Amazon Prime
Even if you aren’t watching The Boys, you’ve certainly heard of it, considering Amazon Studio’s wildly aggressive marketing strategy. Prior to the release of the series, you couldn’t go anywhere on the male-driven internet without seeing an ad for The Boys.
Credit to them, though, as their methods clearly worked on me — it only took three days for me to binge-watch the eight-episode first season.
Warning: spoilers for The Boys will follow.
And let me tell you something, the show is pretty fucking wild. “Bad superheroes” is by no means a revolutionary concept, but what The Boys does so well is its willingness to really delve into the depths of that darkness — what would people really be like if they could get away with anything and everything?
That question is largely answered through sexual depravity and unnecessary violence, as the superheroes that populate the series are largely played as villains — particularly its Superman/Captain America knock-off, Homelander.
And according to The Boys co-creator Erik Kripe, it was a scene involving Homelander that Amazon forced them to cut.
During a Reddit AMA on Tuesday, July 30, Kripe revealed that despite that show’s purposefully shocking yet extremely entertaining graphic nature, there was one scene they shot that Amazon would simply not allow them to do:
“There was one scene that Amazon said, ‘Fuck no you have to cut,’” Kripke began.
“I couldn’t quite understand why considering everything else we have in the show, but Homelander, after being dressed down by Stilwell (Elisabeth Shue) in episode 2, was standing on one of the Chrysler building Eagles. He pulled his pants down and started jerking off, mumbling ‘I can do whatever I want’ over and over again until he climaxed all over New York City.”
If you’ve seen The Boys, you know this sort of legitimately lunatic behavior is perfectly on-brand for Homelander, who is frankly thrilling as the series villain. And if you haven’t seen this show then A) why are you reading this article anyway and B) get on that, because it’s a blast.
THE BOYS, which hit Amazon Prime on Friday, July 26, has already been renewed for a second season.