The Boys
Based on The Boys by Garth Ennis, inked by Darick Robertson
Developed by Eric Kripke
Composer(s) Christopher Lennertz
Main
The Boys
• Karl Urban as Billy Butcher, the leader of The Boys.
• Jack Quaid as “Wee” Hughie Campbell, a man who joins The Boys after his girlfriend Robin was accidentally killed by A-Train.
• Laz Alonso as Mother’s Milk, an African-American member of The Boys.
• Tomer Kapon as Frenchie, a French member of The Boys.
• Karen Fukuhara as Female, a brutal and mute member of The Boys.
The Seven
• Antony Starr as Homelander, the patriotic leader of The Seven.
• Erin Moriarty as Annie January / Starlight, a light-emitting superhero and newest member of The Seven.
• Dominique McElligott as Queen Maeve, a long-time member of The Seven.
• Jessie Usher as A-Train, a speedster member of The Seven.
• Chace Crawford as The Deep, the self-proclaimed King of the Sea and member of the Seven.
• Nathan Mitchell as Black Noir, a superhero in a full black superhero outfit and member of The Seven.
Other
• Elisabeth Shue as Madelyn Stillwell, the Vice President of Vought International.
Recurring
• Jennifer Esposito as Susan Raynor, a CIA agent.
• Simon Pegg as Hughie’s father
Guest
• Alex Hassell as Translucent, a member of the Seven
Hughie is a Septic.
Hold up. “Wee Hughie” Campbell is an American? I remember thinking during the run of Garth Ennis’ The Boys that Simon Pegg would be ideal for the role of the Scottish Hughie if some studio was ever brave enough to take on the series. In the books, Hughie’s nationality is an integral part of the bond he shares with Billy Butcher. The two faced adversaries who were totemic of two mad American obsessions: the physical power of superheroes, and the economic might of massive corporations. Could an American Hughie work?
Jack Quaid plays the good-hearted if slightly dimwitted ginger lad who gets sucked into a battle between superheroes and a human resistance. He not ginger, either, but after one episode, he seems to be managing quite well. Hughie is a bit of an Arthur Dent character who spends most of his time reacting to vast forces well outside his control or understanding, and at first he seems extremely ill-suited to the task at hand, both physically and emotionally.
Then one day the love of his life catches the A Train—or rather, the A Train catches her—and his life implodes in a spray of red.
For what it’s worth, Hughie’s father is played by Simon Pegg. Well, Pegg is great, but he wouldn’t be very convincing as a bereaved twenty-something, would he?
That brings us to one of the greatest anti-hero roles ever created, Billy Butcher. The London East End Butcher, played brilliantly by Karl Urban, is a federal agent (sort of) who is conducting a war against “The Seven” a group of superheroes created and sponsored by Vought Industries (name slightly changed in the TV series to avoid legal entanglements) who have nearly unlimited power, not just from their various superhero talents, but because they are supported in an impregnable corporate bubble of wealth and entitlement. The are a Property, you see, one that hauls in billions of dollars and the corporation will stop at nothing to prevent public adoration of their cash cows to be sullied in any way.
The problem is that the cash cows in question are incompetent, corrupt, venal, intolerant, stupid, self-satisfied, and committed only to self-preservation, particularly at the cost of the people they purportedly defend and serve.
If that isn’t an allegory for America in the age of Trump, (and Epstein, and DeVos, and the Bush family, and the Kochs, and, and, and…) I don’t know what is.
In the first episode, Butcher seems to be working alone. That will change, since it evolves that he is the leader of a group of people known as “The Boys”. One of the Boys is The Female, but she isn’t the sort of girl you would want to bring home to meet the Mom. Or even be in the same restaurant with. She’s a bit . . . random. Imagine if you fed a house cat meth for a month. Yeah, sorta like that. The other two (beside Hughie and Butcher) are Mother’s Milk (and he’s badass enough that nobody smirks when they call him that) and Frenchie, who is Ennis’ gleeful smear across the Channel.
Oh, and there’s also a dog, a bulldog named Terror. He is pretty much a normal dog, except for an … interesting … manner in which he makes his opinions known. Butcher dotes on Terror, and even The Female seems to like him.
The only show on television I can compare this to is Preacher, which of course is Ennis’ other seminal work. Like Preacher, it is extremely irreverent, ribald, violent and hilarious. Ennis doesn’t poke sacred cows. He blows them up so thoroughly that the udders fetch up somewhere in Scotland.
As with Preacher, liberties are taken with the plot line, new material is added, but the tone and spirit of the original remains intact.
If you like Preacher, you’ll love The Boys. You sick bastard.
Now on Amazon Prime.