It’s not enough to make the landing

The boys ended with a bang in season 4 after treading water for a good portion of its eight episodes. As you can see from the headline, I don’t think a strong season finale is enough to elevate this season beyond “okay.” Not terrible, mind you, just okay. And okay is not the level The boys should work.

Forbes‘The Boys’ Season 4 Finale Gets Content Warning After Trump Assassination AttemptBy means of Erik Kain

In my review of episode 7 I described the four biggest problems of this season. I will briefly recap them here:

• It seemed like the show was just coasting along for most of the season, without much progress.
• Homelander felt strangely muzzled in Season 4, when he should have been hunting down The Boys and other dissidents himself. Somehow, the show’s arch-villain felt a lot scarier in Season 1 than he does now.
• The politics of The boys were always obvious — lampooning entertainment media, celebrity culture, and right-wing politics — but this season felt a little obvious and heavy-handed.
• Shock value is the type of thing that stops paying out the more you use it, and The boys has ridden so heavily on shock value that it is rarely shocking anymore. The most shocking scene of the season, however, was the sexual assault on Hughie, and the most shocking thing about it was how it was played for laughs.

The odd thing about the Season 4 finale being so good – and it really was excellent – ​​is that it highlights the problems with the rest of the series. So much of Season 4 was filler, with unsatisfying character development (and many characters effectively just twiddling their thumbs until the finale) and extraneous side stories that didn’t need to take up so much time.

Meanwhile, the really good stuff at the end probably could have been stretched out over more than one episode. Instead of all the side missions and contrived subplots (like Frenchie’s entire story arc this season, for example, or Starlight’s bizarre superpower dysfunction) we should have had a season that constantly ratcheted up the tension.

Every episode should have raised the stakes, with protests gaining momentum in the streets, political violence escalating, Homelander losing his cool a little more with each episode. His visit to his childhood lab should have come later in the season. Butcher’s surprise murder of Victoria Neuman should have been the climax of the penultimate episode, with time for our heroes and villains to react. The pacing is all wrong, and the season’s numerous plot deviations have led to some fun moments — a musical on ice that goes horribly wrong, the farm animals from hell, etc. — but ultimately the meandering narrative falls flat compared to the first three seasons and Generation V.

Meanwhile, the abuse of Hughie continued in the last three episodes. Even in the finale, they have Starlight blame Hughie for sleeping with the shapeshifter, despite him the victim in that scenario. Starlight (who was also a victim) should have had empathy for Hughie.

As it stands, they play it partly for laughs and make both Starlight and Hughie look bad, the former for acting like a petty vengeful and jealous girlfriend and the latter for not standing up for herself and telling her that blaming the victim is not okay. Again, if the tables had been turned and Starlight had slept with a shapeshifter under false pretenses, the writers would never have made Hughie act so haughty and angry.

Anyway, overall I loved the finale. Frenchie and Kimiko’s relationship finally goes to the next level. Vaught goes into full chaos mode as Homelander finally takes control of both the company and the country, with a new puppet president under his thumb. They go on to round up the Starlighters and other dissidents, and they have a large portion of the Boys in custody by the end.

Butcher’s surprise powers—ripping Victoria in half!—were insane and pretty cool. And Ryan, well, it was sad to see him go dark and kill Mallory, but at the same time it seems a little far-fetched that she and Butcher would handle the situation so horribly. What did they think would happen if they refused to let him go? Either knock him out and go that way, or give him his freedom like Butcher has been doing all along. He said he’d be back!

Oh, and speaking of comebacks, it looks like Soldier Boy is coming back for a big happy family reunion. I’m definitely excited to see what he and Ryan get up to in season 5.

A big shout out to the actors who, as always, knocked this one out of the park. Antony Starr is just so unflinchingly terrifying and yet he gives Homelander so many layers, you can’t help but feel for him at times. Karl Urban handles Butcher’s conflicted feelings about his team and Ryan so perfectly, and Jack Quaid remains the human center of the show. The rest of the cast, from Erin Morristy to Laz Alonso, Colby Minifie, Jessie T. Usher and many more, deserve the highest praise.

Scattered thoughts:

• What did Compound V do to Ashley? She went full werewolf in the middle of the episode when she injected herself to save her life from the murderous Seven. But then… nothing! We’ll have to wait until next season.
• Poor Ander Ashley. She wasn’t even on the list!
• I’m glad we got a glimpse of the evil Gen V superheroes, although I do wish we had seen more of them throughout the season. They got a very brief cameo. But hey, the cast is big and not many characters were killed off, so it makes sense not to add too many more.
• I wonder if Butcher embracing his inner demons – and super form – will mean he defeats the super cancer. That seems to be the crux of the story. I’m very curious about his story arc going forward.
• I’m annoyed by the whole Starlight arc this season. I don’t get why she couldn’t use her powers and then all of a sudden she could at the end. I get that “Brought Down To Normal” is a useful trope to play with in shows like this, but you have to make it logical or it feels too easy. They didn’t explain it well.
• I hope the wait between seasons isn’t as long as last time. My memory isn’t up to the task of waiting that long for all those damn shows!

What did you think of it? The boys Season 4 and the Season 4 Finale? Let me know what you think TwitterInstagram or Facebook. Also subscribe to my YouTube channel and follow me here on this blog. Sign up for my newsletter for more reviews and commentary on entertainment and culture.