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Notes -
Anyone watching the new season of The Boys. Cause it feels...worse?
Like, the show was never really subtle. But it seems over the top now. I don't care about things like the Frenchie subplots already. But the show doesn't even seem to be able to keep a coherent continuity.
FYI: Garth Ennis, writer of The Boys comic book, would much rather be writing anything without superheroes. The thing that he cares the most about is his military historical fiction comics. And I've read them and they're basically all better than The Boys. I don't what the best one to start with would be. War Stories (AKA War Story) is an anthology series that varied in quality as all anthologies do, but had some very high highs. There's also Enemy Ace: War in Heaven, which was great.
I don't think he's totally embarrassed by his superhero work or anything, but it's not where his heart lies.
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First season was fine, but the writing was already on the wall by the end of it. Didn't even bother with the second season and don't have the impression I missed anything.
Kripke is also just not a good writer for anything but short episodic monster-of-the-week style shows with black/white morality - see Supernatural. Almost all the overarching storylines were awful and contrived. He can do some decent character work, but it's always obvious whether a character is supposed to be good or evil. And there as well he had a massive problem with dragging things out by ending every season by putting everyone back to starting positions.
Did he? I think SPN had its problems - the plot was the same loop over and over: find Biblical Macguffin in pieces across the season, build magical thing, vanquish enemy - and by the end of his run the show was really showing its budgetary constraints (the show simply couldn't do the apocalyptic premise justice, which is why the characters went around collecting items like a Ubisoft game) but I think Kripke's actual time as showrunner (S1-S5) actually did have a plot that built to a conclusive end instead of cyclical resets.
He left after that and basically every single plotline from those early days was recycled over and over.
Imo, SPN was at its strongest in the first two seasons, when it was 90% episodic monster and 10% overarching season storyline. Kripke also said himself that he originally intended for the show to be only three seasons. My personal impression was that the Azazel storyline (the first two seasons) fit with the design of the show in general (in a show about hunting down monsters, hunting down a more powerful monster makes sense) and seemed clearly intended from the beginning, the Lilith storyline ( third and fourth season) already felt tacked-on and increasing scope clearly strained their resources as you said, and the Lucifer storyline (fifth season) was just the same problems, but moreso. He also did several bait-and-switches already (SAM IS DEAD! Lol nope he isn't DEAN IS IN HELL! lol nope he's back on earth).
Every season after that was just repeating the mistakes that Kripke had already committed. Kripke also still stayed on the show as an consultant for the entire runtime, and being the orginal creator I don't believe that he didn't give his blessing for the garbage that was to come.
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With this thread, I don't think I'm going to bother with this season. The only thing amusing to come out of this is Starlight's boggening https://i.4cdn.org/tv/1718365064375134.jpg (Actually pretty fucking sad to see)
She actually doesn't look much different in the show. I think someone taught her to do an Instagram model face for that photo where she sucks in her cheeks and puts her lips in a weird position.
It was incredibly noticeable in Season 3. I think we've just acclimated since we've had the same face for two years now.
In another season people will also stop asking if Mother's Milk has been recast and I'll stop doing a double take when I see him.
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I disagree. Not only does she look noticeably older, she looks skeletal. Buccal Fat surgery should be banned, it just ages a woman out.
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I'm guessing that Eric Kripke has been struggling with the direction of writing this season. Basically the writing room needs a strong leader to steer things, and that's not happening.
So the only ideas that are getting into scripts are shallow attacks on the out group. Because if you speak out against the critical supe theory joke, you're a potential Trump sympathizer.
I think the rest of the season is probably going to suck. It's possible that they'll get it together but I think they are just going to get burnt out from the arguing and things will end on a bad note.
It is possible that they focussed on the later episodes, fleshed them out in detail, then realized they didn't have enough storyline material for the early episodes.
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The amusing irony, to me, is that the more blatantly bad and stupid they make the red tribe look, the more incompetent and feckless the protags look.
They even lampshade it in Episode 1 of Se4. "How have you guys gotten WORSE at your jobs?"
Starlight is supposedly one of the more effective do-gooders but she can't even make a dent in Homelander's popularity, can't do any material damage to Vought, and can't even shift political outcomes in her side's favor.
If homelander's fanbase is as weak-willed and dumb as the show wants to portray them, then the protags should be able to outsmart them and possibly manipulate them to their ends. But nah. Apparently ONLY Homelander and co. are capable of manipulating rubes.
And the only guy who seems to be somewhat effective is Butcher, who is about as problematic as can be even if his heart is seemingly in the right place.
I am not even sure who a liberal viewer is supposed to root for.
Not just that. Starlight thinks she's in a war for America's soul, but is also so concerned about her purity that she refuses to go out and motivate people because she hates the Starlight brand....while also using it for her bullshit ramshackle charity org? It's past incompetence to even consider this.
As someone who grew up watching Supernatural, Kripke going "woke" seemed like a blackpill but are we sure this whole thing isn't some not-so-veiled critique of left-wing activism?
It could be. Not even hard to read it that way.
Hughie keeps trying to do things "the right way" and he ultimately got completely duped by Neumanns "empathetic liberal" shtick using skills she learned from Stan Edgar himself. Hughie comes back around to Butcher's "kill 'em all" mentality as the only workable solution.
Homelander is objectively a threat to human civilization, and they are just dicking around "fixing" minor side problems while he ticks ever closer to a mental breakdown.
Like they're more concerned with earning brownie points than ending the threat.
If they had literally just let Soldier Boy do his thing it would have been ended. Whatever else was wrong with the guy, he wasn't one for half-measures and DEFINITELY didn't want to leave unfinished business. HIS WHOLE DEAL when he returned from captivity was to immediately follow up on old grudges.
Homelander is a problem that activism cannot solve. Unless they come up with a much more creative solution than the comics do, somebody will have to fight dirty and finish him. There will be (already is) collateral damage.
Every day he continues to exist is demonstrating the protag's uselessness.
So yeah, I find it amusing how this show basically makes liberals out to be ineffective hypocrites, whilst the liberals watching the show fixate on the surface level jokes.
Honestly the show lost its way pretty early on. Up to the point where the boys blow up Translucent, it worked because they had a clear goal (kill the supes) and were working towards that goal in a meaningful way. But after that? Homelander is an excellent villain, but the heroes have made no progress in their goals and mostly seem to have lost sight of what their goals even are. Choosing not to kill A-Train in particular demonstrated the lack of narrative direction that had crept in. Instead you get silly subplots about how Hughie doesn't feel like enough of a man.
I'd have been mostly okay if the show had settled into being a sort of 'procedural' where the Boys have to figure out different approaches to kill different supes while being mostly limited to using standard, nonmagic tech and social engineering and the occasional superpowered assist.
It'd require a lot of creativity to keep it interesting, but yeah, at least they'd have a clear goal in mind.
Homelander as the big bad who is the most difficult to kill and whose confrontation is inevitable would keep the tension ratcheting up.
But now they've had to put Butcher and Homelander in this weird catty rivalry where they will stare each other down and even make snide threats and remarks when they encounter one another, even though both of them damn well know they're trying to kill each other, but are basically just mugging for the audience.
Incidentally, this is why I believe the Venture Bros. still holds the crown for the best, most consistent superhero universe. The reasons why arch-nemeses DON'T (usually) kill each other and the villains are allowed to commit crimes all over the place are all justified in-universe.
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I think you're missing the real point of it. Liberals love criticism of liberalism that goes "we need a Super-Hamas-Man to just literally murder the enemy we're too Nice and Honest to viciously stomp the way he deserves (btw this means trump and anyone who ever opposed Current Thing, and we want to make that unmissably obvious with the least subtle metaphors you've ever seen)".
That's why it's so stupid. It's done on purpose because it's supposed to be Hutu-radio level murder propaganda with the barest hint of plausible deniability so they can sneer at anyone who points it out.
This is classic 2016-2020 liberalism self-criticism designed to morally excuse themselves for having handed the keys of society to violent leftists. Self-identifying as the wishy washy liberal who TV says should just get out of the way and let the death squads work is masturbatory denial of responsibility, because it gives them a passive role to follow.
"MLK hated white moderates like us, so we'd better stay silent and give money to the antifa arson squads whever the TV tells us to" was half of reddit in 2020. This is just a more developed form of that.
Again, though, I'm not sure who the self-professed liberals in the audience are supposed to be rooting for on the show.
Half of the Protags are trying to gin up social pressure against the sentient nuclear bomb with acute narcissism that is Homelander as if that'll keep him from killing everyone, the other half are trying to kill or hurt him but have been utterly inept at following through.
The stakes have been raised to the point where there should be no other priority but stopping Homelander, yet our main characters are still being given minor side plots to resolve as if this were an RPG and they're putting off the final boss battle both because they're underleveled and want to experience the optional content before finishing the game.
If it is propaganda, then they're seemingly not clear on who is supposed to be the glorious hero of the revolution. Who is the Mao/Che Guevera/Vladimir Lenin of the story here?
It looks like they're just padding it out to get to 5 seasons.
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Typically that goes "oh in season 8 some girl stabs the scary white ice king I guess, the end." Or "some girl has a mystic Jedi powerup and stabs the somehow-has-returned evil space wizard guy I guess, the end." (Note: I haven't seen either of these so don't quote me)
The plot doesn't have to be good or make sense, the point is manipulating the audience to feel a certain way about themselves by feeding their insecurities, which in itself is the attraction of these shows to the target audience.
I don't know, if Current Thing hasn't moved on by the time the show finishes, maybe some brave Arab girl will magic-suicide-bomb Homelander somehow I guess, the end.
Then the audience will cry and go "the protagonist did the violence our self-inserts were too nice and principled to do. The service is over, pass round the collection plate for the Hamas bail fund"
... or maybe they'll take the edgelord route. Homelander goes off the deep end and wipes every Arab nation (plus Iran) off the map. Fade to black, silent credit-crawl.
I won't lie this is literally my only exposure to whatever this show is.
So if my prediction is right it'll be doubly hilarious.
(Oh cool, we can add images to posts too)
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If they have any balls whatsoever, them actually taking Homelander down will either be triggered by him killing a whole country's worth of people, or the collateral damage in the process of taking him down will kill millions.
The show has already made it clear dozens of times that innocent people die at the hands of supes with regularity. No goddamn reason to downplay the scale of the incident when Homelander snaps.
That's assuming they have any plan on how to end it.
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Only saw the first season of the boys. But, on a somewhat related note- I just went back to try read Ward, the sequel to Worm, the superhero fic that went viral about 10 years ago.
Ugh. What a huge drop in quality. Worm was fun, visceral, exciting. Ward feels neutered, like the author has been battered by internet critics and is trying so very hard to avoid offending anyone. I keep waiting for something to happen and nothing does, they just go to therapy and talk about how bad the evil christian cult is.
Really? I've heard the exact opposite, that Wildbow went out of his way to basically piss off the surprisingly large Worm fan community in terms of how he handled common topics of discussion like Panacea and Gray Boy loops (some accuse him of actively retconning characterization in the case of the former).
I've never cared enough to read enough Ward to find out, personally.
He certainly pissed off the Worm fan community (by refusing to bring back the main character, and re-writing a lot of the continuity from Worm). But uh Panacea yeah... apparently now she's a Evil with a capital E because she's a rapist. Before there was some moral complexity and shades of grey, she did bad stuff but only because she was so messed up at the time. Now, no, she's just pure evil.
At least, that's what people say in summaries, I've never actually read that far. I've only read the first 5 arcs, I just can't bring myself to go further because of what a slog it is. So, so much of it is just therapy talk + dumping on this christian cult strawman punching bag.
I place Wildbow in the deeply leftist camp, but I hold Worm in high esteem, and you haven't been paying attention that the original was already plenty clear that whatever Panacea had done, there had been an undeniable sexual component to it.
Also, the omnibenevolent therapist character gets bamboozled by a fabrication about the protagonist being eeevil later on, and that was satisfying. Fuck therapists.
I feel like it's a huge motte-and-bailey to jump from "there was an undeniable sexual component" to "she's a rapist, and now her entire character revolves around wanting to rape again." But again I didn't actually get that far, I couldn't make it past the opening arcs that seem to be just this neverending slog of boring therapy talk. It's almost like it's telling the core Worm fans why there immature and wrong for liking it and expecting more of the same.
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Even Reddit normies are getting sick of being beaten over the head with the message, and are getting updoots for saying so.
https://old.reddit.com/r/television/comments/1dewmxw/the_boys_season_4_premiere_discussion/?sort=top
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