TV Thoughts: The Boys (Season 1)

What’s this, Allie? You’re posting about a TV Show? It has been TOO long since I got properly stuck into TV. I much prefer movies which demand less of my time. There’s nothing worse than spending hours over the course of several years being loyal to a show that ends badly, I guess I’ve been burned too many times! Of course, I’ve been loving Modern Family and Schitt’s Creek but they’re happy little 20+ minute episode shows that I tend to watch whilst doing something else (she says, writing a blog post in the middle of Season 5 of Schitt’s Creek).

I’ve heard too many good things about Amazon Prime’s The Boys, though. My husband has been nagged by his friends to watch it too so we decided to watch it together. If you didn’t know already, The Boys is pretty much an anti-superhero show. In a world full of special people with powers, one company has cashed in and suddenly saving the world has budgets, advertising and hidden agendas.

Hughie (Jack Quaid) has his world crashing down on him one day when a superhero accidentally kills his girlfriend. Set on finding answers and closure, he ends up teaming up with vigilante Butcher (Karl Urban) and his crew to bring down the ultimate group of superheros, known as The Seven, headed up by the world’s strongest hero, Homelander (Antony Starr). That’s all I’ll say on plot, because if you’ve watched it already you know what happens, and if you haven’t given the first episode a watch yet…you really should.

The first thing that shocked me about The Boys is the violence and gore – but for good reasons! The moment Hughie’s girlfriend is killed sets that bar perfectly for what you can expect in the rest of the show. Think explosions, guts, severed limbs…the lot. This won’t be the show for you if you don’t like the C word, either. Every sentence that comes out of Butcher’s mouth contains at least one. He is clearly the standout character! For so many years our superhero movies and shows have been made for a family audience so it’s such a breath of fresh air to have The Boys.

What makes something in the superhero genre stand out for me is the villain, or villains. The greatest villain should be someone we feel conflicted about. Take Thanos from the Marvel Universe for example. He commits a terrible act by literally wiping out half of the human race but…the reasons behind that action aren’t diabolical in the slightest. So with The Boys, who actually is the villain? These superheros are as corrupt as can be but Butcher’s team are murderers!

So in short – we are LOVING this show. We’ll be starting Season 2 tonight and I can only hope it stays being this great.