šØ Oh dear, I believe you. The comics looking pretty brutal to me even though I havenāt read them yet. So, what Iām about to say goes for the show, not the comics. And I recognize that my opinion will be obsolete as soon as the story continues but oh well.
The reason why I havenāt lost all hope for Omni Man (... yet)
First off, Iām First Nations (Aboriginal, Canadian equivalent of Native American) and hate colonialism/imperial expansion... but I kind of didnāt think Nolan was beyond redemption. As an individual. Bear with me and (as always) spoilers for Season One of Invincible...
āBy the time I was born, Viltrum was already the greatest empire in our Galaxy.ā (Ep. 8)
Nolan was born into this society. Iād say āI canāt imagine how much propaganda was taught to him his entire (long) life before he got to Earth, but Iām actually perfectly capable of imagining it, having been the subject of post-colonial lies:
My textbooks said that my ancestors were all primitive, stupid, alcoholic, drug addicts who just gave up their land and daughters without a fight, rather than acknowledging that 97% of us were killed either intentionally or by plague upon the arrival of European settlers.
I was once sat in a room full of other aboriginal students and we were told we wouldnāt have good enough grades to get a degree, so we should pick a trade. I was a French Immersion student (Iām legally bilingual), getting A or B honours consistently, taking advanced piano and music theory lessons, was in Girl Guides... listen, I was smart (donāt worry I didnāt stay that way). But, sadly, not actually smart enough to have the vocab or historic resources to argue against the teachers and authority figures I relied on to get good grades and be successful. It was a catch 22 where to get good grades, I had to listen to the teachers who told me I genetically could not get good grades.
My professor said Canadian taxes paid for my tuition. No, it fucking didnāt. My band (tribe) is well off, pretty rich. They could pay for 2 years of my degree (which it turns out I COULD get, despite being an aboriginal). My friendās tribe could only sometimes pay for textbooks. It all depends on how well the tribe originally invested currency whenever Canada decided to apologize by throwing some money at tribes. My tribe owns land and shopping districts. Some tribes didnāt know how to profit in this new system suddenly forced on them. Go figure.
Omni Man genuinely thinks humans are cave men without Viltrum (ep. 8). He genuinely thinks that Viltrum has ālifted alien races out of the mud and into the futureā (ep. 4). He states that he believes in their cause. Heās had decades of brainwashing to believe that.
What matters to me is what he decides to to when he starts to learn differently. What does he do when he stops believing everything Viltrum tells him to believe. So far, weāve seen him do what Allen claims no Viltrum ever does: leave the planet instead of destroy it or continue its takeover.
āThat is super weird for a Viltrumite.ā (Ep. 8)
Omni Man, so far, doesnāt seem to be an educator or a high authority world leader. He is one of many soldiers stationed at a planet. A sentry. A cog in the machine?
He didnāt make the decision to take over the universe. Itās been that way since before he was born and heās never been taught anything other than āall alien races are savages compared to us.ā
Iām not saying ignorance is an excuse to be bigoted. I wouldnāt say that l, just because my teachers didnāt know any better, it was okay for them to segregate all students who look like me in a room and tell us that weād never make it to university. But I canāt lose hope that colonials like Nolan are capable of learning to be better. Losing hope that people might some day see me and mine as fellow people would be a death sentence to me.
That said, if you say things are gonna get worse, I šÆ per cent believe you.
Edit: side note, Nolan says he decided to accept the mission to leave Viltrum and go to Earth because his parents died and he felt lost (ep. 4). Just saying that people who recently lost loved ones or are addicts or who need support that they donāt have are the easiest to indoctrinate.
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