The Boys is a tasteless show. Take the first scene of the season three premiere. A shrinking superhero called Termite (think Marvel’s Ant-Man) tunnels into his lover’s orifice as part of their sex play. But when he sneezes, Termite accidentally grows to full size, causing him to explode.
The Boys doesn’t provide an escape from reality; it captures the feeling of helplessness and disgust we experience as mass shootings continue unabated.
Gory gags such as these occur regularly in The Boys, a television series about a team of (mostly) non-powered humans struggling against reckless and megalomaniacal superheroes (dubbed “Supes”). An adaptation of a cynical comic book created in the wake of 9/11 and the War on Terror, The Boys frequently mixes real-world commentary with slapstick schlock. For example, season two ended with a U.S. Representative modeled after Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez using her superpowers to explode the heads of attendees at a Congressional hearing.
But when the Boys’ morally compromised leader Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) walks into a gun show in the second episode of season three, the series might have gone too far.
Butcher visits the show to investigate Gunpowder (Sean Patrick Flanery), a heavily armed Supe who once was the sidekick of Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles), a Captain America-like patriotic Supe. The three scenes at the gun show involve much of The Boys’s signature repugnant superhero action, with Butcher blackmailing Gunpowder by insinuating that he was abused as a child by Soldier Boy, and the two battling in a parking garage. Gunpowder ricochets bullets at Butcher, until he gets temporary superpowers from an experimental drug and uses his new laser eyes to slice him in half.
For many, the inclusion of a gun show in an episode about sensationalist superhero battles crosses a line. With mass shootings in Laguna Woods, California; Buffalo, New York; and Uvalde, Texas, reminding us of the gun violence that occurs every day in this country, the subject seems too raw and real to be part of a fantasy story about morally compromised good guys punching bad guys.
Except the portrayal of the gun show has very little fantasy in it. As Butcher walks through the halls, we hear country music praising the United States for the freedoms it provides us, we see attendees visiting booths selling guns that promise better security for their owners, and we see children dressed in camo coloring pictures of a smiling, anthropomorphized bullet. Gunpowder warns his audience that guns are the one defense against “the George Soros globalist playbook,” a plan that allows the government to “oppress the citizens and confiscate their firearms . . . have it all gleefully reported by the so-called news media, and . . . in every classroom around the country, they’re gonna teach your kids to hate America, the Constitution, and the Second Amendment.”
Gunpowder’s costume might come straight from the funny pages, but the sentiment of his words comes directly from NRA meetings and Fox News commentators. The Boys doesn’t provide an escape from reality; it captures the feeling of helplessness and disgust we experience as mass shootings continue unabated.
Beneath its gratuity, The Boys is fundamentally about the struggle against overwhelming odds. The series focuses on Hughie Campbell (Jack Quaid), a nondescript young man whose girlfriend, Robin, (Jess Salgueiro) is killed when a Supe running at sonic speed collides with her.
Created by Vought International, a mega-corporation that combines aspects of Disney and Amazon (the latter produces and distributes the show in real life), Supes are propaganda promoting U.S. free-market capitalism and Evangelical Christian fascism, as well as tools for securing the company’s interests. With an army of Supes at its disposal, sufficient money to influence politicians in both parties, and control of most means of production and distribution, Vought shows little concern for the humans crushed under their boots, including Hughie and Robin.
In today’s world outside of television, faced with elected officials who serve corporate interests, a political system designed to stifle democracy, and a major cable network devoted to stoking the anger of the privileged, many of us feel discouraged and angry. Horrors such as the recent mass shootings have resulted in only symbolic gestures toward change, empty of any real systemic action. No matter how many of us recoil with disgust and fury that such events could happen, those with the power to remove AR-15s and implement other basic gun regulations continue to do nothing.
Our reactions to extreme violence of The Boys reflects the fury that we all feel in response to injustices. Nowhere is that more obvious than in the portrayal of the primary Supe, Homelander (Antony Starr). With a million-dollar smile beaming from his red, white, and blue costume, complete with an American flag for a cape, Homelander personifies the dark fantasy of American exceptionalism. Armed with super strength, flight, invulnerability, and laser eyes, Homelander can do whatever he wants, to whomever he wants, without fear of reprisal.
For the first two seasons, Homelander’s desperate need to be loved kept him somewhat in check. But early in season three, he breaks down with a rant on live television, declaring, “I’m not just like the rest of you. I’m stronger. I’m smarter. I’m better.” While most look on in horror, a cutaway shot reveals a white man leaning in with interest. “You people should be thanking Christ that I am what I am because you need me,” Homelander shouts. “You need me to save you!”
The scene initially plays like a downfall for Homelander, but we soon discover that he’s grown only more popular with conservatives who see restraints on his destructive power as tantamount to fascism. In season three’s fourth episode, Homelander discusses his outburst with a commentator (based on rightwing talking heads like Bill O’Reilly and Tucker Carlson).
Within the world of the show, it’s infuriating to hear people support a sociopath who brags about his ability to vaporize us all with a single glance. It’s a familiar anger, one we feel when someone argues that we solve gun violence by introducing more guns or that mass shootings are simply a byproduct of freedom.
When the commentator notes that it scared some people to see that level of anger from a person with so much power, Homelander doubles down. “Well, I am angry,” he says, as the commentator nods. “I’m angry and I’m tired of the lies, peddled by those who wish to control me.”
The commentator looks on in encouragement as Homelander justifies himself, calling the Supe’s comments “courageous.” As he speaks, we see him as a symbol of the America First agenda, and we see the media figures who enable his anger as the same types of people who insist upon their right to use assault rifles to hunt rabbits.
To be sure, it’s absolutely disgusting that The Boys would feature characters that subscribe to such rhetoric, that it would juxtapose real-world pro-gun language and ultra-violent imagery. But it’s even more disgusting that we live in a world in which the powerful do nothing to remove killing machines from public spaces.
We need that revulsion and anger to continue to resist those who tell us that mass shootings are normal and should be accepted. If The Boys keeps that anger stoked, if it reminds us that random, violent death is disgusting, then it plays a necessary role, tastelessness and all.