Eric Kripke, the boss of “The Boys,” discusses what to anticipate from the fifth and final season Jeffrey Dean Morgan Spinoff & “Scary” Political Poignancy in Season 4

SPOILER ALERT: The first three episodes of The Boys’ Season 4, which debuted on Amazon Prime Video today, are covered in detail in this piece.

“Did it occur to you that having a million eyes on you makes it harder to stage a f*cking coup?” In the third episode of The Boys’ fourth season, Sage (Susan Heyward) bemoans Homelander (Antony Starr), the superhero overlord.

That would be shouting the quiet part out loud in any other programme, but since this is the Eric Kripke-led Prime Video series, the insane Supes plot to seize the White House is just one of several spicier plot points that are hammering home the story in what we can now confirm is The Boys’ penultimate season.

The White House Correspondents Respond to Joe Biden’s Complaints About Reporters Not “Playing By The Rules”

 

Donald Trump retreats from direct press conferences with Joe Biden; incumbent campaign taunts former president

A grumpy A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) turning into a mole for the now-MM (Laz Alonso) led Boys, a near-experience of supreme fellatio ordered by Homelander, and a tonne of jargon from new Seven addition Firecracker (Valorie Curry) that you may have heard from Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene and Megyn Kelly are all included. A murder trial that concludes swiftly in Homelander’s favour, charges of grooming against Starlight (Erin Moriarty), a terrifying reenactment of Pizzagate, a lot of chemicals being injected into a lot of people on both sides, a holiday-infused, blood-soaked Vought on Ice, and some unflattering references to Masked Singer and Elon Musk are all included.

After the votes are counted, there is a contested presidential election as well.

Yes, there are cameos by Tilda Swindon and Will Farrell, and Billy Butcher (Karl Urban), the show’s protagonist, is going to die.

 

After revealing on June 11 that Season 5 of the Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg EP The Boys would mark its finale, creator Kripke talked with Deadline today about what fans should expect, how Season 4 would propel the series forward, and his future plans. Kripke also suggests that the newcomer to the show, a particular Walking Dead alum, would have a far longer runway.

DEADLINE: Why do you feel the need to conclude television programmes after five seasons?

Five seasons is a good round number, says Eric Klippe. I’m just partial to five.

DEADLINE: Why is it so?

KRIPKE: After giving it some thought, I would surmise that my training as a television writer consisted of five acts. Thus, it seems reasonable to me to allow ample time for truly getting to know the characters, without going overboard.

DEADLINE: Talking about staying too long. Even though The Boys will finish after Season 5, the franchise will continue with Gen V, the spinoffs from Mexico, and possibly other projects. Therefore, you’re not truly out, are you?

KRIPKE: To be honest, I still want to be part of this. You know, this continues to be the best job I’ve ever had, and I’m still enjoying the time of my life. But I won’t be running the programme on a daily basis, at least not for those shows. I’ll help them break story when they need it and offer suggestions on scripts, but I won’t be there all the time.

DEADLINE: Based on what we’ve seen so far of Season 4, it doesn’t appear that Butcher will be able to recover from the affects of consuming Temp V.

After being put on the back burner by the CIA in the first episode of Season 4, Butcher appears to find fresh inspiration in the form of Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s character, Joe Kessler, an old friend. Even though Kessler is now a comic book character in The Boys, he already seems to play a far larger part here. So, where do he and Butcher head in the penultimate season?

KRIPKE: At first, it was thought that Butcher is insane and that nearly everyone in his life is attempting to stop him.

DEADLINE: With good cause

KRIPKE: All right, so. Therefore, we felt it would be intriguing to develop a character that supports him and could perhaps be more aggressive than he is against superheroes. We considered how explosive a nightmare that would be. We essentially began discussing the necessity for another Butcher, which is undoubtedly a difficult task.

You need a second main man, someone as talented and captivating as Karl, to pull that off. Let those guys compete head-to-head. Luckily, Jeffrey and I were messaging at the same time that this was happening. It had been a while since we had searched for a part for him. When this segment appeared in the room, I thought, “Oh my god, this is the planets aligning on this particular part,” and they actually did. At last, he was available.

 

DEADLINE: It does feel as like a Jeffrey Dean Boys spinoff is being set up, even in the first three episodes.

 

KRIPKE: (LAUGHS) Hey, buddy, who wouldn’t want a Jeffrey Dean Boys spinoff if Jeffrey wants to do it and it works out?

 

DEADLINE: How about a spin-off from Sage? One more new character, the earth’s smartest person. A Black woman who was virtually untraceable but who now obviously has Homelander’s number after he finds her—sure, Sage became the CEO of Vought International, but she’s also the real Puppet Master. What’s the deal with that?

KRIPKE: Our goal was to reinvent the traditional comic book superhero archetype, wherein the protagonist’s intellect serves as their power. They’re always reedy White guys, but they’re just so smart.

DEADLINE: Consider Reed Richards from the Fantastic Four.

KRIPKE: Indeed, and we found it intriguing and thought-provoking that anyone could be the smartest person on the planet. What if, then, it was a low-income Black woman from a neighbourhood? And as a result, she would find it extremely difficult for anyone to listen to her or take her seriously. Thus, it is ironic that the most intelligent person on the planet, capable of curing every social ill, is a figure that no one pays attention to.

That struck us as being incredibly fascinating. It also made it easier for me to comprehend her misanthropic nature. She has a history of people not listening to her, and it has just served to exacerbate her resentment against people.

 

DEADLINE: Continuing in the line of detesting mankind, we have the murdering Homelander on trial in an almost Trumpian setting, further dividing Americans with accusations of Starlight supporters being killed and more blowing heads. In that Season 4 begins with a presidential election. Since it’s The Boys, there is obviously a lot of betrayal, but how do you feel about revealing a plot like this during an election that is already stranger than anything you’ve ever made up?

KRIPKE: Well, look, the plot was going there from the start, or at least as soon as Claudia Doumit’s character, Victoria Newman, was introduced early in Season 2. This is where we were always going, so in a way, this was always the direction the tale was going.

One of the main plots in the comic books is, incidentally, a variation of this tale.

DEADLINE: In agreement.

KRIPKE: I think it feels appropriate for a programme that has always attempted to be incredibly contemporary and capture the zeitgeist since it happened to fall during an election year. I believe there is another reality lineup on the programme.

It’s my hope that individuals won’t perceive it as excessive or unrealistic. After all, there are still people blowing up and a lot of lasers shooting out of people’s eyes, and penises are being used in interesting new ways.

DEADLINE: In such case, the background matters. Additionally, it smells like Trump more than ever before, with that mindset that Trump expressed in 2016—that is, at least for Homelander and a few others—that “I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters.”

 

KRIPKE: Well, I do feel that the near future is frightening and is, at minimum, causing concern, and I know that many writers feel the same way. We’re just sort of expressing our feelings, you know? I’m not attempting to persuade anyone otherwise. All I’m trying to do is express how scared and anxious I am about the new year.

END DATE: It’s straight out of the headlines, as they used to say.

KRIPKE: Well, regrettably, the real world has changed to more closely resemble the show. I believe that things have grown so out of control and outrageous that, in the writers’ room, we would have rejected a pitch that was too extreme or too wide. Things happen in real life now, I believe.

 

DEADLINE: With Season 5 marking the conclusion of the penultimate season, what are you planning to do next?

KRIPKE: The divine. I mean, Season 5 could easily span two years. Thus, I haven’t worried about what will happen next for a very long time.

DEADLINE: Not at all?

KRIPKE: No, because it usually takes two years and more from the time you start the writers room—we started about a month or five weeks ago—to the time you go live. Too soon to fully predict what will happen next. However, I’m going to concentrate on completing this before taking a nap and seeing what comes next.

 

DEADLINE: In response, you made a huge deal out of announcing earlier this week that the programme would conclude after five seasons. What is the status of Season 5 at this point? What kind of mess will all of this make in the end?

KRIPKE: The writers and I are still working through everything. Though we essentially spent the first four weeks of the session discussing general mythology and our goals for the plot, I mean, I know where I want it to end.

DEADLINE: Generalisations?

KRIPKE: In the broadest terms feasible, and our desired outcome for the conclusion. I have witnessed the exact moment when the title card appears and states, “Six months later, you can see where everyone is.” I am aware of that. I genuinely think I’m ready to write the final ten pages of this novel.

We have general ideas about the rest, but we’ll work it out.

DEADLINE: Is that how you always do it?

KRIPKE: To be honest, I believe that knowing too much might be dangerous. You know, you want a little leeway before you’re actually breaking the episodes. You want your writers to believe they have something unexpected to offer you. Make sure not to tighten it too much.

 

DEADLINE: That’s Season 5, but what about the recently released, much anticipated Season 4?

KRIPKE: I adore it!

After sitting on it for two and a half years—including the strike—I’m eager to release it into the public. It took us 2.5 years from the time we first started to finish it.

See, it makes me chuckle. I repeatedly hide my mouth in terror. It goes really deep into each character, in my opinion.

DEADLINE: Nevertheless, you had to have a blueprint. Eric, you’ve been subtly hinting for a long time that this programme would last for five seasons.

KRIPKE: Despite being forbidden from discussing it, we were aware that there were five seasons.

But in a movie, the penultimate season is the conclusion of Act Two, right? It resembles the lowest and most contemplative moment. In this scene, the protagonists are forced to confront their existential trauma on an emotional level. They can then board the roller coaster ride that serves as the film’s finale.

 

DEADLINE: Quite dramatic.

KRIKPE: Correct?

Because each character is coping with the trauma that has affected them the most, we find that Season Four to be extremely painful. However, I must add that it’s also quite funny. We are, I must admit, as gloomy as many have accused the show of being, and that is the case. Simultaneously, I believe I have laughed more this season than I have in the past. I believe Season 4 is hilarious, although that may be because of my own illness.