READ: Soon I Will Be Invincible

As of ten minutes ago I finished reading Austin Grossman’s ambitious novel ‘Soon I Will Be Invincible.’ In terms of its style it reminded me a lot of Keith Donohue’s ‘The Stolen Child’—odd numbered chapters are told from the point of view of the Machiavellian mad scientist Doctor Impossible while the remaining portions are handled by the newest member of the New Champions, Fatale.

If you couldn’t guess from that, ‘Soon I Will Be Invincible’ is part of the growing trend that is super-hero fiction. Society has this way of thinking of comic books as something ten-year-old kids snag with pocket change or that they are the method of escape peddled to the sort of guys who actually learn to speak Klingon and carry an inhaler. Look at what the biggest blockbusters in recent years have been though: Spider-Man, the Dark Knight, Iron Man—Heroes is one of the biggest things on primetime television at the moment.

Comic books in the Silver Age were goofy, absurd stories but modern writers have brought a fresh spin to the medium and have transformed super-heroes into entertainment adults don’t have to feel ashamed of.

That’s what ‘Welcome to Lazytown’ is for.

Grossman’s novel is a marriage of the trite stories and flamboyant characters veteran readers will identify with—but in new circumstances. Doctor Impossible, who comes across like the Venture Brothers’ resident arch-nemesis The Monarch, swears sporadically and Fatale laments that she can’t recall the last time she slept with a man. Still though, Doctor Impossible fabricates doomsday devices and hatches melodramatic plans fresh out of the pages of Fantastic Four. These are farfetched characters who occupy a world not alien to what we all know.

One of SIWBI’s biggest selling points is the way in which Grossman’s uncanny characters interact with each other. The best dialogue exchanges usually happen between Fatale and Lily, the reformed villainess who just happens to be Doctor Impossible’s ex-girlfriend who few on the team can bring themselves to trust.

I cycle viewing modes in the hopes something exciting will come up to justify holding back the cleanup crews this long.

I give it another try. “So. Blackwolf bumps into Doctor Impossible. Calls the Champs…”

“Except the ones who are out of town, and it’s totally not their fault,” Lily adds.

“Where were you?”

“Robbing a bank, thanks.”

The trouble is that these sort of exchanges are far and few between. They only happen with Fatale, who’s saturated with supporting cast members. Doctor Impossible is a man on the lamb and narrates his history and his scheme to no one in particular. At one point it’s made apparent that he’s preserving his thoughts in a journal—much like what I’m doing here, only much more interesting. Most of the best moments in the book surround Fatale and unfortunately she’s too deep in trying to save the world to have much of a life.

Grossman never stops to let his characters evolve. It’s not until the end of the book, when Doctor Impossible has captured the New Champions, that they really begin to chat with each other. It’s only then that you get to see who they actually are. It makes sense that they never stop to just shoot the breeze, what with a mad genius loosed from his prison cell and bent on conquering the world, but at times you find yourself wanting to see more of where the situation between Blackwolf and Fatale could have gone; you want to see Fatale have it out with Damsel; you yearn for more banter between Fatale and Lily.

You sit patiently back and wait for Rainbow Triumph to say something.

My greatest complaint though is with Chapter Fifteen: Maybe We Are Not So Different, You and I. Mister Mystic is a great character who we don’t see much of in the story. He’s an allegory to Marvel’s Doctor Strange and as Doctor Impossible articulates in pulchritudinous fashion:

Mystic’s adventures take place in other dimensions, or concern legendary artifacts whose existence flatly contradicts the most basic understanding of the historical record. He seems most comfortable in his own milieu, up against werewolves or Indian fakirs—I don’t know these people—mystical menaces that never even crop up unless he’s around.

It’s these tongue-in-cheek sort of statements that make those of us who grew up in this sort of universe laugh and realize that… yeah, those sort of situations did only seem to pop up around Doctor Strange. How often did some sort of totemic spirit come after Spider-man or Captain America, after all?

My gripe though is that this chapter begins with Doctor Impossible falling into a trap Mister Mystic sets up for him and as he tries to deduce a way out of it we’re treated to more exposition on where Doc Impossible came from. By the time he finishes he’s inexplicably triumphed over Mister Mystic and we’re left wondering exactly what just happened…

Still, it’s a good book and one that has easily set the stage for a sequel. Here’s to hoping that next time Grossman gives us more of a glimpse into the lives of his characters—not just their jobs.