Heirs to the Wreckage

I’ve mentioned The Boys briefly in previous entries, but near on a month after the show concluded, I still feel the need to talk about it. The Boys most likely won’t claim the top spot for stellar writing, and most of the time it erred closer to plain vulgarity than it did to meaningful social critique, but despite that it’s cultural impact remains indelible– and I feel compelled to discuss why it earned that cultural impact and why it failed to fully live up to it. 

So, let’s lay it all out, shall we? The Boys introduces us to a world where superheroes exist. The show’s premise is sometimes misconstrued as “this is how superheroes would be if they were real”, when it’s actually “this is what superheroes would devolve into if paired with the excesses of modern America”. They are public celebrities– managed by the megacorporation known as Vought– and used to headline movie franchises, clothing brands, and various other commercial interests. These “heroes” behave in parallel to real-life American celebrities: beneath their public followings they throw parties with minors, constantly endanger others with their negligence, develop drug addictions, and make a daily habit of abusing their powers. They concern themselves more with profits and brand image than they do with stopping crime, which is a rare occurrence and often scripted by Vought’s “crime itineraries”. The extensive work of cover-ups and media narratives, plus the general cult-like nature of American celebrity followings, keep the public ignorant to their true nature. Essentially, they are sentient WMDs, tolerated almost purely for commercial reasons, and precariously kept in check by dependence on their decadent lifestyles.

The titular Boys are a team of normal humans who oppose Vought and the supes. Despite being outclassed by literal superhuman opponents, The Boys employ a variety of methods to control, blackmail, expose, or kill supes who overstep too far. The central tension of the series revolves around the increasing threat posed by Homelander (The Boys’s megalomaniacal version of Superman), and his vendetta with Billy Butcher (the leader of The Boys). The series does wonderful social critique along the way, touching on far-right politics, the Marvelization of cinema, crony capitalism, internet culture, and unchecked celebrity power. Every season has in some way touched on current events or a relevant political conversation.

Now for the issues, and where The Boys Season 5 could have done so much more but did not. This section will contain spoilers for the entire show, so I urge you not to read if you’re considering a watch. 

The Boys for me was a godsend. Like many others, I was allured by its irreverent and unapologetic stance against conservatism, against neoliberal centrism, and against the idea of superheroes at all. With Marvel stuffing Disney+ with assembly-line superhero content, and bloated mass-market franchises diluting themselves with crappy products and derivative spin-offs, we were long overdue for a deconstruction of the Superhero in media. But more importantly, the political positioning of the show allowed it to deliver powerful critiques on issues most shows fail to approach entirely. Billy Butcher is a poor choice for a revolutionary figure, and the show never attempts to claim too much of a moral high ground, but one can’t deny that there is something fundamentally radical about a group of ordinary people standing up to entities far more powerful, far more systemic than themselves. 

And this is where the later seasons of the Boys failed to deliver. I’ve noticed that most liberals in America can broadly be divided into two camps. Firstly, there are the ones like Dan Goldman, who emphatically promise in their campaign ads to fight Trump, but do not elaborate on what happens once Trump is ousted (and still take AIPAC money). Then there are those who entertain what Zohran is trying to achieve in NYC, those who understand that opposing Trump is not enough and would like to move on from both Trumpism and Obama-era centrism. One side wants to restore a fantasy neoliberal status quo, which ironically if granted would eventually result in another Trump. The other wants to build something new, something sorely needed for our times. Simply put, The Boys writers revealed themselves to be in the former camp. 

Firstly there’s the problem of Homelander, or rather, the Trumpification of Homelander. This character always made for a natural parody of Trump: unhinged, insecure, self-obsessed, and possessing god-like power with frighteningly few real checks. That, and the fact that he wears the American flag as a cape. The later seasons attempted to make this parallel far more explicit, oftentimes to the detriment of the character (a story arc where Homelander desires the Presidency initially reads as too on–the–nose). Firstly, Trump is not an interesting character and he doesn’t make for good entertainment. He’s not complex, nor an interesting antagonist; he is the most narratively exhausting of stains on American politics, and it’s our misfortune that the New Right chose the thickest and most predictable figure to lead them. You see it not only in the more Trump-esque elements of Homelander but also in Kenneth Marshal from Mickey 17 (played by Mark Ruffalo). Kenneth Marshal was one of the most forgettable antagonists precisely because he told us nothing new, he didn’t advance the discourse in any way or give the audience a new perspective on Trump/him. If anything it’s tiring to see recurring Trump-like traits in the very media we use to escape Trump-reality. Homelander worked best as a Trump parody when he was firmly his own character, and the parallels were allowed to shine through naturally. President Curtis from Rick and Morty is entertaining as a parody because he’s an amalgamation of multiple US Presidents, and this creates a wholly new critique of the office itself for the audience to chew on. 

Then there’s the meta-problem of Trump-parodies, which is that they’re rather useless at this point. Trump is a figure that most people already have a strong opinion on. He’s either the prophesied savior or the devil, a necessary evil or a disgrace, an idiot or a genius. It’s doubtful there are still people whose opinions are subject to the next derivative parody of Trump. That, and it only makes clearer the disturbing trend of liberals whose political bandwidth is reduced to mocking Trump. It’s like watching The Late Show with Steven Colbert, some of the laughs and applause come from the jokes, too much of it comes from the agreeable anti-Trump statements. Now obviously when South Park parodied Trump it was well worth-watching, but only because they upped the ante and amplified the parody to a level that only South Park writers could approach.

The Boys writers adopted a similar line of thinking, and then seemed almost surprised when they received mixed reactions– which brings me to the finale. The finale of the Boys was by no means a complete betrayal like Game of Thrones Season 8, but it was painfully underwhelming for multiple reasons. As mentioned before, the central tension of the series revolves around Homelander’s growing obsession with power and the nuclear possibility that he could destroy the world. As the Superman-figure of this world, it’s assumed that there’s terrifyingly little that could be done if he snapped, and the character himself comes to this reasoning. Much of the show builds up to this doomsday point, and it’s one of the natural Trump parallels that works very well (just as Trump infamously claimed he could shoot someone on 5th avenue without consequence). The finale makes the anti-climactic move of entirely sidestepping this, Homelander does not snap or go nuclear (although he does openly assume control of a fascist-America). It is not merely my sense of spectacle as a viewer that leads me to disapprove of this choice. The states rationale of the writers is they wanted to show that Homelander was always too pathetic and dependent on public validation to make good on his threat (in another attempt to parallel Trump). I think for that very reason, it would have been all the more important to show the real danger of someone that insecure possessing that much power. Yes Homelander is a child, Trump is a child, why does that excuse the possibility of them triggering Armageddon, especially when they lack the empathy and restraint required to wield that sort of power? Trump is an insecure man cosplaying as a strongman, yes, that is precisely what makes him a strongman. Is it truly that unthinkable that this man, obsessed with ratings and public attention as he is, might someday find the mood to start a nuclear war? Unlikely, yes, but certainly not impossible. He has already deployed the US military on domestic soil and recently threatened Iran with “total annihilation”– other forms of escalation are sure to come. Using Homelander to illustrate this possibility would have not undermined the fact that he is pathetic, but only reinforced it while illustrating the real threat of handing a petalant child the nuclear codes. 

(Perhaps the meta-reason is that there wasn’t enough budget to show Homelander razing cities, but historically that hasn’t been an issue for the show.)

The more concerning issue revolves around the ending status quo, namely the ending of the Vought Corporation. Homelander is a figure who has unsurprisingly and unfortunately found of a cult-following in the far-Right. This led to a protracted and concentrated effort to reinforce that Homelander is in fact the villain. And yes Homelander is irredeemably despicable, but the fact remains that he’s not the root of all evil in The Boys; same as Trump isn’t the root of America’s problems. They are both symptoms of the status quo, in Homelander’s case he is literally a product of capitalism/Vought– traumatically raised by them in a laboratory. Even if Trump is ousted and jailed, the America of today could still very well produce another one, just as the show explicitly acknowledges there could someday be another Homelander. So, what happens after Homelander is killed in the finale? The answer is… nothing. Vought experiences shockingly few consequences, the CEO returns to power with clear designs on continuing to “sell” superheroes. And The Boys just disband and go home, their job apparently fulfilled despite the clear continuation of what they strove against for all 5 seasons. And the show treats this like a victory. 

This was a show that presented the most scathing and entertaining critique of capitalism seen in a while, and did not even attempt a solution for it at its conclusion. The ending would be far less offensive and read more pragmatically if nothing about show’s status quo changed, but The Boys at least resolved to continue working against Vought. That would have read as the ending of writers who while well-intentioned, honestly couldn’t come up with a solution for the excesses of capitalism. This ending we received reads as an ending of writers whose liberal imagination is painfully and mistakenly limited to destroying Trump/Homelander. Perhaps it’s unrealistic to expect anything more radical from a show on Amazon Prime; or expect the in-universe “Amazon” (Vought) to face too many consequences given this fact. The other potential reason is that Vought and the status quo were left intact for the sake of the spin-offs they have planned (Vought Rising and The Boys: Mexico), which additionally cheapens the show’s critique of tacky Marvel-esque spin-offs. All that is to say, the show’s ending is shockingly unimaginative and clearly possessed far more potential than the writers gave. 

Perhaps The Boys shouldn’t be read as a liberal show, it certainly wanted to be seen as such; but it fit my tastes with its black comedy, subject matter, and superhero elements. I wanted so much more out of it– perhaps I was foolish to look for a radical answer in a show that ultimately is just Amazon streaming fodder. Even if it was fantastical, I wanted a show that was so unapologetic and visceral about curb-stomping corpo-authoritarian figures to actually make a statement. And it did not, but I suppose we can’t expect every show to reach the same depths as Andor. Regardless, I still enjoyed the show and it remains one of my favorites. I do recommend watching it on Prime… or just pirating it.