The Boys Season 3 Review

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You know, after the epic clash between Butcher, Soldier Boy, and Homelander at Herogasm, I wasn’t sure where else The Boys season 3 could go. Most Especially because everything in that episode felt so final. Or as Butcher would say “Scorched Earth”.

But sure enough, The Boys Season 3 delivered a satisfying conclusion for most of its characters and set up the fourth season of the show. (With only a few issues, but we’ll get into that later)

The Boys

One of the best parts of the Boys Season 3 is how it readapts several storylines & character arcs from the comics to fit the new story it’s telling on the show.

Rather than having MM battling to save his daughter from his drug-addicted wife like in the comics, The Boys season 3 sees Marvin trying to be a good father, all while navigating through his childhood trauma. I loved that we went into MM’s past and got to see the source of his panicking attacks, as this made his character that much more interesting. (Oh, by the way, F*ck Todd).

We see a similar story play out with Kimiko and Frenchie, both of whom are victims of abuse and struggle with the fear of relapsing into their past lives. For Frenchie, he has to confront an old acquaintance in Little Nina (also readapted from the comics), who tormented and used him as her hitman for years. This directly leads into Kimiko’s storyline, as she also goes through her identity crisis. But throughout the season, she slowly comes to terms with her killer instinct.

One character I didn’t expect to step up as much as she did was Starlight. Despite the very real threat of Homelander, Annie puts herself in the line of fire and uses her considerable influence to knock him down a peg or two. Yes, she makes several mistakes along the way, but in the end, she proved she had long since earned her spot on The Boys.

But Hughie’s storyline was different.

After finding out that his new boss Victoria Neuman, was the infamous “Head-Popper,” Hughie feels betrayed and powerless again. But rather than cry about it, Hughie turns to Butcher to get rid of Victoria and other corrupt superheroes by any means necessary. This move not only lands Hughie into several morally grey situations, but it also nearly gets him killed.

To be honest, I wasn’t quite sure where Hughie’s story was heading this season. But by the end, I realized that Hughie’s story was to show how everyone, regardless of how much they mess up deserved to be saved. And trust me, no one needed more saving this season than Billy Butcher.

Homelander & Butcher

If two characters summarised The Boys Season 3 perfectly, it was Homelander and Butcher. After a year of an uneasy truce, the two besties have a chat and decide to keep their feud between themselves.

But in traditional The Boys fashion, things don’t go according to plan. 

Antony Starr’s Homelander remains one of the best Tv show Villains. Despite his character being a literal psychopath, the actor shows the inner complexities of the crazed superhero.

Homelander’s biggest problem remains his desperate need for approval from the people and the higher-ups at Vought. But when he doesn’t get said acceptance (in the first half of the season), the evil superman lashes out at the world. Things only get worse when Homelander’s girlfriend, Stormfront, dies, and it’s at this point, that Homelander drops the pretense of respecting the rules and removes all forms of rebellion or competition in Vought, including the untouchable Mr. Edgar (at least for now).

All this leads to a “Homelander must die by any means Season,” and to no one’s surprise, Billy Butcher was the one leading the charge.

Butcher really goes to the ends of the earth and beyond to find a way to kill Homelander. He even goes as far as to get temporary superpowers from Vought’s unstable Temp V drug. But even a laser-powered up Butcher couldn’t match Homelander’s raw strength, and so Butcher looks for a permanent solution in Soldier Boy.

Soldier Boy

Soldier Boy’s return was the highlight of the season, as Vought’s first-ever superhero brought a lot of answers to the series.

The Second half of The Boys Season 3 does a fantastic job of slowly revealing the truth behind Soldier Boy’s disappearance. However, the full story comes out in episode 7, where the show cleverly uses Black Noir’s memories to recant the story of how the faux hero earned his fate.

Similar to Homelander in the present day, we see that Soldier Boy had an abusive hold over his old team, “Payback”. But unlike The Seven, the entire group gets tired of Soldier Boy’s abuse and works with Vought to hand him over to the Russians. But whatever peace Payback had is short-lived, as thanks to Butcher, Soldier boy returns to hunt down every one of them.

But the biggest twist of the season comes when we find out that Soldier Boy is Homelander’s father. As you can imagine, this creates a bit of awkwardness, especially when Butcher and Meave sign him up to kill Homelander. But thanks to Soldier Boy wreaking so much chaos on his road to revenge (and being an overall terrible person), everyone puts their differences aside (for a moment) to retire the old soldier…that is everyone but Maeve.

If there was one character I was scared for going into The Boys season 3, it’s Queen Maeve. Ever since she blackmailed Homelander into standing down last season, Maeve has been treading on thin ice. And when she challenged Homelander alone in the season finale, I was so sure she was going to die.

But not only did Maeve beat the living hell out of Homelander, but for once, the series didn’t kill off a good person, and gave her a well-deserved ending.

My only issue with Boys Season 3 was Black Noir. Not that I approve of the horrible things that Noir has done, but the man deserved a chance to get his revenge on Soldier Boy. Especially after showing us the dark history between the two characters.

The show didn’t even have to change the betrayal scene, as Homelander could have betrayed Noir during the fight final Soldier Boy. This would have been a much better ending for the character, rather than the anticlimactic one we got.

Verdict