As someone who feels pretty neutral on superheroes as a concept, hates violence and gore, and almost exclusively watches sitcoms, I gotta say, The Boys had me hooked since I watched season 1 when it was released in August 2019. This Amazon Prime show is an adaptation of the comic book series of the same name, in which superheroes, “Supes,” exist like celebrities and work for the powerful company Vought Industries. While they are praised as heroes in the eyes of the masses, the superheroes are actually corrupt and abuse their powers unbeknownst to the public.
Season 1 opens with mild-mannered Hughie, who, after witnessing his girlfriend get brutally murdered by a Supe, becomes disillusioned with the role of Supes in society and joins The Boys, a group of vigilantes who are determined to take down Vought and the Supes. Overall, the show is intense, action-packed, and with lots of twists. The Boys also has a lot of depth to it not only in terms of character development, but also in the sense that it is commentary on capitalism, corporate greed, celebrity culture, and our idolization of the powerful elites. At the end of season 1, viewers were left with some jaw-dropping moments, including the death of that season’s primary antagonist, Vought executive Madeline Stillwell, and the twist that Becca Butcher, Billy Butcher’s wife who went missing and supposedly died giving birth to a Supe baby, was actually still alive with her son, Ryan. Viewers also learned that being a Supe isn’t actually a “genetic lotto win” as Paulette from Legally Blonde would say; Vought injected normal people with the drug Compound-V to create Supes. Not only that, but Vought had been supplying terrorist organizations with Compound-V to create “Supe-terrorists” to justify the need for the “good guy” Supes to be given more political and military power.
Needless to say, season 1 set up a lot for season 2, and the second season surely delivered on character development, surprise reveals, and of course, lots of blood, gore, and death. Let’s recap some of the major, jaw-dropping moments from The Boys season 2, shall we?
The writers ‘Butchered’ Billy’s wife
To be honest, I wasn’t really interested in exploring Becca’s character. I was honestly so convinced that Billy reuniting with Becca at the end of season 1 was a dream sequence. The idea that she had died prior to the beginning of the show allowed for her character to serve its purpose in developing Billy’s backstory; no more, no less. Additionally, the fact that she had been pregnant and then died during childbirth had felt enough of a twist that another shocking moment about her character did not feel all that satisfying. While I was certainly not expecting for Becca and Billy to pick their relationship up right where it left off, the fact that she dies at the end of season 2 felt like such a disservice to her character and to representations of women in general. I think it’s time to retire the dead mother/wife trope.
Queen Maeve actually lives up to her ‘Brave Maeve’ rebrand
In contrast to Becca, one woman I thought was well-characterized in season 2 was Queen Maeve. Queen Maeve, the disillusioned, jaded Wonder Woman parody and member of The Seven has always been such a fascinating character to me and I felt as though she was underexplored and underutilized in season 1. Throughout season 2, she struggles with rekindling her relationship with ex-girlfriend Elena, and coming out to the public. While she and Elena both want a private, normal life, in true Vought fashion, Maeve is rebranded as “Brave Maeve,” LGBTQ+ icon and is used for publicity to demonstrate Vought’s performative inclusivity. Additionally, aspects of Maeve and Elena’s relationship are inaccurately represented to demonstrate a more ‘palatable’ representation of same-gender relationships to a straight audiences; specifically, Maeve ‘comes out’ as a lesbian despite actually being bi, and Elena is dressed in more masculine attire to fit the ‘butch lesbian’ stereotype. While much of Maeve’s coming out is not on her own terms, she is scared of Vought and Homelander and feels forced to comply. This storyline serves as interesting commentary about how straight people have a very specific idea about what same-gender relationships should look like and how LGBTQ+ people might feel pressured to conform to the stereotypes in order to be accepted. Even though on the surface, our society might seem more accepting of LGBTQ+ individuals, heteronormative ideology still exists to police these identities. Being a part of the LGBTQ+ community is still so stigmatized that simply coming out and existing is seen as an act of heroism.
Although “Brave Maeve” is just a marketing tagline, we actually see Maeve becoming braver and developing integrity throughout the season. Throughout seasons 1 and 2, Maeve is an interesting foil to Starlight; while both are aware of the immorality of Vought, are disillusioned by the idea of Supes, and feel guilt over the destruction and violence they have caused, Starlight is more optimistic and tries to change things from the inside, while Maeve accepts her fate as a member of The Seven out of self-preservation. However, we begin to see glimmers of Maeve standing up for what she believes in when she saves Starlight from captivity and helps Starlight and Kimiko fight off Stormfront in the season finale.
Rolling in The Deep… and a cult apparently
Honestly, The Deep has been a low point of the series for me, even in season 1. This man is literally a sexual predator, but at times the show seems to pass him off as comic relief for the audience. In season 2, The Deep is a disgraced hero who has been fired from The Seven and joins The Church of the Collective in an attempt to clear his image and climb back into the spotlight. The Deep is characterized as a sad, insecure, bumbling man and no matter how hard the writers try, I refuse to sympathize with him after he sexually assaulted Starlight when she first joins The Seven. While both members of The Seven and The Boys have brutally murdered multiple people, I see The Deep as irredeemable in a way that some of the other Supes are not (with the exception of Stormfront, but I’ll get to that soon) because sexual assault represents a more-pressing, real-life threat than, say, death by laser eyes.
Beyond my issues with The Deep himself, I was also left a bit confused about the purpose of The Church of the Collective, the church he joins to redeem himself, repair his public image, and eventually rejoin The Seven. Were they supposed to be a parallel to Scientology? A run-of-the-mill cult? Or an organization more sinister? In the season finale, the Church’s place in this cinematic universe was made a little bit more clear, establishing itself as an institution that had dirt on the Supes; through the files at the Church, A-Train and Starlight were able to expose Stormfront for being a Nazi. Still, The Deep’s cult/church storyline still felt as though it was building to a climax that didn’t fully deliver, and questions still remain regarding Stormfront’s ties with the Church.
Honey, you’ve got a big Storm(front) coming…
One of the biggest plot points in season 2 is the introduction of Stormfront, the newest member of The Seven and the primary antagonist in season 2. Stormfront initially brands herself as a headstrong feminist who tells it like it is and relates to her audience through her charisma and her savvy use of social media and memes. At the beginning of the season, Stormfront clashes with Homelander because as a populist leading the charge against Vought’s hypocrisy, she begins to steal the spotlight. However, it revealed later in the season that Stormfront is a xenophobic, white supremacist Nazi whose true goal is to create a master race by injecting adults with Compound-V. This bone-chilling characterization was horrifying and infuriating to watch in all the ways it was intended to be; the anger and upset I felt while watching Stormfront (especially as a Jewish woman) elicited perhaps the strongest, most visceral reaction I have ever felt just by simply watching a TV show. By gender-flipping Stormfront to be a woman, this backstory additionally served to critique white feminism and girlboss/corporate feminism and turned the trope of the “strong independent woman” on its head.
As an already huge fan of Aya Cash, I knew her for playing edgy, sadistic characters and thought she was well-cast and an extremely entertaining Stormfront, whom I actually enjoyed watching before the racist reveal. While she was not supposed to be a likeable character (to say the least), I nonetheless took issue with some of the writers’ decisions surrounding the character. For one, I thought her eventual relationship and co-conspiring with Homelander was unnecessary and felt forced. I enjoyed watching how the characters clashed, because despite them both being antagonists, their initial conflict demonstrated how they were both motivated by such different factors. While Homelander’s immorality stemmed from his self-centeredness and his own personal desires for fame and popularity, Stormfront represented an ideology far more sinister, and a concrete threat to present-day society. Additionally, the fact that Homelander, too, hated Stormfront (albeit for petty reasons) further solidified how evil the character truly was.
One aspect of her character that I could have done without is how, when revealing to Homelander that she was a member of the Nazi party in Germany and the first person to be injected with Compound V, she discusses her daughter Chloe, who had Alzheimer’s and whom Stormfront outlived. Stormfront, who does not age and is able to regenerate due to her superpowers, admits in a moment of vulnerability that everyone she had ever loved has died. I did not appreciate how it was almost implied that Stormfront was so full of hatred in part due to her tough life, as it sent the messages that some people may be bigoted, racist characters for some deeper reason. Viewers should not want to sympathize with white supremacists, period.
I’m supposed to care about a Supe whose only power was turning on a lighter?
Speaking of Stormfront… mid-season 2, it is revealed that Stormfront is going about her plan to create a ‘master race’ by injecting adult patients of the Sage Grove mental hospital with Compound V, and is working with Lamplighter, a hero thought to be dead, on her unethical experiments. Lamplighter, who was revealed to be a double-agents of sorts before his presumed death, agrees to be the key witness in a testimony against Vought, but martyrs himself in an attempt to save Starlight.
This entire plotline felt too significant to only take up one episode, and that episode felt like somewhat of a detour on the overall journey throughout the season. This reemergence of a character whom the audience hadn’t yet seen but supposedly had significance in the universe before the canon of the show felt a bit ill-placed and ill-timed. I feel as though they could have either expanded Lamplighter’s character arc as well as the corresponding story of creating adult Supes at the Sage Grove mental hospital, or eliminated Lamplighter altogether and positioned Vogelbaum to be the star witness from the start. By shifting the focus from the test subjects at Sage Grove to Lamplighter, I’m left wondering about what happened to the patients after they escaped the hospital; specifically the woman with the buzzcut — it looked like the writers were setting her up to take on a more prominent role in the series; though maybe that will happen in season 3.
Fake AOC is exploding people’s heads
Almost all of my qualms with season 2 I can excuse due to that bombshell of a twist in the last few seconds of the season finale. Congresswoman Victoria Neuman, who had been leading the political fight against the Supes, is actually a Supe herself who had blown off the heads of governmental or other officials who had dirt on Vought and the Supes. A nod to Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, I initially thought that it was tacky for a character who is set up to be a prominent figure in Season 3 to only be a parody of a real-life person. Like on Space Force, I expected the AOC parody to just be a one-off joke. However, Victoria Neuman is actually a gender-swapped version of Vice President Victor Neuman in the comics, who is based off of former President George W. Bush.
This twist itself, I absolutely did not see coming, and it sets up a strong premise for season 3. I admire how on The Boys, each villain is more dangerous than the last. Towards the end of the season finale, Hughie gets a job with Neuman to work on her committee against Supes, wanting to fight for justice while playing by the rules. The sheer magnitude of tension and dramatic irony during the last moments of season 2 already has me so fired up for season 3, and I am excited to see where the writers take Victoria Neuman’s character.
Overall, Season 2 of The Boys felt like a bunch of vignettes, the tension didn’t build in a linear way. Clearly a lot happened in season 2; my recap doesn’t even begin to cover all of the major moments. A lot of plotlines that I expected to be a greater source of conflict and tension, such as the news that Supes are made, not born, was exposed to the public, seemed to wrap itself up pretty quickly. This “breadth over depth” storytelling style at times felt unsatisfying or as though the writers did not fully deliver on high-concept, intricate story arcs that could have spanned more than one or a couple of episodes.
The incoherence between some of the shorter plotlines made season 2 at times feel directionless. While the season finale was extremely intense and tied things together to an extent, I’m still left with unanswered questions and feelings that some of the elements of the season were left underexplored. Season 1 had set up a lot of interesting directions for season 2, but it just felt like The Boys had introduced too many characters too early in the series and they simply did not know what to do with all of them. Season 2 was gripping nonetheless, and it was thematically and tonally consistent with season 1. Again, as with season 1, season 2 continued to do justice to how it handles problematic and complex issues; exploring and providing commentary on harmful ideologies without endorsing them in any way. It’s hard to say how much of this had to do with the already strong source material, or the show itself. Despite my critiques, season 2 was way more mindblowing and ‘out there’ than season 1 and I absolutely cannot wait for season 3.