As The Boys, Amazon’s superhero-hating blood fest, comes to a close, its storylines have grown closer to our own reality as the show gears up for its fifth and final series.
It’s fair to say that Garth Ennis, co-creator of The Boys comic book, is no fan of superheroes. Speaking at the 2024 Lawless Comic Con in Bristol, Ennis cited the earlier 1987 superhero parody, Marshal Law by Pat Mills and Kevin O’Neill: “So many exotic variations of nothing.”
One such exotic variation is Homelander, the superhero villain we love to hate, who in this US election year has unquestionably become an analogue for Trump. Throughout the entire series, Homelander finds that not only does his increasingly bad behaviour go unchallenged, but in the divided political landscape of The Boys, the worse he behaves the more his approval goes up among his followers. With the assistance of his new colleague, the super intelligent “Sister” Sage (Susan Heyward), he manipulates the media and effectively discredits his opposition, with the planting of agents provocateurs and unproven accusations of paedophilia.
