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Review: The Boys Season 3 (2022)
The whole season was a bit hazy for me. This is usually what happens in the season-by-season format of Western shows, when minor storylines start to be fleshed out and the story has to spread its attention over more topics. That being said I thought the end of this season was more intriguing than the end of the last season, but that’s also because it was more of an unfinished cliffhanger. But at the very least, I was more excited to watch season 4 than I was season 3. I’d say that the writing in season 3 was overall a bit better than season 2 but not as good as season 1.
Spoilers.
Story
This season was based around finding Soldier Boy, a weapon that could potentially kill Homelander. I’d say that was the one major story line. The other major story lines included compound V and the continued use and research of it, as well as some politics talk. As mentioned, the show was starting to be less focused in this season as there were more characters and storylines. So it actually took me a while to remember what actually happened. And is the case with superhero media, many characters simply don’t die, as we saw with Maeve and Soldier Boy, both of whom were supposed to die but survived. So I didn’t love those parts of the ending, but I will say the rest of the end had me intrigued.
The major story line is going to be the complicated relationship between Homelander, Butcher, and Ryan. Butcher pushed Ryan away in anger which gave Homelander an opportunity to swoop in and claim his role of father. However, we saw at the end of the season that Homelander was descending further and further into madness and Ryan was in shock of his father’s cruelty, very against the values his mother taught him.
For the boys, Annie finally left Vought and joined their ranks, and their next target would be Victoria Neuman, who was now a candidate for vice president of the US. Vicky was a concern because during the season she had switched from going against superheroes to protecting them.
Production
The production value was fairly consistent compared to previous seasons. The look and feel of the movie was similar to previous seasons, including in its violence and flashiness. But flashiness in shock and not in terms of actual fighting. There was one fight scene that got me hyped in episode 6 where Soldier Boy, Butcher, and Hughie all banded together to fight Homelander. It was short, but it was probably my favourite fight scene in the whole season. I also quite enjoyed the end of the season when so much was changing and the members of the team each had missions to take care of.
Characters
Homelander
Always the central character of the Boys. Homelander was very threatened by the idea of having to co-captain with Starlight. He tried to control her using Supersonic and Hughie, forcing her into an on-camera relationship with him. Over the course of the season, Homelander continued to struggle with leadership and trust in his team members. He went so far as to imprison Maeve and kill Noir for turning their backs on him.
Homelander was briefly pleased by the thought of having a father in Soldier Boy. He had even made nice with Ryan to meet him, so that they could be a family. But that was not possible and so he moved on, focusing on Ryan. At the end of the season, Homelander was beginning his reign of madness. He felt that he was on top of the world with his son by his side and having public approval even when ruling with fear.
Maeve
Maeve was a side character for much of the season. She helped Butcher get temporary V, which would give temporary powers. She and Butcher also slept together which I thought was really odd and didn’t make much sense. Overall, Maeve was pretty checked out of it all.
She came at the very end, after the public found out about her imprisonment and helped her escape. She helped the boys by fighting Homelander, and taking Soldier Boy away when he was about to explode, and losing her powers in the process. Ashley hid her survival by deleting footage of her escaping with the help of the boys. In the end, Maeve was going to run away with Elena and finally have their happily ever after. I appreciated that she got her happy ending but I also can’t help but feel like the writers wanted to leave that storyline open in case they wanted to bring her back.
Starlight/Annie
Starlight struggled with power in this season, both in the political and physical sense. She was surprised that Edgar wanted to appoint her as co-captain. As she grew into the role, she butted heads with Hughie. Starlight thought she could do with the influence she had, and Hughie was shocked that she would even consider doing anything good in the name of Vought.
Starlight wanted to gain political power over Homelander and Homelander threatened her by killing Supersonic, her ex-boyfriend, as a threat to what he would do to Hughie. So Starlight acquiesced and played girlfriend to Homelander. Victoria also approached Starlight for a partnership and Starlight was so done with political games and she refused. She didn’t care if Victoria killed her, she just wanted to live in the open without having to hide her intentions.
Starlight and Hughie had their share of arguments over Hughie taking compound V. Starlight felt that Hughie kept interfering with her trying to do her work. Hughie claimed that it was to protect her, but over time she believed that he was doing it because he wanted to feel powerful for once. they came to those realizations on their own, but after fighting with one another.
After the Herogasm party, Starlight livestreamed the death to show an example of what Vought was covering up. She continued to reveal more Vought secrets on livestream, such as when Homelander threatened her at Vought tower. At the end of the season, Starlight gave up her costume and decided to live as Annie. That way, she wouldn’t always have to play the political game and could simply fight for what she wanted.
A-Train
I kind of forgot what A-Train was up to this season. His story lines were all over the place. He was reintroduced back to the Seven, and wanted to kickstart his own media campaign. Ashley heavily disapproved but kind of let him do whatever.
A-Train was trying to be more of a community man and he disapproved of Blue Hawk targeting black communities. He invited Blue Hawk to apologize but it turned out badly, with Blue Hawk saying racist things and getting into a fight, in the process injuring A-Train’s brother so he would never walk again. A-Train got revenge on Blue Hawk and killed him, but had a heart attack. He was saved by receiving a heart transplant from Blue Hawk.
His story this season ended with him getting in a fight with his brother. Obviously his brother was upset with how things turned out. He’d wanted Blue Hawk to be exposed for his racist misdeeds but he ended up with no justice and no use of his legs. Meanwhile, A-Train easily received a heart transplant and was well on his way to recovering his full power. His brother was by his side his entire time as A-Train, and it felt like a big betrayal to him for A-Train to lose sight of what was important.
Black Noir
Black Noir remained a mysterious character even until his end, and not necessarily in the good way. I do think it was powerful to leave him a mystery, but I felt like the writers didn’t show the parts of him that would leave me continuing to see him as cool and mysterious.
Black Noir was revealed to have been a hero in Soldier Boy’s team. Soldier Boy was very confused about Black Noir’s betrayal of him because Black Noir followed Vought orders to a tee, which meant that Vought had ordered Soldier Boy’s destruction. Black Noir was revealed to have been close to Edgar, which was why he followed orders well.
Homelander showed great trust in Black Noir, when he didn’t trust anyone else on the team. However, he realized that Black Noir had known about Soldier Boy being his father, about Soldier Boy being still alive. Hurt by the deception, Homelander reluctantly killed Black Noir.
Deep
I hate that Deep is becoming an effective comedic relief character. I hate it because he was a yucky gross sexual assaulter in season 1 and now he’s just become the loser which is unfortunately a very fun type of character. Deep was readmitted to the Seven by Homelander, and this time around Deep did all of Homelander’s bidding as thanks for his approval. Deep took over the running of the analytics and surveillance team, which was funny because he honestly didn’t know what he was doing.
There was another story line about Deep and his wife, the one who was assigned to him by the cult. They surprisingly had a good relationship, in which she would advise Deep how to act and speak to look good with the authorities (Homelander), reminiscent of the behaviour of the Church of the Collective in season 2. They also had a good sex life despite Deep initially saying they had no chemistry. But things started to change as he grew more and more sexually aroused by aquatic animals and Cassandra couldn’t handle the bestiality.
Deep was desperate to have Homelander’s approval so he had to do a number of things he hated. Reminiscent of him forcing Annie in season 1. First, Homelander made Deep eat a live octopus, which was particularly hard for Deep who could speak with aquatic animals. And at the end of the season, Homelander made Deep kill the vice president elect, as part of a deal between Homelander and Victoria, the latter who would assume the role of vice president elect.
It looks like Deep’s going to be a guy who just continues to hang around in the next season.
Supersonic
Supersonic was a contestant on a competition show to look for the newest members of the Seven. He was Annie’s ex-boyfriend so they had a good relationship. Annie liked him (as a friend), but she was reluctant to have him join the Seven because she knew how dirty the Seven really were. But Supersonic backed her up and said that he’d help her no matter what. However, after he joined, Homelander killed him to threaten Annie into submitting to his leadership.
Soldier Boy
Soldier Boy was the prototype for Homelander. And he was definitely based on Captain America. Well, many of the characters in this show are based on familiar heroes which is honestly kind of fun. Anyway, Soldier Boy was the leader of the heroes in his time. He was supposed to have died. However, the boys received a lead that he was possibly alive and would be the key to eliminating Homelander.
Through Frenchie’s relations with Russian mobsters, they broke Soldier Boy out. It was revealed through Grace Mallory that Soldier Boy was ambushed by his team and betrayed to the Russians. Butcher struck up a deal with Soldier Boy that they would help him track down his team (Payback), in return for Soldier Boy’s help in killing Homelander. Through hunting down his old team, Soldier Boy learned that it was a planned and coordinated attack on him, ordered by Vought. He needed to be taken out for the emergence of his son, the newer and improved version of him, Homelander.
Though Soldier Boy mused on the idea of having a son, he ultimately was ready to kill him for the deal he had struck with Butcher. However, he had hurt Ryan and that turned Butcher on Ryan. At the end of the big fight, Maeve pushed him out of Vought tower and both were presumed dead. However, he was shown being pushed on a stretcher somewhere, implying that he’d just go back into hibernation and he would be broken out again when his powers were needed.
Edgar
It was revealed that Edgar was Victoria’s adoptive father and he used her to keep Homelander and other heroes under control, as her stance as politician was staunchly in favour of regulating heroes and curbing their power. Hughie and Annie tracked down her past information and found out that she was an orphan who was adopted by Edgar because of her powers of being able to kill from afar. Hughie had caught Victoria killing an old friend and that was what started his and Annie’s journey in uncovering her past.
Victoria was approached by Homelander to strike up a deal against Edgar. She and Edgar had planned a press conference to pressure Homelander into answering for his crimes, but she instead turned on Edgar. She was apologetic about it in private, but she insisted to Edgar that she needed to protect her daughter (implying that Homelander would hold her daughter hostage). There was also a scene where she injected her daughter with compound V, saying that it would help her protect herself.
Victoria caught on to the fact that Annie and Hughie knew about her secret, so she asked Annie to strike up a deal. Annie was tired of playing political games so she declined, asking Victoria to either just kill her and get it over with or to leave her alone, of which Victoria chose the latter.
At the end of the season, Victoria and Homelander were more in cahoots. Homelander helped her kill a political rival, and at the very end, it was shown that she was vice president elect and the boys’ new target.
Ashley
Ashley was now the CEO of Vought. She struggled between feeling confident and fearful. She enjoyed domming men, though I struggle to say she enjoyed it because sometimes it felt like she had to do it to feel some semblance of control over her own life. We saw that whenever Homelander talked down to her, she would use the same words to talk down to other people.
Ashley had an assistant also called Ashley who she talked down to, and it represented her lack of empathy. Ashley wanted to be a big fish and she felt she could only do it by stepping on others. There was a scene in which Annie asked for her help but after struggling, Ashley refused and talked down to her with corporate speak.
Throughout the show, Ashley would pull her hair out in frustration and at the end of the season we saw that she was in fact mostly bald, being so stressed out. She was the one who deleted the footage of Maeve escaping, hinting that maybe there’ll be a chance that the boys can rely on her in the future.
Cassandra
Cassandra was Deep’s wife, the one he’d married on orders of the Church of the Collective. She helped him reach new heights, basically acting as his manager as he published books about his experiences in the cult and such. Their relationship was also much better than before. They were having sex all the time. But we saw that she would feed words into his mouth, just like the consultant from the Church did in season 2. So she wasn’t fully free of the mannerisms instilled in her by the Church.
Cassandra obviously couldn’t understand Deep’s connection with aquatic animals. She insisted he eat the live octopus so that he’d be accepted and protected by Homelander. Under her nose, Deep started to have romantic and sexual feelings for an octopus. She was very weirded out when the octopus wanted to have a threesome; she let Deep have relations with her, but Cassandra couldn’t stand being touched by the octopus and left the bed, and the relationship.
Cassandra was later shown on TV promoting her book where she talked about leaving a bad relationship with Deep. I know Deep was an asshole and I don’t want to woobify him, but I do think that Cassandra was the toxic personality here, where she blamed her troubles on other people and used them for clout.
Hughie
Hughie also struggled with power in this season, just as Annie did. He took a dose of temporary compound V after he found out that Butcher had. And Hughie was very pleased with the results, admitting to Annie as such. With the V, Hughie had teleportation powers which were very useful. Hughie told Annie that he struggled with feeling unpowerful, which made sense given how the boys would baby him. Annie didn’t like Hughie taking the V and as they argued, we saw that Hughie would make it feel like it was Annie’s fault he was taking the V (so that he could protect her). And after fighting, the two admitted that it was because Hughie himself wanted to feel powerful.
Annie later found out that the temporary V had negative long-term side effects and Butcher had knocked Hughie out to stop him from taking V and joining them on their last hurrah. Annie came to pick up Hughie and tell him “I told you so,” but Hughie also discussed his revelation that one didn’t need to be a supe to be powerful. He had grown up thinking his dad was weak because he was mild-mannered, but he realized that his dad was strong for being by his side all those years, even while living through the grief of his wife being gone.
Butcher
Butcher, you done fucked up. Butcher continued his quest to kill Homelander and seeking out Soldier Boy was his plan this time around. For the first part of the season, we saw that Butcher actually had a very good relationship with Ryan in which he spent time with him, played with him, encouraged him. It was a very positive relationship. However, in a moment of anger, he pushed Ryan away and blamed him for killing Becca and that drove a deep deep wedge between them.
Nonetheless, Butcher continued on his quest to kill Homelander. He was the first to take the temporary V that he got from Maeve. He received laser eye powers like Homelander, as well as super strength (typical for most supes). He felt very sick, but he started to get used to it and it would prove handy. So we see that in this season, he had less of a problem with supes, having grown quite fond of one (Ryan), and becoming one himself. His grudge was purely with Homelander.
Butcher also had a story line with his father. His father was abusive and he loathed him. But we also saw that Butcher, despite loving his younger brother so much, had also hurt him mightily. He’d abandoned his brother to fend for himself, saying that Lenny needed to protect his mom. But he’d also told off Lenny for being weak. In a sequence in which he was put into a dream state, he revisited his old trauma and watched Lenny, a young boy, kill himself. That pushed Butcher to be kinder to Hughie who reminded him a lot of Lenny.
At the end of the season, Butcher had to put aside his quest to kill Homelander to protect Ryan from Soldier Boy. He did successfully protect Ryan, but Ryan wanted to be with his dad, and Butcher had to live with the regret ☹ Because of the constant use of the V, Butcher only had months left to live, but he decided he’d go all out in his mission for revenge.
I really hope Butcher makes things right with Ryan next season. That’s truly the top priority for me lol.
M.M.
M.M. struggled with hiding the truth from his daughter. She was living with her mom and stepdad who liked superheroes (especially Homelander) and encouraged M.M.’s daughter’s interest in them. M.M. was trying to be a good dad and staying away from the sleuthing but he gave in when he heard Butcher was investigating Soldier Boy because Soldier Boy had hurt his family. Like Butcher, M.M. needed revenge. The difference was that M.M. was not interested in taking V to boost himself. M.M. was very disappointed in Butcher for teaming up with Soldier Boy but he prioritized doing good over taking revenge.
In the end, M.M. joined back with the boys and helped in their final mission. He also revealed the truth to his daughter. He’d gotten into fights over superheroes in front of her and he knew he was scaring her. So he told her about how superheroes were not all good, that they were capable of bad and he was working towards getting justice for their family. M.M. knew he wasn’t perfect, but he tried to show his daughter the truth.
Frenchie
Frenchie’s past caught up with him in this season, because his connections to the Russian mob were required to find Soldier Boy. He was caught up with a mobster named Nina who taunted him with the fact that he used to be subservient and a coward. In a final showdown, Nina captured Cherie and Kimiko and forced Frenchie to choose. He couldn’t, but Kimiko and Cherie fought out of it.
There was also the budding relationship between Frenchie and Kimiko. He was a bit stiff when Kimiko tried to kiss him so she backed off but they clearly had a good relationship and they reconciled. In the end, he worked on a potion that would help get rid of Soldier Boy.
Kimiko
Kimiko was hit by Soldier Boy’s explosion and lost her powers. She was very pleased at first because she hated her powers. At one point she had hung out with Ryan and shared that she hated them. She liked being human. In her time of happiness, she had kissed Frenchie but he didn’t really seem to respond so she backed off.
Later, she was captured by Nina and she had to fight off the henchmen. She realized that she had always been violent, that it wasn’t the powers that made her a monster. After some thought, she asked Annie to get her compound V so she would be a supe again. This time, she was pleased to have her powers because she chose them, and I suppose she wanted them so that she could protect and help. At the end of the season, we saw Kimiko was much happier about using her powers. She had purpose this time around.
I thought Kimiko’s story was going to be about her feeling insecure and useless without her powers. It didn’t quite lean on that negativity. But I can’t really quite say why she wanted her powers. We didn’t get to see the text that she wrote to Annie. So her story was a bit muddy.
Victoria Neuman/Nadia
At the end of last season, we found out that Victoria was the head popper, and Hughie joined her office because he wanted to try to take down supes the proper way in the legal system. Soon in this season, Hughie saw Victoria kill an old friend who kept calling her Nadia. They were friends, but Victoria had to kill him to stop him from blowing her cover. That put Hughie and Annie on her trail. Hughie went to an orphanage to infiltrate their computer systems and found out that Victoria used to live there, and was adopted by Edgar.
In the present day, we saw that Edgar and Victoria maintained a good relationship, and Edgar also doted on her daughter. That being said, Victoria already began to worry for her daughter, knowing that she was going up against Homelander. As mentioned, Homelander approached her with a deal and she ultimately took it and took down Edgar. Edgar wasn’t too angry, acknowledging that he’d taught Victoria to play all sides.
Victoria tried to buy Annie’s loyalty too but Annie wasn’t taking it. Victoria didn’t kill her though, probably recognizing that Annie had considerable influence in the public eye and that killing her would not only throw Victoria into trouble, but that Annie might also be useful to Victoria in the future.
Homelander and Victoria continued to work together (under wraps of course) and we saw at the end of the season, Homelander asked Deep to kill a political rival so that Victoria could be the new vice president elect. The boys wanted to target her next as she would work with Homelander.
I didn’t expect Victoria to be a big bad for the next season, but we’ll see how it plays out. Homelander is always the big bad, we’ll have to see if Victoria is charismatic enough. She had limited screentime this season so that was why I’m still a little skeptical.
Ryan
Ryan and Butcher had a good relationship at the beginning of the season. Butcher was actually making an effort to support him, and Ryan actually seemed to look up to him. When Butcher was feeling sick from the temporary V, Ryan wanted to care for him. It really seemed like a nice relationship.
But Butcher fucked it up by pushing Ryan away and blaming him for Becca’s death, something that Becca forbade him. They didn’t see each other again until Ryan was with Homelander. Homelander had come to Ryan, forgiving him for hurting/killing Stormfront. Homelander forgave him easily, because he was always a lone wolf and he didn’t even care for Stormfront that much; we saw that much at the beginning of the season. Homelander was short-sighted. He was angry at Ryan for going against his wishes, and now he forgave Ryan because he needed someone in this time. So he took advantage of the vacuum that Butcher left and got Ryan to acknowledge him as his dad.
Butcher and Ryan were both a little uneasy at the final confrontation and Butcher knew his first priority was to protect Ryan, which he did. After all was said and done, Ryan just wanted to go away with Homelander. I think he recognized that something bad would happen if Homelander stayed in the same room with those people.
At the very end, Homelander introduced Ryan as his son. Homelander now felt very powerful with Ryan just at his side. He was emboldened to kill people willy-nilly and while Homelander was very proud, Ryan was quite shocked. And I think he’ll come to find some questionable things about his dad in the coming season.
Grace Mallory
Grace was charged with taking care of Ryan. She was also the plot device to tell the boys about what happened with Soldier Boy and the rest of Payback. I suspect Mallory will continue to be a background character in the coming season due to her connections within the government forces.
Themes
Racism
Social issues continue to be themes in the Boys. We saw how race was a large consideration for deciding who would be the newest member of the Seven. Someone ethnic, but not too ethnic.
There was also the storyline between Blue Hawk and the black community. A-Train tried to speak on behalf of the community, giving Blue Hawk a platform to apologize but Blue Hawk was not sorry at all and the stunt was not at all what the community at all. A-Train came from a common family, but it was hard for him to remain humble, not only because of his superpowers, but we saw even from season 1, A-Train was very concerned with his image.
There was also a rise in right wing politics, particularly with Homelander’s speech about how he was better than everyone. That resonated with racists and white supremacists. And we saw at the end of the season that Homelander has become somewhat of a spokesperson for the right wing movement.
Cults
Just a small theme about Cassandra still trying to control Deep in the way that the church had controlled them both in the prior season. But Deep wasn’t easy enough to completely fall for the rhetoric because he had his own wishes and his own ways. And when Cassandra and Deep parted ways, she tarnished his name the way that the cult would.
Family
Fatherhood was a huge theme in this season. We of course know Homelander’s yearning for family. He yearned for Stilwell’s love and when that didn’t work out, he yearned for Ryan. When Ryan was mad at him, he had no choice but to stay away. Homelander was delighted at the thought of Soldier Boy being his father, not because he loved Soldier Boy (he did admire him), but because Homelander loved having a father at all. He was ready to lay it all down for Soldier Boy to accept him. He’d even reconnected with Ryan so that they could be one big happy family. But it didn’t work out because Soldier Boy had hurt Ryan.
Butcher was kind of the mirror to Homelander. He also had complex relationships with his father and his son. He hated his father for being abusive, there was no question about it. His mom wanted him to see his father one last time before he died so that he’d see what a weak man his father had become and he’d feel better. But we saw that the anger wasn’t completely with his father. Some of his anger was with himself for letting his brother be hurt. He used to protect his brother from his father. But he wasn’t there when his brother needed him the most. He called his brother names to try to get him to toughen up, reminiscent of their father hurting them to try to get them to toughen up. And he wasn’t there to stop his brother from killing himself and protecting him. Hughie and Ryan were something of do-overs for Butcher. He realized that Hughie wasn’t a wuss, just like Lenny wasn’t a wuss; they just expressed strength in their own way. He realized that Ryan needed a father figure and he realized that he loved Ryan because he loved Becca, even if he said harsh things to him.
Choice of power
The idea of superpowers being a choice was explored in this season because of the temporary V. Previously, we’d only known of compound V being injected into babies. Of course, those babies had no choice, it was thrust upon them by their parents.
Butcher took V to give him a fighting chance when confronting other supes. Butcher was always more similar to supes than he cared to admit, but I think with him taking V, he was closer to admitting that he didn’t hate supes, he just hated Homelander.
Hughie took V so that he could feel power for once. As discussed, it was through the experience that he understood more of himself and what he wanted. Yes, he wanted to protect, but he realized that strength came in all ways. He didn’t have to be a supe to be strong. He was fine as a supe, but he brought a strength that no one could. He was special, like Lenny was to Butcher.
Kimiko also chose to take V, despite having hated her powers before. She hated being a monster. But she saw when kidnapped by Nina that it wasn’t the powers that made her a monster, it was how she grew to face her environment. Constantly being in danger made her that aggressive person. And while she enjoyed being human for a bit, she found that she now accepted being a hero because she could be helpful, she could protect those important to her.
Would I take V if I had the chance? I have no clue. We all have our reasons for wanting power.
Politics
Politics is going to be a bigger storyline in the next season. That being said, the politics of the boys is quite focused on individuals. We have Victoria as the representative political character but we don’t really see the far-reaching effects of her policies. We just assume things are happening. But anyway we’ll see how Victoria tries to play both sides this time. This time, both sides will be more suspicious of her now knowing her game.
Ashley was the corporate character in this season, especially after Edgar was detained. But I think she’s going to transition out of that role in the next season. I think she’s going to be something of an ally as opposed to the corporate shill she’d become.
Overall
This was still a good season and I’m still going to watch season 4. It wasn’t perfect, but again I thought it was better than season 2.
Spoilers.
Story
This season was based around finding Soldier Boy, a weapon that could potentially kill Homelander. I’d say that was the one major story line. The other major story lines included compound V and the continued use and research of it, as well as some politics talk. As mentioned, the show was starting to be less focused in this season as there were more characters and storylines. So it actually took me a while to remember what actually happened. And is the case with superhero media, many characters simply don’t die, as we saw with Maeve and Soldier Boy, both of whom were supposed to die but survived. So I didn’t love those parts of the ending, but I will say the rest of the end had me intrigued.
The major story line is going to be the complicated relationship between Homelander, Butcher, and Ryan. Butcher pushed Ryan away in anger which gave Homelander an opportunity to swoop in and claim his role of father. However, we saw at the end of the season that Homelander was descending further and further into madness and Ryan was in shock of his father’s cruelty, very against the values his mother taught him.
For the boys, Annie finally left Vought and joined their ranks, and their next target would be Victoria Neuman, who was now a candidate for vice president of the US. Vicky was a concern because during the season she had switched from going against superheroes to protecting them.
Production
The production value was fairly consistent compared to previous seasons. The look and feel of the movie was similar to previous seasons, including in its violence and flashiness. But flashiness in shock and not in terms of actual fighting. There was one fight scene that got me hyped in episode 6 where Soldier Boy, Butcher, and Hughie all banded together to fight Homelander. It was short, but it was probably my favourite fight scene in the whole season. I also quite enjoyed the end of the season when so much was changing and the members of the team each had missions to take care of.
Characters
Homelander
Always the central character of the Boys. Homelander was very threatened by the idea of having to co-captain with Starlight. He tried to control her using Supersonic and Hughie, forcing her into an on-camera relationship with him. Over the course of the season, Homelander continued to struggle with leadership and trust in his team members. He went so far as to imprison Maeve and kill Noir for turning their backs on him.
Homelander was briefly pleased by the thought of having a father in Soldier Boy. He had even made nice with Ryan to meet him, so that they could be a family. But that was not possible and so he moved on, focusing on Ryan. At the end of the season, Homelander was beginning his reign of madness. He felt that he was on top of the world with his son by his side and having public approval even when ruling with fear.
Maeve
Maeve was a side character for much of the season. She helped Butcher get temporary V, which would give temporary powers. She and Butcher also slept together which I thought was really odd and didn’t make much sense. Overall, Maeve was pretty checked out of it all.
She came at the very end, after the public found out about her imprisonment and helped her escape. She helped the boys by fighting Homelander, and taking Soldier Boy away when he was about to explode, and losing her powers in the process. Ashley hid her survival by deleting footage of her escaping with the help of the boys. In the end, Maeve was going to run away with Elena and finally have their happily ever after. I appreciated that she got her happy ending but I also can’t help but feel like the writers wanted to leave that storyline open in case they wanted to bring her back.
Starlight/Annie
Starlight struggled with power in this season, both in the political and physical sense. She was surprised that Edgar wanted to appoint her as co-captain. As she grew into the role, she butted heads with Hughie. Starlight thought she could do with the influence she had, and Hughie was shocked that she would even consider doing anything good in the name of Vought.
Starlight wanted to gain political power over Homelander and Homelander threatened her by killing Supersonic, her ex-boyfriend, as a threat to what he would do to Hughie. So Starlight acquiesced and played girlfriend to Homelander. Victoria also approached Starlight for a partnership and Starlight was so done with political games and she refused. She didn’t care if Victoria killed her, she just wanted to live in the open without having to hide her intentions.
Starlight and Hughie had their share of arguments over Hughie taking compound V. Starlight felt that Hughie kept interfering with her trying to do her work. Hughie claimed that it was to protect her, but over time she believed that he was doing it because he wanted to feel powerful for once. they came to those realizations on their own, but after fighting with one another.
After the Herogasm party, Starlight livestreamed the death to show an example of what Vought was covering up. She continued to reveal more Vought secrets on livestream, such as when Homelander threatened her at Vought tower. At the end of the season, Starlight gave up her costume and decided to live as Annie. That way, she wouldn’t always have to play the political game and could simply fight for what she wanted.
A-Train
I kind of forgot what A-Train was up to this season. His story lines were all over the place. He was reintroduced back to the Seven, and wanted to kickstart his own media campaign. Ashley heavily disapproved but kind of let him do whatever.
A-Train was trying to be more of a community man and he disapproved of Blue Hawk targeting black communities. He invited Blue Hawk to apologize but it turned out badly, with Blue Hawk saying racist things and getting into a fight, in the process injuring A-Train’s brother so he would never walk again. A-Train got revenge on Blue Hawk and killed him, but had a heart attack. He was saved by receiving a heart transplant from Blue Hawk.
His story this season ended with him getting in a fight with his brother. Obviously his brother was upset with how things turned out. He’d wanted Blue Hawk to be exposed for his racist misdeeds but he ended up with no justice and no use of his legs. Meanwhile, A-Train easily received a heart transplant and was well on his way to recovering his full power. His brother was by his side his entire time as A-Train, and it felt like a big betrayal to him for A-Train to lose sight of what was important.
Black Noir
Black Noir remained a mysterious character even until his end, and not necessarily in the good way. I do think it was powerful to leave him a mystery, but I felt like the writers didn’t show the parts of him that would leave me continuing to see him as cool and mysterious.
Black Noir was revealed to have been a hero in Soldier Boy’s team. Soldier Boy was very confused about Black Noir’s betrayal of him because Black Noir followed Vought orders to a tee, which meant that Vought had ordered Soldier Boy’s destruction. Black Noir was revealed to have been close to Edgar, which was why he followed orders well.
Homelander showed great trust in Black Noir, when he didn’t trust anyone else on the team. However, he realized that Black Noir had known about Soldier Boy being his father, about Soldier Boy being still alive. Hurt by the deception, Homelander reluctantly killed Black Noir.
Deep
I hate that Deep is becoming an effective comedic relief character. I hate it because he was a yucky gross sexual assaulter in season 1 and now he’s just become the loser which is unfortunately a very fun type of character. Deep was readmitted to the Seven by Homelander, and this time around Deep did all of Homelander’s bidding as thanks for his approval. Deep took over the running of the analytics and surveillance team, which was funny because he honestly didn’t know what he was doing.
There was another story line about Deep and his wife, the one who was assigned to him by the cult. They surprisingly had a good relationship, in which she would advise Deep how to act and speak to look good with the authorities (Homelander), reminiscent of the behaviour of the Church of the Collective in season 2. They also had a good sex life despite Deep initially saying they had no chemistry. But things started to change as he grew more and more sexually aroused by aquatic animals and Cassandra couldn’t handle the bestiality.
Deep was desperate to have Homelander’s approval so he had to do a number of things he hated. Reminiscent of him forcing Annie in season 1. First, Homelander made Deep eat a live octopus, which was particularly hard for Deep who could speak with aquatic animals. And at the end of the season, Homelander made Deep kill the vice president elect, as part of a deal between Homelander and Victoria, the latter who would assume the role of vice president elect.
It looks like Deep’s going to be a guy who just continues to hang around in the next season.
Supersonic
Supersonic was a contestant on a competition show to look for the newest members of the Seven. He was Annie’s ex-boyfriend so they had a good relationship. Annie liked him (as a friend), but she was reluctant to have him join the Seven because she knew how dirty the Seven really were. But Supersonic backed her up and said that he’d help her no matter what. However, after he joined, Homelander killed him to threaten Annie into submitting to his leadership.
Soldier Boy
Soldier Boy was the prototype for Homelander. And he was definitely based on Captain America. Well, many of the characters in this show are based on familiar heroes which is honestly kind of fun. Anyway, Soldier Boy was the leader of the heroes in his time. He was supposed to have died. However, the boys received a lead that he was possibly alive and would be the key to eliminating Homelander.
Through Frenchie’s relations with Russian mobsters, they broke Soldier Boy out. It was revealed through Grace Mallory that Soldier Boy was ambushed by his team and betrayed to the Russians. Butcher struck up a deal with Soldier Boy that they would help him track down his team (Payback), in return for Soldier Boy’s help in killing Homelander. Through hunting down his old team, Soldier Boy learned that it was a planned and coordinated attack on him, ordered by Vought. He needed to be taken out for the emergence of his son, the newer and improved version of him, Homelander.
Though Soldier Boy mused on the idea of having a son, he ultimately was ready to kill him for the deal he had struck with Butcher. However, he had hurt Ryan and that turned Butcher on Ryan. At the end of the big fight, Maeve pushed him out of Vought tower and both were presumed dead. However, he was shown being pushed on a stretcher somewhere, implying that he’d just go back into hibernation and he would be broken out again when his powers were needed.
Edgar
It was revealed that Edgar was Victoria’s adoptive father and he used her to keep Homelander and other heroes under control, as her stance as politician was staunchly in favour of regulating heroes and curbing their power. Hughie and Annie tracked down her past information and found out that she was an orphan who was adopted by Edgar because of her powers of being able to kill from afar. Hughie had caught Victoria killing an old friend and that was what started his and Annie’s journey in uncovering her past.
Victoria was approached by Homelander to strike up a deal against Edgar. She and Edgar had planned a press conference to pressure Homelander into answering for his crimes, but she instead turned on Edgar. She was apologetic about it in private, but she insisted to Edgar that she needed to protect her daughter (implying that Homelander would hold her daughter hostage). There was also a scene where she injected her daughter with compound V, saying that it would help her protect herself.
Victoria caught on to the fact that Annie and Hughie knew about her secret, so she asked Annie to strike up a deal. Annie was tired of playing political games so she declined, asking Victoria to either just kill her and get it over with or to leave her alone, of which Victoria chose the latter.
At the end of the season, Victoria and Homelander were more in cahoots. Homelander helped her kill a political rival, and at the very end, it was shown that she was vice president elect and the boys’ new target.
Ashley
Ashley was now the CEO of Vought. She struggled between feeling confident and fearful. She enjoyed domming men, though I struggle to say she enjoyed it because sometimes it felt like she had to do it to feel some semblance of control over her own life. We saw that whenever Homelander talked down to her, she would use the same words to talk down to other people.
Ashley had an assistant also called Ashley who she talked down to, and it represented her lack of empathy. Ashley wanted to be a big fish and she felt she could only do it by stepping on others. There was a scene in which Annie asked for her help but after struggling, Ashley refused and talked down to her with corporate speak.
Throughout the show, Ashley would pull her hair out in frustration and at the end of the season we saw that she was in fact mostly bald, being so stressed out. She was the one who deleted the footage of Maeve escaping, hinting that maybe there’ll be a chance that the boys can rely on her in the future.
Cassandra
Cassandra was Deep’s wife, the one he’d married on orders of the Church of the Collective. She helped him reach new heights, basically acting as his manager as he published books about his experiences in the cult and such. Their relationship was also much better than before. They were having sex all the time. But we saw that she would feed words into his mouth, just like the consultant from the Church did in season 2. So she wasn’t fully free of the mannerisms instilled in her by the Church.
Cassandra obviously couldn’t understand Deep’s connection with aquatic animals. She insisted he eat the live octopus so that he’d be accepted and protected by Homelander. Under her nose, Deep started to have romantic and sexual feelings for an octopus. She was very weirded out when the octopus wanted to have a threesome; she let Deep have relations with her, but Cassandra couldn’t stand being touched by the octopus and left the bed, and the relationship.
Cassandra was later shown on TV promoting her book where she talked about leaving a bad relationship with Deep. I know Deep was an asshole and I don’t want to woobify him, but I do think that Cassandra was the toxic personality here, where she blamed her troubles on other people and used them for clout.
Hughie
Hughie also struggled with power in this season, just as Annie did. He took a dose of temporary compound V after he found out that Butcher had. And Hughie was very pleased with the results, admitting to Annie as such. With the V, Hughie had teleportation powers which were very useful. Hughie told Annie that he struggled with feeling unpowerful, which made sense given how the boys would baby him. Annie didn’t like Hughie taking the V and as they argued, we saw that Hughie would make it feel like it was Annie’s fault he was taking the V (so that he could protect her). And after fighting, the two admitted that it was because Hughie himself wanted to feel powerful.
Annie later found out that the temporary V had negative long-term side effects and Butcher had knocked Hughie out to stop him from taking V and joining them on their last hurrah. Annie came to pick up Hughie and tell him “I told you so,” but Hughie also discussed his revelation that one didn’t need to be a supe to be powerful. He had grown up thinking his dad was weak because he was mild-mannered, but he realized that his dad was strong for being by his side all those years, even while living through the grief of his wife being gone.
Butcher
Butcher, you done fucked up. Butcher continued his quest to kill Homelander and seeking out Soldier Boy was his plan this time around. For the first part of the season, we saw that Butcher actually had a very good relationship with Ryan in which he spent time with him, played with him, encouraged him. It was a very positive relationship. However, in a moment of anger, he pushed Ryan away and blamed him for killing Becca and that drove a deep deep wedge between them.
Nonetheless, Butcher continued on his quest to kill Homelander. He was the first to take the temporary V that he got from Maeve. He received laser eye powers like Homelander, as well as super strength (typical for most supes). He felt very sick, but he started to get used to it and it would prove handy. So we see that in this season, he had less of a problem with supes, having grown quite fond of one (Ryan), and becoming one himself. His grudge was purely with Homelander.
Butcher also had a story line with his father. His father was abusive and he loathed him. But we also saw that Butcher, despite loving his younger brother so much, had also hurt him mightily. He’d abandoned his brother to fend for himself, saying that Lenny needed to protect his mom. But he’d also told off Lenny for being weak. In a sequence in which he was put into a dream state, he revisited his old trauma and watched Lenny, a young boy, kill himself. That pushed Butcher to be kinder to Hughie who reminded him a lot of Lenny.
At the end of the season, Butcher had to put aside his quest to kill Homelander to protect Ryan from Soldier Boy. He did successfully protect Ryan, but Ryan wanted to be with his dad, and Butcher had to live with the regret ☹ Because of the constant use of the V, Butcher only had months left to live, but he decided he’d go all out in his mission for revenge.
I really hope Butcher makes things right with Ryan next season. That’s truly the top priority for me lol.
M.M.
M.M. struggled with hiding the truth from his daughter. She was living with her mom and stepdad who liked superheroes (especially Homelander) and encouraged M.M.’s daughter’s interest in them. M.M. was trying to be a good dad and staying away from the sleuthing but he gave in when he heard Butcher was investigating Soldier Boy because Soldier Boy had hurt his family. Like Butcher, M.M. needed revenge. The difference was that M.M. was not interested in taking V to boost himself. M.M. was very disappointed in Butcher for teaming up with Soldier Boy but he prioritized doing good over taking revenge.
In the end, M.M. joined back with the boys and helped in their final mission. He also revealed the truth to his daughter. He’d gotten into fights over superheroes in front of her and he knew he was scaring her. So he told her about how superheroes were not all good, that they were capable of bad and he was working towards getting justice for their family. M.M. knew he wasn’t perfect, but he tried to show his daughter the truth.
Frenchie
Frenchie’s past caught up with him in this season, because his connections to the Russian mob were required to find Soldier Boy. He was caught up with a mobster named Nina who taunted him with the fact that he used to be subservient and a coward. In a final showdown, Nina captured Cherie and Kimiko and forced Frenchie to choose. He couldn’t, but Kimiko and Cherie fought out of it.
There was also the budding relationship between Frenchie and Kimiko. He was a bit stiff when Kimiko tried to kiss him so she backed off but they clearly had a good relationship and they reconciled. In the end, he worked on a potion that would help get rid of Soldier Boy.
Kimiko
Kimiko was hit by Soldier Boy’s explosion and lost her powers. She was very pleased at first because she hated her powers. At one point she had hung out with Ryan and shared that she hated them. She liked being human. In her time of happiness, she had kissed Frenchie but he didn’t really seem to respond so she backed off.
Later, she was captured by Nina and she had to fight off the henchmen. She realized that she had always been violent, that it wasn’t the powers that made her a monster. After some thought, she asked Annie to get her compound V so she would be a supe again. This time, she was pleased to have her powers because she chose them, and I suppose she wanted them so that she could protect and help. At the end of the season, we saw Kimiko was much happier about using her powers. She had purpose this time around.
I thought Kimiko’s story was going to be about her feeling insecure and useless without her powers. It didn’t quite lean on that negativity. But I can’t really quite say why she wanted her powers. We didn’t get to see the text that she wrote to Annie. So her story was a bit muddy.
Victoria Neuman/Nadia
At the end of last season, we found out that Victoria was the head popper, and Hughie joined her office because he wanted to try to take down supes the proper way in the legal system. Soon in this season, Hughie saw Victoria kill an old friend who kept calling her Nadia. They were friends, but Victoria had to kill him to stop him from blowing her cover. That put Hughie and Annie on her trail. Hughie went to an orphanage to infiltrate their computer systems and found out that Victoria used to live there, and was adopted by Edgar.
In the present day, we saw that Edgar and Victoria maintained a good relationship, and Edgar also doted on her daughter. That being said, Victoria already began to worry for her daughter, knowing that she was going up against Homelander. As mentioned, Homelander approached her with a deal and she ultimately took it and took down Edgar. Edgar wasn’t too angry, acknowledging that he’d taught Victoria to play all sides.
Victoria tried to buy Annie’s loyalty too but Annie wasn’t taking it. Victoria didn’t kill her though, probably recognizing that Annie had considerable influence in the public eye and that killing her would not only throw Victoria into trouble, but that Annie might also be useful to Victoria in the future.
Homelander and Victoria continued to work together (under wraps of course) and we saw at the end of the season, Homelander asked Deep to kill a political rival so that Victoria could be the new vice president elect. The boys wanted to target her next as she would work with Homelander.
I didn’t expect Victoria to be a big bad for the next season, but we’ll see how it plays out. Homelander is always the big bad, we’ll have to see if Victoria is charismatic enough. She had limited screentime this season so that was why I’m still a little skeptical.
Ryan
Ryan and Butcher had a good relationship at the beginning of the season. Butcher was actually making an effort to support him, and Ryan actually seemed to look up to him. When Butcher was feeling sick from the temporary V, Ryan wanted to care for him. It really seemed like a nice relationship.
But Butcher fucked it up by pushing Ryan away and blaming him for Becca’s death, something that Becca forbade him. They didn’t see each other again until Ryan was with Homelander. Homelander had come to Ryan, forgiving him for hurting/killing Stormfront. Homelander forgave him easily, because he was always a lone wolf and he didn’t even care for Stormfront that much; we saw that much at the beginning of the season. Homelander was short-sighted. He was angry at Ryan for going against his wishes, and now he forgave Ryan because he needed someone in this time. So he took advantage of the vacuum that Butcher left and got Ryan to acknowledge him as his dad.
Butcher and Ryan were both a little uneasy at the final confrontation and Butcher knew his first priority was to protect Ryan, which he did. After all was said and done, Ryan just wanted to go away with Homelander. I think he recognized that something bad would happen if Homelander stayed in the same room with those people.
At the very end, Homelander introduced Ryan as his son. Homelander now felt very powerful with Ryan just at his side. He was emboldened to kill people willy-nilly and while Homelander was very proud, Ryan was quite shocked. And I think he’ll come to find some questionable things about his dad in the coming season.
Grace Mallory
Grace was charged with taking care of Ryan. She was also the plot device to tell the boys about what happened with Soldier Boy and the rest of Payback. I suspect Mallory will continue to be a background character in the coming season due to her connections within the government forces.
Themes
Racism
Social issues continue to be themes in the Boys. We saw how race was a large consideration for deciding who would be the newest member of the Seven. Someone ethnic, but not too ethnic.
There was also the storyline between Blue Hawk and the black community. A-Train tried to speak on behalf of the community, giving Blue Hawk a platform to apologize but Blue Hawk was not sorry at all and the stunt was not at all what the community at all. A-Train came from a common family, but it was hard for him to remain humble, not only because of his superpowers, but we saw even from season 1, A-Train was very concerned with his image.
There was also a rise in right wing politics, particularly with Homelander’s speech about how he was better than everyone. That resonated with racists and white supremacists. And we saw at the end of the season that Homelander has become somewhat of a spokesperson for the right wing movement.
Cults
Just a small theme about Cassandra still trying to control Deep in the way that the church had controlled them both in the prior season. But Deep wasn’t easy enough to completely fall for the rhetoric because he had his own wishes and his own ways. And when Cassandra and Deep parted ways, she tarnished his name the way that the cult would.
Family
Fatherhood was a huge theme in this season. We of course know Homelander’s yearning for family. He yearned for Stilwell’s love and when that didn’t work out, he yearned for Ryan. When Ryan was mad at him, he had no choice but to stay away. Homelander was delighted at the thought of Soldier Boy being his father, not because he loved Soldier Boy (he did admire him), but because Homelander loved having a father at all. He was ready to lay it all down for Soldier Boy to accept him. He’d even reconnected with Ryan so that they could be one big happy family. But it didn’t work out because Soldier Boy had hurt Ryan.
Butcher was kind of the mirror to Homelander. He also had complex relationships with his father and his son. He hated his father for being abusive, there was no question about it. His mom wanted him to see his father one last time before he died so that he’d see what a weak man his father had become and he’d feel better. But we saw that the anger wasn’t completely with his father. Some of his anger was with himself for letting his brother be hurt. He used to protect his brother from his father. But he wasn’t there when his brother needed him the most. He called his brother names to try to get him to toughen up, reminiscent of their father hurting them to try to get them to toughen up. And he wasn’t there to stop his brother from killing himself and protecting him. Hughie and Ryan were something of do-overs for Butcher. He realized that Hughie wasn’t a wuss, just like Lenny wasn’t a wuss; they just expressed strength in their own way. He realized that Ryan needed a father figure and he realized that he loved Ryan because he loved Becca, even if he said harsh things to him.
Choice of power
The idea of superpowers being a choice was explored in this season because of the temporary V. Previously, we’d only known of compound V being injected into babies. Of course, those babies had no choice, it was thrust upon them by their parents.
Butcher took V to give him a fighting chance when confronting other supes. Butcher was always more similar to supes than he cared to admit, but I think with him taking V, he was closer to admitting that he didn’t hate supes, he just hated Homelander.
Hughie took V so that he could feel power for once. As discussed, it was through the experience that he understood more of himself and what he wanted. Yes, he wanted to protect, but he realized that strength came in all ways. He didn’t have to be a supe to be strong. He was fine as a supe, but he brought a strength that no one could. He was special, like Lenny was to Butcher.
Kimiko also chose to take V, despite having hated her powers before. She hated being a monster. But she saw when kidnapped by Nina that it wasn’t the powers that made her a monster, it was how she grew to face her environment. Constantly being in danger made her that aggressive person. And while she enjoyed being human for a bit, she found that she now accepted being a hero because she could be helpful, she could protect those important to her.
Would I take V if I had the chance? I have no clue. We all have our reasons for wanting power.
Politics
Politics is going to be a bigger storyline in the next season. That being said, the politics of the boys is quite focused on individuals. We have Victoria as the representative political character but we don’t really see the far-reaching effects of her policies. We just assume things are happening. But anyway we’ll see how Victoria tries to play both sides this time. This time, both sides will be more suspicious of her now knowing her game.
Ashley was the corporate character in this season, especially after Edgar was detained. But I think she’s going to transition out of that role in the next season. I think she’s going to be something of an ally as opposed to the corporate shill she’d become.
Overall
This was still a good season and I’m still going to watch season 4. It wasn’t perfect, but again I thought it was better than season 2.