The fifth and final season of The Boys is on its way to Prime Video; according to cast member Jensen Ackles (Soldier Boy), filming wraps up next month. Then all there is to do is edit the episodes together, add in special effects and watch as the reactions roll in.
If you're showrunner Erik Kripke, that's a scary prospect. "I am in a fair amount of terror about a series finale," Kripke told The Night Agent and The Shield creator Shawn Ryan on an episode of the Creator to Creator podcast. According to Kripke, there are not that many great finales in the history of television, and being a fan-favorite show means nothing if you're unable to stick the landing. "You can count in one, maybe two hands, the truly great series finales. Of which, by the way, well done, I think The Shield is one of them. And, conversely, the graveyard is literally filled with terrible [series finales]. You could have the greatest show for years, but if you stiff that ending, and that's what's sending everyone out in the parking lot, they go, 'Oh, maybe that show wasn't that good,'" he explained.
Ryan brings up how "some people feel about Game of Thrones, which aired its famously divisive series finale in 2019. Kripke went back further, joking that Lost co-creator Damon Lindelof “got so much shit for [the finale] that he’s still writing op-eds.”
On the other hand, there is the rare finale that seems to please everyone. “Breaking Bad, to me, is as good as a show gets," Kripke said, "and I was able to ask some of those writers, I’m like, ‘The way you tied everything together, how did you do that?’ And they said, ‘Oh, we had just a list of loose ends on our board that we had no idea what to do with them, that we would keep compiling over the seasons. And then when it came time to do the final season, we would just start checking them off of like how do we pay them off cuz we’re gonna look like geniuses because the Season 2 storyline becomes this.’”
Kripke and his team have already written The Boys series finale, and may have already filmed it, even if there's still a lot of finessing to do. He's thinking constantly about how to deliver an ending that will live up to fans' expectations. “How do you tie up the stories?" he asked "How do you do it in a way that is emotional and satisfying? How do you do it in a way that creates — frankly — the illusion that some detail that you dropped in Season 1 or Season 2 is now suddenly coming back to pay off?”
"We always say we want to go deeper, not bigger. But there's inevitably [a bigger scope], like, just because you need to find a new way to do an action scene, or you need to find a new superpower. The trick is so it doesn't inflate so much that it becomes a parody of itself, because it's already a parody. So you really keep it grounded."
The Boys boss fears a "cooling effect" on politically minded TV shows
Pleasing fans of The Boys might be particularly tricky, since the show is many things to many people. It's a superhero drama that delights in extreme violence and gross-out humor; I will never for as long as I live forget the opening scene of season 3, when an Ant-Man-like superhero shrinks himself down and crawls into...well, just watch it if you're brave enough.
The show is also a drama with a lot of balls in the air. Season 4 ended with the tyrannical Homelander (Antony Starr) consolidating his power, most of the Boys kidnapped, and wildcards like Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) still on the loose. Finally, the show is a political satire that takes direct aim at Donald Trump and the movement he's created, with the power-hungry Homelander often compared to the president.
And no, Trump isn't the only inspiration behind Homelander — actor Antony Starr calls him "a conglomerate of tyrants" — but everyone on the show is aware that the series has tapped into something. “Despite all the sex and violence and madness, we take a lot of pride in, maybe, being the most current show on TV right now,” Kripke told The Los Angeles Times. “You’re not really expecting a superhero show to have the vibe of Veep. It’s just another way that we try to be unexpected.”
"[Homelander] is authoritarian in general. Obviously, things are happening in the particular country I live in that I respond to. This is a reflection of the things we see and the writers are scared of. What we found early on about the superheroes in this world is there’s this interesting intersection of fascism and celebrity. It’s a unique yet very current notion — not just in the States but all over the world — how people are using the power of celebrity to advance authoritarian ideas."
I fully expect the final season of The Boys to lean into the political metaphor. Amazon hasn't given Kripke and company any notes — by this point they've proven that what they're doing works — but in an era where Trump is increasingly going after industries and institutions he doesn't like — from universities to law firms to broadcasters — Kripke is worried that future shows won't have it as easy.
“Look, not about this particular show, but I’m certainly worried about a cooling effect when, now more than ever, you need people in the back of the classroom throwing spitballs,” Kripke said. “That’s not just healthy, that’s vital. It’s really important that people who can thumb their nose at it don’t get scared.”
It's hard to predict how the final season of The Boys will land when it comes out on Prime Video, probably sometime next year. But I tend to think they'll nail the moment to the wall once again.
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h/t Collider, Games Radar