The Boys showrunner Eric Kripke instructed viewers who disagree with his show to “go watch something else.”
Erin Moriarty as Starlight and Antony Starr as Homelander in The Boys
During an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Kripke was asked by Mikey O’Connell about using Homelander as a stand-in for Donald Trump in Season 3, “How did you digest the uglier reaction to that? I saw multiple headlines with the word ‘woke’ in them.
Kripke responded, “I clearly have a perspective, and I’m not shy about putting that perspective in the show. Anyone who wants to call the show ‘woke’ or whatever, that’s OK. Go watch something else.”
He added, “But I’m certainly not going to pull any punches or apologize for what we’re doing. Some people who watch it think Homelander is the hero. What do you say to that? The show’s many things. Subtle isn’t one of them. So if that’s the message you’re getting from it, I just throw up my hands.”
Erin Moriarty as Starlight in The Boys
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As for whether or not he thinks he is influencing people with the show, Kripke said, “It’s catharsis. I have no illusions about my job. I’m somewhere between a carnie and a court jester. I am not particularly up my own ass, so I don’t know if it’ll ever change minds. If it does, that’d be fantastic.”
“Look, I am a big proponent of genre — good genre, which doesn’t get enough respect. Through the metaphor of superheroes or space or whatever, you can say subversive things that you’d never get away with in most straight dramas,” he said.
However, he did go on to state the message he wants to convey with the show, “I’m a humanist. I think it’s important that a show have a lot of heart. We took great pains to create the moral universe of this show. It’s not nihilistic, as much as people say it is. If the show had a message, it’s that anyone who stands in front of you and says they can save the world is lying.”
Antony Starr as Homeland and Cameron Crovetti as Ryan in The Boys (2024), Amazon MGM Studios
Kripke has had no problem declaring his worldview and using his platform as The Boys showrunner to do so. Infamously, in an interview with ScreenRant back in 2020, he was asked, “In season two, there’s the supervillain terrorists all over the world that have been activated by Homelander. However, you never really get the sense that they’re more dangerous than their creators. Can you talk to me a little bit about that dynamic?”
Kripke responded, “We were really interested in exploring the idea of authority figures getting the public really riled up with xenophobia and racism, but ultimately the most dangerous people are the white dudes standing next to you. We wanted to reflect that story. So, the supervillains are, in a way, a misdirect.
Nathan Mitchell as Black Noir and Chace Crawford as The Deep in The Boys (2024), Amazon MGM Studios
In the same interview he claimed that a caravan of Central American immigrants attempting to illegally enter the United States of America was based on real world events.
He explained, “We wrote it at the time of the travel ban, if you remember; the caravan that were ‘going to come over the border and rape all the white women.’ We were in that world, and the way that authority figures were drumming up fear in these outsiders was disgusting, frankly.”
Kripke elaborated, “And so we wanted to reflect that story, which is Vought and the superheroes and Stormfront are really drumming up quite a lot of fear about these supervillains. When in reality, Homelander and Stormfront are the real threat.”
Karl Urban as Billy Butcher, Tomer Capone as Frenchie, and Laz Alonso as Mother’s Milk in The Boys (2024), Amazon MGM Studios
In 2022, while accepting the Saturn Award for Best Action/Adventure Streaming Television Series, Kripke stated, “The message of The Boys is, in the real world, anyone who stands in front of you and says that they’re here to save you is f***ing lying and trying to sell you something. We all have a responsibility to save each other, taking care of the people next to you in a thousand, boring, unremarkable moments every day, and that is how the world gets saved.”
He concluded the speech stating, “So, thank you everyone. Please vote. F*** MAGA. Have a good night.”
Here we have the rest of @therealKripke acceptance speech for @TheBoysTV ! #SaturnAwards pic.twitter.com/4O8k7DnJKD
— Rhiannon/FAN (@HughiesBoys) October 26, 2022
In 2023, he also claimed that Homelander murdering a protestor in Season 3 was inspired by President Trump.
He told Variety, “It’s not great. It’s just a notion taken to the extreme that the more horrible public leaders act, the more fans they seem to rack up. And there’s always that expression that Trump can shoot a guy on Fifth Avenue and wouldn’t lose any fans. And so we said, ‘Let’s do that. Let’s have Homelander kill a guy on Fifth Avenue and see what the reaction is.’ And it’s just true.”
“It’s like that campaign video of the guy actively saying he’s going to hunt down people with his semi-automatic and kicking open private residences to hunt them down — and people cheer for that now. So for us, it was just sadly, not that far off from what would actually happen,” he said.
Erin Moriarty as Starlight in The Boys (2024), Amazon MGM Studios
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It’ll be interesting to see what the ratings for the next season of The Boys will be. Usually when individuals tell people to not watch their show they take their advice. One need only look at Doctor Who to see that. Actor Ncuti Gatwa told Variety, “Don’t watch. Turn off the TV. Go and touch grass, please, for God’s sake.”
The show has since posted some of the worst viewership in Doctor Who history. The premiere episode only saw overnight numbers hit 2.6 million in the United Kingdom. By episode three it fell to 2.04 million. The most recent episode’s overnight numbers clocked in at 2.12 million.
Ncuti Gatwa as The Doctor in Doctor Who (2024), BBC
What do you make of Kripke’s comments?
NEXT: ‘The Boys’ Actress Erin Moriarty Responds To Accusations She’s Had Plastic Surgery
