[TV] The Boys - Celebrity Superhero

2 hours ago

I don't think I've ever watched a superhero series that made me feel this uncomfortable, entertained and confused at the same time because let's be honest...
What if superheroes were actually terrible people....
That's basically the question The Boys asks...

The story takes place in a world where superheroes are real, but instead of simply protecting people, most of them work for a massive corporation called Vought...

They're celebrities, celebrities with superpowers, endorsement deals, movies, merchandise and millions of fans.... Basically, superheroes have become a business and that's where things get interesting...

The main character, Hughie Campbell, is just an ordinary guy whose life completely falls apart after a superhero accidentally kills his girlfriend and the worst part.. Nobody really cares.

Vought covers everything up, lawyers get involved and Hughie is basically expected to accept some money and move on.
But he doesn't... That's how he eventually gets involved with Billy Butcher, played by Karl Urban and a group of people who have made it their mission to expose and take down corrupt superheroes and honestly, Billy Butcher is one of the craziest characters I've watched in a long time....

This man hates superheroes with every part of his soul and I mean HATES them....

Karl Urban plays him perfectly. He's aggressive, sarcastic, unpredictable and constantly one bad decision away from making everything worse but what makes Butcher interesting is that underneath all that anger, there's a lot of pain...

He's not just fighting superheroes because he thinks they're bad, He's carrying his own personal reasons for wanting them destroyed...

Then we have Homelander...
Oh my God..
I don't even know where to start with this guy...

Homelander is basically what happens if you take Superman's powers, remove the morality and add an enormous amount of insecurity and narcissism...

He's incredibly powerful, but emotionally he's basically a child who desperately wants everyone to love him and Antony Starr is absolutely terrifying in this role.
There are moments where Homelander doesn't even need to do anything... He just looks at somebody qnd you're already thinking..
"Yeah... that person is probably not surviving this conversation."..

What makes The Boys so good is that it doesn't treat superheroes like perfect heroes, it looks at what would happen if people with unbelievable power were still just human beings with greed, jealousy, insecurity and terrible personalities and honestly, that's what makes some of the show's moments hit harder..

The series is extremely violent too and when I say violent, I mean EXTREMELY violent...
People explode.
People get crushed.
People get burned.
People get thrown through walls.
Sometimes the violence is so ridiculous that you can't help but laugh but there's always something uncomfortable underneath the jokes...

The show uses the violence, sex and dark humor to criticize things like corporate greed, celebrity culture, political manipulation, social media and the way people blindly worship public figures.
Vought is probably one of the most interesting parts of the whole series because they're not just selling superheroes, They're selling an image, They control the narrative, control the public perception and constantly manipulate people into believing whatever benefits them and honestly, that part feels surprisingly realistic... Not the superheroes though but the idea that powerful organizations can create celebrities, control information and influence what people believe?
That part isn't difficult to imagine...

Hughie is basically the normal guy thrown into this completely insane world...

Annie January, or Starlight, is probably the character I connected with most because she starts the series believing superheroes are genuine heroes, Then she slowly discovers what actually happens behind the scenes and watching her struggle between who she thought these people were and who they really are is one of the better character arcs in the show...

Then there's Frenchie and Kimiko.
Those two...
Honestly, I love them.

Their relationship brings some much-needed warmth into an otherwise incredibly messed-up world and Mother's Milk is basically the guy constantly trying to keep everyone from completely losing their minds...

The Boys knows how to keep you watching... Every season seems to end with me thinking:
"Okay, there's no way they can make things crazier than this.". And then they somehow do, but underneath all the blood, jokes and ridiculous superhero fights, I think the real reason this show works is because it keeps asking one simple question...
What would people actually do if nobody could stop them?...

Give someone enough power and remove the consequences, and eventually you find out who they really are and that's the scary part...

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