The Big Picture Robert Kirkman explains why there was such a long wait for Invincible Season 2 and confirms that won’t be the case with Season 3. He discusses why Angstrom Levy was the ideal “big bad” this time around. Kirkman also teases why Episode 7 is his favorite episode of the new season.
It’s been a long road for fans of the adult animated superhero series Invincible. After premiering back in 2021, the realities of producing an animated show in lockdown took its toll. However, the time has finally come for more! The Invincible: Atom Eve Special is now available on Prime Video, and the first half of Season 2 is set to debut on November 3rd.

In this interview with Collider’s Perri Nemiroff at San Diego Comic-Con, series creator Robert Kirkman talks about the long wait between Season 1 and Season 2, his favorite episode of the new season, why he chose Angstrom Levy as the new “big bad,” the storytelling potential in the multiverse, and loads more.

You can hear it all for yourself straight from Kirkman in the video at the top of this article, or you can read the interview in transcript form below.

PERRI NEMIROFF: Is there any particular element of the first season that fans sparked to that surprised you that you decided to more heavily embrace in the second season?

KIRKMAN: Oh my gosh. Lord, I have so many joke answers. There’s so many memes, but I don’t want to get in trouble. I don’t know. I mean, it’s a character drama at its core and I think the fact that people responded to that so much. I was worried that maybe the audience would say I need more fighting, there needs to be more action, this thing slows down too much. I wanted the show to feel like an hour-long cable drama that had its cool action and was a superhero story, but made you really feel for the characters and their journey, and just to have everybody respond to that was great. So there’s absolutely not even one fight scene in Season 2. It’s spectacular.

Image via Prime Video

It’s been a two-year wait since Season 1. So, why the wait? Is it just the animation process? Are there any particular bumps in the road that caused it, maybe something like COVID?

KIRKMAN: It’s three things. It’s the animation process which is difficult in and of itself. Two, very complicated show. We have a larger cast than you might see in any other show. We’re an hour-long animated show which is very unusual. But we have so many characters and so many settings, even in just one episode that we’re really kind of pushing the limits of what can be done in animation, so it takes a long time to make it. But it has also taken a long time to learn how to do it and figure it out because we’re doing a lot of things that you don’t necessarily do in animation.

And three, COVID. We debuted in 2021 and when we got the pick-up for Season 2 and 3, we had to kind of figure out — we finished the show as COVID was starting, for Season 1, and so we had to figure out completely new processes to work with all the restrictions that came from that. Animation studios were shut down quite a bit during COVID because animators, in a lot of cases, work in large rooms and in giant groups. So we had to figure out a whole new way of working and that slowed things down quite a bit.

But I’m very happy to report that the process of figuring out all the complexity of the show and building the factory that can generate this show has made it to where this is the longest period that there will be between seasons. So things should move much more smoothly from this point on.

You answered one of my questions, and I like that answer.

So we do know that we are getting Season 2, but we’re getting it in two parts. Is that decision tied to the production process or is there something about the Season 2 storyline that you think will be benefited from having that break in between?

KIRKMAN: It’s a little bit of the production process just because ramping things up has taken a lot longer than we thought. But also this is something that we’ve done with every season of The Walking Dead, and I think narratively, it’s kind of cool to have that pause to digest what you’ve just experienced. And when you see Episode 4 of Season 2, you may need a break. It’s a big episode. It’s definitely a mid-season finale kind of episode. And with everything going on in that time of year with Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year’s, and a lot of family time, I think a lot of shows get lost in the shuffle there, and so I think it’s good to take a pause. And narratively, it’s gonna make things hit a little bit harder. And people will know what I’m talking about when the season launches.

Image via Prime Video

Here’s my greedy question that you kind of answered. So, we can confirm that we won’t have as long of a wait before Season 3?

KIRKMAN: Correct.

I like hearing that! I know you always have to the future when planning a series like this, so is there any early development happening on the story beyond Season 3?

KIRKMAN: In my head I always have plans and I know exactly how things would continue, and there’s definitely discussions, but nothing I could break here. Amazon and Prime Video are very happy with the show. Very excited about the possibilities of what we could do were we to have a nice good long run, and so there’s a lot of discussions around that stuff, and hopefully there’ll be some good news at some point.

I always say, we speak things into existence on the Collider interview set.

KIRKMAN: I’m expecting a full Season 4 through 14 pick-up, and if we don’t get that, I’ll be disappointed. [Laughs]

[Laughs] I’m here for as many seasons as you want to give us!

I jumped a little far ahead because we also know we’re getting the Atom Eve origin story in her own standalone episode. Did you always know that origin story episode was gonna be for her character? And then also, do you have hopes to do any more similarly-styled episodes for other characters in the future?

KIRKMAN: We did that in the comic. We did an Atom Eve miniseries that was by Benito Cereno and Nate Bellegarde. It was a story that I had given them because I needed somebody to establish Atom Eve’s backstory because it comes into play in the series proper. It’s a prequel episode that has her origin but is absolutely essential to the longevity of the series. Anyone who’s read the comic knows what I’m talking about, but Atom Eve becomes a bigger and bigger character as the story of Invincible progresses. The stuff that you learn in that episode is very important, so it was always meant to be an Atom Eve episode. She’s one of our favorite characters. She’s one of the most popular characters in the show. We wanted to really give her a showcase.

And as far as doing other episodes with different characters in a similar way, I’d love to. We’ll just have to see.

Image via Prime Video

Just for fun, is there any particular smaller supporting character that you have yet to explore to that extent, even in the comics, that you would love to do a fun off-shoot episode for one day?

KIRKMAN: I mean, there are so many. It’s hard. I love Battle Beast. I’d love to do something with Battle Beast. I think that really digging in — and Monster Girl’s origin is dealt with in the comics a little bit, but to expand it out to this level and actually show the pathos that comes from being trapped in that body and being turned into a big monster. I don’t know, that would be a lot of fun to explore. But there’s a lot of different characters I’d love to kind of show that spotlight on.

Again, we’re gonna have 14 seasons, so you have more than enough time to cover it all.

KIRKMAN: Oh gosh. Wait, now I’m tired. [Laughs]

I want to get into the villain that you revealed for Season 2, Angstrom Levy. What is it about that particular villain that you think at this point in the show’s run would serve Invincible’s arc well and made you say, this is the villain to introduce and we have to do it now?

KIRKMAN: There’s a lot to it. A lot of people joke about [how] Invincible hasn’t won a fight yet. It’s a superhero show, we’ve had the first season, he’s never really definitively won an actual conflict, which I think is awesome. And so we’re gonna see him actually start winning in Season 2. Maybe not always. And maybe in some ways, a win is a loss, and I think that that kind of comes into play with Angstrom Levy. It’s a villain that if he were able to use his strength, could defeat very easily, but this is gonna put him in a place where he has to take the maturity he’s developing now that his father is gone and use his skills that he’s honed as a superhero. He’s gonna have to try to outsmart him instead of just beating him up. So it puts him in a position where everything he’s learned doesn’t really work for him so far.

Would you describe Angstrom Levy as the big bad of Season 2 or is he one of many adversaries that Invincible will face?

KIRKMAN: I think he’s probably the big bad of Season 2, but he’s not the only big bad of Season 2. There’s a lot going on in the season, but I think that like the Invincible/Omni-Man conflict was kind of the throughline of the first season, what happens with Angstrom Levy carries over the entire season in a way that some of the other stories don’t.

Image via IMDB

Angstrom Levy has multiverse capabilities. First, more broadly, what do you think it is about whatever phase we’re in in storytelling where everyone is obsessed with multiverse?

KIRKMAN: It’s funny because I don’t think I knew about Far From Home or Spider-Verse, or maybe Spider-verse was out, but when we decided to do this for Season 2, I didn’t know that there was a Flash movie. It’s literally everywhere. I don’t know what it is about it. I think it’s a great tool to use to bring different incarnations of things in, which I think is kind of becoming a, I’m gonna say “easy button.” It’s like, “Let’s make this cool. Bring that guy from that other thing in here!” And so it’s super cool and as a fan, I love it.

But I will say that we’re using Angstrom Levy’s multiverse capabilities in a much different way. It’s not just about pulling different things that you may love into a story through the multiverse. It’s a very character-driven story. There’s a lot of drama to it. Seeing the Sliding Doors aspect of another dimension and finding out how things went a different way when different decisions were made, we’re kind of drilling it down to its simplest form, and it’s not this massive — I’m trying not to say the word unwieldy, but you know, whatever.

I like the sound of all that.

Is there anything you wrote for yourself in Season 1 that you found yourself having the most challenging time writing yourself out of? Or finding the most creative solution to expand that particular plot point in Season 2?

KIRKMAN: I don’t think so. We had the comics as a guide post, which is kind of a cheat code for making a TV show to a certain extent. It’s great. We didn’t have this with Walking Dead because the comics weren’t done yet, but with Invincible, we can literally read the last issue and go, “It might be neat to plant this thing here in Season 2 that may come into play if we’re lucky enough to get to Season 14.” We’re kind of following that road map to a certain extent.

I think there’s a lot of deviations that we were able to do in Season 1 [and] it’s fun to pick those up and to run with those balls because we have to do different things because we changed the playbook a little bit in the first season. So there’s that aspect of it. But there definitely isn’t that brilliant end of that season of Star Trek with Picard as Borg and then sit there for six months going, “How are we gonna follow this up? I don’t know how we’re gonna follow this up.” We haven’t been able to write ourselves into that corner just yet. But maybe! Maybe eventually!

It’s an exciting creative challenge when you write yourself into a corner and have to really sit and think about how to write yourself out of it!

KIRMAN: I love that stuff.

A Season 1 and Season 2 question here; which character of the bunch wound up being more creatively fulfilling to bring to screen in Season 1 than you ever could have imagined? But then I also want the answer for Season 2. Who surprised you most in the new season?

KIRKMAN: Season 1, I love Cecil and Donald. And Donald especially, RIP. He just turned out great, and Chris Diamantopoulos who does Donald’s voice is spectacular. I would marry Walton Goggins if I wasn’t already married. I love that guy so much. His Cecil Stedman is just spectacular.

I can’t say who plays him because it’s a reveal later, but for Season 2, the character is Shapesmith. I think Shapesmith, he was a fun character in the comic and he brought a cool dynamic and the way he affected the larger martian storyline was very interesting, but the actor whom I almost just named does so much with him and brings so much to the character. It is just absolutely amazing.

And as I’m saying that I also have to throw out a shout-out to Jeffrey Donovan for Machine Head in Season 1. He is also another actor that came in and was like, “Nope, I’m gonna make this character 400 times better than you thought it could be,” which is great.

In the middle of a SAG strike, let’s talk about how much these actors bring to these roles and how absolutely essential they are. They really do breathe life into everything in ways that people who aren’t behind the scenes could never anticipate. When you hear Jeffrey Donovan playing Machine Head, you may think, “Oh, that’s some good writing.” And writers are great, too. I’m a writer, you know, whatever. I don’t know where I’m going here. I’m lost!

Well, I cannot emphasize that point nearly enough. It’s a miracle to bring any show, movie, anything to screen whatsoever, and every single artist, and there are hundreds, if not thousands of them involved in every single project we watch, deserves to be treated fairly for their work and celebrated in a way that makes the experience creatively fulfilling, but also makes them feel like they’re getting what they deserve.

Image via Amazon

Here’s a really obnoxious logic question for you because I love lore and things like that.

KIRKMAN: Sure! I hope I have an answer for you.

Invincible is essentially impenetrable except for the most advanced intense weaponry ever. In your mind, how is he operated on by human beings? How can things like needles penetrate his skin?

KIRKMAN: I think that one of the things that I try to achieve with Invincible that I think is magical is to never consider those things. We had a thing that they would not let me do on the show where, if you read the comic, Invincible’s house makes absolutely no sense. It’s like an M.C. Escher design. There’s a door here that goes outside, but if you look at the room from the other angle, the front door’s there, and so it’s like the house is one room wide. That doesn’t make any sense, and that works in comics. You can just bend reality around what is the most entertaining, and what is the coolest.

That is something that I think is kind of what makes superhero stories special. You can have someone that can fly around the world and get takeout, but you don’t spend time worrying that it’s going to vaporize when they move that fast. It’s selectively ignoring the things that — yeah, Mark and Nolan are playing baseball, standing back to back, throwing a baseball around the circumference of the earth. How many birds did they kill? How many planes did they crash? How many avalanches did they cause? How many sonic booms wreaked havoc across the world? None because they’re just playing baseball and it’s fun and it’s cool. But if you start thinking about the reality of it, it drags things down and so I think that there’s a jackhammer that they have that cuts into Mark’s skin and that’s what allows them to do surgery.

Now I’m gonna lose many nights’ worth of sleep thinking about the poor birds that died for a game of catch. [Laughs]

KIRKMAN: [Laughs] Sorry. Also, if you throw a baseball that fast, it might ignite the atmosphere anyway.

I could spin out of control thinking about all that, but that’s what I love, too. I love when those things aren’t weighing heavily on my mind while I’m watching the show, but I then enjoy filling in those blanks after the fact, and come up with my own reasons. In my mind, he is weakened, and that reduces all of his powers in which case he would need to be stitched up by human doctors.

KIRKMAN: Canon! We’re doing it!

I’ll end with one question just to tease what everyone can look forward to in Season 2. Do you have a particular favorite episode, and what can you tease about why that is your favorite episode of the new season?

KIRKMAN: Jeez. 207 maybe? There’s a scene in 207 — Season 2, Episode 7. Sorry, that’s TV code. I apologize for anyone out there. But Episode 7 of Season 2 has a scene that I’ve been dying to adapt from the comics into the show. I can’t wait for people to see the way that we changed it because it couldn’t be done in the same way, I’m speaking in code now, because of the way it is in the comics. And so we had to change it completely, and so we kind of had to rebirth a fan-favorite iconic scene in a way that works in animation. So it’s the same, but it’s 100% fundamentally different, so I wanna see if it has the same effect and is as beloved. So look out for that scene!

Invincible Season 2 premieres on Prime Video on November 3rd.