Great return episode.
The show continues to impress me with its genuine emotional interactions, in turn warming my heart and being really relatable with how Hughie and Annie interact on the subway, and then having me on the edge of my seat in the life and death action scenarios in the show, as well as heightened "normal" confrontations where you're never really sure what's going to happen, and whether someone will end up crestfallen, bleeding, or dead.
There's also a lot of societal humor that is executed superlatively by the director and actors, and I have to wonder how much a foreign audience would pick up on the subtleties thereof, or even just someone who just isn't in touch with the last decade's zeitgeist. The scene where The Deep wakes up on the couch had me sequentially unnerved, intrigued, and laughing out loud, completely drowning out The Deep's protestations. Kripke is a master of tone and subtle satire and I miss it in other shows and films.
Can't wait till I hit play on MPC-BE to watch the next episode.
meta
I always have to wonder about the internal psychology (of both the show runners and casting liason, and the courted subject) and the way negotiations go when a film or show like this casts someone like Chris Hansen as himself. They cast him doing something he'd likely actually do in the universe of the show-- that is, being a skeezy nineties-style show presenter exploiting human tragedy for morbid speculative drama to sell dish washing liquid. I doubt someone like Hansen has any qualms about essentially playing himself in a show criticizing society, but the prospect of actually reaching out to someone like that for that reason seems so socially fraught and surreal to me. It took me until well into adulthood to get to where I could be confident and natural ordering takeout, so I can't imagine how that kind of thing works.
Annie: "Alden Ehrenreich."
The Deep: "You bailed me out?"
The Eagle: "Yeah."
The Deep: "Why?"
The Eagle: "Because even heroes need a hand once in a while."
Annie: "There is nothing up there. There's nobody in the sky watching over us."
Annie: "You have to. Or I put this on Facebook tonight."
Hughie: "Uh, ma'am, your nose."
This was a slow start to the season. I can understand why some people may rate it around average or lower. But there's something about this show that's still super entertaining, even if you'd give an episode a lower rating than most people would. At the same time, I do think that giving an episode, specifically this one, a high rating is a little premature and ridiculous.
Of course, as I said, something about this show is present, in that episodes of which you'd give a lower rating are still pretty damn good, like this one. I think this premiere was a slow one and focused a lot on establishing starting points for the season. Something that all premieres do, I'd imagine. And I think it'll take a few more episodes for this season and what it's going to be about to sink in, including this episode. For me, at least.
As always, The Deep is great comic relief. I think his scenes in this episode alone were way more entertaining than all of his comic relief-ish scenes in the first season. And this is just the premiere of this season. I'm sure there will be more scenes like that in the following episodes, and I must say: I'm looking forward to them. Of course, even the scenes that are comic relief with him are almost too comical in the sense that it's depressing. But probably not as depressing/depressed as he feels. Sorry but not sorry, Deep.
And I feel like this plotline of his with Eagle the Archer and this Carol person is a little off. It just seems weird, you know? And what's with the Fresca's? Am I the only one who had the thought that The Deep was drugged with them? The second time he was handed one of them came across as a little bit weird. When The Deep woke up from his nap ─ I was getting weird vibes, all-around. Maybe there's nothing more to the Fresca thing, and it'll be a running gag throughout the season and/or some kind of meta-joke that I'm just not getting.
It seems likely that The Deep is going to be exploited by Carol ─ more specifically, the church that she's seemingly apart of, The Church of the Collective. Or was that just the title of the book and not referencing an actual church in the show? That seems to be the route the plotline is heading towards. I can't think of any theories as to what the church wants with him or what they're probably already doing with Eagle the Archer. But I think that something with that whole thing is afoot. That much is apparent. I'll have to wait and see.
Right off the bat, Stan seems to be a powerful force, one to be reckoned with. That was shown with how he handled Homelander, someone who you'd expect would come out on top in scenarios like that. Speaking of which, I'm fairly certain, and I'm guessing that he is going to be the show's equivalent of James Stillwell in the comics since Madelyn was the show's female version of him.
I still haven't finished read through all the comics, but I remember that James seemed to be the "true villain," so to speak. Homelander always listened to him, I think, among other signs and aspects that made him come across as "scarier." I think he could've been scared of James as well, somewhat. And while Homelander isn't as smart and cunning or as scary as in the show, I have a feeling that he ended up killing James in the comics. That's just a theory because, as I said, I haven't finished reading the comics. But if I'm right ─ hell, even if I'm wrong, that should be more likely to happen in the show since Homelander is smart, cunning, scary, that sort of thing, unlike in the comics, to an extent.
Therefore, I think the show wants you to be wary of Stan, warier of him than of Homelander. It wants you to think that he's the one to pay attention to because he put Homelander in check and is capable of doing it again. It wants you to be scared of him, and so on, because that will make it all the more shocking and surprising when Homelander ends up killing him. And that will elevate Homelander even more, of course. Referencing one of Walter White's quotes in the fifth season, I think Stan is going to "fly too close to the sun" with Homelander at some point in this season.
As I said in the beginning, this was a slow start to the season, which is why I am not giving as high of a rating to it as a lot of people would, I'd imagine. At the same time, that isn't necessarily that important. I was still very entertained while watching this premiere. Of course, it'll take a couple more episodes for me to get sucked into this season, like with every other show/season, pretty much. Other than that, I'm looking forward to what this season has in store, and I'm looking forward to watching all the following episodes.
Review by Andrew BloomVIP 9BlockedParentSpoilers2022-07-25T04:38:36Z
[7.4/10] This is more of a soft reboot than a direct sequel to the prior season, and I can’t help but be a little disappointed by that. Homelander kills his handler and gets a new one specifically to be his pushover so that he’s no longer penned in...until the CEO of the company is the one penning him in now. Annie took a stand against what her company is oding and wasn’t going to take crap anymore...only now she’s wearing the skanky costume and singing nonsense at Translucent’s funeral. The Anti-Supe Squad struck a big blow for justice and are now...hanging out in some gang’s safehouse while the heat’s on and basically just waiting for Billy to come back.
I don’t know. It feels like everyone took some major steps, good and bad, by the end of season 1, and the start of season 2 has effectively walked it all back to where the major characters are in similar positions to where they were at any random point last season.
There are definitely some new developments. For one thing, there is a new supervillain with telekinetic powers who came in as part of a human trafficking ring and dropped a boat on the smuggler. There is another individual, whether that same supervillain, or some other ally, who popped Rayner’s head off right when she was putting the pieces together of Vought (or so she thinks) feeding the terrorists Compound-V. And there’s strong hints that Vought was founded as Nazi-esque eugenics company whose founders were embraced by the U.S. for their scientific prowess a la Operation Paperclip.
Oh yeah, and an ersatz Green Arrow/Hawkeye and his “teacher” are trying to get The Deep into a thinly-veiled version of Scientology. The Deep hitting rock bottom has its moments, and someone using him to help get a Scientologist onto the Seven could be interesting. But he’ll have to step over Stormfront (oof on that name), a hashtagging, live streaming new addition stamped by the CEO himself. She has potential as a way to comment on Gen Z-style internet stars, but also the potential to age like milk as a character.
Otherwise, I don’t know, it seems like we’re retreading a lot of already trodden ground. Hughie and Annie have a tortured relationship where they’re still getting over what each ahs been through, but they care about each other. Hughie’s lying to Annie...again...with the twist that now he’s trying to protect her from knowing too much lest she be under threat from Homelander. Meanwhile she’s working her angles to blackmail low grade heroes and secure them some more Compound-V. It’s not a grand advvancement from the big place that they left things last season.
A few of the details are nice. I like that Kimiko is learning English and picking up on something none of her colleagues are. I like the Black Noir “Sympathy for the Devil” sequence, which is gruesome but blackly comic in a fashion The Boys has all but perfected. I like that MM is building dollhouse accoutrement Lester Freeman style.
I’m less enamored with the arc they seem to be setting up where Hughie wants to become the leader. His story about having nothing except this crusade is a compelling one. His jealousy over Annie’s professional flirtations and broken connections to the rest of the world is sad and sympathetic in its way. But the need for Billy to come back in and be “the captain” is pretty thin, especially when I wish either Frenchie or MM would step up instead, and I’d rather see Billy rocked and changed by finally finding his wife rather than basically picking up where he left off as more or less the same person.
The core of The Boys is still good. This episode is still entertaining, and the performances are still good. But the end of the last season promised some major changes and developments, and this season premiere spends most of its time restoring something closer to the status quo rather than paying that bill now that it’s actually come due.