The Boys season 4 becomes a stronger show but a weaker satire
It’s an election year in these United States, and as go the headlines, so goes The Boys. Not on purpose — showrunner Eric Kripke, articulating a reality of television production, has noted that his narrative plans often precede their real-world parallels — but the hit Prime Video series has a pretty consistent rep for producing a bloody response to the moment at hand. In its fourth season, the dark satire circles a familiar target, once again arriving in a pivotal election year. Now it’s returned to ask if anyone learned anything since the last go round.
Unfortunately, the only clear answers to that question are bad ones in the world of The Boys. Last season ended with Homelander (Antony Starr) lasering a man’s head off in public to the cheers of his supporters, signaling a shift in the status quo between the world and the supes that inhabit it. As debauched and amoral as the supes of The Boys have been in the series, they still kept up appearances. They engaged in the theater of being superheroes, noble exemplars there to help their fellow man. But the appeal of playing pretend is losing its luster.
Normal humans, Homelander frequently tells his son Ryan (Cameron Crovetti) and himself, are lesser, “toys for our amusement.” The ticking time bomb of The Boys, narratively, has been: How long can the show’s writers convince us that he is more amused with the normal people committed to ruining his fun?
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This is where some may find exhaustion beginning to creep in, as a show with an antagonist who can credibly eliminate all sources of conflict whenever he chooses continues to, well, not do that. But The Boys has always been a canny show where petty flaws and insecurities drive the action more than big, violent fights, and while season 4 leads with politics, its character work carries the show this year.
In between the clear parallels to our modern media circus, The Boys takes its time for a renewed focus on its characters, making a point to have everyone
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