‘The Boys’ Completes Homelander’s Transformation into Donald Trump

The Boys is one of the most popular superhero series in the world at this moment, especially since the fourth season has just premiered. The twisted take on the superhero genre, adapted from the comic book of the same name, became a major hit for Amazon Prime and a series that has pushed the boundaries of what can be shown on TV in more ways than one. After three successful seasons and a spin-off series, the fourth season of The Boys premiered on June 13, 2024, and while we do know that this is going to be the penultimate season (at is has been announced that the fifth season will also be the series’ last), we’re still excited to see what the guys have in store for us.

Now, after the first three episodes of Season 4, it has become apparent that Homelander, the series’ main villain, has completed his “transformation” into former US President Donald Trump in the symbolic sense that stresses out the irony of the situation and satirizes Trump and his presidency.

If you’re looking for evidence on this, you need not dig too deep, as Kripke and the writing team have been quite straightforward in satirizing the former president and his actions. Homelander is put on trial, claiming that he is innocent despite overwhelming evidence proving his guilt. Homelander also wants to instigate a rebellion to overthrow the current governmental structures. He is also a horrible father to his son, just like Trump is a horrible father as a whole. The evidence has always been there; it all pointed to the fact that Homelander is a twisted parody of Trump, but Season 4 has finally made it official, and it is now clear that Homelander’s symbolic transformation has finally been completed in the series.

And this shouldn’t really come as a major surprise, no. Not only has it been evident from the start, but we also reported how Kripke, the series showrunner, explicitly confirmed that the show had always been about Trump:

Was that always your intent?

When Seth [Rogen] and Evan [Goldberg] and I took it out to pitch, it was 2016. We just wanted to do a very realistic version of a superhero show, one where superheroes are celebrities behaving badly. Trump was the, “He’s not really getting the nomination, is he?” guy. When he got elected, we had a metaphor that said more about the current world. Suddenly, we were telling a story about the intersection of celebrity and authoritarianism and how social media and entertainment are used to sell fascism. We’re right in the eye of the storm. And once we realized that, I just felt an obligation to run in that direction as far as we could.

They’re very different series, but sometimes The Boys‘ prescience or parallels to current events remind me of Homeland.

It’s happened now almost every season, and we write them sometimes close to two years before they air and again we’ll find that the news is accurately reflecting whatever we’re talking about. It’s not a spoiler to say that first episode [of season four], Homelander [played by Antony Starr] is on trial. A big concern is “Can you convict someone that powerful of a crime?” And what does that mean for the various supporters or the people protesting him? Did I know it was going to come out during Trump’s trial? Of course not. But we write what we’re either scared of or pissed off about. Someone asked me last year, about season three, “How are you so prescient with cops and over-policing in Black neighborhoods?” Well, it’s been a problem for over 100 years. It was a problem five years ago, and, unfortunately, it’s going to be a problem five years from now. It’s always the same shit.

Source: THR

It remains to be seen how the season is going to evolve this story further, so we advise you to keep following us for all the updates!

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