| For the alternate versions Mauler Twins, see Mauler Twins' Character Hub |
The Mauler Twins were a criminal scientist duo in Invincible, they served as the secondary antagonists of Season 1, major antagonists in Season 2 and minor antagonists in Season 3.
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What is the significance of the Mauler Twins in the Invincible series?
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Appearance[]
Due to the cloning process, each pair of Maulers was physically identical, with no noticeable differences to distinguish one from the other. The Maulers were blue-skinned humanoids with highly pronounced muscular bodies and were very tall, easily dwarfing most humans, aliens, and other sentient beings. Each had broad shoulders and a shaved head with square facial features. Their main article of clothing was a black, sleeveless leotard featuring a white "M" that stretched from the chest down to their legs. The Maulers always walked barefoot, but they may wear long white lab coats and safety goggles during engineering operations. Additionally, they had black fingernails and toenails.
In A Lesson For Your Next Life, the surviving Mauler (dubbing himself King Mauler) had the right side of his body melted by the destruction of Angstrom Levy's somatic encoder, rendering it uneven and marked with pocks and ridges. His skin had turned a discoloured grey-ish colour, with visible, bulging purple veins. The skin on his face was visibly sloughing downwards, at some parts exposing the bone underneath, including his teeth and part of his jawbone. His right eye is missing, with the empty eye socket partially obscured by his sloughing brow.
As of It's Been a While, both Maulers are unscarred and look the same as they did before the Somatic Encoder explosion.
Personality[]
The pair come across as callous, opinionated and overconfident until they're confronted with adversity. And due to them being literally of one mind, with one's consciousness technologically copied and then transferred into the other, their coordination whenever it counts is borderline seamless allowing them to achieve undeniable efficiency when working in tandem. Such that it is not even uncommon for them to finish each other's sentences back-and-forth, even when the two Maulers are in conversation with someone else, despite the fact that they sometimes openly insult each other with words like "idiot" and "jackass". Though undeniably shown to have a penchant for sadistic cruelty, the Twins' scientific pursuits are not inherently motivated by malice, and instead are the result of a dangerous thirst for knowledge as well as privacy; the duo are more callous in their scientific ambitions than they are outright evil. They can be convinced to work for anyone who offers them sufficient payment, incentive or a chance to further that urge. Despite their high intelligence the Maulers tend to be short-sighted and arrogant, often making mistakes that they never predicted.
Despite their behavior, they are not completely heartless. This is demonstrated when the two seemed genuinely saddened upon seeing Rudy's clone interacting with his original self, explaining in no uncertain terms the issue with knowing which one is the clone; and before that, they even solemnly explained to the original Rudy that the memory transferal he was about to undergo will not transfer his consciousness into a new body, but rather awaken a new version of himself that is completely separate and perhaps very different from the predecessor. Similarly, after the failed mind-transfer experiment left both himself and Angstrom Levy severely disfigured, the surviving Mauler still expressed concern for Levy's mental state and physical well-being, suggesting the latter go to a hospital. This is in spite of the fact that he was furious just moments prior.
Their encounters with Robot and Angstrom Levy resulted in the surviving Mauler never wanting to work for anyone else. This could be what prompted him to elevate himself above the clone using his scars, which went against the nature of the Twins, effectively creating a Mauler that was seen as inferior amongst the two, which as previously stated, ultimately resulted in the clone eliminating the original. Ironically the clone expressly states self-awareness on the matter after taking out the original, seeking to restore the balance between the two.
Powers and Abilities[]
Powers[]
- Superhuman Strength: The Maulers exhibit tremendous physical strength, endurance, and stamina. They are capable of effortlessly lifting industrial-grade objects made of solid metal and other dense materials that are equal to or even larger than their own size, without experiencing fatigue. Additionally, they handle military-grade firearms, such as mounted cannons and machine guns, with ease. Despite their slower movement due to their massive frames and considerable weight, their legs possess a high muscle-mass, enabling them to leap impressive distances and heights within a few seconds, as demonstrated during their prison escape.
- Superhuman Durability: The Maulers display an exceptional degree of resilience, granting them a significant level of immunity against gunfire and explosive forces. They have the ability to endure a series of successive gunshots and explosions without incurring any form of harm or impairment. While they do perceive the effects of such attacks, they characterize it as a minor tingling sensation rather than encountering substantial discomfort. Nevertheless, there are boundaries to their ability to bounce back from adversity. If an individual is targeted at close proximity in a vulnerable area, such as the eye, they may encounter pain and endure observable injuries. Furthermore, formidable entities such as Omni-Man, Immortal, or War Woman possess the capability to administer impactful strikes that, albeit non-fatal, have the potential to induce bleeding and distress. In order to showcase their resilience, one of the twins went as far as employing a drill press in the process of extracting a blood sample, thereby emphasizing the difficulty encountered while piercing through their considerably thick skin. Nevertheless, their bodies can be penetrated by more sophisticated armaments such as the Multi-phase fusion generator turret. The occurrence of this became apparent when, subsequent to their escape from imprisonment, one of the twins was fragmented by the utilization of said weapon.
- Regenerative Healing Factor: The Maulers exhibit an augmented capacity for healing, empowering them to expeditiously heal gunshot injuries, even when inflicted upon their eyes, in a more rapid manner when compared to humans. Nevertheless, despite their impressive regenerative abilities, these beings are incapable of regrowing severed limbs, rendering them susceptible to sophisticated armaments such as the Multi-phase fusion generator turret, capable of penetrating their anatomies. Massive explosions, such as the destruction of the massive somatic encoder caused by Angstrom Levy, are powerful enough to reduce the Maulers into ash and carbonated bones. If shielded significantly enough, they could survive. This was the case of the sole survivor of the explosion on the pier, although the last Mauler had the entire right side of his body severely deformed from the fires.
Abilities[]
- Genius-Level Intellect: The Maulers have demonstrated profound levels of intelligence in several scientific fields and technological prowess, with each pair at the time being capable of creating advanced pieces of tools and machinery to their personal advantage, even from out of seemingly unimpressive means as well as eclectic and on-the-spot resources.
- Cloning Expertise: The Maulers devised a cloning method via rapid mitosis (cell division) of certain blood cells. After having isolated a proper cell, distinguishable from the other red blood cells, one of the Maulers uses a syringe to introduce a serum into and then channel an electric discharge on that cell, causing it to multiply en-mass. The cell sample is then placed inside a vat-machine which further multiplies the cells into a exact copy of his body in a matter of a few days. While the clone is growing, the currently living Mauler feeds them in order to ensure cell growth. As was seen with Robot, this cloning methodology is not limited for the Mauler's use alone.
- Memory Duplication Expertise: One of the Mauler's most important inventions is a device that can copy the entirety of someone's memory and transfer it inside a nascent body, such as that of their clones. After a new clone body has been completed the currently living Mauler uses a this device to copy the entirety of his mind and then places it inside the clone's brain. In doing so, the clone typically awakens fully believing himself to be the original, hosting the latter's duplicated recollection, while the original cannot physically differentiate himself from his creation. The machine is, however, susceptible to brains with abnormalities. In the case of Rudy Connors's over-sized cerebral cortex and sub-developed motor, occipital and peripheral lobes, the machine overloaded and overheated, thus bursting into flames and forcing the Maulers' to surreptitiously improvise during the procedure. Even the Maulers' brains, having neurons less dense than Rudy's, caused the somatic encoder to overheat, resulting in smoke to burst out due to the sheer strain of copying their memories, making such devices strictly single-use and implemented very sparingly by virtue of the Maulers seeing to it that neither twin gets easily killed in battle.
- Medical Expertise: In addition to their knowledge of cloning, the Maulers are exceptionally talented in the fields of surgery and diagnostic observation; made even more impressive for surgical expertise generally demands extensive anatomical knowledge along with peerless manual precision in respect to their scalpelwork. And given the size of their hands, it's a miracle that a Mauler can even hold an instrument as small and fragile as a scalpel to actually create accurate incisions, with it, into a patient's body. Or, conversely, to masterfully mend together damaged bodily tissue as seen when one of them used a laser and some staples to impeccably reattach the Immortal's decapitated head. They were able to place more than a dozen hazardous devices inside the cloned younger body of Rex-Splode without any noticeable knife marks and then later could even insert a device the size of a lace-bracelet inside the nape of clone's neck without any neurological damage being made. But most outstandingly, they were able to ensure a successful memory encoding of recollections from Robot's original organic mind and into that of his newly-cloned body, in spite of the unseen technical complications from only moments before that.
- Engineering Expertise: Aligning with their aptitude for cloning and memory transferal, the Maulers are also very adept when it comes setting up the necessary tools and equipment to satisfactorily meeting not just those endeavors, but also in respect to other fields of applicable science and research which they, time and again, indulge in. With that, they were able to adjust, with record time, Angstrom's sizable memories-transferring apparatus (which he modeled from the Mauler's design) for it to accommodate a near-multitude of other Angstrom Levy's from alternate dimensions in order to meet its intended function, literally "funneling" all their worldly knowledge (in respect to their native dimensions) into their counterpart with the dimension-hopping abilities. And before that, one Mauler alone was able to convert and fully equip a forgotten warehouse into a working makeshift laboratory to not only clone himself with, but also as a site for later advanced experiments. Such as manufacturing an obedience collar from the digital blueprints supplied to them by Robot, then later installing so around the Immortal's neck right before reviving the fallen hero.
Sightings[]
| Season 1 | ||||||||||||
| 1. "It's About Time": | Appears | 5. "That Actually Hurt": | Appears | |||||||||
| 2. "Here Goes Nothing": | Absent | 6. "You Look Kinda Dead": | Appears | |||||||||
| 3. "Who You Calling Ugly?": | Appears | 7. "We Need To Talk": | Appears | |||||||||
| 4. "Neil Armstrong, Eat Your Heart Out": | Appears | 8. "Where I Really Come From": | Appears | |||||||||
| Season 2 | ||||||||||||
| 1. "A Lesson For Your Next Life": | Appears | 5. "This Must Come as a Shock": | Absent | |||||||||
| 2. "In About Six Hours, I Lose My Virginity to a Fish": | Absent | 6. "It's Not That Simple": | Absent | |||||||||
| 3. "This Missive, This Machination!": | Absent | 7. "I'm Not Going Anywhere": | Absent | |||||||||
| 4. "It's Been a While": | Appears | 8. "I Thought You Were Stronger": | Absent | |||||||||
| Season 3 | ||||||||||||
| 1. "You're Not Laughing Now": | Absent | 5. "This Was Supposed To Be Easy": | Absent | |||||||||
| 2. "A Deal With The Devil": | Absent | 6. "All I Can Say Is I'm Sorry": | Video | |||||||||
| 3. "You Want A Real Costume, Right?": | Appears | 7. "What Have I Done?": | Absent | |||||||||
| 4. "You Were My Hero": | Absent | 8. "I Thought You'd Never Shut Up": | Mentioned | |||||||||
Trivia[]
- The Mauler Twins are the first on screen antagonists in the series.
- The Mauler Twins do not seem to reference any pre-existing comic book character. Rather, they are an example of the dopplegänger, a literary trope of a look-alike who seeks to undermine or even replace the original in the same vain of the evil twin trope.
- Coincidentally, The Mauler Twins shares some similarities with the Vreedle Brothers from Ben 10 though they debuted earlier than the Vreedle Brothers.
- Both pairs are twin brothers that are tech savy and skilled in combat, often times using their technology to go up against the heroes of their universe.
- Both pairs have served as villains in their series, though they have occasionally helped the heroes before when the situation requires it.
- Both pairs also specializes in Cloning Technology to resurrect themselves after getting killed in battle.
- Both pairs also shares a brotherly dynamic with each other.
- In the comics, one of the Mauler Twins sports a beard, making the resemblance less uncanny. In fact, the comics showed one of the main Maulers with goatee.
- As seen in "A Lesson For Your Next Life" some of The Mauler Twins alternate selves have blue hair of varying lengths.
- As of Season 2 Episode 4, the original Mauler is officially pronounced as deceased.
- The Maulers may be inspired somewhat by the Hulk or his more intelligent counterparts like Professor Hulk or Red Hulk.
- The Maulers quote “Ah, Thursday. Chicken Pot Pie…” inspires the releases of Season 3 which happens on a Thursday