Advance Review – ‘Universal Monsters: The Invisible Man’ #3 Continues To Thrill

It is a testament to the Universal Monsters: The Invisible Man creative team that, three-quarters through the limited series we still haven’t seen the main character disappear. (Well, you know what I mean.)

He is coming, though. We know it — it’s in the title! Writer James Tynion IV even mercilessly teases us about it, when the main character’s girlfriend complains to her beau: “I feel like I hardy see you anymore.” It’s a meta laugh-out-loud line in a series intentionally devoid of humor. It’s a horror story, after all.

But The Invisible Man isn’t the horror story you think it’s going to be. And that’s what makes it so successful.

Through these first three issues, Jack Griffin tries to find the secret to invisibility. Griffin is no model of sanity to begin with, but the constant exposure to the invisibility drug — as well as his obsession — is accelerating his descent into madness. He finally advances his experiments from animals he finds on the street to a homeless boy. And all the while, he fantasizes about murdering those who get in his way. He even imagines killing his girlfriend when she complains about his singlemindedness.

Artist Dani clearly has some fun with this issue. Drawing an invisible man doesn’t sound like much of a challenge, but that journey to invisibility certainly is. At first, we see the boy Tommy’s musculature. Future doses bring him down to his bones. Finally, his eyes are all that can be seen. It’s all great fun, though a final twist is a bit difficult to understand at first. (You try illustrating a fight where someone is invisible!)

If this were an ongoing series — say Tynion’s Something is Killing the Children — this deliberate pacing wouldn’t work as well because it feels like bloat. Here though, it’s producing one of the best series of the year.

Universal Monsters: The Invisible Man #3 will be available in comic book stores and on digital platforms Wednesday from Image Comics.