. Fortunately, he and Debbie are able to steer Oliver toward the right path, while Eve agrees to give their relationship a shot (though their first date is interrupted by Dropkick and Fightmaster, revealed to be time travels in need of Invincible's help to stop a deranged and despotic Immortal thousands of years in the future). To mitigate some of the chaos, the couple plan to move in together and start a private security firm — Invincible Inc. — to earn money.

Their first and only client, a supervillain prison, calls upon Mark when the dragon projection of Mr. Liu (Tzi Ma) tries to break Multi-Paul out. Paul was Liu's best assassin — though Liu, being the head of the supervillain-supergroup The Order, only got involved because Titan refused to bend the knee and do so himself. Secretly, Titan had orchestrated these events so that Liu and Invincible's fight would free Machine Head, who he had teamed up with to subvert Liu's rule. Machine Head kills Liu, takes his place in The Order, and allows Titan to be free from their interference — at least, for now.

Meanwhile, in the GDA, Scott Duvall (apparently an engineer there, for some unexplained amount of time) has been stealing experimental plates that allow him to absorb kinetic energy and amplify his inherent superhuman gifts of electric manipulation. Scott had become obsessed with prosecuting Invincible for his role in Omni-Man's attack, but was unsuccessful in getting the D.A. involved. Working with his wife (Kate Mara), he adopts the name Powerplex and stages multiple attacks to goad Invincible into open conflict so he can exact his revenge.

When he finally succeeds in luring Invincible to the apartment where his sister and niece lived, he does so by staging a kidnapping with his wife and son present. They are both accidentally killed during the battle, and he is ultimately taken into GDA custody. Invincible tries to take accountability for Omni-Man's destruction, but Scott vows revenge.

Not long after, Angstrom, fully repaired and in the dimension of the Technicians, throws his grand plan into action. He sends over 18 alternate, evil versions of Invincible from other dimensions into his own, where they kill thousands and cause chaos across the globe. The GDA's combined might does what it can, but the alternate Marks tear through most of the heroes sent their way. During this multi-day war, many perish, including Rex Splode (who blows himself up to kill a single Invincible). Eve is critically injured, which causes Mark to retreat to protect her.

Cecil discovers that Angstrom is alive and behind the attack (having promised the unruly variants their own dimensions to conquer, a deal that falls apart, forcing him to send them all home prematurely). Mark allows Cecil to teleport him to Angstrom's location, where they fight once more. When Mark has Angstrom in his hands, Oliver urges him to kill him. Mark seemingly decides to, but Angstrom teleports himself away before he can (severing an arm in the process). In the Technicians' dimension, Angstrom tries to rally, but finds the scientists are reversing the terms of their own deal after seeing him betray the Invincibles. He will now spend his days as their servant.

In the aftermath of the so-called "Invincible War," the world tries to rebuild. Cecil offers Mark the chance to lead the Guardians of the Globe, but Mark adamantly refuses — though a civil conversation between them seems to imply their partnership isn't entirely dissolved. Invincible joins the clean-up efforts, where he is forced to reckon with his role in the atrocity.

In the midst of this, Conquest (the Viltrumite Elite Anissa warned about, voiced by Jeffrey Dean Morgan) arrives to beat some sense into Mark. Their battle, though surprisingly close to evenly matched, still nearly kills an exhausted Mark. Eve arrives and is nearly killed, but this state allows her to overcome the mental restrictions that prevent her from manipulating biological matter — she then flays Conquest alive so Mark can seemingly kill him. Mark tells Cecil to burn the body, but, of course, Cecil refuses to listen and keeps Conquest as a captive informant.

Though their battle may mark the end of the "Invincible" timeline so far, it signals the beginning of even crazier stories yet to come. To find out what happens next, you'll need to check out the original comic book series by Robert Kirkman, Cory Walker, and Ryan Ottley — or wait until 2026 for the release of "Invincible" season 4 on Prime Video.