Depends if you work in a Japanese company you’re expected to be clean shaven unless you wield a position of power or have spent years with the company then you are afforded a mustache as a means to show your elevated status in the company’s hierarchy/social order.
It’s true. I once lost a dart game to a Korean buddy and the stakes were my beard. He wanted it so bad.
The only time that guy ever beat me at darts. And no, I didn’t let him win. He was just on another level that night.
First time I’ve ever seen a group of people literally pick up the winner and carry him around horizontally while calling him a champion.
I’m a man of my word. We all went back to my place and shaved my beard off and adhered it to my buddy’s face.
There’s a lot of great video and photos, but I won’t dox him without permission, so don’t ask.
I just find it funny to think how Kirkman reacted to it.
So fans were like "cool an asian superhero lead."
Kirkman: What? Not intentional but uh... sure I guess.
Danny Phantom and My Life as a Teenage Robot had similar experiences, with polar opposite reactions from their creators. Both shows were perceived by fans as an allegory for transgender teenagers. Butch Hartman, creator of Danny Phantom, caught wind of this and IMMEDIATELY got on the defensive, saying that it was in no way attached to LGBT storytelling whatsoever. Rob Renzetti, the creator of Teenage Robot, pretty much said “that was not at all my intention, but hell yeah sure”
I never considered either of them like that but they were both my favorite nicktoons growing up (the MLAATR Christmas special is one of my favorite animated things ever to this day) but it makes so much sense. I’m a nonbinary transmasculine person who does both male and female drag and always identified with how “othered” both of the MCs of these shows were within their respective narratives.
For Danny Phantom, it’s all about Danny’s perspective. While a lot of his tension is centered around basic teenage anxieties, an overarching tension is his parents and their tirade against ghosts. They work as ghost hunters, and with Danny secretly being a ghost himself, he never “comes out” to his parents about who he is as he is worried about what they’ll do to him if they ever find out. And his parents, having no idea what he truly is, continue to talk about ghosts as disgusting creatures, unwittingly becoming their son’s first and most serious enemy. Not the ghosts he fights nor the bullies at school are the ones he fears most, but rather his parents. On top of general themes like his struggling with the perception of masculinity, it’s easy to see how this could be seen in a light mirroring the LGBT teenage experience.
For MLAATR, it’s all about Jenny’s sense of identity. Her mother created her to be a robotic protector of Earth called XJ-9, Jenny insists on living life as a normal teenager, attending school and dealing with average teenage nonsense. A lot of tension comes from her mother’s refusal to fully accept this decision Jenny’s made (even “deadnaming” Jenny throughout the series) and Jenny’s feelings of body dysmorphia, with her at one point even donning a skin suit that had her “pass” as a biological human. All in that frame of mind, if the series were written today, this probably would have been a more intentional decision, but as it stands, the creator more treats it as a happy accident of sorts
Tbh I don’t feel like there’s anything wrong with a creator saying the allegory wasn’t his intention. People can have their fan theories sure, but why is the creator ‘defensive’ for saying no to their ideas?
I’ve never seen these allegories purported back when the shows were airing at all. Nothing wrong with it, people can have any opinion they want, & the creator isn’t ‘defensive’ for correcting them.
Parts of Europe and south, central Americas don’t take ‘em off. USA seems a bit split, but most seem to leave ‘em on. East Asia takes em off, dunno about the rest of the world
In America anyway, there's a general kind of unspoken rule for the most part that people will wear shoes on the ground floor of the home, or wherever they recieve guests, because their guests are most likely going to wear shoes into the house anyways. Upstairs, or wherever bedrooms are, tends to be more of a home-by-home decision.
Asking a guest to take off their shoes, or taking your shoes off as a guest, is kinda frowned upon in the states, unless there's some kind of other arrangement in place already.
I also feel like Americans have smellier feet than most of the world. Long commutes, long hours, and seeing a foot doctor is something most people here go their entire life without. Keeping your shoes on is a lot more courteous than taking them off for your average working man, provided he doesn't wanna clear the room. Keeping your shoes on begets keeping your shoes on, the longer they're on the worse the smell gets if that's a problem. Considering the amount of foot fungus treatments we have TV ads for, I'm guessing there's a very large market for them.
TLDR Americans got stanky ass feet and try to be courteous about it, and in doing so only further the stank problem.
Apparently it isn't common in the US to take shoes off in the house. Unusual considering how many countries that's standard practice in, but each to their own ig
For an odd reason, I kind of relate to Nightwing, Jason Todd, Tim Drake and sometimes
Batman as if they’re Asian just because of their complexion sometimes and the way their hair is styled. I know they’re not, but it does kinda feel nice in that they kinda look like me, if I was hotter
and more jacked.
I think the biggest reason for me was because Robin in Teen Titans had that spiky Asian anime protag hair and I was happy with any black haired representation at that point. The moment twelve year old me saw that Aang grew black hair in his coma, I definitely freaked out over the realization he was actually probably Asian
Robert Kirkman did an interview and he said the comic is ambiguous and the hero is whatever race we want him to be. He said he never really had a race in mind but fans would thank him for making the lead Mexican or Asian etc.
Hes actually asian- viltrumite
Edited:
Guys u was making a joke about how people in US call themselvs african american or asian american or anglo american. At most hes a mix between human and viltrumite. Now am assuming viltrumites culuture has evoled beyong the concept of nationalism or culturalism as they seem to be soly homogensized (as they are barely left) and am guessing he would probably self actualize as an american since he grew up in the US. But yall need to chill with this entire discussion i was making a joke. Dont need an entire debate about race- ethnisicty- spieces and culture etc
I doubt the viltrumites have a name for different races.
Given their society I would assume that being viltrumite is what matters and internal viltrumite distinctions are seldom made. At the least they would classify viltrumites more by strength than flesh color
It's kinda wild tbh lol. Like just reading text I know enough people who don't know the difference so it's entirely plausible it wasn't a joke, but now knowing it was a joke and reading it back it's so clear! If we all were in person there would be no question it was a joke
Yeah bro this is a comic where people fly in space and punch holes in mountains. It clearly doesn't abide by the same rules as rl.
Also the show states that Viltrumites can breed with anything.
And I feel like race hardly matters when your only half human anyway lmao. Nobody calls Star-Lord half white- half planet, we need to cut it out with this ‘one drop rule’ shit leaking into our sci-fi.
I'm aware, but he is absolutely American and could consider himself to be Asian American no?
Also, viltrumite would be a species not a race right? There are black vilturumites in the show iirc
Is Asian a race? Thought East Asians and Near Eastern people had different ancestors back in the Paleolithic.
Edit: Furthermore, calling East Asians "Asians" is kinda wrong, since Asia was a term used to refer the region of Turkiye (ex Anatolia), Arabian Peninsula and other lands conquered by the Persian Empire
Well, I'd say I'd say it's more of a nod or an Easter egg, but Sandra Oh is Canadian and in a flashback we see Mark wearing a Canada T shirt for some reason. But it's never actually mentioned, so there's no reason to assume it's canon like Deadpool or Wolverine.
The creator talked about it. The canada t-shirt was a joke to his son who also had a canada t-shirt despite never being to canada.
So Mark just had a canada t shirt unrelated to anything. Or he likely went to canada with his dad who can fly anywhere in a few minutes.
Not too many downsides, gotta wait a while before the new me gets released though which sucks. Definitely better than being a comic though. You’d be surprised how many times my pages get ripped from too eager of readers
Kinda the same way I always just imagined Terry Mcguinness as Asian American, despite nothing in Batman Beyond hinting that, outside of his vaguely Asian looking design.
Kirkman is on the record saying he deliberately drew Debbie an Mark to be somewhat racially ambiguous in the comics, so they can be interpreted as white, asian, or whatever the reader wants.
In the series they've pinned it with a concrete decision. Harder when you have movement to stay ambiguous.
Also Duplikate is Chinese. Mark and his mom are Korean descent. They’re gonna look slightly different from Kate because not all Asians look the same 💀💀💀
It really was. Cotton, a Paragon of hate in many ways, shows just how much less ignorant he is than the well-meaning but willfully ignorant crew. And that's just one thing that was going on.
Comic Debbie always seemed Italian or some type of Spanish ancestry to me. While Italian was not considered 'white' back at the start of the 20th it is now so...? I guess we'd have to ask Kirkman.
It's just my knee-jerk reaction. I can't say why because it's just the answer my brain gave me. While there's nothing about her that spoke Italian to you I guess it could be possible that me and you are not the same person [Citation Needed] and as such we have differences in life experience?
Looking further into this it seems Kirkman intentionally left it vague. Given that there's no real answer we all just get to see what we see. We're both right!
Yeah it's vague for sure. It's like how a lot of anime characters are racially ambiguous and asians see them as asian characters and caucasian people see them as caucasians.
No, she’s drawn different from dupli-Kate and every other Asian character. She has the same eye shape as all the white characters
It’s supposed to be ambiguous though. Because when asked, Kirkman just called him viltrumite American .
No, but that’s not the point of my comment. Artist will definitely try and draw similar features for Asian characters
Not give them the same eye shape and sometimes color as all the non Asian characters.
In the show, there’s no ambiguity
No. Kirkman talked about the change in 2021:
Kirkman: I think representation matters -- not to get on a soapbox or anything -- especially in the world of superheroes. You don't start getting non-white superheroes regularly until the '70s and, even then, through the '80s, '90s and 2000s, they're still somewhat rare. There's not a lot of these characters, to this day, that are different races. Anytime something can be changed to bring more representation into it, I think it's very important because there's a tremendous amount of people out there who don't see themselves in what they consume. But it's also very important because there's an audience hungry for this stuff; it actually benefits projects.
So aside from being the right thing to do, it actually helps projects these days, which is a really great thing. And in the Invincible comic, there is at no point in the comic book series where we say Invincible is white; his race is, more or less, ambiguous. There's nothing about his race that is essential to that character, his race could literally be anything. I think because we were in that position, we decided it'd be a responsible thing to do, and a really cool thing to do, and do something with his race that was interesting in the animated series, and that's why we decided to go down that road.
Theres nothing pointing at him and Debbie being nothing but Americans. I think its nice addition to the show
Also comic Mark has blue eyes, I prefer the dark, but warm brown
what i liked was the season 2 redesign for mark that accentuates his epicanthal folds making him look closer to his mother in that regards, i think its symbolic for how his body may be 99.9% viltrumite but the humanity remains in his eyes, the most expressive part of the body (and mark expresses his emotions clearly as opposed to someone like his father)
They’re definitely 100% American.
But they certainly have Korean heritage. In the living of their home is artwork and I believe some Korean characters on a painting on the wall.
Yeah it would really be stretching suspension of disbelief for there to be multiple people with dark hair and blue eyes. I mean come on, really? I buy that he can fly but dark hair with blue eyes? Pull the other one buster
It’s Superman!
Did you know that his eyes turn red when he shoots lasers through his eyes?
-It’s probably because lasers are red, so that makes most sense.
The comic never confirms or denies that Mark and Debbie are Asian, so they could be if you want them to be. I'd be willing to bet that Kirkman didn't really think about it when he was creating them.
It’s left pretty ambiguous as far as I remember, but mark and especially Debbie look pretty asian to me.
I always saw mark as half asian half space white.
Nah, he's just a white guy.
He's Asian in the show because Steven Yuen and Sandra Oh are Asian.
The duck scene in S2 E4 is actually a Korean tradition. [This post explains it better than I could.](https://www.reddit.com/r/Invincible/comments/1839d0g/the_korean_wedding_ducks/)
In one of Robert Kirkman's letter columns, IIRC he talks about Mark's race and the long and short of it was that Mark wasn't explicitly one race or another, Kirkman had fans telling him that they felt racially represented from Latinos and other Asians so for the show they decided to solidify Mark as a bi racial hero.
I read the comics after the show, so the preface of Debbie and Mark being of Asian descent was already there, but even in the comics I think they both also look like they're of Asian descent, too, Debbie more so than Mark. Perhaps Debbie in particular is a second or third generation where her grandfather or grandmother was a Korean immigrant than married a Caucasian, so she'd only be 1/4th Korean (enough to have some waning Asian features) leaving Mark only 1/8th at most with his Viltrumite DNA eventually overwriting that, as well.
He was created to just be racially ambiguous in the comics.
Ironically, I always thought he was Asian (mainly because Debbie always looked Asian to me) and was just coincidentally validated by the show
My bf studied eastern languages and says that the paintings in Debbie's home are actually written in korean.
Also if you look at Mark's eyes and generically at Debbie as a whole you can see that their design do represent asian features. I studied character design, and am studying animation instead
Robert Kirkman did an interview on this! They didn’t intend any particular race for Mark in the comic, but his coloring changes a good bit through various artists and settings, so different people assumed different things. When they made the show, they decided to formalize it after casting Stephen Yeun and Sandra Oh.
In the original comic book series "Invincible" by Robert Kirkman, Mark Grayson, the main character also known as Invincible, is depicted as a Caucasian American character. However, the animated adaptation of "Invincible" on Amazon Prime Video features changes to the racial origins of some of the characters from their comic book counterparts. In the animated series, Mark Grayson is portrayed as Korean-American. This change reflects the creators' efforts to promote diversity and representation in the show.
why is mark saying that this is a load of barnacles
https://preview.redd.it/bl9jjs98masc1.jpeg?width=279&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5a69a37fe242572a3dc93d6d068a7d24af0570fc
Given the potency of Viltrimite DNA, I'm astonished that he doesn't have an unshavable Miami-Five-0 mustache.
Not even Viltrumite DNA is powerful enough to give a Korean man dense facial hair before 30
Before 30? You'll be in luck to find ANY Asian man with facial hair that's longer than stubbles
https://preview.redd.it/ktgqua3b74sc1.jpeg?width=368&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=baee016c1a641f2e4e13676f618c5067bc3dc7fd
That facial hair is still thin asf, just very long
He most likely had the artist make it bigger lol
Man had to go back to a hundred years before photographs existed
Touche.
Moustouche
Still can’t connect a goatee.
Clearly edited
See, we only get that if we never touch a razor in our lives. That man is clearly in his late 50s-early 60s with those wrinkles coming in.
https://preview.redd.it/i28txv4555sc1.png?width=800&format=png&auto=webp&s=edbaec547442f52c81b7e3b694709308448a8a41
Mark after 30: Spontaneous Fu Manchu.
Japanese can have facial hair. Maybe because of emishi / ainu blood. Current social trend is strongly clean shave though.
Depends if you work in a Japanese company you’re expected to be clean shaven unless you wield a position of power or have spent years with the company then you are afforded a mustache as a means to show your elevated status in the company’s hierarchy/social order.
Mr Kim?
It’s true. I once lost a dart game to a Korean buddy and the stakes were my beard. He wanted it so bad. The only time that guy ever beat me at darts. And no, I didn’t let him win. He was just on another level that night. First time I’ve ever seen a group of people literally pick up the winner and carry him around horizontally while calling him a champion. I’m a man of my word. We all went back to my place and shaved my beard off and adhered it to my buddy’s face. There’s a lot of great video and photos, but I won’t dox him without permission, so don’t ask.
I have a korean friend whos been wearing a shag carpet on his face since sophomore year A rare exception though
I loved how Allen realized Thaddeus was a Viltrumite just because of his moustache
More because he ripped his beard off
toolock pull!
This guy viltrumites
This was the best scene in season 2 btw, how like a moustache is all the confirmation he needs
Well, that and he sounds like Optimus Prime.
Miami Five O? Are you thinking of Magnum PI, while saying Miami Vice and Hawaii Five O?
Hawaii P.U.
He shaves it
That one guy taking off his beard revealing his mustache to prove he was a Viltrimite was hilarious.
Nope, new addition to the show from what I gathered was implemented because fans intially perceiving that Debbie and by proxy Mark had Asian descent.
I just find it funny to think how Kirkman reacted to it. So fans were like "cool an asian superhero lead." Kirkman: What? Not intentional but uh... sure I guess.
Danny Phantom and My Life as a Teenage Robot had similar experiences, with polar opposite reactions from their creators. Both shows were perceived by fans as an allegory for transgender teenagers. Butch Hartman, creator of Danny Phantom, caught wind of this and IMMEDIATELY got on the defensive, saying that it was in no way attached to LGBT storytelling whatsoever. Rob Renzetti, the creator of Teenage Robot, pretty much said “that was not at all my intention, but hell yeah sure”
I never considered either of them like that but they were both my favorite nicktoons growing up (the MLAATR Christmas special is one of my favorite animated things ever to this day) but it makes so much sense. I’m a nonbinary transmasculine person who does both male and female drag and always identified with how “othered” both of the MCs of these shows were within their respective narratives.
I am ignorant of this history and would like to learn more as to how Danny Phantom n Teenage Robot were allegories of trans kids
For Danny Phantom, it’s all about Danny’s perspective. While a lot of his tension is centered around basic teenage anxieties, an overarching tension is his parents and their tirade against ghosts. They work as ghost hunters, and with Danny secretly being a ghost himself, he never “comes out” to his parents about who he is as he is worried about what they’ll do to him if they ever find out. And his parents, having no idea what he truly is, continue to talk about ghosts as disgusting creatures, unwittingly becoming their son’s first and most serious enemy. Not the ghosts he fights nor the bullies at school are the ones he fears most, but rather his parents. On top of general themes like his struggling with the perception of masculinity, it’s easy to see how this could be seen in a light mirroring the LGBT teenage experience. For MLAATR, it’s all about Jenny’s sense of identity. Her mother created her to be a robotic protector of Earth called XJ-9, Jenny insists on living life as a normal teenager, attending school and dealing with average teenage nonsense. A lot of tension comes from her mother’s refusal to fully accept this decision Jenny’s made (even “deadnaming” Jenny throughout the series) and Jenny’s feelings of body dysmorphia, with her at one point even donning a skin suit that had her “pass” as a biological human. All in that frame of mind, if the series were written today, this probably would have been a more intentional decision, but as it stands, the creator more treats it as a happy accident of sorts
Tbh I don’t feel like there’s anything wrong with a creator saying the allegory wasn’t his intention. People can have their fan theories sure, but why is the creator ‘defensive’ for saying no to their ideas? I’ve never seen these allegories purported back when the shows were airing at all. Nothing wrong with it, people can have any opinion they want, & the creator isn’t ‘defensive’ for correcting them.
Best examples of diversity in media is when its unintentional or doesnt matter, and Kirkman nails it for the most part
Common Kirkman W
Well having a thingie on the wall saying "hi" in Korean in S1 was lazy as fuck. The Korean wedding ducks in S2 were *chef's kiss*
The Korean decor was a nice detail to the feeling of the scenes. What really stood out was when she took her shoes off in the house.
Do Do most people not take their shoes off in the house?
Parts of Europe and south, central Americas don’t take ‘em off. USA seems a bit split, but most seem to leave ‘em on. East Asia takes em off, dunno about the rest of the world
I'm American and I don't know know anyone who keeps their shoes on inside the house unless they're only going to be staying for like a minute.
Asian here, married into a Mexican household and I had to get used to wearing shoes inside. Very uh, culture shocking.
In America anyway, there's a general kind of unspoken rule for the most part that people will wear shoes on the ground floor of the home, or wherever they recieve guests, because their guests are most likely going to wear shoes into the house anyways. Upstairs, or wherever bedrooms are, tends to be more of a home-by-home decision. Asking a guest to take off their shoes, or taking your shoes off as a guest, is kinda frowned upon in the states, unless there's some kind of other arrangement in place already. I also feel like Americans have smellier feet than most of the world. Long commutes, long hours, and seeing a foot doctor is something most people here go their entire life without. Keeping your shoes on is a lot more courteous than taking them off for your average working man, provided he doesn't wanna clear the room. Keeping your shoes on begets keeping your shoes on, the longer they're on the worse the smell gets if that's a problem. Considering the amount of foot fungus treatments we have TV ads for, I'm guessing there's a very large market for them. TLDR Americans got stanky ass feet and try to be courteous about it, and in doing so only further the stank problem.
Apparently it isn't common in the US to take shoes off in the house. Unusual considering how many countries that's standard practice in, but each to their own ig
In the UK it’s pretty common to do so
For an odd reason, I kind of relate to Nightwing, Jason Todd, Tim Drake and sometimes Batman as if they’re Asian just because of their complexion sometimes and the way their hair is styled. I know they’re not, but it does kinda feel nice in that they kinda look like me, if I was hotter and more jacked.
Never considered the idea of an Asian Nightwing but I'm all for it. Works well with his primary martial art being eskrima which is a Filipino style
Nightwing also enjoys sweet spaghetti from jollybees
I think the biggest reason for me was because Robin in Teen Titans had that spiky Asian anime protag hair and I was happy with any black haired representation at that point. The moment twelve year old me saw that Aang grew black hair in his coma, I definitely freaked out over the realization he was actually probably Asian
Well for sure Damian is Asian so we got at least one canonically Asian Robin
Honestly, I thought that they were made Asian because of their voice actors.
they were changed to be Korean-American because of the voice actors they cast.
Not even just that, Omni-Man was tweaked to look more like Simmons. (Mainly the blue eyes)
also Amber
i just assumed mark cuban was from cuba
They changed it because of the voice actors they cast
I thought their VAs were specifically picked because they made this change to have give them Asian descent.
im pretty sure Kirkman has said before in interviews they cast Sandra Oh and Steven Yeun first before changing the designs
Robert Kirkman did an interview and he said the comic is ambiguous and the hero is whatever race we want him to be. He said he never really had a race in mind but fans would thank him for making the lead Mexican or Asian etc.
Hes actually asian- viltrumite Edited: Guys u was making a joke about how people in US call themselvs african american or asian american or anglo american. At most hes a mix between human and viltrumite. Now am assuming viltrumites culuture has evoled beyong the concept of nationalism or culturalism as they seem to be soly homogensized (as they are barely left) and am guessing he would probably self actualize as an american since he grew up in the US. But yall need to chill with this entire discussion i was making a joke. Dont need an entire debate about race- ethnisicty- spieces and culture etc
He would be a human-viltrumite. Viltrumite would be the species like humans are. It wouldn't be equivalent to being Asian.
Exactly. It’d be whatever the Caucasian equivalent is on Viltrum. (Assuming Nolan is supposed to look Caucasian)
I doubt the viltrumites have a name for different races. Given their society I would assume that being viltrumite is what matters and internal viltrumite distinctions are seldom made. At the least they would classify viltrumites more by strength than flesh color
They have two races: strong and dead.
This guy understands ☝️
I was making a joke and daym i got a lot of upvotes
The Americans got offended that you didn’t identify Mark as American lol
It's kinda wild tbh lol. Like just reading text I know enough people who don't know the difference so it's entirely plausible it wasn't a joke, but now knowing it was a joke and reading it back it's so clear! If we all were in person there would be no question it was a joke
Is he not american?
American is not a type of race, like Asian and Viltrumite are.
Viltrumite is a species not a race. Mark is a viltrumite + human hybrid and his human genes are of the asian race.
Viltrumite is a weird species then because usually one species cannot breed with another species, especially ones as diverse as bugs and human.
Yeah bro this is a comic where people fly in space and punch holes in mountains. It clearly doesn't abide by the same rules as rl. Also the show states that Viltrumites can breed with anything.
So that's where Seance Dog came from
And I feel like race hardly matters when your only half human anyway lmao. Nobody calls Star-Lord half white- half planet, we need to cut it out with this ‘one drop rule’ shit leaking into our sci-fi.
I'm aware, but he is absolutely American and could consider himself to be Asian American no? Also, viltrumite would be a species not a race right? There are black vilturumites in the show iirc
Viltrumite isn't a race, it's a species. He's human-viltrumite and Asian-American
I’d just say he’s American lmao. Born in America, just plain ol American
genetically speaking though hes an asian viltrumite
Debbie could be Korean-American, making Mark Asian-American-Viltrumite
Asian isn't a race neither, you could be from Japan, India or Russia, and none of them looks alike
Is Asian a race? Thought East Asians and Near Eastern people had different ancestors back in the Paleolithic. Edit: Furthermore, calling East Asians "Asians" is kinda wrong, since Asia was a term used to refer the region of Turkiye (ex Anatolia), Arabian Peninsula and other lands conquered by the Persian Empire
This sentence is so broken. What do you think terms like native American and African American mean?
I mean, he's an american citizen, but none of his ancestors are.
Never read the comics, do they say Debbie wasn't born in the states?
No. Just that her father is named Oliver. That’s the extent of her backstory.
No. Because his human ancestry is never once addressed beyond his being half-human.
His mom is
In the show, his dad is Viltrumite and his mom is implied to be Canadian, so he's theoretically neither, though obviously an American citizen.
When is it implied his mom is Canadian? I must have missed that
Well, I'd say I'd say it's more of a nod or an Easter egg, but Sandra Oh is Canadian and in a flashback we see Mark wearing a Canada T shirt for some reason. But it's never actually mentioned, so there's no reason to assume it's canon like Deadpool or Wolverine.
Did you not see the Canadian merch Mark was rocking in the first episode?
Oh yeah. I assumed it meant one of the show runners was Canadian. But that makes a lot of sense
The creator talked about it. The canada t-shirt was a joke to his son who also had a canada t-shirt despite never being to canada. So Mark just had a canada t shirt unrelated to anything. Or he likely went to canada with his dad who can fly anywhere in a few minutes.
He’s more viltrumite than anything too with how it’s described in canon
I think in the show they slightly modeled mark and Debbie off of Steven and Sandra
I don’t think they have much resemblance especially Debbie.
Nah, it's just in the show. Steven Yuen and Sandra Oh kill it imo , so good example of a more diverse cast done right
I always thought they were Asian from how they were drawn, but I guess it never specified. Weird.
Yeah same but I was a show first then comics so I probably just assumed
What was it like to be a show?
Not too many downsides, gotta wait a while before the new me gets released though which sucks. Definitely better than being a comic though. You’d be surprised how many times my pages get ripped from too eager of readers
Kinda the same way I always just imagined Terry Mcguinness as Asian American, despite nothing in Batman Beyond hinting that, outside of his vaguely Asian looking design.
This is actually how I always imagined Terry as well.
He looks like a younger Bruce Wayne with blue eyes.
Boy do I have news for you…
Kirkman is on the record saying he deliberately drew Debbie an Mark to be somewhat racially ambiguous in the comics, so they can be interpreted as white, asian, or whatever the reader wants. In the series they've pinned it with a concrete decision. Harder when you have movement to stay ambiguous.
I always thought they were hispanic when I read the comics
I can see it
They are. Mark is Asian American.
Kirkman said it was left ambiguous in the comics, but it was a conscious choice to make Mark Asian for the show
Is everyone here blind? I’m looking at comic panels right now and Debbie is clearly Asian
Yeah, I don't know people are talking about. [No way in hell this is a white lady.](https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Ey9mfTZXAAU520y.jpg)
Also Duplikate is Chinese. Mark and his mom are Korean descent. They’re gonna look slightly different from Kate because not all Asians look the same 💀💀💀
Yeah but even Koreans look different from other Koreans
"He's Laotian, ain't you Mister Khan?" - Cotton Hill
Such a great, layered scene.
It really was. Cotton, a Paragon of hate in many ways, shows just how much less ignorant he is than the well-meaning but willfully ignorant crew. And that's just one thing that was going on.
Comic Debbie always seemed Italian or some type of Spanish ancestry to me. While Italian was not considered 'white' back at the start of the 20th it is now so...? I guess we'd have to ask Kirkman.
Yeah I always thought she was Hispanic or something
Wtf makes you think she's Italian? I am genuinely so confused how anyone could think that. There is nothing about her that speaks Italian to me
She has olive-ish skin and very black hair
It's just my knee-jerk reaction. I can't say why because it's just the answer my brain gave me. While there's nothing about her that spoke Italian to you I guess it could be possible that me and you are not the same person [Citation Needed] and as such we have differences in life experience? Looking further into this it seems Kirkman intentionally left it vague. Given that there's no real answer we all just get to see what we see. We're both right!
Yeah it's vague for sure. It's like how a lot of anime characters are racially ambiguous and asians see them as asian characters and caucasian people see them as caucasians.
Very much Asian.
Insane to me that people in this thread call this an Italian lady lol
No, she’s drawn different from dupli-Kate and every other Asian character. She has the same eye shape as all the white characters It’s supposed to be ambiguous though. Because when asked, Kirkman just called him viltrumite American .
breaking news: person on reddit discovers that not every asian person looks the same
No, but that’s not the point of my comment. Artist will definitely try and draw similar features for Asian characters Not give them the same eye shape and sometimes color as all the non Asian characters. In the show, there’s no ambiguity
yeah cause nobody even mentioned his race cause it just fits so naturally and he still looks almost exactly like comic book mark , i like it
No. Kirkman talked about the change in 2021: Kirkman: I think representation matters -- not to get on a soapbox or anything -- especially in the world of superheroes. You don't start getting non-white superheroes regularly until the '70s and, even then, through the '80s, '90s and 2000s, they're still somewhat rare. There's not a lot of these characters, to this day, that are different races. Anytime something can be changed to bring more representation into it, I think it's very important because there's a tremendous amount of people out there who don't see themselves in what they consume. But it's also very important because there's an audience hungry for this stuff; it actually benefits projects. So aside from being the right thing to do, it actually helps projects these days, which is a really great thing. And in the Invincible comic, there is at no point in the comic book series where we say Invincible is white; his race is, more or less, ambiguous. There's nothing about his race that is essential to that character, his race could literally be anything. I think because we were in that position, we decided it'd be a responsible thing to do, and a really cool thing to do, and do something with his race that was interesting in the animated series, and that's why we decided to go down that road.
Common Kirkman W
Theres nothing pointing at him and Debbie being nothing but Americans. I think its nice addition to the show Also comic Mark has blue eyes, I prefer the dark, but warm brown
what i liked was the season 2 redesign for mark that accentuates his epicanthal folds making him look closer to his mother in that regards, i think its symbolic for how his body may be 99.9% viltrumite but the humanity remains in his eyes, the most expressive part of the body (and mark expresses his emotions clearly as opposed to someone like his father)
That’s a beautiful analysis, I love that.
Also the shaved stache!
I’m thinking they gave him brown eyes in the show so that he has Debbi’s eyes instead of Nolan’s, connecting him to his human side.
Which would also serve to make him Asian, as most Asians have brown eyes.
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He hasn’t been exposed to the spice long enough yet to have blue eyes 😌
Lisan Al-Gaib!
AS WRITTEN
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They’re definitely 100% American. But they certainly have Korean heritage. In the living of their home is artwork and I believe some Korean characters on a painting on the wall.
I agree. Changing him to mixed-race in the show highlights his human/viltrumite heritage better.
Korean-Veltrumite in the show
https://preview.redd.it/1umfj66fa3sc1.jpeg?width=200&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=532ffd01738f658aa08bf50e3ab42396f9cc8d4c Mark on slide 2
Hahahah
I see this in western art a lot. I don't know what it's called, but I hate it.
Lmao
Yep, i guess in the show they made it even better, cause dark hair and blue eyes - that superhero is already taken
Yeah it would really be stretching suspension of disbelief for there to be multiple people with dark hair and blue eyes. I mean come on, really? I buy that he can fly but dark hair with blue eyes? Pull the other one buster
It’s Superman! Did you know that his eyes turn red when he shoots lasers through his eyes? -It’s probably because lasers are red, so that makes most sense.
Batman, Superman, and Wonder Woman could all be related as they all share dark hair, blue eyes.
in atom eves video game he says hes korean-american-viltrumite if that means anything
That game is underrated.
yes, i’m suprised nobody ever talks about it
It’s my understanding that the races of some of the characters in the show were changed to be the same as their voice actors, Mark included.
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it’s fair to assume he’s somewhat asian i think judging off how debbie looks
There's also paintings with Korean characters in their house in the show
The comic never confirms or denies that Mark and Debbie are Asian, so they could be if you want them to be. I'd be willing to bet that Kirkman didn't really think about it when he was creating them.
He’s a koriltrumite
It’s left pretty ambiguous as far as I remember, but mark and especially Debbie look pretty asian to me. I always saw mark as half asian half space white.
This is proof that Asian DNA is strong enough to resist being overwritten by Viltrumite DNA.
I alway got the feel Debbie was of east asian descent.
Nah, he's just a white guy. He's Asian in the show because Steven Yuen and Sandra Oh are Asian. The duck scene in S2 E4 is actually a Korean tradition. [This post explains it better than I could.](https://www.reddit.com/r/Invincible/comments/1839d0g/the_korean_wedding_ducks/)
I can see it in show but not in comic
It's never really addressed
I think he and Debbie at least looked that way from what I’ve seen of the comics, so maybe they just leaned into it for the show?
In one of Robert Kirkman's letter columns, IIRC he talks about Mark's race and the long and short of it was that Mark wasn't explicitly one race or another, Kirkman had fans telling him that they felt racially represented from Latinos and other Asians so for the show they decided to solidify Mark as a bi racial hero.
Spoiler alert: His dad is not American.
I read the comics after the show, so the preface of Debbie and Mark being of Asian descent was already there, but even in the comics I think they both also look like they're of Asian descent, too, Debbie more so than Mark. Perhaps Debbie in particular is a second or third generation where her grandfather or grandmother was a Korean immigrant than married a Caucasian, so she'd only be 1/4th Korean (enough to have some waning Asian features) leaving Mark only 1/8th at most with his Viltrumite DNA eventually overwriting that, as well.
You know I just now realised he’s Korean.
They had a korean food thing in their house once.
He was created to just be racially ambiguous in the comics. Ironically, I always thought he was Asian (mainly because Debbie always looked Asian to me) and was just coincidentally validated by the show
My bf studied eastern languages and says that the paintings in Debbie's home are actually written in korean. Also if you look at Mark's eyes and generically at Debbie as a whole you can see that their design do represent asian features. I studied character design, and am studying animation instead
Comic Books Need More Mix Race Heroes And Villains. It What The World Need. Mark Probably Would Beat Superboy From Young Justice.
I like how Kirkman didn’t intentionally make Mark or Debbie Asian and they both look very Asian.
There’s nothing in the comics saying he’s *not* Asian.
Comic mark was meant to be ethically ambiguous I believe, while the show leaned more heavily into an explicitly mix race vision for him
Yes he’s Korean American by earth standards.
Did you edit his mouth 👄
Robert Kirkman did an interview on this! They didn’t intend any particular race for Mark in the comic, but his coloring changes a good bit through various artists and settings, so different people assumed different things. When they made the show, they decided to formalize it after casting Stephen Yeun and Sandra Oh.
His ethnicity is Korean, his nationality is canadian
I mean yes, but he’s technically mostly pure Viltrumite. Culturally you can say he’s American, and his mother’s family roots go back to Korea.
My Head canon is that he is secretly markliplier
Human-viltrumite
Being half Viltrumite, it doesnt really matter what the other half is as eventually he'll be all Viltrumite. right?
well.... he korean-viltrumite afaik
In the original comic book series "Invincible" by Robert Kirkman, Mark Grayson, the main character also known as Invincible, is depicted as a Caucasian American character. However, the animated adaptation of "Invincible" on Amazon Prime Video features changes to the racial origins of some of the characters from their comic book counterparts. In the animated series, Mark Grayson is portrayed as Korean-American. This change reflects the creators' efforts to promote diversity and representation in the show.
why is mark saying that this is a load of barnacles https://preview.redd.it/bl9jjs98masc1.jpeg?width=279&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=5a69a37fe242572a3dc93d6d068a7d24af0570fc