As a lover of almost all things superhero (although Ant-Man (Peyton Reed, 2015) is vacuous tedium), when The Boys (Eric Kripke, 2019- ) came out last year, I was thrilled, mesmerised and horrified, bingeing the whole thing in two days. It can be very refreshing, if perhaps a little masochistic, to see something you are very fond of deconstructed and teased for all its flaws, and this is something The Boys accomplishes with a cheeky wink.
The story is relatively simple: morally corrupt superheroes are up against foul-mouthed Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) and his team who are seeking to bring them down for their crimes against humanity – an attempt to effectively end the superhero-obsessed madness that has caused so much unanswered pain. Season two introduces high narrative stakes with the fugitive status of Butcher’s team, the shady Church of the Collective that promises to return The Deep (Chace Crawford) back into top superhero team, The Seven, using their far-reaching influence over the focus of the public eye, and a new super-influencer in the form of Stormfront (Aya Cash). The Boys pastiches the latest in superhero iconography from the marketing of Justice League (Zack Snyder, 2017) to the all-female team-up scene in Avengers: Endgame (Anthony Russo and Joe Russo, 2019), as well as poking fun at the controversy over the Joss Whedon-led bastardisation of Justice League, and addressing the lack of consequences for violence on screen in superhero dramas.
When a superhero punches a human in the face, of course that face would become mashed beyond recognition! Think of all the people Captain America beats up across the MCU. Sure, unlike the Cap-esque figure of Homelander (Antony Starr) in The Boys, Steve Rogers shows restraint, but sometimes restraint isn’t possible during an Act Three mega-battle, even for the most wholesome of Chris Evanses. As a great dead uncle once said, “with great power, comes great responsibility,” but doesn’t this “great power” often leave collateral damage? There is certainly an alarming trend of bloodlessness across family-friendly Hollywood blockbusters, where extreme violence is often shown without addressing the resulting consequences in order to secure a PG-13 rating – namely, by removing the bloody pulp that remains of the victims. If the MCU machine expects us to believe that Captain America can hold his own in a fight against the big boy that is Thanos, won’t he have crushed a few human faces with that superhuman strength along the way? I understand why the MCU does not have Captain America crying himself to sleep at night over all the poor humans who were unlucky enough to get in his way, just as much as I understand why they don’t address the fact that he snogged his soulmate’s great-niece (who may or may not be his own great-niece if you do the Endgame maths). This is where The Boys’ critique of superhero culture is felt most poignantly: the show very much emphasises the chilling abnegation of actual consequences to the violence perpetuated by super-powered characters in mainstream media by showing the opposite, even at the hands of the actual heroes of the story.
Indeed, The Boys does relish in its depiction of graphic violence, but, at the same time, it never pretends that this violence is acceptable. Even if you are rooting for some of the heroes to exact physical punishment on the villains, the action is always grotesque, disturbing and uncomfortable, and the show never permits you to forget as much. This is not to say that the show sacrifices style to secure a more realistic approach to superheroes. The palette is dour to reflect the bleakness of the world the characters inhabit; the visual effects are as good as any DC or Marvel film, and music compliments the storytelling as much as it does in an Edgar Wright film.
Additionally, the second season adds some convincing narrative development to the troubled relationship between Butcher and Hughie (Jack Quaid) that manages to stay true to their characters and their contrasting reactions to the state of the world; Quaid and Urban’s tangible onscreen chemistry alone merits engagement with the series. And they’re not isolated in their striking performances: Erin Moriarty is brilliant once again as Starlight, adding further layers to the combination of vulnerability and empowerment within that character. The supporting cast of Queen Maeve (Dominique McElligott), A-Train (Jessie T. Usher), Black Noir (Nathan Mitchell), Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso), Frenchie (Tomer Capon) and Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) all have their time to shine, and do so with wit and purpose. Antony Starr, as in season one, is certainly the MVP of the show (even with his tongue’s disgustingly relentless quest for milk), and manages to scare the living hell out of you in close proximity to showing you just how charming he can be. Perhaps what is so chilling about Homelander is how convincing he is as a beloved public figure, while at the same time being an irredeemably repulsive villain.
There are some stumbles in the season: the narrative arc of certain characters in the penultimate episode felt uncharacteristically anticlimactic and reduced the otherwise incredibly suspenseful pacing of the season to a tortoise trot. Yet, it’s remarkable that the finale is still a fantastic closer in spite of this. For the most part, The Boys season 2 is a triumph, and I cannot wait to see what they do with the next season, and the recently announced spinoff.
The Boys season 1-2 is available on Amazon Prime.
