Reviewing a TV show?!
What kind of nonsense is this!
To be fair, it makes sense to me. You see, The Boys on Amazon Prime is based on a comic book.
And I love comic books.
I ESPECIALLY loved The Boys. There was a time where I’d name-drop it any time I could because it was such a bloody wild ride of a comic and I needed people to talk about it with. So now I have to touch on the new television series from Prime Video.
It’s only fair to be honest.
I can only hope you got a sense of the…MANIA from the trailers. Because that’s the *kissy fingers* craziness I needed to converse about comics-wise.
Wild thing part 2 (Don’t sue me DJ Khaled) though, the TV show is nowhere NEAR as perverse or manic as the books. In many respects, it’s a lot more watered down, which is hilarious cause it’s STILL SO HORRIBLY GRAPHIC.
I guess that would be review point 1: This show is HELLA GRAPHIC.
Thankfully Prime Video do a bloody good job of classification every episode and you should 100% pay attention to what they’re advising because even I, a desensitized boi, had trouble with some moments in later episodes of the season.
Anyway, The Boys tells the story of Wee Hughie. Or just Hughie now. But he eventually gets called Wee Hughie in other ways.
He’s also portrayed by Meg Ryan and Dennis Quaid’s son and I need everyone to know that cause it’s quite cute.
Anyway, something happens to him that leaves poor Hughie as the collateral damage of an event involving supes and his girlfriend. Something Billy Butcher can relate to, who is played by our boy Karl Urban.
Apparently Butcher is supposed to sound like Michael Caine, but he ends up sounding like Éomer meets Skurge meets some bloke named Bill from Melbourne.
I love it though.
Antony Starr gets slapped in a super-suit and yes, Kiwi’s lead this Prime production because NEW ZEALAND IS THE BEST. But also he absolutely triumphs in a role that requires the delivery of what absolute power would look like on a person, and it’s kind of hot but also terrifying.
The world of Hughie and supes begins to close in, raising the stakes in graphic ways while adding some corporate drama to the mix, because what’s better than superheroes?
Review point numero dos; SUPERHERO MARKETING.
Dabbling in the world of marketing and celebrity with superpowered beings in the mix is nuts, and the show gets all sorts of twisty as it culminates in a fashion that is nothing like the books.
Which is review point 3; Diverting in ways that benefits the outcome.
I don’t feel the show aims to overstay its welcome. There’s characters in the mix that match the conclusion of the comic, but it wants to end up somewhere maybe a little lighter. Something that doesn’t seem so hopeless, but may be just a little hopeful.
It’ll still be all sorts of f*cked up though and I can’t wait to see what Season 2 does with that.
Especially if something a little interesting happens to The Boys.
