The Boys season 3 makes it clear that Butcher is worse than Homelander - Looper (2023)

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Contains spoilers for The Boys season 3 finale and The Boys comics.

The Boys season 3 confirms that Homelander (Antony Starr) can do almost anything now. In addition to being the leader of Vought in all but name, he earns the trust of Ryan (Cameron Crovetti), and his overly devoted supporters openly applaud him when he publicly attacks an attacker. He has already established himself as a powerful presence among the religious segment of the population, and with his new political and corporate influence, he is not only the most powerful supe in the world, he is on his way to becoming the most powerful person in the world. world. , spot

Furthermore, her discussions with the mirror have revealed that as her powers accumulate, she loses the shards of humanity she still had. In fact, showrunner Eric Kripke recently shared thatWest America Writers Unionthat Homelander will absolutely be a complete sociopath before the show ends. "Essentially, I could trace the metamythology of the series as the slow unraveling of Homelander," Kripke said.

Still, The Boys wouldn't be The Boys if it wasn't about to exceed expectations. So don't expect the fact that the show is about the world's strongest superhero going bad to mean that this superhero is the baddest guy out there. In fact, after The Boys season 3, it's clear that Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) is much, much worse than Homelander, because he now has a mission, a schedule, and absolutely nothing to lose.

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The season 3 finale of The Boys reveals that Butcher's rampant use of the temporary Compound V has ruined his health to the point that he only has a few months left. As the season progressed, viewers also discovered that he can be even more devious and manipulative than anyone would have imagined, as he is willing to team up with Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles) and reveal vital information about Hughie's (Jack Quay) . Oh, and because he basically took Ryan away from him, he now has absolutely nothing and no one to lose.

That's a bad idea, because Butcher holds a huge grudge against all of his superiors, and now that he has a clear deadline, he's probably ready to ditch any qualms he still has. However, he did not have too many left. As bad as he is, Homelander mostly stumbles on his victories. The public eats away at his selfish and violent lapses, and allies like Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit) present unexpected opportunities. Meanwhile, Butcher is all about proper preparation and planning, and he's already proven to be just as moral as his overpowered nemesis. Homelander may be a bomb, but he lacks proper targeting and doesn't always go off. Butcher, on the other hand, is a sniper rifle aiming at the heart of his enemies at all times... and now that he knows the clock is ticking, he'll probably start shooting.

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As powerful and fearsome as Homelander is, there is a limit to the horrors he can wreak, and we've already seen what that is. Time and time again, the show has revealed in the dark what Homelander is. From the way he handles plane rescue in Season 1 to his demonstration of taking down crowds with his eye beams in Season 2, it's been clear for quite some time that the Supe is one bad day away, a virtually unstoppable one for become a mass murderer. Season 3 simply gives him the support and trust of the public to act out his worst impulses in broad daylight.

However, despite the occasional threats, his villainy's maximum cannon is still at the "could start killing a lot of people with his eye beams" level. Therefore, it is his one-on-one wrongdoing that often stands out the most. While the rooftop scene with the girl he's tasked with rescuing in The Only Man in Heaven and his various verbal jabs are eminently hideous villain moments in their own right, they're something a fairly evil person with a level of power much lower could also do. deduct.

Homelander remains an excellent villain, and AntonyStarr's deadpan, jerky performance is enduring MVP material. However, there is a rather tragic side to the character, and while he is certainly smart enough to pose a serious threat, his selfishness and constant emotional turmoil undermine his aspirations. Since Kripke has hinted that the show plans to escalate Homelander's path into obscurity, it's very likely that the next few seasons will enhance Homelander's roguelike gameplay by featuring some of the unspeakably different behavior of his comic book counterpart. For now though, he needs to get better if he wants to hang out with Butcher... just like the source material.

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The comic book version of Homelander is a different type than the incarnation of the strongest super in the series. Both have exactly the kind of tragic backstory you'd imagine from an ultra-powerful, lab-created corporate superhero. However, while the comic man is far from a good person, the appearance of him in the dark is strange. Black Noir (played by Nathan Mitchell on the show) slowly and steadily manipulates him into a murderous supervillain whose printed incarnation is the mad clone of Homelander created as a fail-safe. Convinced that he committed Noir's various atrocities without really remembering them, Homelander eventually begins doing unimaginable things on his own.

Meanwhile, Billy Butcher spends all of his comics on a self-proclaimed mission to get rid of as many supers as he can. Once Homelander and Black Noir are out of the way, he allows himself a brief moment to think before embarking on a mission to kill everyone who has ever come in contact with Compound V. This would affect untold numbers of people. , by the way... including all of his teammates, almost all of whom he personally kills. Even discounting the many, many atrocities and double entendres committed by the comic butcher, this latest mission of mass murder confirms him as the true final villain of the series.

The homelander of the series seems to be walking the path of full-blown psychopathic supervillain through his loneliness, thanks to his fragile ego and numerous problems. He also kills Black Noir and Stillwell (Elizabeth Shue), his biggest opponents in the comics other than Butcher. So it's very possible that he will eventually become the kind of villain that will outshine the exploits of the comic book butcher.

Of course, there is still a problem with this theory. From what we've seen so far, the butcher in the series is even worse than his comic book counterpart.

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The scariest thing about Billy Butcher on the show isn't his willingness to do anything to get the job done. Other than the very occasional feeling of guilt, or an even rarer genuine attempt to connect with someone, he seems to have even less redeeming qualities than his comic book counterpart. There's hardly anyone he doesn't want to betray or use, and now that he's on a tight schedule it's likely to get worse.

The cartoon butcher is a violent man who sometimes slips into a state of silent rage where his darker instincts take the driver's seat. "It's not me," he tells a very unhappy Supe in a moment of extreme violence. "I'm somewhere else, watching it happen." He is also a highly intelligent and manipulative man, able to make everyone from his team members to various CIA directors fiddle.

Despite all this, it has certain positive qualities. He really cares for Hughie, whom he considers a little brother. He has a brilliant, if extremely worldly, sense of humor, and seems to genuinely enjoy laughing with his teammates. He's also surprisingly willing to help the other guys out with their personal issues, as well as anyone who's been hurt in any way by Supes, though his help is more of the Black Ops kind and he's not above giving it to hold someone's head up. people when the time is right

The butcher of the show is none of that other than intelligence, violence, and manipulation. Even in moments of apparent hilarity, Urban's performance makes it clear that this butcher is basically "watching it happen somewhere else" the whole time. If the worst part of him wasn't in control before, by the end of The Boys season 3, there's a good chance he is. Great, be careful.