@lefthandedguitarist your comment was pretty spot-on (even though I enjoyed the season more than you seem to have enjoyed it), you raise some valid concerns that do knock a few points off the show, but what I absolutely loved was the Simon Pegg reference, as I felt exactly the same. How odd was it having Simon playing the dad part?
@lefthandedguitarist Scotty. But then Celtic characters are always handled poorly and most of the world doesn't notice or care.
Review by LeftHandedGuitaristBlockedParent2019-08-23T16:48:31Z
There's a lot of intriguing ideas here, unfortunately it kind of feels like they've all been done before. It doesn't help that The Boys feels a little bit cheap due to a mix of budget constraints, production design and a few real misfires in casting. The storytelling is often scattershot and I even at the end of the season I feel like I haven't been properly introduced to quite a few characters and their development was extremely weak (notably A-Train, The Deep). There's an immaturity to it all that just prevents it going from good to great a little too often.
There's a lot of strong stuff, though. Jack Quaid as Hughie is fantastic and credibly portrays someone really out of his depth who's getting swept away. Karl Urban is definitely playing a very exaggerated character (with a dodgy attempt at an accent), but he makes it work and the character is great fun. The dark humour works more often than not, even when it's unexpected. Erin Moriarty as Annie/Starlight is a real bright spot in an otherwise grim show. The show presents a gloriously America-centric point of view and makes no apologies for it, presenting issues that feel unique to its set up and location and can certainly inspire a lot of debate (which did indeed happen among my housemates and I).
The show is often gratuitous to the point of absurdity, but it's not a massive issue with only a few moments that felt genuinely unnecessary, just put in there to satisfy gore hounds. This applies to the characters too, many of whom are unbelievably shitty people. This super cynical viewpoint was often a turn off for me.
I still found more to like than dislike here, but this could be a lot better. The show takes 8 episodes to tell very little story and there isn't much to really get invested in. And has Simon Pegg ever been more miscast than here?