Lowkey the ending of The Boys wasn't terrible like GoT or filled with as many plot holes as Stranger Things (that requires going to an extremely limited access stage play, just to cover few of those holes), it was a good to even great episode but a shallow finale imo.
*How the Gen V cast were retroactively treated is actually diabolical and made most of their stories in the greater The Boys universe kinda pointless. Like how you going to hype up Marie has this Homelander level supe? but unlike John Milk she truly wants to help/actually save people, she actually has healthy relationships and has clear remorse if/when innocent people get hurt or killed (for most of her teen life she literally hated and blamed herself for killing her parents as well as traumatising her sister, only realising much later her parents knowingly let both her and her a sister get experimented on and thus were far from blameless for their own deaths as well as the years of trauma both Marie and Annabeth went through) and after all that, you just have her appear for barely 5 mins tops in the finale to save people and go to Canada? (all off-screen btw). WTF Eric Kripke!?
*Also just like episode 7 of this season, the finale also screamed of "clear budgeting and scheduling issues" like WHERE ARE Cate, Sam, Annabeth and the other young supes? (also a big missed opportunity to have Zoe join the Gen V cast imo). The fact I was relieved to see Emma for the whole of two minutes of screen time she had this season was ridiculous (also notice how none of the Gen V characters actually got to show off their powers at all? We didn't even get to see Jordan in they male body). I won't go into all the details about the advertising since it's already getting bashed all over social media right now for being misleading but yeah we were baited about the actual scope of the final season with it being all localised brawls, again with "the budget" (pretty sure Noir 2 was the one that did the most destructive feat and technically has the highest kill count in the entire final season, with the long term environment damage he caused from breaking the Alaskan oil pipeline, which only makes his death to The Deep even more disrespectful and funnier).
*The fact Vought is still around with the tower intact, Stan back on top and essentially proving himself right, that even with bad products like Homelander gone, you can't kill the status quo of the corrupt rich people (greedy corporations/banks) always winning aka the true "villains" of capitalist societies, is a pretty cynical take but it does fit in with The Boys. Also is Zoe and her dad still on the run or did Stan take them in?
*Kinda hilarious to me that Sage got a similarly good ending to Queen Maeve after all the murders, torture of young supes and emotional manipulation (she straight up slept with The Deep and Noir 2) she played a hand in while supporting Homelander and just like Butcher she was all for scorched Earth too as long as she had isolation in the end. I guess she really did outsmart the system and plot even without her intelligence.
*Homelander having a pathetic death live on TV was truly fitting and it parallels well with him looking down on The Deep for being an afraid, begging and useless wimp only for John to end up as an afraid, begging and useless wimp in front of Butcher, The Deep got what he deserved too plus pretty satisfying that Noir 2 inevitably played a hand in The Deep's death even beyond the grave (so much for bros huh?) also possibly building level giant octopus? prffft /s, Oh Father dying to a metal ball gag reverberating his sonic scream back into his skull (that Ashely had specially made for him during sexy times) was hilarious too, Ashely getting impeached then arrested was a fitting end after her brief moment of moral clarity and to the suprise of absolutely no-one, Terror dying ment Butcher's humanity died with him thus William had to be put down like a rabid dog before he could commit genocide which ofc it had to be Hughie who did the deed (the supe killing virus is still in the Vought Tower sprinkler system though, so did Hughie tell Stan about it or...?)
**While I liked the endings The Boys got (especially MM), though I did find it a little creepy that Starlight was ok naming her unborn daughter after Hughie's dead ex, a ton of ramifications weren't addressed but I guess it'll be explained in Vought Rising and/or The Boys: Mexico?
1) Kimiko is a living and breathing nuclear reactor (just like Solider Boy) and she is casually walking around France passively emitting radiation, like ok? Also I guess the Shining Light Liberation Army and Nina have both truly given up trying to pursue her?
2) Marie is stated to be on Homelander's level plus she can heal, rejuvenate and even resurrect others so what's next for a supe that powerful? (I feel like that line about about her not being able to "control her powers" in The Boys S5 despite having full control of her powers at the end of Gen V S2, was a cheap plot contrivance to write her out of the final battle and explain her not using her powers at all in The Boys even for just support).
3) There was seemly very little global response to two presidents of the USA being gone in quick succession (one murdered and the other impeached in the matter of weeks of each other). Like aside from Bashley briefing mentioning NATO, the geopolitics in The Boys S5 was non-existent.
4) There are still plenty of depraved supes out there and supes that obviously want to do good too, so what's actually stopping Vought from just maintaining the status quo of cover ups, corporate manipulation and other corrupt deeds? Sure the current president is going to watch Vought like an Eagle armed with a gun but Stan clearly has dirt on pretty much everyone in the government plus access to supes with telepathy too, so what's next?
5) For me the biggest ramification that was left kinda unchecked, well Butcher mentioned that as long as supes exists, inevitably another Homelander will rise up (he isn't really wrong tbh) but worse what's stopping another Frederick Vought from rising up? He was an intelligent yet still regular man that created V1 which granted super powers and immortality decades ago during the 1940s but the drawback was it was very unstable and most subjects that took it died. Fast forward to now, with more advanced technology, far more accessibility to both education as well as general information not to mention a better understanding of the human anatomy/psyche and the world now is filled with thousands of super-powered individuals. What's stopping another ambitious scientist rising up in the USA, China, India, Russia, Japan or elsewhere in the world of The Boys and improving if not perfecting Frederick Vought's work?
***Overall I enjoyed my time with The Boys, even if a few times I did have to look away and I did feel some gory as well as sexual moments were completely unnecessary even in a cynical deconstruction of the Superhero genre (though nowhere need as bad as the comic). For me the ratings are:
1st) S1 8.5/10
2nd) S3 8/10
3rd) S2 7/10
4th) S5 6/10
5th) S4 5/10
Overall: 6.9/10 (this wasn't intentional I swear).
****Still a little bitter my time invested in Gen V may have been wasted since I actually enjoyed the spin-off more than The Boys but I won't dwell on it for long. Just wish the final season didn't have a good chuck of it's content be setup for Vought Rising (S4 of The Boys was already the setup season), had an entire episode being mostly a Supernatural reunion (save that for an one off special) and personally Butcher should not of immediately teamed up with the rest of The Boys in the first episode of S5 after going into the super cancer deep end at the end of S4.
*****In closing, the final season definitely needed at least an extra episode while also not giving unnecessary screen time to new characters introduced in the final season over pre-established fan favourites (yes I'm still miffed a cat girl that ***** in a litterbox got more screen time than the Gen V cast) but overall I still enjoyed it for what it was and the endings of GoT and ST were worst but The Boys is definitely on the weaker end of conclusions imo.
Well that's was a lot, pardon lol!
