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When reality catches up with satire – Message from the Editor

15 0
10.07.2026

The Boys spent years exaggerating the Trump era. By its final season, political reality had become so grotesque that satire was struggling to stay ahead.

I don’t get much time to watch TV – and when I do I normally fidget my way through an episode before distractedly picking up my phone – but I do set aside time for The Boys, whose final season has recently aired.

Before we get into that, some disclaimers. This show is extraordinarily, graphically violent. It features superheroes and an unconscionable amount of spandex. It stars Kiwi actor Karl Urban giving us probably the worst attempt at a London accent since Dick Van Dyke brutalised the ears in Mary Poppins.

Honestly, if you haven’t seen it, enter at your own risk.

The show is about what happens when superheroes are products controlled by a corrupt and villainous corporation, when people are the valueless collateral of capitalism and when religion is used to reinforce a deeply broken status quo.

It tells the story of superpowered Homelander – think an all-American Superman but narcissistically evil – and a small group of flawed people who try to stop him as he goes from being a case study in ‘absolute........

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