Wee Hughie needs time for soul searching. Last issue, Billy Butcher – leader of a black-ops CIA anti-superhero team – injects Hughie with a serum that gave him increased strength and a few other goodies. Hughie quit the team, but he returns just as quickly this issue after talking with Starfire – the newest member of the Seven, a stand-in for the Justice League of America. He never realizes her identity, but their conversation convinces him to return to the Boys. The Seven will have their time with the Boys soon enough, but right now the team has aimed its particular brand of vitriolic discipline on the members of Teenage Kix – a Teen Titans parody. After obtaining a variety of incriminating evidence that exposes the team’s predilection for drugs and weird sex, the Boys deliver an anonymous message – Kix can give up one of their own to the press, or the Boys will do it for them. When Shout-Out comes out of the closet for the media, the Seven hear the message clearly: Billy Butcher has returned.
The Boys offers Garth Ennis’s usual mix of graphic violence, profanity, and weird sex with madcap abandon. You almost feel guilty enjoying this book, but it never fails to entertain. Ennis displays his usual affinity for more down-to-earth heroes – soldiers, gun-toting vigilantes, cowboys, and any other masculine archetype that doesn’t wear a cape and spandex. He uses his love for machismo and Americana as a butcher’s axe against the predominance of superheroes in comics. He also unflinchingly portrays the attitudes attendant with overwhelming power. The Homelander – leader of the Seven and a Superman stand-in – abuses his authority with total disregard for everyone around him. In the first issue, he and a few other male members of the Seven coerced Starlight into performing oral sex on them in exchange for membership on the team. While every person in a leadership position doesn’t engage in such repugnant behavior, I can’t imagine the attendant ego on someone with superhuman powers. That said, The Boys will still prove to overtly crass and violent for some readers. Heed the mature readers warning on the cover.
Darick Robertson’s art continues to impress, particularly with his well-nigh flawless depiction of British actor Simon Pegg as Wee Hughie. He portrays an appropriately dark and dirty vision of Butcher’s world. Everyone looks just a little bit worn out, and the material it serves the material well. Anyone still on the fence can probably still jump on with The Boys, but decide soon – things are about to get brutal.
Questions? Comments? Let us know what you think at cinescape@mania.com.
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