The Boys(Season 2):- Utterly preposterous, extremely violent and insanely fun- the second season of The Boys is better at portraying satire than most other shows out there.
The boys finally wrapped up its second season with the season finale that dropped last Friday. Personally, I wasn’t a fan of the one episode per week decision that series creator, Eric Kripke decided for the second season and would have preferred all the episodes from the onset. Anyhow, much like its first season, the second season of boys is a living, breathing satire of the American dream and this time the superhero satire show is out to criticize white supremacy and gets highly political at that, though some of these moments don’t feel as great as the others.
The Boys, from it’s first season, had established the fact that it is a lot more than simple popcorn fun and the second season carries on this tradition even better than the first outing. The season starts off some months after the events of the first season. All the characters in the group except Billy Butcher(played by Karl Urban) and are living in an awful secret hideout. All of them have become most wanted criminals whom the law enforcement agencies are actively pursuing. With the captain of their ship missing, they all feel that they have no purpose in life. The titular character, Hughie(played by Jack Quaid), is still in contact with his love interest, Annie(played by Erin Moriarty) who is the superhero, Starlight and a part of the superhero group, Seven. Both of them plan on making the next big move to take down Vought but Hughie ends up getting an earful from M.M(played by Laz Alonzo) as he warns him that by associating with her, he is endangering both of their lives. The heroes in the seven are in no good shape either. Homelander(played by Anthony Starr) is grief stricken for having to kill Madeline(played by Elizabeth Shue)in the previous season and Queen Maeve(played by Dominique McElligott) is suffering from severe depression and anxiety issues, owing to the fact that she had abandon a whole airplane full of civilians at Homelander’s command but none of them have it as bad as Billy Butcher. It was revealed that Billy’s wife, Becca, for whose rape and murder, he wanted revenge on Homelander, was actually alive and well and raising Homelander’s son, who is also a supe. The second season thus though starts off slow, it takes it’s time to explain the broken mindset of each character after the events of the first season but once, the narrative picks up there is absolutely no stopping.
The second season is a lot more dark, gritty and gory than the first and this was a welcome addition for the fans of the series. The second season widens it’s scope beyond the premise of greedy corporations and larger than life celebrities, to focus on some of the really pressing issues like racism and brainwashing by cult like organizations. At one point of time a character makes a comment that the people believe in what she says, they just don’t like the word ‘Nazi’. This moment isn’t at all overemphasized but it speaks a lot more than the fictionalized moment it was created for. The Boys also puts it’s focus on the dark side of social media, how it can be used as a tool to plant fear in the minds of the people. The show talks of predators in power, mainly through the characters of Homelander and The Dee(played by Chase Crawford), who had been accused of sexual assault by Starlight publicly, in the previous season. The portrayal of corporate greed is done through the character of Stan Edgar(played by Giancarlo Esposito), who is always in the mindset of making the most money out of a situation, irrespective of how out of hand it may be. The season also boasts of some of the most stellar action sequences and it’s great to see that the use of CGI in the action scenes is minimal, which is why hand-to-hand combat scenes feel real and brutal and the show heavily relies on practical effects to make the gruesome scenes striking. Season two of the boys are therefore really creative and by the time all the eight episodes are done, you will have too many gruesome acts and massacres to remember. They are not forgettable but you have to make way for the more extreme bloodbaths that happen as the season progresses. Altogether, these aspects are what propel Eric Kripke’s superhero series to be a more ambitious and overall better satire in the second season.
The performances in the second season are undeniably top-notch. Karl Urban and Jack Quaid give memorable performances as Billy Butcher and Hugh Campbell respectively. Both do a great job of portraying characters who have lost people to actions committed by superheroes but they are inherently different, with Hughie preferring to sort things out peacefully and Butcher preferring the old tried and tested violent method of getting what he wants. The other characters in the group are also phenomenal. Laz Alonzo does a great job of playing the part of a guy who cares so deeply for his cause that he puts above all else, even when he doesn’t get to meet his family and Tomer Kapon and Karen Fukuhara do a great job at playing broken characters wanting redemption and finally there is some much-needed character development for Fukuhara’s character in this season. Anthony Starr is breathtaking as Homelander. He fits into the role perfectly and is menacing in every frame he is in. The surprise, however, was the newcomer, Aya Cash, who plays the new hero, Stormfront. From the onset we feel that there is something off about her character, as if she’s more than she is letting on and this feeling is very real as the reveal of her true nature will disturb anyone out there. She has arguably received the best character arc in the whole season. However, Giancarlo Esposito as Stan Edgar felt a bit underutilized. He is not outright bad in his portrayal of the character and does deliver some of the best lines in the series, still given how interesting his character was, I personally felt a lot could have been done with it.
The entirety of the second season is not without flaws. The episode featuring Frenchie’s backstory felt like too much exposition due to which his backstory doesn’t hit as hard as in case of others and the character arc of Starlight felt a lot emptier than the first season. Though being a guest performance, Shawn Ashmore as Lamplighter, felt the most out of place, almost as if he wasn’t even trying. Overall, there are flaws similar to this that exist but none of them are overpowering enough to hamper the whole narrative and stay as minor hiccups. In conclusion, The Boys is a heavily subversive and cynically delightful piece of work that, despite its minor flaws, is beyond entertaining and rightfully establishes itself as the bad boy of superhero stories.
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