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The Boys: Vought declares the Christmas spirit to be at an all-time high (?!?); how "Let’s Put the Christ Back in Christmas" came together.
Posted in: Amazon Studios, Preview, Review, streaming, TV | Tagged: amazon, episode 5, Review, season 3, the boys
The Boys S03E05 Review: Legendary Egos, Happy Feet & Team Hughie
Directed by Nelson Cragg and written by Ellie Monahan, Amazon's The Boys S03E05 "The Last Time to Look on This World of Lies" was another stunning effort by showrunner Eric Kripke and the crew. But unlike my previous reviews, I'm going to have to turn on the "MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!" sign and throw down an image spoiler buffer early on. Why? Because now that we're five episodes in, someone needs to make the case for Hughie (Jack Quaid)… dammit! Of course, there are a whole bunch of other things we need to cover (like how we have a new favorite couple and a random thoughts rundown), so we'll meet you on the other side…
Who Could Ask for Anything More than Serge & Kimiko? Nothing against Hughie and Starlight (Erin Moriarty), but Sergei (Tomer Capone) and Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) are my top couple on the show. The evolution of not just their relationship but their dynamic has been a joy to watch, with Capone & Fukuhara giving us no choice but to root for them to get that "happy ending" even in a world that chews those up and spits them out. And it looks like they might just be on their way to one when they learn Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles) burned the V out of her system, leaving her powerless. For once, a chance at what passes as normalcy… hell, Kimiko's even getting her voice back. All the more reason to… dance! Look, I don't know a ton about dance but I do know that Capone, Fukuhara, and the team that put that musical number together deserve all the praise for one beautiful, uplifting effort- an effort that also left us feeling like this happiness is very short-lived (as we learned with the return of Katia Winter's "Little Nina").
But Is Hughie Wrong? Look, I get the argument that you can't let yourself become The Devil to fight The Devil. That there are lines that you need to draw in the sand that can't be crossed. Starlight and MM (Laz Alonso) make very compelling cases in this episode to that very point. On the opposite end of that, Butcher's immediate past alone doesn't make him the most qualified person to speak for the opposition. But then there's Hughie… and just like when we first met him, Quaid's Hughie continues to not only speak for us (the mortals) but also serve as the "gray area" for questions of "right" & "wrong" that don't have easy answers. He's gone down the "right path" to make things better and all it's left is a trail of dead bodies and a Homelander (Antony Starr) more empowered than ever. And to be without powers in a world where someone can make your head explode just by looking at you, what kind of "living" is that? By now, Hughie knows what Homelander did to Supersonic (Miles Gaston Villanueva)… and he was a supe.
No, Hughie's done feeling like a victim. But more meaningful than that? Hughie's done waiting to die. He's done with having to be rescued time and time again, putting those he loves & cares about in danger in the process. Does he need to lighten up on the whole "doing it to save Starlight" thing because it sounds chauvinistically bad on a number of levels? Definitely, but Hughie's also made serious points with the argument that it's not so much wanting to be her "savior" as it is his wanting to be able to offer her (and everyone else) the same. Look, we all know that there's no way that there isn't a price that Butcher & Hughie are going to have to pay down the road for taking V24 (maybe their powers become permanent, or V24 is cancerous?) but right now? We're on "Team Hughie's" side until someone comes up with a better plan.
Random Thoughts: Okay, we have a ton of points to cover so let's not waste any time, cool?
Need another example of just how genuine of a human being MM is? Look no further than the opener, where he even shows sympathy for Soldier Boy of all people when he watches the video of Soldier Boy being tortured. Also, answering the question about a supe's insides also being near-invulnerable was a nice touch and brought back memories of J. Michael Straczynski's Rising Stars (if you know, you know).
Colby Minifie's Now-Vought CEOAshley Barrett continues to be a majorly overlooked character in most of the coverage I've seen, and that needs to change fast because Minifie is brilliant this season. From berating a Vought board member to save the member from Homelander's wrath to those brief moments of scared-vulnerability with Starlight, Ashley understands she's playing a deadly game and doing what she can to stay alive. And yet, there are still threads of decent within. Here's hoping those threads don't form the rope that hands her.
Well, it didn't take long for Stan Edgar's (Giancarlo Esposito) "heavy is the head that wears the crown" words to start hitting Homelander. Because running a multi-national mega-corporation is exactly the kind of pressure you want to see a mind that's already gone psychotic having to deal with… right? And having Homelander put The Deep (Chace Crawford) in charge of analytics, only for The Deep to end up firing 95% of the staff because of past anti-Homelander tweets? A nice jab at today's social media state of affairs.
Having Supersonic's murder written off & publicized as a drug overdose was some seriously cruel shit.
Serious bonus points to Hughie for dropping a "Fast & Furious" reference in the middle of a sweet scene and making it oddly work.
The scenes between Butcher and Queen Maeve (Dominique McElligott) offered a deep dive into two warriors who are tired of fighting battles that never seem to end, looking for that "glorious death" to atone for their past sins. It also demonstrated the duality at war within Butcher, sharing intimate moments with someone who represents the very thing he's literally looking to eliminate. And with Maeve, we're seeing true heroic sacrifice in that she's working with someone who hates her kind to put down a greater threat even though it nearly guarantees her death. Amazing stuff here.
After selling our Supersonic to Homelander to get into his good graces and some brutal words from Starlight, A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) was presented with his own moral crossroads in racist vigilante Blue Hawk (Nick Wechsler). After a violent confrontation at a Vought-manufactured event to offer a corporate apology that escalated into an assault by Blue Hawk on several citizens, A-Train is left with a brother who will never walk again and a Vought-approved smear campaign against the community by blaming it on "Antifa protestors."
Between Netflix's Stranger Things 4 and his turn as The Legend in this episode, 2022 is definitely " The Year of Paul Reiser." Updating his role from the comics, The Legend was Vought's long-time Vice-President of Hero Management and that's where he gained his encyclopedic knowledge of Vought's real supes history ("Shit, I okayed a million cover-ups"). And I'm not the only one wanting to know the full backstory on how Butcher cost The Legends his leg, am I? As for Reiser, he was in full-on old-time Hollywood mogul mode and he killed it times ten (with bonus points for his quick asides to Hughie to brag about who he had sex with).
If we're being honest? The Boys gave Laurie Holden (Crimson Countess) more to work with as an actor in one episode than in any three episodes of AMC's The Walking Dead– and I'm a huge TWD fan. And props to Kripke and the team for creating a show vibe that actually made me nervous (in a good way?) about how far CC was going to go with her private room chat (clearly, chimpanzee sanctuaries only pay so much). Also, bonus points to series EP Seth Rogen for making a guest appearance and for proving he will do what needs to be done to make a scene work. That said? I'm glad I don't have to interview him anytime soon because I'm going to need some time before I can look him in the eyes.
I'm liking the "Payback" subplot with Soldier Boy hunting down his old teammates to learn why they sold him out to the Russians decades ago. And maybe it's just me, but those close-ups of Ackles as he's speaking with a tied-up CC reminded me of his Supernatural co-star Jeffrey Dean Morgan. And did you notice how similar the exchanges between Soldier Boy & CC and Homelander & Queen Maeve were? If there was ever a sign that Soldier Boy might not be the "weapon" against Homelander that Butcher was hoping for, it's right here.
So with that in mind, we'll join you back here at Bleeding Cool next week as we take a look at… yup… "Herogasm."
The Boys Season 3 Episode 5 "The Last Time to Look on This World of Lies"
9/10
Directed by Nelson Cragg and written by Ellie Monahan, Amazon's The Boys S03E05 "The Last Time to Look on This World of Lies" was another stunning effort by showrunner Eric Kripke and the crew. But unlike my previous reviews, I'm going to have to turn on the "MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD!" sign. Why? Because now that we're five episodes in, someone needs to make the case for Hughie (Jack Quaid)... dammit! Of course, there are a whole bunch of other things we need to cover (like how we have a new favorite couple and a random thoughts rundown), so we'll meet you on the other side...
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