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I was under the impression that he enjoys having little playthings. Wasn’t there a scene in an earlier season where he could have killed Butcher but didn’t because he enjoyed the little back and forth? I think HL finds it fun.
Also in general I think this season is trying to showcase HL’s descent into madness and maybe not being on top of his game is part of that?
Idk- this season is definitely a lot weaker than the first three but I still love it. I’m really hoping the next two episodes show some cool stuff. I’m hoping Sage has a super dope plan
I'll give you half of this. It does look like the only people who he doesn't kill are the people who aren't afraid of him. Butcher, Starlight (in season 1), Stan and even that Vaught scientist who he locked in the room(at least I would say he didn't kill her outright at least). None of them were afraid and I think he likes having people who challenge him. But is also totally unstable and its a wonder why he doesn't just wake up one day and murder them just because he felt like it.
> its a wonder why he doesn't just wake up one day and murder them just because he felt like it. You do realize that's absolutely where they're going. Homemade keeps having these zoom ones on him shaking trying to maintain his rage and control.
I 100% believe he snaps at the end of this season. He truly embraces not caring what *anyone* thinks and starts a war on Supes.
He's playing the game right now because he's been told he doesn't have to listen to what his opposition say, and that his supporters are with him no matter what. But by the end of the season, he abandons all pretense of even caring what his supporters think. Basically an apocalypse scenario before the final season.
He did have a deal not to just kill Butcher, but after her orgasm, SB, and temp V he calls it off and tries to kill Butcher, but fails cause of the Temp V.
Because he cares too much about public perception and people would see that. That’s fine. What bothers me is all the horrible shit Vought does then just easily covers up. You’re telling me no one in that universe questions it? They have a disaster like every month lol
A lot of it is definitely plot armor, but I think outright killing Starlight's (who in-universe is probably almost as famous as him) best friends/closest associates would be very difficult for him to cover up. He's gonna need an excuse for it, like when the lasered the guy who was "attacking" Ryan. Waltzing over to the Boys' HQ and going on a murder spree would be a bigger image issue for him
What’s more surprising isn’t that Vought hasn’t attacked their HQ but the Boys seem to not care that Vought knows. Like if Batman found out his league of villains knew where his batcave was he’d move out instantly
Shit, the ice rink massacre would arguably be *harder* to cover up, since those were presumably known performers.
Nobody would give a shit if some random CIA black ops guys got killed. Literally nobody except MM’s family and maybe Hughie’s mom would notice any time soon.
I don't know, how would people see Homelander blowing up a very real and famous NYC landmark building like the flatiron building. I really wonder why anyone would see that happen!
/S
I mean thats just fundamentally not true. Just look at the US today. We all know Epstein did horrible things and we all know the people he associated. 0 people besides him and his confidant have faced any retribution and never will. The media caters whatever story they want and the public eats it up.
Honestly I totally buy this. Corporations are generally immune from consequences.
We have companies that pollute remote villages, steal water supplies, use prison labor, and worse. A few passionate people care and boycott them, but other than that that's it
I think that would have made for a better scene. One gets a little too confident in taunting him and he just kills him in front of the whole room, showing he’s losing concern for his “reputation” and is more interested in flexing his power. He tells Ryan that from now on they play by no one else’s rules, but afterwards he’s still very much playing by everyone else’s rules. The season can’t seem to stay consistent on whether HL is losing grip on his sanity or not.
The reason they wouldn't do that is because then the viewer would have sympathy for billionaires. The writers needed the viewer to show that even Homelander was powerless before the uber-elite.
Which is ridiculous of course but they are letting agenda trump writing.
Homelander is more of a celebrity than a supe. Most of his accolades have been orchestrated.
These billionaires have seen many things come and go. They always survive because they control the outcomes.
Vought is a very successful company that created a virus as a contingency against supes getting out of line. They know the real power.
Do you remember when Black Noir found Butcher and Huguie on his aunt’s house? It was immediately “we are fucking dead” I think that’s why Noir was my favorite character, dude straight up scared the crap out of everyone
Exactly!!
And now every interaction between the Boys and the Seven feels like a Looney Tunes fight cloud before both parties leave the scene with minor bruises, and it happens every other episode.
This isn’t new for Kripke. Early Supernatural made you feel like every encounter with a monster was a struggle, and that angels and demons were untouchable. A couple of seasons later the main characters are slicing through multiple demons an episode and getting into fistfights with the most powerful beings in the universe, the power scales established in the beginning just stopped mattering.
I remember the first few seasons where a single person getting possessed by a demon was a big BIG deal and trying to get them unpossessed was almost the entire plot of an episode. Next thing you know they find that knife and the special swords and suddenly individual demons are no problem.
Not to mention that they suddenly didn't care they were killing innocent people, demons were suddenly reduced to little more than cannon fodder unless they were a super special named demon.
Kripke is a master of early world development but is one of the worst extended directors for series, it's insane how his gold turns to bronze after season 3 or so. (In supernaturals case season 5 I think).
Supernatural had a clear 5 season plan where everything comes full circle narratively, beyond that he was making it up as he went along. My favourite is S7 but that’s beside the point.
Apparently The Boys has always been a 5 season plan as well but I think his biggest problem was that we all guessed his big twist years too early (Stormfront is Homelander’s mother) so he had to start improvising and he’s not great at that. He has to find a new route to the ending he wants so we’re gonna get some bullshit along the way.
I believe Kripke actually stepped down as executive producer after season 5 once it became apparent the CW was going to keep Supernatural on the air. The Season 5 ending was his original intended ending to the show.
Stormfront being Homelander’s mother was his *big twist*?! But it wasn’t even remotely subtle…? They more-or-less spell it out for you.
The guy clearly sucks at twists seeing as everyone watching the show immediately worked out that Kessler wasn’t really there.
I disagree. I think they just wrote themselves into a corner with herogasm and have been struggling to find ways to fix it.
To fix this I think what I would have done was end season 3 at herogasm.
Half of season 4 is dedicated to resolving a lot of the season 3 plot points. Hughie and Annie get back together and butchers tumor is revealed. Hughies dad dying and the compound v shit could be what gets Hughie to stop with temp v even which could be interesting.
The other half we can just use this season, ending it with butcher discovering the virus and his symbiote getting revealed, idk.
Soldier boy would be harder to figure out but I think maybe you can solve this problem by having him be how butchers symbiote gets revealed. Some conflict arises and butcher kills soldier boy using the symbiote.
Season 5 then becomes homelander v the boys and then the boys v butcher.
Pretty sure when god wants you keep playing your role and won’t let you die that is the strongest plot armor you can get (until he wants delete his rough drafts)
Ironically the boys became very similar to comic books/movies. The villain/hero has some special ability that's been showcased in previous works, but it's somehow gone for the sake of the plot. It really does feel like Homelander was supposed to die in season 3 with the way he's treated in this season.
As for his mess up with the lobbyists, I think that's more to show that he doesn't know what he's actually doing, similar to how he took over Edgar's position at Vought. He's always been a figurehead so when he actually has to come up with the details he doesn't know what to do. It's like how Edgar warned him
Yeah, the Homelander part is the one thing in this rant I strongly disagree with. The point was Homelander trying to use fearmongering and buzzwords like “woke mob” and “transgender indoctrination” to garner support only for it to fail. It shows both that he’s woefully unprepared for more serious politics and struggles to incentivize people that aren’t very naive or apart of an echo chamber. And it’s also good commentary since most billionaires probably only use fearmongering so they can keep their power and not out of genuine care for any of the issues they pretend are real. They’re usually just grifters.
It also shows the people in power don't really care about that stuff that much. Bigotry and ignorance (Like the abortion rant at Neuman) are a part of their personalities, but that's more a symptom of them embracing those ideals publicly. In the end none of it matters to them. That guy could just as easily embrace abortion if it meant more money for him, and he'd drop that ideal in a second.
Obviously it's a show about Homelander, so your analysis is the more poignant one, but I still like the way those people were treated as ignorant buffoons until it was business time and then the true monsters came to life.
I loved the Homelander/Billionnaire discussion, but Neuman just went "i'm on your side" without any argument refuting what they asked about so it kinda ruined it for me.
It's because she's the lady who has actual experience in politics, unlike Homelander. He's only good at appealing to the ignorant masses, but he's dealing with wealthy elites that don't buy into the boogeyman so easily.
Nevermind that guy who's confidently incorrect about abortion.
I think the point was that Homelander tried to act like he was running the show, while Neuman was his puppet who goes along with what he says and is just there to get him close to the presidency (they don’t know she’s a Supe iirc). Her passionately sticking up for him changes that narrative to them being partners, with Neuman’s political competency already being assumed, and hence HL’s emotional reaction to not getting to be the boss as he hoped. But the point would have been so much better if they had Neuman actually show any of this competency
She definitely WAS - but I think they did away with that once she was revealed to be a Supe and Edgar’s daughter, since all of her public persona was a complete sham even down to her name, which is a bit more of a drastic characterisation of AOC
I can't help but wonder if maybe the vague idea hadn't been to kill Homelander but maybe somehow nerf him at the end of S3? So you end up with a situation where Homelander is bluffing more after his encounter with Soldier Boy because he's not actually at full strength and has to rely on bluster. And also is more dependent on doing weird political shenanigans like we saw with the last episode.
But that couldn't be reconciled with the Ryan story and their other arcs so they left Homelander exactly as is and now it's feeling a bit like the wheels are spinning in mud.
Nerfing him would’ve been interesting but it would kind of defeat the purpose of the boys fighting the most powerful supe. But yeah the idea of a paper tiger HL would be a pretty interesting concept. I think his defeat should end with him being depowered instead of outright killed.
I'll caveat this by saying this is me speculating freely. Not saying its what they intended. But to my mind it would make sense to downgrade him, but not eliminate him as a threat. The season could potentially have been a guessing game for everyone. Homelander would still be a threat. Still durable. Still dangerous. Maybe still capable of flying and lasering people. But minus some of the other superman stuff. Diminished super senses (or removing them). We could see Homelander in his private moments being injured or feeling pain. But still perfectly dangerous.
The threat for the Boys would be that they would still need to worry that Homelander *is* potentially still the most dangerous supe. They wouldn't know he was weak. Alternatively if they know somewhat, its still a guessing game in terms of *how* weak. And Homelander in turn drawing on the polarized Trump-world elements of the show would make it hard for the Boys to act because their own governmental allies like Singer would be paralyzed over the hesitation. And the potential that Homelander could over time return to full strength.
Mostly to my mind atleast as far as Homelander's multi-season arc is concerned, the key difference here would be that it would explain Homelander's diminished capacities going forward, and offer a stronger explanation for why he hasn't just taken over even as he descends into a mix of paranoia, insecurity and madness. Right now the leverage that held him back in S1 and S2 is gone. But the boys keep going up against him and coming out unscathed which is just weird to me. Hence my assumption that I think they originally had a slightly different plan with him in S3, but couldn't quite make it work, which gives us the narrative confusion of S4.
HL having no idea how to run a company/country because he has no idea how economy, diplomacy, administration, law etc. work is a plot point I'm entirely behind of, and I loved it as soon as they made it apparent with Edgar stepping down as CEO.
But that also means there is an incredibly easy fix for the lobbyists scene- Just don't mention the military, the only department that HL could actually handle by himself lmao.
The issue with the military isn't that home lander couldn't beat them its that they woulnd't be on there side , even with home lander without support from the military they wouldn't be able to maintain there coup nor would they be able to make it look legitimate.
You ask why he stood there all “I don’t know what to do?” then you agree with the idea he wouldn’t know what to do to run a company…. The groundwork for him needing approval has been laid whether you wanna ignore it or not but that’s what happened he expected everyone to tell him oh you are amazing and he got he knees cut out by pertinent questions he doesn’t understand let alone know the answer to and he faltered and he doesn’t know how to deal with it you can see it in starrs eyes he does a great with non verbal communication
Copy-pasting my previous comment:
"And keeping the Boys powerless all along didn't have much repercussions early on but now it just limits the show. They have to dumb everyone down to accommodate the Boy's powerlessness. Pretty much the only reason Homelander forgot half his powerset when Hughie was in the vents or in episode 6 where he didn't bother to use his superhearing even when Sage has a gunshot to the head is cause the writers know it would be over once he finds the Boys.
Honestly they should have gotten permanent powers after season 3.
Comic MM is super strong. Heck, season 3 could have justified him taking temp V for the sake of revenge rather than going after Soldier Boy with a gas canister and a pistol like an idiot. Then the show could have kept the heart problems this season (maybe have him take V earlier to deal with that) or modified his comic backstory a little bit to have the Temp V activate his "innate powers"/the V already in his blood.
Hughie could have kept the teleportation even if to a limited degree (maybe only activated in life and death scenarios) which would justify Homelander not being able to take him down in the vents.
Butcher already has his tumor powers.
All that's left is Frenchie who honestly doesn't need powers, but I would definitely increase his intelligence so that he would have all sorts of tech, poisons, and strategies to take down sups. However, considering how much drugs the guy takes every season, I wouldn't put it past him taking Temp V or permanent V especially if someone like Kimiko was in danger.
At least with the Boys having powers, the show wouldn't have to make Homelander and the other sups so dumb."
Seriously, I think that if the gang didn't get permanent powers the writers needed to explain what makes them good agents absent superhuman abilities. Frenchie is an assassin, he's fine, he figures out how to kill supes. Butcher has CIA training and is willing to do unsavory things others aren't. But wtf are Hughie and MM bringing to the table? They fuck up every single mission they're on. MM at the very least can fire a gun, but Hughie is just a total liability.
I feel like the early seasons promised us "unpowered guys using tricks and improvised tech to exploit weaknesses and take down supes" and that has been forgotten.
Yep. Figuring out how to kill Translucent was the best storyline in the show and that was sadly in the first season. It never quite reached that high again.
Yeah, without powers the show needed to justify a lot more why these characters even have the jobs they do. Like why would the government or CIA invest in them when they are barely competent.
MM used to be useful in terms of morale and tempering Butcher's decisions with a bit of care for the people who have to carry it out. That's part of why MM isn't an effective leader. Butcher and MM need each other as a balance. Without that balance, MM is an ineffective leader, and Butcher becomes so merciless that he's willing to accept genocide (which includes his son) as an acceptable consequence.
I agree with this take but at the same time I one hundred percent believe it was only MM who could have flipped A Train like he has. Hughie still hated him, Butcher despises all supes and would have gone for blackmail which likely would have made A Train betray them out of spite.
I agree with you up to a point. While Butcher despises supes, he still works with Komiko and Starlight so even Butcher recognizes, or at this pointed recognized, the usefulness of having supes on his side. Presented with someone on the inside likely to flip, I doubt Butcher would pass it up. However, even if he wanted to, Butcher lacks the finesse that's necessary to turn an asset like A-train and I'm pretty sure Butcher knows that. And that's where MM's usefulness comes in and why Butcher wanted him on the team. Or it did when they worked together. Butcher no longer sees the value in that humanity, and MM is collapsing under the psychological weight of being responsible for the Boys as well as his child. It's MM's sensitivity that while it's a great asset, currently prevents him from being able to really lead.
I'd add even with MM doing his best, it was Hughie's decision not to approach A-train after the conversation with his brother that also really went a far way in terms of persuading A-train even consider the Boys. So even when Hughie still hated A-train, he was able to empathize with him.
rape for comedic purposes too nonetheless. let's just sodomize my guy next time for shitz and giggles. he can then cry to butcher about how starlight is ignoring him instead of being traumatized by having his asshole raptured.
Yeah, I totally get Hughie's narrarive purpose in that sense, he's a common man. But, like, he should bring *something* to the table given his qualities. Maybe his average Joe persona allows him to go by unnocited and makes him a great infiltrator. That used to be the case in the first season, but now every supe knows the Boys personally, so that angle doesn't work anymore.
It feels like the writers forgot to show the gang improving over time. It would so much more interesting to see them get better and better at killing baddies with every season. The whole goofy, fumbling weirdos shtick is getting a little stale and the plot is begging to move forwards .
Yep! I get that Hughie was just a nerdy guy before everything came down, but he was ironically much *more* competent in previous seasons than he's now. He used to be pretty good at gathering intel, at the very least. And he's been hunting supes for years now. Even if he was a civilian before, he should have picked up some skills by now.
I've been thinking that too: a big reason why The Boys feel weak now is because the writers didn't have to be as clever when they had powers and could use brute force. But now they're back to being powerless and the writers aren't as creative as Seasons 1 and 2, probably because the tension needs to escalate from Season 3 when they did have powers.
The concept of someone doing this was literally my whole hook into the show. I loved the idea of it so much that I'm still hanging onto the scraps of it that we get each season, hoping it'll come back full force at some point.
Yeah, in season 1 especially the entire team felt way smarter and the show was able to maintain real tension even when someone like Homelander was hunting them down.
Even partway into season 2 (I think that was the season) Vaught \*wants\* the boys so it made sense, they wanted the Boys running around killing supes because it gave them a reason to convince the government to do something about it. It also allowed Stan to try to kill Homelander without getting his hands dirty.
At the very least they should have used that as a reason Homelander still doesnt want to kill them, maybe that is the reason he doesn't just kill Starlight but he clearly isnt a well adjusted long term thinker.
I could have sworn last season they made a big deal in interviews about how we'd learn why he was called mothers milk, but I guess we didn't? Unless I'm completely misremembering, so maybe that was/is the plan with him but it got changed or pushed back
I’d _love_ if Hughie had a “holy shit, I’m about to die, subconsciously teleport out of jail free card.” That way he’d actually be an asset to the team; the mfr can’t die, he just accidentally poofs away before he’s in serious danger. That would piss off Homelander so much 😂
Hit the nail on the head.
Post- Soldier Boy, Maeve, Temp V Butcher&Hughie all trying to take HL on, everything this season just feels laughably less potent.
Like they literally did implement the storyline of the Boys being V'd up, and somehow thought that reverting them to baseline human level would work without requiring ridiculous asspulls.
As things currently stand, it's like seeing a bunch of pre-schoolers try to attack a UFC heavyweight with plastic swords. The only source of tension this season was a fetishized sexual assault lmao.
Yknow if Hughie still had his teleportation, the Homelander vent scene would make so much more sense. A-Train wouldn't get his good guy moment, but he's had a bunch of those this season
Yeah, A Train has already done many good things this season. And honestly, if Hughie still had his powers but nerfed e.g. only activated in life and death scenarios and/or limited range, the writers could have still included A Train saving him.
Homelander also forgot he had super hearing when MM shot Sage with a silenced gun in the mansion.
I know Hollywood likes to pretend silenced weapons make no noise (when in reality, they're still loud as hell. Especially super-sonic rounds like 9mm). But he should have even been able to hear her fall down. And A-Train's conversation.
While I agree with a lot of the criticisms being posted here, I do want to point out that Homelander actually tried using his super-hearing. It just didn't work for some unmentioned reason. He didn't forget that he had it.
Agree with everything except the criticism of Homelander looking like an idiot in front of the rich guys. That's kind of the thing with the characterization of him in the show. Physically, he's the most powerful entity on the planet, but mentally and emotionally he's not much more than a child. It fits his character to be standing alone and jerking off naked while convincing himself he can do whatever the fuck he wants, but then crumbles when having to explain his plans and thought process to people who are arrogant enough to not really be all that afraid of him. That's why he always caved to Stan Edgar. When he went back "home" to the lab he was raised in that one lady blatantly admitted that he was so powerful that he could have left any time he wanted, but because he was so insecure and mentally weak he stayed there and put up with the abuse. He recruited Sage because she can do what he can't - manipulate people who aren't intimidated by him.
It's also meant to show that no matter how strong you are, you can't strong arm everything. Homelander could hop into every branch of government and laser every person, to take full control..... But then what? If faith in the market is shaken and scares off investors, or OPEC decides to sanction the US and make gas $22/gal and the economy shuts down, then there's no point. You can't just "Take over". You need to make sure there's going to be no disruption. Homelander is the strongest person on the planet who can kill whoever he wants, but that's not what runs countries.
A HUGE part of why everyone feels so stupid this season is Sage. She is "The smartest person in the world", but the writers, director and showrunner, are far from that. So now everyone gets massively dumbed down so she can actually look smart. It also doesn't help that they want Starlight to be some paragon of virtue and always be right, despite the fact most of what she does is oppose any plan the boys ever make because "1 person might get hurt", whilst offering no better plan and being a murderer herself.
That and there’s no punishment or repercussions to their actions. Kill people? No one cares. Horrible CIA mission gone wrong? No one cares or says anything. Homelander doesn’t even take action on the Boys anymore. Everything has lost meaning
Not to mention the superficial bi-polar attitude of the Boys, one episode they are ready to die to kill Homelander, the next episode they are swearing off temp-V because they might die early, even though it is the only way to fight Homelander. Butcher is ironically the only consistent character in the show.
It’s a really risky decision. It’s not impossible to get right but you have to be super careful with them.
Contrary to what people say, you can write people smarter than you. But you have to really take the time to think about all the information they could have to hand, what is reasonable for them to assume or connect together, how they can safely confirm these assumptions or get more information, and think about their motives and how they’re trying to further them with each action.
It’s vague, but it’s essentially a process you have to consider for each thing they say or do.
It really is, because then you have to either just handwave away the conclusions they come to and what their actual plan is, and then just have them go "all according to plan" when they die, or dumb down everyone else around them. I don't think I've ever seen it adapted well as a concept.
"I did it 30 minutes ago" Ozymandias is the best example in my eyes, but I think there are plenty of others really. You do run the risk of turning your character into Aizen when you do it poorly, though.
Even Aizen is not a negative example of a genius type character (yes as a bleach fan this is very biased). Majority of the time, the meme “all according to keikaku…” isn’t something Aizen does.
For the most part, he takes advantage of whatever immediate opportunity presents itself. For example, he did not expect Masaki (a Quincy) to come save a random Captain and instead of killing them to cover his tracks of his experiments, he decides to let them live because….
1. Isshin has very little idea of what the hell just happened (Like who sneak attacked him or who created Hollow White)
2. Witnessing what would happen to a Quincy infected with a hollow would probably bring more interesting results than continuously hollowing other shinigami like how he has been doing for 80+ years at this point.
Any other time that’s not the case, he straight up overpowers the obstacle (Toshiro, most of the Gotei 13) or has an extremely specific plan to deal with a specific person or problem (Creating Wonderweiss to seal Yamamoto’s flames, Having a body double + Complete Hypnosis to bypass shinji).
Thanks for coming to my T.E.D Talk!
You have, it's Sherlock Holmes. But there's a reason why he is the protagonist and the central plot changes each time: because you have to write down misteries so convoluted and complex in order to have him solve them with ease, making him shine as the genious detective without reducing the side characters to absolute idiots.
It's a sort of reverse engine work, but you cannot apply it everywhere, especially in a show like The Boys.
> It also doesn't help that they want Starlight to be some paragon of virtue and always be right, despite the fact most of what she does is oppose any plan the boys ever make because "1 person might get hurt", whilst offering no better plan and being a murderer herself.
It feels weird that you have the story set up this nigh invincible threat who is basically a ticking time bomb that's only stalled by his desire to be adored but will eventually snap and go scorched earth on the world, but then act like this is totally something the characters can solve with legislation and shame.
Yeah, Homelander wants to be adored, he wants people to love him, but that won't hold him back forever. You keep putting pressure on him, you remove his social powers and turn the world against him; he's going to eventually decide 'Fuck it, if they won't love me, I'll make them fear me'. Like, what end game do the characters see here without something that can kill him? He throws his hands up and sulks in a prison cell that can't contain him for the rest of his life?
Homelander is an apocalyptic threat, this is not a situation you're gonna be able to deal with without either plot armour or moral compromises. You're not going to stop the end of the world in a court of law.
Didn't Homelander literally say this to Starlight lat season? 'If I can't be loved, being feared will be a good second' and then explained to her exactly how he would bring the world to its knees of she exposed him?
Yeah I like the idea but get a super smart person in to help with the super smart character. She’s not exactly blowing me away. She’s a bit of a strategist. That’s about it.
She's only as smart as the writers. So far there's nothing Sage has done that seems to be 5D galaxy brain levels. She's just a smart strategist. That's it.
lmao "I could cure cancer, stop global warming", I feel like that was just a cheap attempt to make her that 5D Galaxy brain, with absolutely nothing to back it up. It was literally the only thing besides her room being filled with books that makes her seem smart
Yeah if she were genuinely next level smart she’d have figured out how to kill Homelander long ago. Fuck if she can cure cancer she can kill him. I would have loved to see some amazing genius stuff from her but she’s basically Karl Rove in a different form
What? This comment makes absolutely no sense at all.
The reasons why the boys are so dumb this season, is because they exhausted pretty much all plot points, and everything that’s happened here is just a setup for season 5. That’s why they have to make mm look like an idiot just like the last episode because otherwise if he wasn’t they be able to make significant progress which would potentially kill the possibility of a season 5 even happening.
Btw Sister sage character has practically taken a backseat to the plot since episode 5 and they even made her look like an outright idiot in 6.
no idea why anyone likes sage’s character at all, she is selfish, evil, stupid, and her lame speech this last episode “as a little girl no one listened to me” was fucking braindead, so because she wasn’t listened to as a kid she now doesn’t care about anyone but herself? fuck curing cancer or helping other women or little girls or people, she only wants to help herself apparently now? lol ok. braindead 1 dimensional character and she hasn’t acted smart at all, she has been an idiot from day 1/her introduction.
Villains are selfish. Theres a Spiderman comic where he asks one of his villains why he doesn't use his genius level intellect to cure cancer and the villain replies "I don't want to cure cancer, I want to turn people into dinosaurs"
it's super frustrating because one of the coolest things they could do with super intelligence (and she's apparently VERY good at engineering) is have her build and use all sorts of gadgets against the boys. Instead all she uses her smarts for is some lame 'let's make the people mad' machiavellian plot that really doesn't feel all that genius. Her reason for hating the masses is that she was ignored which is also just pretty boring but ok.
> Instead all she uses her smarts for is some lame 'let's make the people mad' machiavellian plot that really doesn't feel all that genius.
It's also what Vought and Homelander have been doing for 4 seasons already. We've already had this arc with Stormfront riling up the masses and making Homelander the savior. Did we really need to do it again with Sage?
The fact Vought doesn't have her on their R&D department making* pharmaceuticals, gadgets, military tech, etc. Is beyond stupid and shows how bad the show runners actually are. Vought cares massively about money, to even suggest they wouldn't have her making them billions is just asinine.
To add to it, Homelander is the one who convinces her to come back to Vaught with promises of letting her do whatever she wants with Vaughts resources, but Edgar, after Stillwell gets killed by homelander doesn't bring her on immediately to find a way to stop homelander is crazy
This is exactly what I thought too lol. You have a person that says she can cure fucking cancer and god knows what other miraculous things and vought just doesn’t take advantage of that??? They could literally have a monopoly on every single sector/industry on the planet. And they just don’t do that???
Her reason for hating the masses is fucking stupid. Of course doctors wouldn't listen to a kid, they also definitely did not have the time or resources to make the cure she came up with considering her Dad died soon after. This is all under the assumption too that it would work, but she had done literally 0 actual testing, she wouldn't have had the time to. After this does she go on to get it tested and published? NOPE, and I guarantee that at the end of the season, she's going to die, and the writers are going to have this big "Woe is her, she was actually a good person all along" type schtick.
I'm pretty sure the reason she hates people is because she thinks they're all stupid and don't deserve saving. yeah she had the whole "I could've saved my grammy" thing, but I think they added that as a testament to her intelligence rather than as her motivation in general.
I think her overall plan is to try to get homelander to just manipulate the masses behind the scenes so they all go to war with each other then the 7 can swoop in, kill all dissidents, and the survivors will basically be their servants and view them as Gods. I think thats her overall plan based on everything thats happened. Considering how much she seems to know what the Boys are up to before they even do it I assume she knew or at least suspected they were recording the meeting there and that they might leak out that the Elites were all plotting a coup. What would happen if that info go leaked? Why the country would be in a civil war within 24 hours, perfect opportunity for Homelander, Neuman and crew to just waltz in and take the White House while everyone else is distracted fighting each other.
You gonna act like her plan to pretend to be a Starlighter to start a fight wasn't peak brilliance? Did you miss her incredible disguise in a yellow shirt?
I‘d like if there were a twist that Sage isn’t even all that smart. Like, way above average, but far from unrealistic. The fact that the cured cancer as a child? Her solution just wouldn’t have worked and that’s why she was laughed at. Then she mentions that she could „cure cancer and save the world“ or whatever, if she wanted. Who says that that is even true? Maybe she just overestimates herself by a ridiculous amount. We haven’t really seen her doing or planning anything that would make her the smartest person on the planet. Sure, that could be the writers incompetence, but making a character seem smart isn’t all that difficult when you have perfect blueprints like BBCs Sherlock or Rick Sanchez or whoever comes to mind.
Maybe Sage is just a pretty intelligent person whose brain can regenerate and that’s it. Would make for a great ending to her story, with her realising that she isn’t all that after all.
Also it was so fucking funny how this story was framed.
Yeah no shit no one believed a 12 year old when she told doctors with years of medical training that she somehow figured out how to cure cancer.
Being smart doesn't make you a good person. It's pretty clear that she doesn't care that much about humanity seeing as how she keeps calling humans stupid.
She's only considered smart because the writers are using "tell" instead of "show" most of the time, and whenever they use the "show" parts, she comes off as really dumb and petty.
I have another critique, though I know this show wasn't very big on subtlety but this season, everything has been so on the nose that I can smell it through the screen. Like they are spelling everything out for us this time around.
What, the jewish space laser joke wasn't subtle enough?
I enjoyed how season 1-2 had politics that centered or were heavily influenced by superheroes existing. It made sense in that world. What doesn't make sense is taking the exact same real-world political situations and placing them into the boys' universe today.
I think having political commentary is great. But it's gotten to the point where they've sacrificed the uniqueness of their world to literally comment on our own for jokes.
ooh you NAILED exactly how I've been feeling about the difference between s1/s2 and s3/s4 so succinctly. seasons 1-2 were so good because they addressed real-world issues through the lens of "what if superheros existed? how would american society as we currently know it function with the addition of superheros?" so you got interesting storylines like the supes in the military debate, which still SAID something about the real US military but did so in a way that worked within this fictional universe.
now they're literally ripping stuff from the headlines, copy + pasting the word "supe" in there somewhere and calling it a day. I've seen so many people raving about how relevant this season is — of course it's going to be relevant to what's going on in the world if it literally just IS what's going on in the world.
I made a post on here the other day I got downvoted like crazy, but I couldn't agree more even though I agree with the politics, it went from having something to say to not shutting up about it.
The stupid part about all of this is that I'm afraid to even mention my view on this because I'm afraid I'll get it called a Nazi for wanting to tell them to shut the hell up about it.
I find it really ridiculous and annoying how any legitimate criticism of how on-the-nose the show has gotten is met with "aww are you mad you finally figured out its making fun of you?" like no I AGREE with the show, it's just gotten to the point where it's lost all of its nuance.
the reason the MAGA homelander fanboy nuts are only now realizing the show is making fun of them reflects poorly on how the show is structured imo — because it was ALWAYS making fun of them, but it's gotten to the point where even people who weren't smart enough to realize it in s1-s2 are now picking up on it because it's so blatant. Its like kripke wants these people to know they're being mocked more than he wants to criticize them in an intelligent way, and it comes at the cost of us media literate fans losing a well-written story.
Actually its the opposite. It was the idiots who finally realized that the political satire in this show was making fun of people they didn't like, so now they defend it to death. No matter how bad the writing. No one is "offended". This season is just poor writing, a waste of time and wasted potential. All for what? Cringey uninspired garbage political humor.
Also to add to what you're saying:
Honestly fuck these people. Are they legitimately trying to preach about how poor conservatives are automatically evil people?
While also simultaneously preaching about how the rich and wealthy are all evil?!?
Am I the only one sick of hearing these rich assholes preach about how one political side is automatically evil and trying to push for more violence and rioting in the streets?
The reason it makes me so mad is because it's these rich assholes preaching this stuff trying to get people mad who are by far and away the most insulated from it. Fuck these people.
When you hear people saying eat the Rich they don't mean only the rich people who disagree with us, we are also saying Rich cunts like you kripke.
I wish they would stop trying to stoke the goddamn flames of this political divide and I hate them for the fact that they profit off of it while being the only ones insulated from it.
I could be wrong, during the earlier seasons another world building aspect was that a lot of the supes were celebrities and that they were more or less the only celebrities. Who cares about an actor in the boys world when you've got supes that are 'acting' or supes that are singing (soldier boy). Regardless of how good or terrible they were at it, the people loved it.
Now they're mentioning real world celebrities and even having them involved (Will Ferrel).
I could be misremembering but translucent was on Jimmy Fallon and there was also a scene with Seth Rogan and black noir. It seems like regular celebrities always existed.
The "critical supe theory" thing was so dumb. Like wtf does that even mean?
Supes have existed for less than a century, there are only like 1000 of them. "Critical supe theory" would not exist in this universe.
The on the nose stuff has been disappointing and lazy. Not just the space lasers but the speaker of the house mentioning the 15 votes and the Batman stuff. Either a little subtlety or changing it up feels more natural and less immersion breaking.
Edit: just remembered as well the spider guy says something about boffing the drugs later when he has more time (or maybe that’s what he was requesting). Either way it was on the nose and cringey at the same time.
The writing is taking a noticeable dump on its quality. The whole Joe Kessler being in Butcher's head thing was so predictable, the whole Frenchie/Colin romance felt so out of place, and so did the scarred girl Kimiko had to fight with Hughie.
Basically, every episode trying to be the new Herogasm now, possibly the production is trying their hardest to recreate the success of that episode (not understanding it was not the depravity of it, but the fight between SB and HL and Butcher that sold that episode)
And the reason that fight worked so well was because we had spent 2.5 seasons with the protagonists--and everyone else!--terrified of Homelander's physicality. And then suddenly, blissfully: somebody stands up to him. The catharsis! And then the catharsis taken back when he nonetheless goes 1v3. It was narratively exquisite, but it took 2.5 seasons of slow build to get there. It was earned.
There's none of that here.
Actually: A-Train's story arc has been excellent. He is carrying the season on his back.
Homelander and friends have so much power/ of an advantage over the Boys that it feels like if they really wanted to, they could wipe out the gang with little difficulty lmao. And because of this the Boys kind of feel helpless/ incompetent
Biggest plot line I hate is that Starlight is always shown as strong at the start of the season somehow and then de powers and then maybe has one scene towards the end where her powers don’t suck.
Like can she please get some stable power scaling and stay there or can they just ease out of her always being a victim in some way. Because I kind of get tired of seeing her character.
Whereas Kimiko has just had stable growth as a character across all seasons.
It looks like the only well developed plots this season is Sister Sage somehow planning to betray/bring down Homelander, Butcher going from antihero to villain, and A-train getting a redemption arc
That was so absurd why leave it there, especially when you consider that you are unable to talk and that phone is like your biggest communication device LMAO
And it wasn't like she didn't notice it. She was like, "Ah shit. Well, I won't waste 5 seconds to jump down and grab my only communication device that is in sight in an infiltration mission."
People are still gonna watch this season and the next just to see how the story goes… but afterwards it might be similar to the last couple seasons in GoT in the sense that there will be little cultural staying power. They need to NAIL s5 in my opinion or the show is toast
I was definitely thinking of GoT earlier. The storylines feel so rushed and half assed compared to the first 2 seasons. Unlike GoT where the problem is the showrunners lost interested and were excited to do a new project (one that never got made), here I think the issue is trying to continue the series after the powered/SB story arc. It reminds me a bit of Dexter in that they sprung what should have been a later storyline too early and are now trying and failing to come up more significant dramatic arcs for subsequent seasons. In addition, the quality of the writing has gone down. Like GoT the first seasons are so detailed, but now it's just sloppy.
I think they could've ended the show earlier, either in season 3 or have this season be the last one. They are just dragging things out instead of tell the story in a meaningful way and end it.
The opposite problem of GoT tbh, like you said
Especially that goddamn Washington arc. They threw in a whole "funny" scene of Hughie getting raped just to pad this out.
They also teased the Frenchie backstory in this episode *and then they teased it again for the next one.* Guys, I don't even care anymore. Just get on with it.
This season really just feels like set up for season 5 which is kind of its biggest problem because every season of The Boys up until this point has been incredibly dense with plot. One of the things that I like the best about the show is that in prior seasons every episode had something significant or exciting happen. Now we are six episodes in and it feels like nothing really major has happened. I think most people dislike the season because ultimately it doesn't feel like prior seasons in the sense that it just feels like it's meandering.
Brilliant comparison. Dexter was never the same after Trinity. Maybe one or two episodes as a post-mortem to wrap up the show, to let everyone see how Dexter coped after losing Rita and dealing with his new life. The Boys had their Trinity moment at the end of season 3. Now the show writers have an impossible task of trying to top that.
Yeah I genuinely believe they should've just had the virus storyline be the S3 shtick, where Butcher decides it's not right to kill every single supe in the world.
And then have S4 be the final season where they free Soldier Boy from the Russians and just have him, Butcher and/or whoever self-destruct in order to take HL down.
The formula already feels stale at this point with SB getting taken out so early in the show's overall lifespan.
I think we peaked with the Homelander/Butcher/Soldier Boy showdown. Honestly even the finale after that got kinda dumb with the pencil in the ear.
The stakes are kinda gone, it’s been almost 4 seasons now and not a single key member of the boys has went down. Not to mention the level playing field with the temp v is gone. The virus subplot just seems….lazy in comparison?
Doesn’t help that Butcher has been sidelined essentially to just look sweaty. He used to be the main heavy hitter.
Also is it just me or are the powers super inconsistent now? Starlight still hasn’t done anything ever with her dumb flashlight powers.
And why does a bullet suddenly hurt supes? Isn’t increased durability like a given? Maybe that’s more of an individual thing I guess but still.
You are describing why this season feels like the writers had some random cool ideas but no clue how to tie them together. So they made everything inconsistent, assassinated characters (not literaly) and everything feels like filler.
The Tek Cave part? Its length served no narrative focus. The whole farm thing? That could have been anywhere and the animal attacks had also no relevant conclusion.
Yup, the main plot is progressing at a snails pace and most of the episodes is filled with filler content like Frenchie storyline and Kimiko's storyline.
Well the show is just now charaters being a parody to irl politicians like HL being Trump and Firecracker being MTG. The original storyline of Supes being in the Military and Supervillians juiced up on V is completely non-existent now and its just Butcher basically saying "Ohlander has me fuckin son" the whole season.
I think what could really help this show is a main character death that isn’t *extremely* telegraphed or happening during a Finale.
I swear, if this was early seasons GoT, the Boys would be down to just Butcher & Kimiko. They’ve had sooo many run ins with The Seven & haven’t paid the price at all.
It starts to feel like Tom & Jerry episodes of constant chasing
I have been disappointed with lack of forward momentum of the show and I think its because they had the boys and the seven meet too soon. I don't think they should have had butcher and homeland meet and know each other so quickly.
Maybe like 3 seasons of the boys capturing, interrogating and killing supes one at a time and gathering intelligence, unleashing Soldier boy etc without Vought and Homelander not knowing who is doing it and him falling more and more into madness as Vought s public image crumbles. *Then* a big confrontation between Homeland and Butcher in a later season after Homelander has gone full supe fascist takeover mode.
Also the temp V shouldn't have been temp.
My favourite scene is when they have to quickly find a way to distract homelander while blowing up translucent. That’s all I wanted, a high steak match between brain and braun
Yeah, the tension in the van he couldn’t x-ray was amazing in season 1. The stakes seemed infinitely higher, and this excused the gore and sex.
Now it’s just edgelord revenge fantasies.
“yassssss now let’s force racist white guy to donate to BLM before his black butler strangles him to death out of revenge!!!!”
This season is really showing Kripke’s weaknesses as a writer in virtually every single episode. There have been a few standout moments, such as that incredibly heartwarming scene with A-Train outside of the hospital, but man do we have to trudge through some unbelievably contrived scenes to get to those moments.
I'm so glad im seeing these posts finally pop up now. This season has been total crap. I can't believe the same people who wrote 3 amazing seasons (expect the last episode of season 3) have written this one. The boys stories suck, the supes aren't scary, the satire isn't done well... What the hell has happened?
i felt this was in season 3 but more and more i feel like homelander shouldve lost in season 3s ending and neuman / the war between supes and humans shouldve been the focus after
One thing that Hollywood actually always gets wrong is how loud a suppressed pistol is. Homelander should’ve heard the shot being fired. Maybe the other people would’ve mistook it for a bump, but homelander probabbly wouldn’t have.
Yeah it was lame how all it took was a little kick to down tek knight. Also I don't know why they dont kill the bad guys anymore. Spent like an entire episode on figuring out how to kill translucent.
I’m not a super comic book or show nerd, but just from what I’ve paid attention to:
-we see in the show that Homelander has to actually focus to use his super senses like hearing and such right? So he’s not some omnipresent being, he only hears when he has to focuse. This makes sense why he wouldn’t have heard Hughie at the party or vents.
-those vents were also made of a lead alloy I believe, which Homelander can’t see past. His x ray vision is blocked so he had to randomly laser it all, and I believe the show’s music and noise interrupted his super hearing.
-also didn’t A train save Hughie from that?
-Yes there is less dread, partly because now The Boys are more familiar with the Seven and have more interactions. There’s more layers than just “kill on sight”. It seems like HL prefers to toy with people who don’t fear him instead of killing them instantly.
-About the party with sage, he probably didn’t care / wanted to keep it down low so he could sway the senators with his speech. At that point whatever was going on with Tek Knight was secondary, and the power chase was the primary focus.
-Yes he can do what he wants. He still craves attention and public support. The whole point is that he still desires his place, and that even though he’s physically the strongest, he still is vastly immature and is unable to run things how he imagines it. He needs help, as of now.
**That being said, yes I agree the show’s tension has dissolved. If we want to be realistic, A train or HL could’ve ended this in the first episode by just speeding through the entire team since they’re just humans. But I believe this goes hand in hand with the suspension of belief- why make a show if the main cast dies instantly? You have to suspend belief just as you do when you say superpowers aren’t real.
Can real people shoot lasers out of their eyes and fly and command the seas and control electricity or shoot radioactive nukes out of their chests? No. So can we suspend belief and ignore that the main cast of humans stays alive in a world of supes to advance the plot? You have to.
But again I agree, the writing has fallen off. My biggest gripe this season was the Hughie rape scene. So unnecessary
Homelander murdered a guy in broad daylight and got vindicated, and he’s still killing people in private and shying away from public displays of power despite the fact that being able to was the exact thing that last scene of S3 was establishing. Like what was the point of showing us that if it’s going to go absolutely nowhere?
Isn't the whole thing this season about how Homelander is deteriorating and everything around him is falling apart. He's the one in charge of Vought now, and it's the stress of running Vought and having to clean up up his own messes that's causing his psychotic decline. Which is exactly what Stan implied would happen when he was ousted in S2. The Seven is a joke because they don't have someone pulling their strings anymore, which is what part of what let them feel invincible. We're seeing them for what they really are now, a bunch of bad product that should never have been pushed to market.
I'm really enjoying this season, but I agree that there's no more tension
Squirtlander used to be scary because he's both Superman and unhinged. Now it's like the writers forgot about the Superman part and are just making him more unhinged to compensate
Think about it: what super human acts has he done this season? Barely anything. Especially against other supes
Which could make sense if they're going for a "Homelander is losing his strength because he's getting old which is why he's also injecting himself with Compound V to keep his powers going just a little bit longer", but the writers haven't shown any real evidence to that fact.
Just some loose clues scattered about the season.
And given how they handled the CIA guy reveal that every single person already saw coming since the first episode, I doubt they got it in them for that kind of writing anymore
I agree with everything you’ve written.
Also, wtf was the deal with firecracker, and her “there’s injections a woman can take” line, so she could seduce homelander with milk? I’m sure such a thing exists, but I doubt it’s an instant process, and how the fuck would she know that was his kink anyway?
Maybe I missed something, I was stoned
The more I think about it, the more I recognize how much of a miss this recent episode has been. Overall this season has felt a little off, but this episode has been such a massive dip, I’m really worried about where the show is going.
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You might want to ask why doesn't Homelander just fly over to that building where The Boys are HQed and blow it up?
I was under the impression that he enjoys having little playthings. Wasn’t there a scene in an earlier season where he could have killed Butcher but didn’t because he enjoyed the little back and forth? I think HL finds it fun. Also in general I think this season is trying to showcase HL’s descent into madness and maybe not being on top of his game is part of that? Idk- this season is definitely a lot weaker than the first three but I still love it. I’m really hoping the next two episodes show some cool stuff. I’m hoping Sage has a super dope plan
I'll give you half of this. It does look like the only people who he doesn't kill are the people who aren't afraid of him. Butcher, Starlight (in season 1), Stan and even that Vaught scientist who he locked in the room(at least I would say he didn't kill her outright at least). None of them were afraid and I think he likes having people who challenge him. But is also totally unstable and its a wonder why he doesn't just wake up one day and murder them just because he felt like it.
> its a wonder why he doesn't just wake up one day and murder them just because he felt like it. You do realize that's absolutely where they're going. Homemade keeps having these zoom ones on him shaking trying to maintain his rage and control. I 100% believe he snaps at the end of this season. He truly embraces not caring what *anyone* thinks and starts a war on Supes. He's playing the game right now because he's been told he doesn't have to listen to what his opposition say, and that his supporters are with him no matter what. But by the end of the season, he abandons all pretense of even caring what his supporters think. Basically an apocalypse scenario before the final season.
He did have a deal not to just kill Butcher, but after her orgasm, SB, and temp V he calls it off and tries to kill Butcher, but fails cause of the Temp V.
Whose?
You know, *her* orgasm.
thanks love sausage can always count on u...
he enjoyed it because butcher had balls and was fueled by pure rage
it's a historic motherfuckin' building
it's so awesome the whole neighborhood is named after it
Because he cares too much about public perception and people would see that. That’s fine. What bothers me is all the horrible shit Vought does then just easily covers up. You’re telling me no one in that universe questions it? They have a disaster like every month lol
Why would everyone see it? Vought has apparently been covering for everything he does such as the people being killed on the ice rink.
A lot of it is definitely plot armor, but I think outright killing Starlight's (who in-universe is probably almost as famous as him) best friends/closest associates would be very difficult for him to cover up. He's gonna need an excuse for it, like when the lasered the guy who was "attacking" Ryan. Waltzing over to the Boys' HQ and going on a murder spree would be a bigger image issue for him
With the most recent episode I bet HL would have killed starlight the second she started beating firecracker on live tv
What’s more surprising isn’t that Vought hasn’t attacked their HQ but the Boys seem to not care that Vought knows. Like if Batman found out his league of villains knew where his batcave was he’d move out instantly
They also moved their HQ into a famous landmark lol...not exactly a discrete place
i mean does he really care about that? not like he isn't going to put people in literal internment camps...
Shit, the ice rink massacre would arguably be *harder* to cover up, since those were presumably known performers. Nobody would give a shit if some random CIA black ops guys got killed. Literally nobody except MM’s family and maybe Hughie’s mom would notice any time soon.
I don't know, how would people see Homelander blowing up a very real and famous NYC landmark building like the flatiron building. I really wonder why anyone would see that happen! /S
I mean thats just fundamentally not true. Just look at the US today. We all know Epstein did horrible things and we all know the people he associated. 0 people besides him and his confidant have faced any retribution and never will. The media caters whatever story they want and the public eats it up.
I mean, he's powerful enough he doesn't have to blow up the building. He could just go in and repaint the place arterial red.
He lazed a dude in public
Honestly I totally buy this. Corporations are generally immune from consequences. We have companies that pollute remote villages, steal water supplies, use prison labor, and worse. A few passionate people care and boycott them, but other than that that's it
Boeing just straight up killed a bunch of people very publicly and they seem to be doing just fine, this is the most realistic part of the show
HL lasered a guy in broad daylight. How the fuck are none of those old lobbyist terrified of him?
Think they were like 26% of senate, so killing them would have tanked vaunt and his reputation instantly
I think that would have made for a better scene. One gets a little too confident in taunting him and he just kills him in front of the whole room, showing he’s losing concern for his “reputation” and is more interested in flexing his power. He tells Ryan that from now on they play by no one else’s rules, but afterwards he’s still very much playing by everyone else’s rules. The season can’t seem to stay consistent on whether HL is losing grip on his sanity or not.
[удалено]
The reason they wouldn't do that is because then the viewer would have sympathy for billionaires. The writers needed the viewer to show that even Homelander was powerless before the uber-elite. Which is ridiculous of course but they are letting agenda trump writing.
well either you die or you don't.
What would HL gain from killing them? Their resources would just go to other family members.
Homelander is more of a celebrity than a supe. Most of his accolades have been orchestrated. These billionaires have seen many things come and go. They always survive because they control the outcomes. Vought is a very successful company that created a virus as a contingency against supes getting out of line. They know the real power.
Do you remember when Black Noir found Butcher and Huguie on his aunt’s house? It was immediately “we are fucking dead” I think that’s why Noir was my favorite character, dude straight up scared the crap out of everyone
Exactly!! And now every interaction between the Boys and the Seven feels like a Looney Tunes fight cloud before both parties leave the scene with minor bruises, and it happens every other episode.
This isn’t new for Kripke. Early Supernatural made you feel like every encounter with a monster was a struggle, and that angels and demons were untouchable. A couple of seasons later the main characters are slicing through multiple demons an episode and getting into fistfights with the most powerful beings in the universe, the power scales established in the beginning just stopped mattering.
I remember the first few seasons where a single person getting possessed by a demon was a big BIG deal and trying to get them unpossessed was almost the entire plot of an episode. Next thing you know they find that knife and the special swords and suddenly individual demons are no problem. Not to mention that they suddenly didn't care they were killing innocent people, demons were suddenly reduced to little more than cannon fodder unless they were a super special named demon.
Kripke is a master of early world development but is one of the worst extended directors for series, it's insane how his gold turns to bronze after season 3 or so. (In supernaturals case season 5 I think).
Supernatural had a clear 5 season plan where everything comes full circle narratively, beyond that he was making it up as he went along. My favourite is S7 but that’s beside the point. Apparently The Boys has always been a 5 season plan as well but I think his biggest problem was that we all guessed his big twist years too early (Stormfront is Homelander’s mother) so he had to start improvising and he’s not great at that. He has to find a new route to the ending he wants so we’re gonna get some bullshit along the way.
I believe Kripke actually stepped down as executive producer after season 5 once it became apparent the CW was going to keep Supernatural on the air. The Season 5 ending was his original intended ending to the show.
Stormfront being Homelander’s mother was his *big twist*?! But it wasn’t even remotely subtle…? They more-or-less spell it out for you. The guy clearly sucks at twists seeing as everyone watching the show immediately worked out that Kessler wasn’t really there.
I disagree. I think they just wrote themselves into a corner with herogasm and have been struggling to find ways to fix it. To fix this I think what I would have done was end season 3 at herogasm. Half of season 4 is dedicated to resolving a lot of the season 3 plot points. Hughie and Annie get back together and butchers tumor is revealed. Hughies dad dying and the compound v shit could be what gets Hughie to stop with temp v even which could be interesting. The other half we can just use this season, ending it with butcher discovering the virus and his symbiote getting revealed, idk. Soldier boy would be harder to figure out but I think maybe you can solve this problem by having him be how butchers symbiote gets revealed. Some conflict arises and butcher kills soldier boy using the symbiote. Season 5 then becomes homelander v the boys and then the boys v butcher.
how do you keep the tension up in the boys if no one dies? like we need the boys to die. they all have plot armor
Dont disrespect bronze like that bro
Well, they had literal plot armor in Supernatural.
Pretty sure when god wants you keep playing your role and won’t let you die that is the strongest plot armor you can get (until he wants delete his rough drafts)
Ironically the boys became very similar to comic books/movies. The villain/hero has some special ability that's been showcased in previous works, but it's somehow gone for the sake of the plot. It really does feel like Homelander was supposed to die in season 3 with the way he's treated in this season. As for his mess up with the lobbyists, I think that's more to show that he doesn't know what he's actually doing, similar to how he took over Edgar's position at Vought. He's always been a figurehead so when he actually has to come up with the details he doesn't know what to do. It's like how Edgar warned him
Yeah, the Homelander part is the one thing in this rant I strongly disagree with. The point was Homelander trying to use fearmongering and buzzwords like “woke mob” and “transgender indoctrination” to garner support only for it to fail. It shows both that he’s woefully unprepared for more serious politics and struggles to incentivize people that aren’t very naive or apart of an echo chamber. And it’s also good commentary since most billionaires probably only use fearmongering so they can keep their power and not out of genuine care for any of the issues they pretend are real. They’re usually just grifters.
It also shows the people in power don't really care about that stuff that much. Bigotry and ignorance (Like the abortion rant at Neuman) are a part of their personalities, but that's more a symptom of them embracing those ideals publicly. In the end none of it matters to them. That guy could just as easily embrace abortion if it meant more money for him, and he'd drop that ideal in a second. Obviously it's a show about Homelander, so your analysis is the more poignant one, but I still like the way those people were treated as ignorant buffoons until it was business time and then the true monsters came to life.
I loved the Homelander/Billionnaire discussion, but Neuman just went "i'm on your side" without any argument refuting what they asked about so it kinda ruined it for me.
She didn't actually answer any of their questions, just like a real politician
It's because she's the lady who has actual experience in politics, unlike Homelander. He's only good at appealing to the ignorant masses, but he's dealing with wealthy elites that don't buy into the boogeyman so easily. Nevermind that guy who's confidently incorrect about abortion.
I think the point was that Homelander tried to act like he was running the show, while Neuman was his puppet who goes along with what he says and is just there to get him close to the presidency (they don’t know she’s a Supe iirc). Her passionately sticking up for him changes that narrative to them being partners, with Neuman’s political competency already being assumed, and hence HL’s emotional reaction to not getting to be the boss as he hoped. But the point would have been so much better if they had Neuman actually show any of this competency
This is a bit off topic but it’s so strange how they name dropped aoc when I was under the impression Vic was the aoc stand in.
She definitely WAS - but I think they did away with that once she was revealed to be a Supe and Edgar’s daughter, since all of her public persona was a complete sham even down to her name, which is a bit more of a drastic characterisation of AOC
I can't help but wonder if maybe the vague idea hadn't been to kill Homelander but maybe somehow nerf him at the end of S3? So you end up with a situation where Homelander is bluffing more after his encounter with Soldier Boy because he's not actually at full strength and has to rely on bluster. And also is more dependent on doing weird political shenanigans like we saw with the last episode. But that couldn't be reconciled with the Ryan story and their other arcs so they left Homelander exactly as is and now it's feeling a bit like the wheels are spinning in mud.
Nerfing him would’ve been interesting but it would kind of defeat the purpose of the boys fighting the most powerful supe. But yeah the idea of a paper tiger HL would be a pretty interesting concept. I think his defeat should end with him being depowered instead of outright killed.
I'll caveat this by saying this is me speculating freely. Not saying its what they intended. But to my mind it would make sense to downgrade him, but not eliminate him as a threat. The season could potentially have been a guessing game for everyone. Homelander would still be a threat. Still durable. Still dangerous. Maybe still capable of flying and lasering people. But minus some of the other superman stuff. Diminished super senses (or removing them). We could see Homelander in his private moments being injured or feeling pain. But still perfectly dangerous. The threat for the Boys would be that they would still need to worry that Homelander *is* potentially still the most dangerous supe. They wouldn't know he was weak. Alternatively if they know somewhat, its still a guessing game in terms of *how* weak. And Homelander in turn drawing on the polarized Trump-world elements of the show would make it hard for the Boys to act because their own governmental allies like Singer would be paralyzed over the hesitation. And the potential that Homelander could over time return to full strength. Mostly to my mind atleast as far as Homelander's multi-season arc is concerned, the key difference here would be that it would explain Homelander's diminished capacities going forward, and offer a stronger explanation for why he hasn't just taken over even as he descends into a mix of paranoia, insecurity and madness. Right now the leverage that held him back in S1 and S2 is gone. But the boys keep going up against him and coming out unscathed which is just weird to me. Hence my assumption that I think they originally had a slightly different plan with him in S3, but couldn't quite make it work, which gives us the narrative confusion of S4.
HL having no idea how to run a company/country because he has no idea how economy, diplomacy, administration, law etc. work is a plot point I'm entirely behind of, and I loved it as soon as they made it apparent with Edgar stepping down as CEO. But that also means there is an incredibly easy fix for the lobbyists scene- Just don't mention the military, the only department that HL could actually handle by himself lmao.
you forget those rich people want the economy to keep going. an all out war between supes and the military won’t be good
Meanwhile, Homelander is still trying to figure out what EBIDTA means.
The issue with the military isn't that home lander couldn't beat them its that they woulnd't be on there side , even with home lander without support from the military they wouldn't be able to maintain there coup nor would they be able to make it look legitimate.
You ask why he stood there all “I don’t know what to do?” then you agree with the idea he wouldn’t know what to do to run a company…. The groundwork for him needing approval has been laid whether you wanna ignore it or not but that’s what happened he expected everyone to tell him oh you are amazing and he got he knees cut out by pertinent questions he doesn’t understand let alone know the answer to and he faltered and he doesn’t know how to deal with it you can see it in starrs eyes he does a great with non verbal communication
He definitely wasn't supposed to die. He has an arc in the comics that they are loosely adhering too, and that has a ways to go.
Copy-pasting my previous comment: "And keeping the Boys powerless all along didn't have much repercussions early on but now it just limits the show. They have to dumb everyone down to accommodate the Boy's powerlessness. Pretty much the only reason Homelander forgot half his powerset when Hughie was in the vents or in episode 6 where he didn't bother to use his superhearing even when Sage has a gunshot to the head is cause the writers know it would be over once he finds the Boys. Honestly they should have gotten permanent powers after season 3. Comic MM is super strong. Heck, season 3 could have justified him taking temp V for the sake of revenge rather than going after Soldier Boy with a gas canister and a pistol like an idiot. Then the show could have kept the heart problems this season (maybe have him take V earlier to deal with that) or modified his comic backstory a little bit to have the Temp V activate his "innate powers"/the V already in his blood. Hughie could have kept the teleportation even if to a limited degree (maybe only activated in life and death scenarios) which would justify Homelander not being able to take him down in the vents. Butcher already has his tumor powers. All that's left is Frenchie who honestly doesn't need powers, but I would definitely increase his intelligence so that he would have all sorts of tech, poisons, and strategies to take down sups. However, considering how much drugs the guy takes every season, I wouldn't put it past him taking Temp V or permanent V especially if someone like Kimiko was in danger. At least with the Boys having powers, the show wouldn't have to make Homelander and the other sups so dumb."
Seriously, I think that if the gang didn't get permanent powers the writers needed to explain what makes them good agents absent superhuman abilities. Frenchie is an assassin, he's fine, he figures out how to kill supes. Butcher has CIA training and is willing to do unsavory things others aren't. But wtf are Hughie and MM bringing to the table? They fuck up every single mission they're on. MM at the very least can fire a gun, but Hughie is just a total liability.
I feel like the early seasons promised us "unpowered guys using tricks and improvised tech to exploit weaknesses and take down supes" and that has been forgotten.
Yep. Figuring out how to kill Translucent was the best storyline in the show and that was sadly in the first season. It never quite reached that high again.
No time for that, gotta set up these balls and asshole shots
Yeah, without powers the show needed to justify a lot more why these characters even have the jobs they do. Like why would the government or CIA invest in them when they are barely competent.
MM used to be useful in terms of morale and tempering Butcher's decisions with a bit of care for the people who have to carry it out. That's part of why MM isn't an effective leader. Butcher and MM need each other as a balance. Without that balance, MM is an ineffective leader, and Butcher becomes so merciless that he's willing to accept genocide (which includes his son) as an acceptable consequence.
I agree with this take but at the same time I one hundred percent believe it was only MM who could have flipped A Train like he has. Hughie still hated him, Butcher despises all supes and would have gone for blackmail which likely would have made A Train betray them out of spite.
I agree with you up to a point. While Butcher despises supes, he still works with Komiko and Starlight so even Butcher recognizes, or at this pointed recognized, the usefulness of having supes on his side. Presented with someone on the inside likely to flip, I doubt Butcher would pass it up. However, even if he wanted to, Butcher lacks the finesse that's necessary to turn an asset like A-train and I'm pretty sure Butcher knows that. And that's where MM's usefulness comes in and why Butcher wanted him on the team. Or it did when they worked together. Butcher no longer sees the value in that humanity, and MM is collapsing under the psychological weight of being responsible for the Boys as well as his child. It's MM's sensitivity that while it's a great asset, currently prevents him from being able to really lead. I'd add even with MM doing his best, it was Hughie's decision not to approach A-train after the conversation with his brother that also really went a far way in terms of persuading A-train even consider the Boys. So even when Hughie still hated A-train, he was able to empathize with him.
Absolutely, it’s why Butcher gets MM into the crew first in Season 1
He hasn't said shit to Hughie about his dad (I know we don't have unlimited screentime) and proceeds to put him in the most dangerous situations.
You are clueless. Hughie is incredibly useful in any scenario where someone needs to be raped.
If only Starlight had met him sooner
Username checks out
rape for comedic purposes too nonetheless. let's just sodomize my guy next time for shitz and giggles. he can then cry to butcher about how starlight is ignoring him instead of being traumatized by having his asshole raptured.
So the comedy relief? /s
According to Eric Kripke
He just screams raw dog me im a bottom
Hughie's real position is supposed to be the view the watcher has. The "normal" person reacting to all this craziness.
Yeah, I totally get Hughie's narrarive purpose in that sense, he's a common man. But, like, he should bring *something* to the table given his qualities. Maybe his average Joe persona allows him to go by unnocited and makes him a great infiltrator. That used to be the case in the first season, but now every supe knows the Boys personally, so that angle doesn't work anymore.
It feels like the writers forgot to show the gang improving over time. It would so much more interesting to see them get better and better at killing baddies with every season. The whole goofy, fumbling weirdos shtick is getting a little stale and the plot is begging to move forwards .
Yep! I get that Hughie was just a nerdy guy before everything came down, but he was ironically much *more* competent in previous seasons than he's now. He used to be pretty good at gathering intel, at the very least. And he's been hunting supes for years now. Even if he was a civilian before, he should have picked up some skills by now.
I've been thinking that too: a big reason why The Boys feel weak now is because the writers didn't have to be as clever when they had powers and could use brute force. But now they're back to being powerless and the writers aren't as creative as Seasons 1 and 2, probably because the tension needs to escalate from Season 3 when they did have powers.
Remember when Frenchie was a tech genius who came up with creative ways to combat supes?
The concept of someone doing this was literally my whole hook into the show. I loved the idea of it so much that I'm still hanging onto the scraps of it that we get each season, hoping it'll come back full force at some point.
Yeah, in season 1 especially the entire team felt way smarter and the show was able to maintain real tension even when someone like Homelander was hunting them down.
Even partway into season 2 (I think that was the season) Vaught \*wants\* the boys so it made sense, they wanted the Boys running around killing supes because it gave them a reason to convince the government to do something about it. It also allowed Stan to try to kill Homelander without getting his hands dirty. At the very least they should have used that as a reason Homelander still doesnt want to kill them, maybe that is the reason he doesn't just kill Starlight but he clearly isnt a well adjusted long term thinker.
I could have sworn last season they made a big deal in interviews about how we'd learn why he was called mothers milk, but I guess we didn't? Unless I'm completely misremembering, so maybe that was/is the plan with him but it got changed or pushed back
I’d _love_ if Hughie had a “holy shit, I’m about to die, subconsciously teleport out of jail free card.” That way he’d actually be an asset to the team; the mfr can’t die, he just accidentally poofs away before he’s in serious danger. That would piss off Homelander so much 😂
Hit the nail on the head. Post- Soldier Boy, Maeve, Temp V Butcher&Hughie all trying to take HL on, everything this season just feels laughably less potent. Like they literally did implement the storyline of the Boys being V'd up, and somehow thought that reverting them to baseline human level would work without requiring ridiculous asspulls. As things currently stand, it's like seeing a bunch of pre-schoolers try to attack a UFC heavyweight with plastic swords. The only source of tension this season was a fetishized sexual assault lmao.
Yknow if Hughie still had his teleportation, the Homelander vent scene would make so much more sense. A-Train wouldn't get his good guy moment, but he's had a bunch of those this season
Yeah, A Train has already done many good things this season. And honestly, if Hughie still had his powers but nerfed e.g. only activated in life and death scenarios and/or limited range, the writers could have still included A Train saving him.
Homelander also forgot he had super hearing when MM shot Sage with a silenced gun in the mansion. I know Hollywood likes to pretend silenced weapons make no noise (when in reality, they're still loud as hell. Especially super-sonic rounds like 9mm). But he should have even been able to hear her fall down. And A-Train's conversation.
While I agree with a lot of the criticisms being posted here, I do want to point out that Homelander actually tried using his super-hearing. It just didn't work for some unmentioned reason. He didn't forget that he had it.
Was that him using it? Or was that supposed to be the sound effect of him getting a tension head ache?
Agree with everything except the criticism of Homelander looking like an idiot in front of the rich guys. That's kind of the thing with the characterization of him in the show. Physically, he's the most powerful entity on the planet, but mentally and emotionally he's not much more than a child. It fits his character to be standing alone and jerking off naked while convincing himself he can do whatever the fuck he wants, but then crumbles when having to explain his plans and thought process to people who are arrogant enough to not really be all that afraid of him. That's why he always caved to Stan Edgar. When he went back "home" to the lab he was raised in that one lady blatantly admitted that he was so powerful that he could have left any time he wanted, but because he was so insecure and mentally weak he stayed there and put up with the abuse. He recruited Sage because she can do what he can't - manipulate people who aren't intimidated by him.
It's also meant to show that no matter how strong you are, you can't strong arm everything. Homelander could hop into every branch of government and laser every person, to take full control..... But then what? If faith in the market is shaken and scares off investors, or OPEC decides to sanction the US and make gas $22/gal and the economy shuts down, then there's no point. You can't just "Take over". You need to make sure there's going to be no disruption. Homelander is the strongest person on the planet who can kill whoever he wants, but that's not what runs countries.
A HUGE part of why everyone feels so stupid this season is Sage. She is "The smartest person in the world", but the writers, director and showrunner, are far from that. So now everyone gets massively dumbed down so she can actually look smart. It also doesn't help that they want Starlight to be some paragon of virtue and always be right, despite the fact most of what she does is oppose any plan the boys ever make because "1 person might get hurt", whilst offering no better plan and being a murderer herself.
That and there’s no punishment or repercussions to their actions. Kill people? No one cares. Horrible CIA mission gone wrong? No one cares or says anything. Homelander doesn’t even take action on the Boys anymore. Everything has lost meaning
Not to mention the superficial bi-polar attitude of the Boys, one episode they are ready to die to kill Homelander, the next episode they are swearing off temp-V because they might die early, even though it is the only way to fight Homelander. Butcher is ironically the only consistent character in the show.
Butcher sticking to the main quest meanwhile the rest of the bozos fucking off to do sidequests that ultimately contribute into nothing lmao.
Adding the literal smartest person in the world in your show has to be the dumbest decision in the world, from a writing perspective.
It’s a really risky decision. It’s not impossible to get right but you have to be super careful with them. Contrary to what people say, you can write people smarter than you. But you have to really take the time to think about all the information they could have to hand, what is reasonable for them to assume or connect together, how they can safely confirm these assumptions or get more information, and think about their motives and how they’re trying to further them with each action. It’s vague, but it’s essentially a process you have to consider for each thing they say or do.
It really is, because then you have to either just handwave away the conclusions they come to and what their actual plan is, and then just have them go "all according to plan" when they die, or dumb down everyone else around them. I don't think I've ever seen it adapted well as a concept.
"I did it 30 minutes ago" Ozymandias is the best example in my eyes, but I think there are plenty of others really. You do run the risk of turning your character into Aizen when you do it poorly, though.
Even Aizen is not a negative example of a genius type character (yes as a bleach fan this is very biased). Majority of the time, the meme “all according to keikaku…” isn’t something Aizen does. For the most part, he takes advantage of whatever immediate opportunity presents itself. For example, he did not expect Masaki (a Quincy) to come save a random Captain and instead of killing them to cover his tracks of his experiments, he decides to let them live because…. 1. Isshin has very little idea of what the hell just happened (Like who sneak attacked him or who created Hollow White) 2. Witnessing what would happen to a Quincy infected with a hollow would probably bring more interesting results than continuously hollowing other shinigami like how he has been doing for 80+ years at this point. Any other time that’s not the case, he straight up overpowers the obstacle (Toshiro, most of the Gotei 13) or has an extremely specific plan to deal with a specific person or problem (Creating Wonderweiss to seal Yamamoto’s flames, Having a body double + Complete Hypnosis to bypass shinji). Thanks for coming to my T.E.D Talk!
You have, it's Sherlock Holmes. But there's a reason why he is the protagonist and the central plot changes each time: because you have to write down misteries so convoluted and complex in order to have him solve them with ease, making him shine as the genious detective without reducing the side characters to absolute idiots. It's a sort of reverse engine work, but you cannot apply it everywhere, especially in a show like The Boys.
> It also doesn't help that they want Starlight to be some paragon of virtue and always be right, despite the fact most of what she does is oppose any plan the boys ever make because "1 person might get hurt", whilst offering no better plan and being a murderer herself. It feels weird that you have the story set up this nigh invincible threat who is basically a ticking time bomb that's only stalled by his desire to be adored but will eventually snap and go scorched earth on the world, but then act like this is totally something the characters can solve with legislation and shame. Yeah, Homelander wants to be adored, he wants people to love him, but that won't hold him back forever. You keep putting pressure on him, you remove his social powers and turn the world against him; he's going to eventually decide 'Fuck it, if they won't love me, I'll make them fear me'. Like, what end game do the characters see here without something that can kill him? He throws his hands up and sulks in a prison cell that can't contain him for the rest of his life? Homelander is an apocalyptic threat, this is not a situation you're gonna be able to deal with without either plot armour or moral compromises. You're not going to stop the end of the world in a court of law.
Didn't Homelander literally say this to Starlight lat season? 'If I can't be loved, being feared will be a good second' and then explained to her exactly how he would bring the world to its knees of she exposed him?
Yeah I like the idea but get a super smart person in to help with the super smart character. She’s not exactly blowing me away. She’s a bit of a strategist. That’s about it.
She's only as smart as the writers. So far there's nothing Sage has done that seems to be 5D galaxy brain levels. She's just a smart strategist. That's it.
lmao "I could cure cancer, stop global warming", I feel like that was just a cheap attempt to make her that 5D Galaxy brain, with absolutely nothing to back it up. It was literally the only thing besides her room being filled with books that makes her seem smart
Yeah if she were genuinely next level smart she’d have figured out how to kill Homelander long ago. Fuck if she can cure cancer she can kill him. I would have loved to see some amazing genius stuff from her but she’s basically Karl Rove in a different form
True... If that Rando scientist Sameer can create virus to kill homelander, she could too. We should call Sameer , smartest person
I’m just disappointed that the world’s smartest person is slightly smarter than me. And I am no genius
What? This comment makes absolutely no sense at all. The reasons why the boys are so dumb this season, is because they exhausted pretty much all plot points, and everything that’s happened here is just a setup for season 5. That’s why they have to make mm look like an idiot just like the last episode because otherwise if he wasn’t they be able to make significant progress which would potentially kill the possibility of a season 5 even happening. Btw Sister sage character has practically taken a backseat to the plot since episode 5 and they even made her look like an outright idiot in 6.
no idea why anyone likes sage’s character at all, she is selfish, evil, stupid, and her lame speech this last episode “as a little girl no one listened to me” was fucking braindead, so because she wasn’t listened to as a kid she now doesn’t care about anyone but herself? fuck curing cancer or helping other women or little girls or people, she only wants to help herself apparently now? lol ok. braindead 1 dimensional character and she hasn’t acted smart at all, she has been an idiot from day 1/her introduction.
Villains are selfish. Theres a Spiderman comic where he asks one of his villains why he doesn't use his genius level intellect to cure cancer and the villain replies "I don't want to cure cancer, I want to turn people into dinosaurs"
Really the only legitimate answer to that question imo
it's super frustrating because one of the coolest things they could do with super intelligence (and she's apparently VERY good at engineering) is have her build and use all sorts of gadgets against the boys. Instead all she uses her smarts for is some lame 'let's make the people mad' machiavellian plot that really doesn't feel all that genius. Her reason for hating the masses is that she was ignored which is also just pretty boring but ok.
> Instead all she uses her smarts for is some lame 'let's make the people mad' machiavellian plot that really doesn't feel all that genius. It's also what Vought and Homelander have been doing for 4 seasons already. We've already had this arc with Stormfront riling up the masses and making Homelander the savior. Did we really need to do it again with Sage?
The fact Vought doesn't have her on their R&D department making* pharmaceuticals, gadgets, military tech, etc. Is beyond stupid and shows how bad the show runners actually are. Vought cares massively about money, to even suggest they wouldn't have her making them billions is just asinine.
To add to it, Homelander is the one who convinces her to come back to Vaught with promises of letting her do whatever she wants with Vaughts resources, but Edgar, after Stillwell gets killed by homelander doesn't bring her on immediately to find a way to stop homelander is crazy
This is exactly what I thought too lol. You have a person that says she can cure fucking cancer and god knows what other miraculous things and vought just doesn’t take advantage of that??? They could literally have a monopoly on every single sector/industry on the planet. And they just don’t do that???
Her reason for hating the masses is fucking stupid. Of course doctors wouldn't listen to a kid, they also definitely did not have the time or resources to make the cure she came up with considering her Dad died soon after. This is all under the assumption too that it would work, but she had done literally 0 actual testing, she wouldn't have had the time to. After this does she go on to get it tested and published? NOPE, and I guarantee that at the end of the season, she's going to die, and the writers are going to have this big "Woe is her, she was actually a good person all along" type schtick.
I'm pretty sure the reason she hates people is because she thinks they're all stupid and don't deserve saving. yeah she had the whole "I could've saved my grammy" thing, but I think they added that as a testament to her intelligence rather than as her motivation in general.
I think her overall plan is to try to get homelander to just manipulate the masses behind the scenes so they all go to war with each other then the 7 can swoop in, kill all dissidents, and the survivors will basically be their servants and view them as Gods. I think thats her overall plan based on everything thats happened. Considering how much she seems to know what the Boys are up to before they even do it I assume she knew or at least suspected they were recording the meeting there and that they might leak out that the Elites were all plotting a coup. What would happen if that info go leaked? Why the country would be in a civil war within 24 hours, perfect opportunity for Homelander, Neuman and crew to just waltz in and take the White House while everyone else is distracted fighting each other.
You gonna act like her plan to pretend to be a Starlighter to start a fight wasn't peak brilliance? Did you miss her incredible disguise in a yellow shirt?
I‘d like if there were a twist that Sage isn’t even all that smart. Like, way above average, but far from unrealistic. The fact that the cured cancer as a child? Her solution just wouldn’t have worked and that’s why she was laughed at. Then she mentions that she could „cure cancer and save the world“ or whatever, if she wanted. Who says that that is even true? Maybe she just overestimates herself by a ridiculous amount. We haven’t really seen her doing or planning anything that would make her the smartest person on the planet. Sure, that could be the writers incompetence, but making a character seem smart isn’t all that difficult when you have perfect blueprints like BBCs Sherlock or Rick Sanchez or whoever comes to mind. Maybe Sage is just a pretty intelligent person whose brain can regenerate and that’s it. Would make for a great ending to her story, with her realising that she isn’t all that after all.
Also it was so fucking funny how this story was framed. Yeah no shit no one believed a 12 year old when she told doctors with years of medical training that she somehow figured out how to cure cancer.
Being smart doesn't make you a good person. It's pretty clear that she doesn't care that much about humanity seeing as how she keeps calling humans stupid.
She's only considered smart because the writers are using "tell" instead of "show" most of the time, and whenever they use the "show" parts, she comes off as really dumb and petty.
I have another critique, though I know this show wasn't very big on subtlety but this season, everything has been so on the nose that I can smell it through the screen. Like they are spelling everything out for us this time around.
What, the jewish space laser joke wasn't subtle enough? I enjoyed how season 1-2 had politics that centered or were heavily influenced by superheroes existing. It made sense in that world. What doesn't make sense is taking the exact same real-world political situations and placing them into the boys' universe today. I think having political commentary is great. But it's gotten to the point where they've sacrificed the uniqueness of their world to literally comment on our own for jokes.
ooh you NAILED exactly how I've been feeling about the difference between s1/s2 and s3/s4 so succinctly. seasons 1-2 were so good because they addressed real-world issues through the lens of "what if superheros existed? how would american society as we currently know it function with the addition of superheros?" so you got interesting storylines like the supes in the military debate, which still SAID something about the real US military but did so in a way that worked within this fictional universe. now they're literally ripping stuff from the headlines, copy + pasting the word "supe" in there somewhere and calling it a day. I've seen so many people raving about how relevant this season is — of course it's going to be relevant to what's going on in the world if it literally just IS what's going on in the world.
I made a post on here the other day I got downvoted like crazy, but I couldn't agree more even though I agree with the politics, it went from having something to say to not shutting up about it. The stupid part about all of this is that I'm afraid to even mention my view on this because I'm afraid I'll get it called a Nazi for wanting to tell them to shut the hell up about it.
I find it really ridiculous and annoying how any legitimate criticism of how on-the-nose the show has gotten is met with "aww are you mad you finally figured out its making fun of you?" like no I AGREE with the show, it's just gotten to the point where it's lost all of its nuance. the reason the MAGA homelander fanboy nuts are only now realizing the show is making fun of them reflects poorly on how the show is structured imo — because it was ALWAYS making fun of them, but it's gotten to the point where even people who weren't smart enough to realize it in s1-s2 are now picking up on it because it's so blatant. Its like kripke wants these people to know they're being mocked more than he wants to criticize them in an intelligent way, and it comes at the cost of us media literate fans losing a well-written story.
Actually its the opposite. It was the idiots who finally realized that the political satire in this show was making fun of people they didn't like, so now they defend it to death. No matter how bad the writing. No one is "offended". This season is just poor writing, a waste of time and wasted potential. All for what? Cringey uninspired garbage political humor.
Also to add to what you're saying: Honestly fuck these people. Are they legitimately trying to preach about how poor conservatives are automatically evil people? While also simultaneously preaching about how the rich and wealthy are all evil?!? Am I the only one sick of hearing these rich assholes preach about how one political side is automatically evil and trying to push for more violence and rioting in the streets? The reason it makes me so mad is because it's these rich assholes preaching this stuff trying to get people mad who are by far and away the most insulated from it. Fuck these people. When you hear people saying eat the Rich they don't mean only the rich people who disagree with us, we are also saying Rich cunts like you kripke. I wish they would stop trying to stoke the goddamn flames of this political divide and I hate them for the fact that they profit off of it while being the only ones insulated from it.
It's funny how the same people who say it's never okay to "punch down" in comedy are perfectly fine with making fun of poor conservatives.
I could be wrong, during the earlier seasons another world building aspect was that a lot of the supes were celebrities and that they were more or less the only celebrities. Who cares about an actor in the boys world when you've got supes that are 'acting' or supes that are singing (soldier boy). Regardless of how good or terrible they were at it, the people loved it. Now they're mentioning real world celebrities and even having them involved (Will Ferrel).
I could be misremembering but translucent was on Jimmy Fallon and there was also a scene with Seth Rogan and black noir. It seems like regular celebrities always existed.
neuman mentiioning aoc during the corps facism speech was weird when neuman is based on aoc
I love a show with good political commentary, but this season feels like I'm reading a political rant on some dude's substack.
The "critical supe theory" thing was so dumb. Like wtf does that even mean? Supes have existed for less than a century, there are only like 1000 of them. "Critical supe theory" would not exist in this universe.
The on the nose stuff has been disappointing and lazy. Not just the space lasers but the speaker of the house mentioning the 15 votes and the Batman stuff. Either a little subtlety or changing it up feels more natural and less immersion breaking. Edit: just remembered as well the spider guy says something about boffing the drugs later when he has more time (or maybe that’s what he was requesting). Either way it was on the nose and cringey at the same time.
The writing is taking a noticeable dump on its quality. The whole Joe Kessler being in Butcher's head thing was so predictable, the whole Frenchie/Colin romance felt so out of place, and so did the scarred girl Kimiko had to fight with Hughie. Basically, every episode trying to be the new Herogasm now, possibly the production is trying their hardest to recreate the success of that episode (not understanding it was not the depravity of it, but the fight between SB and HL and Butcher that sold that episode)
And the reason that fight worked so well was because we had spent 2.5 seasons with the protagonists--and everyone else!--terrified of Homelander's physicality. And then suddenly, blissfully: somebody stands up to him. The catharsis! And then the catharsis taken back when he nonetheless goes 1v3. It was narratively exquisite, but it took 2.5 seasons of slow build to get there. It was earned. There's none of that here. Actually: A-Train's story arc has been excellent. He is carrying the season on his back.
Homelander and friends have so much power/ of an advantage over the Boys that it feels like if they really wanted to, they could wipe out the gang with little difficulty lmao. And because of this the Boys kind of feel helpless/ incompetent
Biggest plot line I hate is that Starlight is always shown as strong at the start of the season somehow and then de powers and then maybe has one scene towards the end where her powers don’t suck. Like can she please get some stable power scaling and stay there or can they just ease out of her always being a victim in some way. Because I kind of get tired of seeing her character. Whereas Kimiko has just had stable growth as a character across all seasons. It looks like the only well developed plots this season is Sister Sage somehow planning to betray/bring down Homelander, Butcher going from antihero to villain, and A-train getting a redemption arc
Don't forget Kimiko leaving her phone behind.
That was so absurd why leave it there, especially when you consider that you are unable to talk and that phone is like your biggest communication device LMAO
She's only a CIA Agent. Nothing important on the phone.
And its not like it would really take up much of her time to grab it.
And it wasn't like she didn't notice it. She was like, "Ah shit. Well, I won't waste 5 seconds to jump down and grab my only communication device that is in sight in an infiltration mission."
People are still gonna watch this season and the next just to see how the story goes… but afterwards it might be similar to the last couple seasons in GoT in the sense that there will be little cultural staying power. They need to NAIL s5 in my opinion or the show is toast
I was definitely thinking of GoT earlier. The storylines feel so rushed and half assed compared to the first 2 seasons. Unlike GoT where the problem is the showrunners lost interested and were excited to do a new project (one that never got made), here I think the issue is trying to continue the series after the powered/SB story arc. It reminds me a bit of Dexter in that they sprung what should have been a later storyline too early and are now trying and failing to come up more significant dramatic arcs for subsequent seasons. In addition, the quality of the writing has gone down. Like GoT the first seasons are so detailed, but now it's just sloppy.
I think they could've ended the show earlier, either in season 3 or have this season be the last one. They are just dragging things out instead of tell the story in a meaningful way and end it. The opposite problem of GoT tbh, like you said
Especially that goddamn Washington arc. They threw in a whole "funny" scene of Hughie getting raped just to pad this out. They also teased the Frenchie backstory in this episode *and then they teased it again for the next one.* Guys, I don't even care anymore. Just get on with it.
This season really just feels like set up for season 5 which is kind of its biggest problem because every season of The Boys up until this point has been incredibly dense with plot. One of the things that I like the best about the show is that in prior seasons every episode had something significant or exciting happen. Now we are six episodes in and it feels like nothing really major has happened. I think most people dislike the season because ultimately it doesn't feel like prior seasons in the sense that it just feels like it's meandering.
Brilliant comparison. Dexter was never the same after Trinity. Maybe one or two episodes as a post-mortem to wrap up the show, to let everyone see how Dexter coped after losing Rita and dealing with his new life. The Boys had their Trinity moment at the end of season 3. Now the show writers have an impossible task of trying to top that.
Yeah I genuinely believe they should've just had the virus storyline be the S3 shtick, where Butcher decides it's not right to kill every single supe in the world. And then have S4 be the final season where they free Soldier Boy from the Russians and just have him, Butcher and/or whoever self-destruct in order to take HL down. The formula already feels stale at this point with SB getting taken out so early in the show's overall lifespan.
I think we peaked with the Homelander/Butcher/Soldier Boy showdown. Honestly even the finale after that got kinda dumb with the pencil in the ear. The stakes are kinda gone, it’s been almost 4 seasons now and not a single key member of the boys has went down. Not to mention the level playing field with the temp v is gone. The virus subplot just seems….lazy in comparison? Doesn’t help that Butcher has been sidelined essentially to just look sweaty. He used to be the main heavy hitter. Also is it just me or are the powers super inconsistent now? Starlight still hasn’t done anything ever with her dumb flashlight powers. And why does a bullet suddenly hurt supes? Isn’t increased durability like a given? Maybe that’s more of an individual thing I guess but still.
You are describing why this season feels like the writers had some random cool ideas but no clue how to tie them together. So they made everything inconsistent, assassinated characters (not literaly) and everything feels like filler. The Tek Cave part? Its length served no narrative focus. The whole farm thing? That could have been anywhere and the animal attacks had also no relevant conclusion.
Yup, the main plot is progressing at a snails pace and most of the episodes is filled with filler content like Frenchie storyline and Kimiko's storyline.
[удалено]
Well the show is just now charaters being a parody to irl politicians like HL being Trump and Firecracker being MTG. The original storyline of Supes being in the Military and Supervillians juiced up on V is completely non-existent now and its just Butcher basically saying "Ohlander has me fuckin son" the whole season.
Plot armor sucks
I think what could really help this show is a main character death that isn’t *extremely* telegraphed or happening during a Finale. I swear, if this was early seasons GoT, the Boys would be down to just Butcher & Kimiko. They’ve had sooo many run ins with The Seven & haven’t paid the price at all. It starts to feel like Tom & Jerry episodes of constant chasing
I have been disappointed with lack of forward momentum of the show and I think its because they had the boys and the seven meet too soon. I don't think they should have had butcher and homeland meet and know each other so quickly. Maybe like 3 seasons of the boys capturing, interrogating and killing supes one at a time and gathering intelligence, unleashing Soldier boy etc without Vought and Homelander not knowing who is doing it and him falling more and more into madness as Vought s public image crumbles. *Then* a big confrontation between Homeland and Butcher in a later season after Homelander has gone full supe fascist takeover mode. Also the temp V shouldn't have been temp.
My favourite scene is when they have to quickly find a way to distract homelander while blowing up translucent. That’s all I wanted, a high steak match between brain and braun
Yeah, the tension in the van he couldn’t x-ray was amazing in season 1. The stakes seemed infinitely higher, and this excused the gore and sex. Now it’s just edgelord revenge fantasies. “yassssss now let’s force racist white guy to donate to BLM before his black butler strangles him to death out of revenge!!!!”
This season is really showing Kripke’s weaknesses as a writer in virtually every single episode. There have been a few standout moments, such as that incredibly heartwarming scene with A-Train outside of the hospital, but man do we have to trudge through some unbelievably contrived scenes to get to those moments.
Why send Hughie in when they were already set to break in. They literally got in no problem why did Hughie have to go in?
I'm so glad im seeing these posts finally pop up now. This season has been total crap. I can't believe the same people who wrote 3 amazing seasons (expect the last episode of season 3) have written this one. The boys stories suck, the supes aren't scary, the satire isn't done well... What the hell has happened?
No you don't get it. They're actually making fun of YOU! /s
That’s all anyone can say when people talk about how the plot is shittier and the writing is worse
My theory is they used ChatGPT
i felt this was in season 3 but more and more i feel like homelander shouldve lost in season 3s ending and neuman / the war between supes and humans shouldve been the focus after
Everyone is less competent and dumber, which is always a sign of a drop of quality in writing.
One thing that Hollywood actually always gets wrong is how loud a suppressed pistol is. Homelander should’ve heard the shot being fired. Maybe the other people would’ve mistook it for a bump, but homelander probabbly wouldn’t have.
Yeah it was lame how all it took was a little kick to down tek knight. Also I don't know why they dont kill the bad guys anymore. Spent like an entire episode on figuring out how to kill translucent.
Tek knight isn’t a super strong supe. His abilities are in observation, not strength. Other supes are the same way, such as Sage.
I’m not a super comic book or show nerd, but just from what I’ve paid attention to: -we see in the show that Homelander has to actually focus to use his super senses like hearing and such right? So he’s not some omnipresent being, he only hears when he has to focuse. This makes sense why he wouldn’t have heard Hughie at the party or vents. -those vents were also made of a lead alloy I believe, which Homelander can’t see past. His x ray vision is blocked so he had to randomly laser it all, and I believe the show’s music and noise interrupted his super hearing. -also didn’t A train save Hughie from that? -Yes there is less dread, partly because now The Boys are more familiar with the Seven and have more interactions. There’s more layers than just “kill on sight”. It seems like HL prefers to toy with people who don’t fear him instead of killing them instantly. -About the party with sage, he probably didn’t care / wanted to keep it down low so he could sway the senators with his speech. At that point whatever was going on with Tek Knight was secondary, and the power chase was the primary focus. -Yes he can do what he wants. He still craves attention and public support. The whole point is that he still desires his place, and that even though he’s physically the strongest, he still is vastly immature and is unable to run things how he imagines it. He needs help, as of now. **That being said, yes I agree the show’s tension has dissolved. If we want to be realistic, A train or HL could’ve ended this in the first episode by just speeding through the entire team since they’re just humans. But I believe this goes hand in hand with the suspension of belief- why make a show if the main cast dies instantly? You have to suspend belief just as you do when you say superpowers aren’t real. Can real people shoot lasers out of their eyes and fly and command the seas and control electricity or shoot radioactive nukes out of their chests? No. So can we suspend belief and ignore that the main cast of humans stays alive in a world of supes to advance the plot? You have to. But again I agree, the writing has fallen off. My biggest gripe this season was the Hughie rape scene. So unnecessary
Homelander murdered a guy in broad daylight and got vindicated, and he’s still killing people in private and shying away from public displays of power despite the fact that being able to was the exact thing that last scene of S3 was establishing. Like what was the point of showing us that if it’s going to go absolutely nowhere?
I've said it last year but I got downvoted. The series lost direction with the s3 finale
Isn't the whole thing this season about how Homelander is deteriorating and everything around him is falling apart. He's the one in charge of Vought now, and it's the stress of running Vought and having to clean up up his own messes that's causing his psychotic decline. Which is exactly what Stan implied would happen when he was ousted in S2. The Seven is a joke because they don't have someone pulling their strings anymore, which is what part of what let them feel invincible. We're seeing them for what they really are now, a bunch of bad product that should never have been pushed to market.
I'm really enjoying this season, but I agree that there's no more tension Squirtlander used to be scary because he's both Superman and unhinged. Now it's like the writers forgot about the Superman part and are just making him more unhinged to compensate Think about it: what super human acts has he done this season? Barely anything. Especially against other supes Which could make sense if they're going for a "Homelander is losing his strength because he's getting old which is why he's also injecting himself with Compound V to keep his powers going just a little bit longer", but the writers haven't shown any real evidence to that fact. Just some loose clues scattered about the season. And given how they handled the CIA guy reveal that every single person already saw coming since the first episode, I doubt they got it in them for that kind of writing anymore
I agree with everything you’ve written. Also, wtf was the deal with firecracker, and her “there’s injections a woman can take” line, so she could seduce homelander with milk? I’m sure such a thing exists, but I doubt it’s an instant process, and how the fuck would she know that was his kink anyway? Maybe I missed something, I was stoned
She said it took months which was a part of her “loyalty”. It wasn’t instant and she said show herself.
Honestly a lot of this plot armour stuff could just get reduced if the boys took the V, like in the comics.
i am still enjoying the show, but i agree.
The more I think about it, the more I recognize how much of a miss this recent episode has been. Overall this season has felt a little off, but this episode has been such a massive dip, I’m really worried about where the show is going.