The Boys - Season 3 June 3, 2022

[Gabai]

Good enough. The send offs were all good and the downfall was satisfying to watch. A precipitous descent was, while in keeping with the theme of the episode, not as interesting as the slower burning, ill-paced ascent that was the rest of the season. Epic show the first seasons that stumbled to being a good show by the end, but I’m glad to see it done.

[Souj]

I didn’t think the finale was bad. There were some issues but those all lie at the feet of the choices made earlier in the season.

Spoiler: show

Oh Father’s death was telegraphed right at the start and he dies super quick, but since he hasn’t been in the show all that long, that’s fine I guess. As soon as the Deep and Starlight dropped down on the beach you knew what was going to happen to him. I do wish they had shown him to be more of a threat, though, against Starlight.

The real complaint I had was that Kamiko should have been sidelined a long time ago and Soldier Boy used in place of her. At least something else happened with the virus to make that whole plot a bit more relevant.

Over all, this season as a whole would have been a lot better without the V1 subplot. It wasn’t needed to make Homelander an even greater threat. Then they could have focused less on the virus and find some other way to sideline its use.

No complaints about the overall endings all the characters got. Those were done well. Doesn’t deserve to be grouped up with other shows that mishandled their finales, only those that started a decline with later seasons.

A couple more things after having a little bit with it:

Spoiler: show

Sage leaves a bit of a sour taste in my mouth, both her ending and her character as a whole, which was incredibly mishandled. Not every character needs to have a fate they “deserve,” but Sage did nothing to gain her happy ending, in fact only made things worse for everyone on both sides of the fence. All she was was an agent of the plot for things to happen with. She didn’t do a single thing some other character couldn’t have. I think I was ok with her ending at first because I was just glad she was gone.

This whole season really needed to show more of the general public. All we get is a focus group, and even then we still don’t actually see the dissent, we are only told it through psychics reading their mind. The people on the tv show discomfort when Homelander starts speaking how he’ll be the god of ashes, but they seem to show more of a reaction once he starts talking about eating shit.

Also, when Frenchie popped up, I 100% thought it was going to be one of the mind-related Supes and was really disappointed when it was just a way to waste more time unnecessarily.

[Xno Kappa]

Kripke absolutely nailed the ending! It sucks how we got there but the finale did some ridiculous heavy lifting for an otherwise poorly produced season.

Spoiler: show

I mean my god! Butcher's ending had me crazy choked up man. A pyrrhic victory where his last link to Becca rejects him, and the only soul left that would comfort him dies, RIP Terror. He knows the battle is won. He knows what he's doing is wrong. But his rage and hatred has completely consumed him that he was almost begging Hughie to stop and kill him. You couldn't have asked for a better closure to his character. "Scorched Earth"

Homelander becoming what A-Train and Frenchie called him out on before they died was just the *chef's kiss*. Dude became an instant bitch the second he no longer had his powers. Him groveling for his life in front of the world was the ending he deserved.

And huge shout out to Karen Fukuhara. She made amazing work at such a convoluted script for her character this season.

[Tyrath]

I liked the ending. I know it was a rough ride to get there, but I didn't think it was as rough as some others did.

Spoiler: show

I know Butcher had to die, but they didn't have to kill Terror

Also Ashley getting impeached right after saying she wouldn't resign was fucking funny

Pretty happy with the show overall. Idk if I'll be joining on Vought Rising, we will see what that looks like when it's closer.

[Tyrath]

Also I guess for everyone complaining about Gen V not being used enough. I guess that show's cancellation happened after this was written so there you go

[Tyrath]

Apparently reddit hated it for the lack of a rampage and buildings blowing up. They wanted a fucking MCU ending for this lol

[chazzyphizzle]

there could have been at least one moderately sized action set piece but i'm not too broken up about it. the show has never been about dueling skybeams for the most part; the fights have always been fairly boring and never the highlight (that i can remember anyways). all in all the finale was fine, definitely not as bad as i thought it was gonna be

[Tyrath]

I do wish they addressed/showed...

Spoiler: show

Soldier Boy now that Homelander is dead. Are they keeping him on ice or whats going on

[Souj]

I do wish they addressed/showed...

Spoiler: show

Soldier Boy now that Homelander is dead. Are they keeping him on ice or whats going on

Depends how well Vought Rising does, I have a feeling.

[Xno Kappa]

there could have been at least one moderately sized action set piece but i'm not too broken up about it. the show has never been about dueling skybeams for the most part; the fights have always been fairly boring and never the highlight (that i can remember anyways). all in all the finale was fine, definitely not as bad as i thought it was gonna be

Exactly. The show was never about ridiculous rampage and destruction on a city-wide scale. Yeah Homelander teases about it, but we never truly get there and it's constantly hammered to us that he doesn't do it because he wants people to genuinely love him. I think the most we ever got out of The Boys in this context was the Homelander/Maeve airplane situation and the Soldier Boy PTSD blasting an apartment building in mid-town Manhattan.

The vocal point of the series has always been the depraved morality of super humans doing whatever they felt like. And the general public greeting it with either apathy or straight up support.

Spoiler: show

I agree Homelander finally snapping and saying fuck it only to die 10 minutes later kind of sucked. Would've been dope to see him glass a city or two. But his final scene was 100% in line with his character and everything the story had setup to.

[Xno Kappa]

I'm not sure what reddit or social media in general has to say about the ending nor do I care. Society today is way too hellbent on upvotes, likes, and subscriptions.

[Karbuncle]

I'm not sure what reddit or social media in general has to say about the ending nor do I care. Society today is way too hellbent on upvotes, likes, and subscriptions.

Second.

I liked it, not just the ending, but the season. Without going into spoilers I admit I definitely got full on choked up more than once. I don't watch The Boys for some marvel level global wide shot of an entire continent getting nuked nor was I expecting /anything/ remotely like that and I can't imagine why anyone got it in their mind that would happen when Supe fights in this have always been extremely "localized". Even the fight between Soldier Boy/The Boys/Homelander/Ryan/Maeve etc in Season 3, like 8 damn supes, all took place in the like, News room of a single building.

Legitimately blows my mind some people expected this to be like Invincible tier destruction lol. The fights in this show have never really deviated from that "Small scale encounter" format.

Spoiler: show

Granted I expect if they had gotten the full 13 episodes they'd of done more with the psychics and there probably would have been more time for Oh Father, The Deep and Noir, but I suspect Homelanders death or the speed of which it happened wouldn't have changed wildly, if anything they'd of probably had more run up to the actual battle, more infiltration time and scenes, stuff like that. Pretty sure the fight with Homelander always would have been about 5-10 minutes because anything more than that and I'm getting Star Wars Episode 3 flashbacks.

I dont always feel like "Longer scenes = better scenes".

Overall, the Finale was good, I think the only thing that I can think of that leaves my head scratching.

Spoiler: show

Making a spin-off show to introduce an overpowered supe who can bring people back to life. Even though I think it would be objectively a terrible choice, "Why couldn't she just revive Frenchie and Butcher?" is now a legitimate question people can ask and they have no one to blame but themselves as, if I'm understanding right, she's an OC of the show creators and wasnt in the comics.

I guess only person she's ever revived was only recently deceased, maybe theres a time-window on it, but she seems to be able to heal literally anything, even brain injuries and full on death... so... idk, feels like it was a mistake to introduce that concept, control or no control

Oh and one last thing I guess regarding the ending

Spoiler: show

Butchers death man. The way they conveyed or seemed to convey that at the last second he was going to change his mind just before being shot, then he seemingly lies to Hughie and tells him he had no choice that he was going to do it. I had the feeling the Series would have to end with Butcher dying, but I'm glad that for just a moment, his humanity was there. For one brief second, he was going to make the right choice, which makes it all the more tragic Hughie was the one to do it.

Fuck that got me, it was like the Titanic sinking, I knew what was going to happen... but for just a moment the show almost convinced me Butcher might just have been this close to coming to his senses, to letting the rage go.

[Andalusian girls]

I'm not sure what reddit or social media in general has to say about the ending nor do I care. Society today is way too hellbent on upvotes, likes, and subscriptions.

the Boys sub has become one of the most salty ones on Reddit and are losing their damn minds over it calling it the worst finale of all time. Twitter meanwhile has been mostly positive with some caveats, basically what our reception here is. kinda funny to see the divide from an anthropological lens.

[chazzyphizzle]

i hate being politics brained but i wonder how much of the hate is genuine and how much is pseudo astro-turfed nonsense from people that hate kripke/the shows politics

[Obsidian]

A surely not-insignificant amount.

[Dimmauk]

Has there ever been a finale that everyone enjoyed or thought was great?

[Zealot]

MASH?

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[Xno Kappa]

Breaking Bad is the gold standard. I dare anyone to bitch about that ending so I can explain to you how wrong you are.

[Obsidian]

The Good Place was incredible start to finish, but especially the finish.

Edit: Halt and Catch Fire had a great ending too. Mr. Robot, Cowboy Bebop.

[Karbuncle]

I absolutely love Cowboy Bebop and its ending but I also absolutely hate Cowboy Bebops ending.