The Boys is the sort of visceral superhero-themed series that fits so perfectly into a post-Avengers landscape it’s almost hard to believe it’s based on a comic that premiered long before they suited up. It began in the mid-’00s, when the MCU and Marvel Phase 1 was a twinkle in Disney’s eye. It couldn’t have predicted the superhero fatigue audiences may be feeling now, but it provided an acceptable post-Watchmen look at a world in which superheroes are treated as celebrities, and greedy corporations exploit their escapades for profit, resulting in the complete decay of their moral fiber.
HOW DID BILLY NOT KNOW ABOUT BECCA’S WHEREABOUTS?
The season finale dropped one of two bombshells; not only is Billy’s wife Becca still alive (she didn’t die in childbirth like Vought executive Madelyn Stillwell informed him), but so is the son she bore, who’s father just so happens to be the sociopathic Homelander.
If Billy is ex-CIA and has friends still involved at the agency, how is it that he couldn’t track Becca down after all these years? Especially since she appears to be living a normal suburban life, hardly hidden away in some remote location? Especially since he made it his mission to find out what happened to her?
WHY DID A-TRAIN OD?
A-Train finally figures out who Hughie is and his connection to “the Boys” in the season finale. He later confronts him but has the misfortune of having a heart attack from Compound V at the same time, allowing Hughie to have enough time to escape.
Starlight remains with A-Train to help him, but it’s unclear why he had the heart attack in the first place. He’d been taking Compound V regularly while he was training, which would certainly have put more strain on his heart than going toe to toe with Hughie. Did Starlight get him to a hospital?
WHY DID THE DEEP LET HIS HOOKUP GET SO FRISKY?
When The Deep is shipped off to Sandusky, Ohio following a slew of sexual harassment charges, it looks like its only a matter of time before he gets his official pink slip from being a member of the Seven. During this time, he doesn’t even bother with helping out the small town but uses the time to get groupies to come back to his apartment instead.
With one eager young lady, he experiences the uncomfortable irony of being taken advantage of in a way that he used to do women like her. During the encounter, she shoves her hands into his gills after he repeatedly tells her they’re sensitive and she’s hurting him. Apparently he feels that much self loathing because even though he’s got super strength, he just lets her keep straddling him and causing him physical pain.
WHY DOES NO ONE STAND UP TO HOMELANDER?
Yes, Homelander is like Captain America and Superman all rolled into one. That means he’s got super strength, the power of flight, laser vision, and he’s not afraid to use any of his abilities to harm perfectly innocent people. That being said, there’s an entire planet of superheroes, why is no one standing up to him?
He treats other members of the Seven horribly, is constantly condescending to his superiors, and acts like he can do whatever he wants because no one can stop him. Surely there are other superheroes, slightly less crooked ones, that would have had enough of his crap by now that it wouldn’t take “the Boys” to take him out.
WHAT HAPPENED TO MADELYN’S BABY?
The series finale was bursting with shocking moments, not the least of which was watching Homelander nonchalantly laser Madelyn Stillwell’s face off. He stares into her eyes and all of a sudden hers are melting out of her head. It was an unprecedented moment of complete sociopathy and established Homelander as the ultimate supervillain.
After her death and Billy’s confrontation with Homelander, he blows up her condo to conceal all traces of their interactions. Wasn’t her baby still inside? What happened to the baby that was formerly in Homelander’s arms, that she assumed would elicit a humane response from him?
WHY WASN’T HUGHIE’S FATHER FREAKING OUT MORE?
After Hughie gets pulled into the sordid underworld that “the Boys” inhabit, he understandably can’t be around his father very much. He’s participating in highly illegal activities now, and he doesn’t want to be a liability to his father by putting his life in danger.
It happens anyway when A-Train tries to kill him, forcing the Boys to offer Hughie’s dad some manner of protection. He goes along with Hughie and his new pals, seemingly fine, even though they spend days hiding out, on the run from the Seven. He acts like this is all perfectly normal, even when he’s once again forcibly separated from his son.
BLACK NOIR
The silent member of the Seven, Black Noir is one of the only members that we get zero information about. Constantly lurking in the corner of frames, he shows up for important meetings at Vought Headquarters but barely interacts with any of the cast in a meaningful way.
What’s the point of him, exactly? Is he a double agent? Is he secretly in cahoots with the Boys? In the comic, Black Noir was part of a big reveal arc and did some things that would make The Deep blush, but the series may not follow the same character development for him.
HOW DID BECCA SURVIVE BIRTHING A SUPERHERO?
Putting aside for the moment the ways in which a superhero can reproduce, we have to accept the fact that Billy Butcher’s wife had a baby with Homelander. Madelyn Stillwell told him that she died during childbirth, when in fact, she’s been alive all the while Billy was looking for her.
How was she able to birth the potential baby superhero to begin with? Billy was told it practically clawed its way out of her stomach, so if that wasn’t the case, was it born like a normal baby? Will it grow up to be as morally debased as its father?
SUPERHEROES AS CELEBRITIES
The Seven are firmly established as a Justice League like team of superheroes, who both exist as beings that walk among mortals, as well as action figures and the inspiration behind series of films. This makes matters confusing when it comes to documenting their lives.
Are the films they participate in documentaries? Are they really using their superpowers against other actors in the film, given that there aren’t any supervillains? They’re clearly revered by their fans, but it isn’t explicitly conveyed whether or not the fans treat them as real saviors or as commercial entities to be exploited.
WHERE ARE THE SUPERVILLAINS?
The Boys makes it seem like in a world of thousands of superhumans (every major city, and even places like Sandusky, Ohio have a few), there are no supervillains. This is because, we’re lead to understand, the majority of superhumans have been created by Vought using Compound V.
Would all superhumans necessarily want to be represented by an agency like Vought, though? Could they work alone? And if they’re as morally bankrupt as Homelander to begin with, what ensures they’ll be protectors of humanity? The Boys implies that basically Vought is playing out storylines involving professional wrestling on a massive scale, with complete control over the threats, all for commercialization and advertising of superheroes.
