The Boys: 19 Differences Between the Show and the Comics

[Music] the boys is amazon prime's brutal satire of superhero franchises but how much of garthiness's original made it to the screen garth innis has built a reputation for dark satirical comics first with his unflinching preacher series and then with his savage takedown of comic book superheroes and the boys that comic has become a popular series on amazon prime which like innis hasn't been shy about its take on the modern superhero franchise but what has changed from the comic to the show in the old rules of the internet rule 63 states that there will be a gender swapped version of any character somewhere on the internet you don't have to look that hard when it comes to the corporate baddie in the boys in the show madeleine stillwell is the senior vp of hero management and the one with big plans for the vaught-sponsored superheroes including a multi-million dollar military contract she's close enough to homelander that butcher thinks kidnapping her might give the boys some leverage turns out not so much in the comics stillwell is the cold and emotionless james stillwell like madeleine james is the only one who can stand up to homelander despite having no powers also like madeline he's the brains behind most of the shady things the seven do in the name of self-promotion so stoic is james stillwell that when he doesn't seem to care when homelander tries to kill him his lack of a reaction stops homelander from finishing the deed homelander of course is the center of the seven the team of superheroes that the boys have dedicated themselves to putting a check on he's a not-so-subtle amalgamation of superman and captain america a superhero that on the outside is a beacon of good but in reality is a self-absorbed man-child who can do anything he wants with hardly anyone being able to do anything about it that's true of both the comic book version of homelander and the television show homelander but the difference lies in the degrees primarily it's in how homelanders immaturity plays out in the comics he's an unhindered murder machine with no real connection to anyone in the show he's got a disturbingly edible relationship with vaught and its representative stillwell both manifest in a hyper-powered man-child who acts on his basest impulses innis is the boys turns a superhero trope around traditionally a superhero gets into the superhero biz after two things happen they get powers and they suffer a tragic loss villains become villains because they encounter the power to indulge their worst impulses in the boys the heroes are manufactured and the boys are motivated by tragic losses usually at the hand of supes for the leader of the boys that loss was butcher's wife becca at the hands of homelander the attack that is too brutal to describe here results in the death of butcher's wife becca in the comics becca has stayed as dead as uncle ben but in the show she's adhered to the rule that no one stays dead in comics except uncle ben by the second season butcher finds out that not only is becca alive but she's been secretly raising the sun she had with homelander unfortunately homelander finds out as well the world of the boys in the comics is full of superheroes taking its shot at teams like the avengers and justice league as well as teams like the x-men while the series hints at a larger world of superheroes its primary focus is on the seven and the boys who want to take them down even so the show has added a few heroes to build out the roster of their adaptation one of the new characters is translucent the hero with the ability to bend light around himself and become invisible as well as being bulletproof the closest analog to his character in the comics is the martian manhunter parody jack from jupiter like translucent jack doesn't really have the respect of either the boys or the seven and like translucent jack from jupiter meets his end at the hands of the boys though for very different reasons ezekiel the capes for christ leader in the show has the worst superpower in super powered him stretchy powers the capes for christ's leader in the comics is oh father with a much darker secret and no stretchy powers hayley joel osment's mesmer is also a creation for the show providing the boys background on the female before ultimately betraying them oh you can't trust that baby face and who can you trust one of the big turning points for the story of the boys in both the comics and the tv show is a failed attempt to save an airliner from hijackers in the show homelander and queen maeve are dispatched to save the airliner as part of stillwell's plan to gain a lucrative military contract for supes when it all goes bad homelander has to convince queen maeve to leave the plane to crash with all of the passengers still on board in the comics homelander and maeve are sent to rescue a hijacked plane from real world events rather than averting the disaster it also goes wrong crashing the plane into the brooklyn bridge instead both events have similar effects on the arc of the story however one of the biggest driving factors of marvel comics and especially the mcu is the search for the elusive super soldier serum even with the help of inventor abraham erskine the serum didn't really take with steve rogers being the only one who successfully used it after that they got results like the hulk and luke cage though bulletproof and crazy strong seems like a good result it's just that they should have asked first the world of the boys is also driven by a super soldier serum this time compound v compound v is the magic elixir that brings superpowers into the world for the tv series it's the only source of powers that or being the child of someone who's been treated with compound v it can also be used to juice powers an addiction that causes a train some trouble in the comics the massive expense of compound v keeps its use small but if it's cut with other drugs it can give people powers temporarily but a bit unpredictably butcher uses a cut version of compound v to be able to stand up to the seven that's not just new characters that have popped up on the series that aren't in the comics there are some new relationships as well some stories are combined to make things more efficient or just to add a little more to the character that's going to carry a little more narrative weight atrain has had a rough time of it thanks to some of his own careless actions the cost of that comes home when in order to cover up his own compound v issues he kills his girlfriend popclaw making it look like she was the one abusing the substance it's a tragic moment for sure but in the comics the two characters haven't even met a train wasn't the only one who's paying the price of his own misbehavior on the show the deep has fallen on some well-deserved hard times as well after giving starlight a highly inappropriate welcome to the seven once that becomes public knowledge the deep is sent back down to the miners so to speak and has to try and earn his way back into the good graces of the seven and the general public in the comics the deep is more into his financial success more than anything else in fact he doesn't seem to have the same let's say issues that the other supes have instead starlight gets her bad reception from homelander black noir and a-train he also loses his cool diving helmet that he's forced to wear thanks to an ancient atlantean curse comics and heroes alike the boys get a lot of their muscle from the female of the species not women in general but the character known as the female of the species or just the female the other constant for the female is that she is downright horrifying in her application as the muscle for the boys the difference as is often the case is her origin in this series she's an adult recipient of compound v is part of vott's plan to create supervillain terrorists to justify government contracts for supes she meets the boys when they think they're rescuing someone being held in a cage but then find themselves hiding in the cage from her eventually frenchie is able to connect with her and turn her into an ally if a terrifying one they also help her find her brother who has been recruited as a terrorist as part of vott's plan in the comics she fell into a vat of japan's version of compound v as a child and was given super strength and a super strong urge to kill perhaps the most notable difference is in the main character of huey in the comic books and series huey loses his girlfriend to a less than attentive a train and in both the comics and the series huey forms a relationship with annie the alter ego of starlight the first thing that anyone would notice is how much the series huey does not look like simon pegg the comic book huey was drawn to look like the scottish actor and he was also written as very scottish in a nod to the nod to simon pegg pegg actually plays huey's father in the series huey is also a little more proactive in his actions and willing to stand up to butcher a lot quicker than he is in the comics where he's more or less dragged around as a tool of the boys and sometimes even the seven garthiness's book is a wide ranging satire of comic book tropes and assumptions essentially asking the question of what if people got super powers instead of ideal people instead of a bunch of people struggling with becoming their better angels it's people who relish their power exploit it and find little connection between themselves and the people they could wipe out without breaking a sweat to complete his parody inn has populated the world of the boys with analogous groups and types of superheroes that fill out the world fittingly the series has been more focused on satirizing the superhero movie franchise focusing in on the central group of the seven and the boys there are mentions and acknowledgments that other groups exist but they play a smaller part innis has admitted that the relationship between annie and huey was never meant to happen the intent with annie was to explore each new indignity that she would endure in order to be part of the top team of superheroes but during a scene where huey was at a low point he envisioned annie as annie seeing him there and the two connecting this gave annie some more agency by having her be more than just a series of unfortunate events and her character grew in the series butcher pushes huey to use their relationship to get access to the seven causing a rift between annie and huey in the comics it takes a while for either of the two characters to assert themselves one character that looms large in the comics is hardly present at all in the series though that might be down to the conventional wisdom of film and tv production never work with kids or animals neither of them know why everyone is there looking at them and neither care if you make your day whatever the reason the only living thing that butcher cares about gets only a cameo in the series that of course is butcher's english bulldog terror in the comics butcher has trained his loyal pup to uh defowl things on command for the series we only meet tara when butcher visits his aunt's house who is taking care of the pup he's on hand to help the team when black noir came hunting for them and as a reward he was given a soup toy to uh well you know mother's milk is another one who has gone through some pretty big changes in the transition from page to screen in the comics and the series mother's milk is one of the oldest members of the boys and butcher's oldest friend the major difference lies in mother's milk's beef with vaude international we know in the series that his father was involved in a lawsuit with a mega-corporation and eventually worked himself to an early grave pursuing it as a result he views revenge to be a disease but not one he's entirely cured of in the comics we have a better idea what his family's beef with vaught is both he and his brother have compound v induced powers mother's milk has some pretty straightforward powers like super strength his developmentally disabled brother also had powers that allowed him to increase in size but he did it while wearing a helmet and well it didn't end well also in the comics the name comes from what he needed to survive we'll uh let you work out what that means queen maeve rounds out the holy trinity of the seven in the same way that wonder woman does for the justice league she is an important part of both the series and the comic books but how she goes about that are very different just like in the series queen maeve is involved in the failed attempt to save the hijacked airliner and just like in the series that failure affects her emotionally in the series it leads to her questioning her role in the seven as of all of them she seems to have the most desire to actually be heroic outside of starlight she also develops a relationship with an old flame revealing her bisexuality that vaught then exploits in the comics that failure sends her into a disconnected state of alcoholism and depression further withdrawing from those around her except for an assistant that she abuses and as her gather more booze one of the comic book queen maeve's dalliance is is with the character not included in the tv series the legend has a relationship with queen maeve that produces an offspring that ended up also being a superhero that relationship hasn't happened in the series primarily because the legend doesn't exist in the comics the legend is a retired hero that oversees victory comics that tells the stories of the seven and other soups a sort of stan lee figure within the world were he to exist in the tv show he'd likely be more of a kevin feige figure since the show is parodying live action superhero properties some changes are made to tell a broader story or to give a character some dimension that they otherwise wouldn't have in the other medium some changes just reflect availability and then other changes happen because staying the same would be crazy expensive this is definitely the case with the differences between where the seven call home in the series versus the comics in the show they gather in a very avengers tower style building that's not a free option but buildings do currently exist alternatively in the comics the heroes gather in a floating sky base resembling the helicarriers of shield fame rather than spend the money on that big effect every episode a nice building stood in sometimes you just have to go with what you can afford there's another big change in a train story and that circles back to the way that compound v is different in the series than it is in the comics like we mentioned in the comics compound v can be cut with other drugs in order to give temporary but unpredictable powers in the show it can give soups a boost of power but they can become addicted to that boost for the series the event that kicks it all off is a train being juiced up on v and unable to control his speed resulting in him running straight through huey's girlfriend and making huey a prime recruit for the boys a train doesn't have that same addiction in the comics and is more aloof well he still runs straight through huey's girlfriend but rather than that being traumatic or a signal that he's out of control he approaches it like it's an insignificant price of doing business as a superhero neither option sits well with either huey the boys have huey as their new recruit the fresh face that helps the audience get introduced to the world of the story regardless of the reason hughie's girlfriend is killed by a train and that results in him getting recruited by the boys on the other side our newbie is annie aka starlight her departures aren't drastically different to the comic versus the series except in how much compound v comes into play for the series in the comics she is formerly of a christian-themed superhero called the young americans while in the series she is the defender of des moines both bring an awesome midwestern idealism to the role only to be crushed by the cynicism and casual disregard inherent in superhero life both try to live by their ideals with mixed results in the comics the crushing weight of it all makes annie an unwitting accomplice in the series she becomes more proactive helping reveal the compound v hoax and defending huey from stormfront those are some of the differences between the comics and the series so what element from the comics would you like to see on the show let us know in the comments and while you're there be sure to subscribe to cbr for the latest videos in your inbox thanks for watching [Music]

Channel: CBR

Views: 764,740

Keywords: The Boys, Amazon Prime, The Seven, Homelander, Starlight, The Deep, A Train, Mesmer, Wee Hughie Campbell, Billy Butcher, Queen Maeve, Compound V, Voight, Marelyn Stillwell, Black Noir

Id: tKgW-jxdFL8

Length: 15min 47sec (947 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 18 2020