Hey Hamliet!
Were you into The Boys? I feel like it's not your style, so you probably haven't watched it. But if you did, the finale episode divided people a bit. I mean the whole season had a lot of flaws, but one scene in the finale felt very out-of-character to some people (especially fans of that character!). I don't think that way btw but If you watched it, I'm actually curious about your opinion! That's all I can write without spoilers but I was curious because I trust your character interpretations and analyses :D
Well, I don't go here, that's true. It's not my style. At the same time, I have a dear friend who has been SUPER into it, and I vicariously know the story through her. Still not for me, but it seems like a good story. My friend was pretty satisfied with the ending.
I also did like what the creator said at the end, that he wanted the message to be about hope and that even if the world can't be fixed, you can still find salvation through love. I think that's a beautiful message. Without actually seeing it, of course, I have no idea if that's what was delivered or not.
I'm not going to talk about that show specifically, because I haven't seen it, but I am going to talk about what the discourse reminds me of and the broader societal/fandom thoughts that stem from that. These are broad ideas that may or may not apply to this specific instance, and of course I won't know the nuances of this show, so I beg forgiveness for that. At the same time it does tie into a broader trend that I want to talk about.
I will say that what I know about the ending reminds me of SnK, in that yet again, toxic alpha dudebros fail to understand that all along they were the butt of the joke, despite the entire story making it abundantly clear. Then they scream and throw whiny hissy fits in outrage that their "heroes" are shown screaming and throwing whiny hissy fits, because it outs what they truly are. And they don't want to face that.
All stories have flaws and I can't speak to The Boys. But from what I'm seeing I am side-eyeing the complaints about bad writing, which seem to be coming from precisely one type of fan and mimic the bad faith SnK ending criticisms, and those who seem more or less satisfied, who tend to be different demographically and in terms of creative presence. Which isn't to say there aren't legitimate critiques because there probably are (there were for SnK). But is to say:
Throughout history, the majority of stories across the world have catered to a certain type of control-oriented, male-strength narrative. The "male power fantasy," if you will. When stories not only choose to emphasize something else, but deliberately subvert that with characters like Eren Jaeger or Homelander, people who signed up for the story expecting their usual bout of justification and praise are shocked to see what other stories told them was good is actually not only bad, but cringe, pathetic, and laughable.
I understand the shock, but I also think that these dudes should look at how they respond to being told "this isn't cool" just once, and realize that maybe, just maybe, these stories are onto something. Maybe it's not cool to be an entitled dudebro. Maybe, this kind of entitlement leads to fascism and war crimes. Maybe this kind of temperament shouldn't have power.
And when it comes to fiction, maybe the rest of us can have some stories, too. Because I also think this entitled attitude spreads beyond just the toxic fascist character and into even offering complexity and genuine failings to heroes. See, fanboys' reactions to The Last Jedi and Luke Skywalker, or Kylo Ren. The irony being, of course, that TLJ offered the entitled dude some complexity and compassion and hope, only for them to scream about that and scream about their hero having flaws.
They don't want people. They want gods because they want to imagine they themselves have that level of control. Society tells them they do. But, they don't. In the end we are all just people--and they're no inherently better or worse than others.
