The Boys (Amazon)

[Tyndmyr]

Haven't seen the show. Not sure if I want to due to the subject matter delighting in deconstruction and "shock value." (It is more like horror without the horror, it is the element of surprise is what I intuit from others.)

But a fun friendly question I am curious about from fans of The Boys show.

Could the Justice League DCAU animated versions of the characters take on and defeat The Boys if The Boys decide to go all Justice Lords on Earth? What is the power scale?

It's more suspense, really. There are brief moments of stark horror, but the tension cycle is more akin to a thriller with a touch of black comedy than a full on horror film. Imagine watching Pulp Fiction, only people happen to wear capes.

The DCAU would absolutely flatten either the Boys, who are largely unpowered, or the capes. The Seven is very much the in-world equivalent of the Justice League, but they are far less unified, and some of the members are far less competent. They're much more human, nuanced, and all that, but in straight power, this largely isn't a contest.

Consider, Homelander is basically superman. He's got flight, strength and invulnerability beyond compare, very, very effective laser eyes, and the guy is even reasonably clever at finding things out. Oh, and of course super hearing, Xray vision. It is blocked by zinc instead of lead, but in terms of combat capability, that seems fairly trivial. However, Homelander will never be as good at leading, inspiring, or working with others as Superman is. In his universe, he doesn't have to be. Nobody can really touch him. He might have the powers of Superman, but he doesn't have the character of him.

Therefore, Superman and his team wins in reasonable matchups. Barring random comic oddities or whatever.

That said, most lower tier super-teams would lose against the seven, or even against Homelander solo. Being able to laser in half anything/everything at the speed of looking at it is remarkably powerful even without considering everything else.

She's definitely filling the role of naive character whose illusions are destroyed by discovering the darkness of her world, along with the audience. That's fairly standard for a deconstruction story. She isn't pearly pure, however. IIRC, Stillwell asks her 'Then why don't you burn the outfit and become a cop?" and she doesn't have an answer. That puts her more on the hypocrite end than the awful end, and makes her a parallel to Nite Owl and Silk Spectre (Laurie) in Watchmen that way. I think it remains to be seen how she's going to be developed.

There is most definitely some illusion destroying going on...but the answer here I think isn't so much hypocritical, as that she'd never really thought about it. She'd grown up accepting her mother's, and societies values at pretty much face value. She definitely does want to do good, and risks basically everything to do so, but she's still learning just how rough the world is.

That doesn't make her a hypocrite, though.

That's the problem. I don't find it dark, nor with any real horror. It's just people being awful, and then some body horror* death-scene moments. To me, it's not gritty, it is just grimy. As False God put it, someone taking away all the wrong lessons from GoT, but also the parts of Man of Steel and cinematic Watchmen that didn't land.

The darkness largely doesn't stem from the blood. That's just a stylistic choice, IMO. More or less blood affects the aesthetic, but doesn't significantly change the show as a whole. That comes more from the tension, seeing the lies, the traps, the fear, the twisted webs of power and plots. Certain characters are remarkably compelling because they are simply always a threat, and the conflict is always present.


Watching someone come out with a story of how a company has horribly wronged them, and seeing that same company repackage it as an empowerment tale for profit is where the real darkness is.

The above only applies to the show, of course. The comics are just the shock without the rest of it.

[Bartmanhomer]

For a starter Hawkgirl has training whereas of the Boys only 3 of the 5 have any training whatsoever.
She has the mace, Boys usually don't carry any weapons
She can fly which provides various tactical advantages
Hawkgirl has fought really dangerous, superpowered opponents. The Boys exist to pick off supers who have generally done nothing but get laid and get high.
The Boys do have some enhanced strength and toughness probably more than Hawkgirl gets from being Thanagarian but not by much
Boys do have advantages. Butcher is a canny fighter and an utterly dirty one as well. The Female is a dynamo of sheer bloodlust once she gets started

If Hawkgirl (times 7) can use her flight for an early advantage the fights hers. If the Boys can get out, next time it will be them pulling the ambush. The next fight they will come prepared and it will probably be theirs

All IMHO of course

Hawkgirl is no pushover. She can face anybody no matter how powerful her enemies are.

[Wraith]

Okay can 7 Hawkgirls do it without breaking a sweat?

Without breaking a sweat? No.

If she can get the drop on the two heaviest hitters - Homelander and.... (Spoiler) - and take them out early with her magic mace, then the rest of them aren't going to be much of a challenge. If the Big 2 know she's coming, or worse decide to start the fight and go after her, she's dead.

That said, most lower tier super-teams would lose against the seven, or even against Homelander solo. Being able to laser in half anything/everything at the speed of looking at it is remarkably powerful even without considering everything else.

This is really the key difference between the DC heroes and the Seven; the latter are quite prepared to kill, even prefer it in some cases.

The Justice League would win hands down, if only just because they have a Green Lantern and the Seven don't have anything that compares to that sort of flexibility. That being said they would likely take casualties while doing so - Batman in particular is mortal and in a straight-up brawl someone would just put their fist through him or laser him to ash no matter how much ninjitusu he knows.

Outside of a fight, Batman would psychologically destroy the entire Seven in record time - they're all narcissists with various hang-ups and neuroses - but physically the world of The Boys is far, far less forgiving than DC and it would be more "realistic" (note the inverted commas when talking about super-people punching chunks out of each other )

[Tyndmyr]

Mmm, Batman might work decently well with the Boys. Certainly his usual adeptness with surveillance would be of help.

Though that aversion to killing in most renditions would be a problem. If tossing people in Arkham isn't an option, and most fights have lethal stakes, that denies a lot of Batman's usual outcomes.

[comicshorse]

Mmm, Batman might work decently well with the Boys. Certainly his usual adeptness with surveillance would be of help.

Though that aversion to killing in most renditions would be a problem. If tossing people in Arkham isn't an option, and most fights have lethal stakes, that denies a lot of Batman's usual outcomes.

Bruce Wayne buys a controlling interest in Vought. Ends the Supers programme and starts moving the current Supers into more socially useful activities

[Tyndmyr]

I mean, if he fought crime primarily as Bruce Wayne rather than dressing as a bat to recreationally punch poor people, I think Gotham old look very different.

[WinterKnight404]

I watched the first season and the biggest thing I remember is that it was very funny dark humor, similar to the Deadpool movies. I don't think I'm wrong to say that if you love Deadpool you will love The Boys season one. However, the second season does seem darker with less comedic breaks. The story is still good and more things are being revealed about The Boys that seem to humanize them more and make them seem less like the "scumbags" people here are complaining about.

In regards to the racist angle on Stormfront, Homelander seems to share that flaw as well:

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Did you notice in episode 4 (or 3?) the painting of Homelander on the side of the barn where the inside of his cape was the Battle flag of the Confederacy. Also I seem to remember several racist comments that he made in season one. In any event I'm interested to see how his growing hatred of Stormfront plays out.

[Peelee]

I mean, if he fought crime primarily as Bruce Wayne rather than dressing as a bat to recreationally punch poor people, I think Gotham old look very different.

IIRC he canonically does fight crime as Bruce Wayne in various ways. The thing is, that would make less Batman stuff happen, so in Gotham it doesn't work as well as you would expect.

ETA:

I watched the first season and the biggest thing I remember is that it was very funny dark humor, similar to the Deadpool movies. I don't think I'm wrong to say that if you love Deadpool you will love The Boys season one.

Further, if you hate Deadpool, you may still like The Boys.

Source: I hate Deadpool.

[Traab]

Okay can 7 Hawkgirls do it without breaking a sweat?

• Generally she is considered the weakest of the 7 of the Animated, though she is super effective against certain enemies. Next weakest would be Wally / The Flash which is simultaneously the strongest unless fighting durable enemies yet at the same time he is the least durable so one mistake and he can be dead.
• Hawkgirl also seems the most aggro of the heroes and it would be a good matchup since many of The Boys are more aggro, more aggressive, more deconstructive of what it means to be a hero and whether you would limit yourself.

The flash is only the weakest if you catch him flat footed. If you go by his peak feats the dude is basically a god. Its honestly only holding the idiot ball that makes it possible to beat him as even against other speedsters like superman the guy has the equivalent of minutes of reaction time in between swings to decide what to do. Against anyone slower? He might as well be fighting statues. I would put it batman, hawgirl, then the rest are kinda interchangable depending on versions and feats taken into account. Batman is only impressive on a street level OR if he has time to gather intel and plan. And no im not using the bat god fallacy where he can defeat anything with prep time, but he IS far more effective once he has had the chance to scout out his opponent, search for weaknesses, figure out how to counter strengths, etc. But that only takes him so far, it takes so much plot armor and author fiat to bring out stuff like batman defeating the league that its honestly silly. Or that scene in the cartoon where he literally dodged darkseids omega beams for several seconds and got away by using a parademon to take the hit. (I guess they dont count as no killing) That was the same show that gave us supermans world of cardboard speech though so i forgive it.

[Tyndmyr]

In regards to the racist angle on Stormfront, Homelander seems to share that flaw as well:

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Did you notice in episode 4 (or 3?) the painting of Homelander on the side of the barn where the inside of his cape was the Battle flag of the Confederacy. Also I seem to remember several racist comments that he made in season one. In any event I'm interested to see how his growing hatred of Stormfront plays out.

I would agree.

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In S2 alone, he makes a fairly perjorative comment regarding people who live in the middle east, as well as reacted VERY poorly when he found out his son was learning Spanish.

Oh yeah, and frigging maiming or killing the Daredevil equivalent for being a "f*ing cripple". Perhaps not strictly racist there, but Homelander does not appear to be very good at tolerance. I'm probably missing half a dozen other examples, but these were just a few bad ones that immediately popped to mind.

Very different style of evil than Stormfront, though.

I'm speculating that they'll both end up banging *and* having a murder-off against each other at some point. The latter will probably have ludicrous collateral damage.

IIRC he canonically does fight crime as Bruce Wayne in various ways. The thing is, that would make less Batman stuff happen, so in Gotham it doesn't work as well as you would expect.

That's fair. That and Arkham kind of...have to happen so they can keep using the same villains. It's a little hard to entirely justify in universe, but it makes sense from a writing perspective.

Oddly, I don't think buying out Vought would solve the major problems. Homelander is a huge problem even if Vought tells him to do only good stuff, after all. You could probably get rid of some of the corporate hypocrisy, but all the major problems are unlikely to be solved because someone tells them to play nice.

[comicshorse]

Oddly, I don't think buying out Vought would solve the major problems. Homelander is a huge problem even if Vought tells him to do only good stuff, after all. You could probably get rid of some of the corporate hypocrisy, but all the major problems are unlikely to be solved because someone tells them to play nice.

Not just someone but the people who hold the purse strings.
Some of the heroes are always going to be a problem (Homelander, Stormfront, etc) but most just want to be rich and famous and will do what's necessary to keep the money rolling.

[Tvtyrant]

I would agree.

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In S2 alone, he makes a fairly perjorative comment regarding people who live in the middle east, as well as reacted VERY poorly when he found out his son was learning Spanish.

Oh yeah, and frigging maiming or killing the Daredevil equivalent for being a "f*ing cripple". Perhaps not strictly racist there, but Homelander does not appear to be very good at tolerance. I'm probably missing half a dozen other examples, but these were just a few bad ones that immediately popped to mind.

Very different style of evil than Stormfront, though.

I'm speculating that they'll both end up banging *and* having a murder-off against each other at some point. The latter will probably have ludicrous collateral damage.



That's fair. That and Arkham kind of...have to happen so they can keep using the same villains. It's a little hard to entirely justify in universe, but it makes sense from a writing perspective.

Oddly, I don't think buying out Vought would solve the major problems. Homelander is a huge problem even if Vought tells him to do only good stuff, after all. You could probably get rid of some of the corporate hypocrisy, but all the major problems are unlikely to be solved because someone tells them to play nice.

There's a Riddler arc from the 1990s that explains this, I think it got dropped in the 2000s.

As I recall: Gotham is possessed by a bat demon. It was summoned to avenge witches murdered in Yester Year. The demon essentially forces the city to replay the melodrama of those events, so there is always ludicrous villains, Arkham, and bat themed vigilantes. It brings back the dead to keep replaying the story, Gotham is basically a huge trap its inhabitants can't get out of.

Edit: On topic, I would much prefer the Wildcards get a show. It's as dark and gritty as you can get while still being fun and ending most arcs optimistically. Enemies range from day to day thugs to a tyranid hive feet and an elder god.

[Knaight]

That's the problem. I don't find it dark, nor with any real horror. It's just people being awful, and then some body horror* death-scene moments. To me, it's not gritty, it is just grimy. As False God put it, someone taking away all the wrong lessons from GoT, but also the parts of Man of Steel and cinematic Watchmen that didn't land.

There are some definite patterns to how people are awful that are worth noting though, which support a few strong themes. Some of them are hard to discuss without getting into too much politics for this board (starting with almost everything about Stormfront), but keeping clear of that you still have the throughlines about the moral corruption of considering yourself better than everyone else, the damage wrought by celebrity culture writ large, the banality of evil that comes from relentless corporate profit seeking, the corrupting influences of spending too long too dedicated to revenge, and the dangers of growing cyclical vengeance.

[NigelWalmsley]

Very different style of evil than Stormfront, though.

Yeah. I think Homelander is less racist and more just a sociopathic narcissist. For example, I see the thing with not!Daredevil as being less about bigotry and more about enforcing control and intimidating the Vought executive who sees it. The "cripple" comment is just twisting the knife. I expect he probably would have done the same thing if it'd been not!Hawkman or not!Scarlet Witch sprung on him. That said, it's not like there's much practical difference, or any real moral high ground for him to claim.

That's fair. That and Arkham kind of...have to happen so they can keep using the same villains. It's a little hard to entirely justify in universe, but it makes sense from a writing perspective.

Honestly, the worst thing about comics is the way they try to maintain continuity over all the decades of stuff that has been written in the Marvel or DC universes. Stories should have beginnings, middles, and ends. And that doesn't mean you can't tell multiple Batman stories, but they should be in a new continuity. Like they are with the movies. This is why I tend to like Elseworlds or IP scrubbed limited series (like The Boys or Watchmen or The Authority) better than long-running mainline comics. A story is better when it starts somewhere and ends somewhere else. Gotham can just be a city that is in bad shape because of mismanagement, super-criminals, and economic bad luck. It doesn't need to be possessed by a bat demon, because that is very stupid. Over the course of a series of Batman comics, Batman can clean up Gotham, and then he can hang up the cowl and we can flash forward to him looking out over a prosperous future Gotham. Or he can be consumed by vengeance and end up dying when he pushes himself too far. Those can be separate stories in separate continuities, just as The Dark Knight and The Batman are.

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Did you notice in episode 4 (or 3?) the painting of Homelander on the side of the barn where the inside of his cape was the Battle flag of the Confederacy. Also I seem to remember several racist comments that he made in season one. In any event I'm interested to see how his growing hatred of Stormfront plays out.

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That seems more like "racists like Homelander" than "Homelander is racist". Which is not to say that Homelander isn't racist, and certainly not to say that he isn't awful, but it's not like he painted the barn.

[Psyren]

Homelander is definitely racist. Perhaps not as bad as {spoiler} - not yet, anyway - but casually dropping terms like "camel-jockey" goes beyond merely being self-centered.

I'm speculating that they'll both end up banging *and* having a murder-off against each other at some point. The latter will probably have ludicrous collateral damage.

And the former wouldn't?

Though considering that she's

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old enough to be his (great?)grandmother

... eww.

[Precure]

How can a show with evil superhumans can be a deconstruction of superheroes? Anti-heroes and supervillains are already a thing.

[Peelee]

Homelander is definitely racist. Perhaps not as bad as {spoiler} - not yet, anyway - but casually dropping terms like "camel-jockey" goes beyond merely being self-centered.

I wholly agree, but the barn painting of Homelander was definitely other people putting their ideals on him rather than them trying to portray his ideals. I know of an amazingly accurate real-life analogy example, but alas, I would prefer to not ban myself.

How can a show with evil superhumans can be a deconstruction of superheroes? Anti-heroes and supervillains are already a thing.

Because they are supposed to be superheroes. They are portrayed as superheroes. They are shown to the public as superheroes. Their missions are the missions of superheroes. They ahve movies made of them being superheroes. They just happen to be abjectly terrible people behind the veil.

[Bunny Commando]

IMHO, Homelander is more of a nationalist and a nativist than a straight-up racist.

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E.g. In S2E1 the Homelander pushes for having "Saving America" in the slogan instead of "Saving the World" even if the focus group prefers the latter. Throughout the course of the series he doesn't seem to have a problem with A-Train.

[Willie the Duck]

How can a show with evil superhumans can be a deconstruction of superheroes? Anti-heroes and supervillains are already a thing.

The existence of an already-existing literary structure where some facet of the superhero motif is flipped to opposite ('superhero, but not nice/shining/heroic'; or 'superhero's evil counterpart/nemesis') don't interfere with the ability for a deconstruction to exist. That is subverting an aspect of the genre, but not necessarily with a specific purpose in mind. A deconstruction is (among other definitions) a subversion of some aspect of a trope/theme/narrative to examine the thing and expose the inner workings (or non-workings/inconsistencies).

Mind you, a deconstruction of superheroes is kind of iffy now, but not because of super-villains and anti-heroes, but because superhero comics have become their own deconstructions. It seems about 1 in 10 mainline superhero storylines as of late are written to showcase just how fragile the luster on the gleaming superhero myth really is (compared to when Moore was pitching his proto-Watchmen storyline, and DC not wanting to spoil even a second-hand superhero team they acquired from another comic company's bankruptcy with such a plot). As much as I'm not loving this new version, I'm glad to see that it's a plausible property, simply because I thought the premise was too old-hat to find an audience.

[NigelWalmsley]

IMHO, Homelander is more of a nationalist and a nativist than a straight-up racist.

Honestly Homelander seems kind of exactly how you'd expect someone who is basically a god compared to everyone he's ever met to be. I don't think he's racist (even though he says racial slurs), because I think his thought process is less "brown people bad" and more "everyone who isn't Homelander is an insect". I mean, really, do you think Homelander is going to not lazer you for getting in his way because you're white or american or whatever?

Mind you, a deconstruction of superheroes is kind of iffy now, but not because of super-villains and anti-heroes, but because superhero comics have become their own deconstructions.

Also The Boys specifically is weird, because it's aiming at The Justice League, when the big name in superheroes right now is The Avengers. The Boys seems like a biting satire of the genre as it existed ten or fifteen years ago, which is not super relevant to the way it is today.

[comicshorse]

Also The Boys specifically is weird, because it's aiming at The Justice League, when the big name in superheroes right now is The Avengers. The Boys seems like a biting satire of the genre as it existed ten or fifteen years ago, which is not super relevant to the way it is today.

Well 'The Boys' comics started in 2006 so....

[Willie the Duck]

Also The Boys specifically is weird, because it's aiming at The Justice League, when the big name in superheroes right now is The Avengers. The Boys seems like a biting satire of the genre as it existed ten or fifteen years ago, which is not super relevant to the way it is today.

Made doubly weird because the guy in charge of (cinematic) Justice League for the past 7+ years is the poster child of doing superhero deconstructions (including both a movie version of Watchmen, and deconstructive takes on Superman and the Justice League), none of which have exactly been resounding successes.

That said, I think people still know the iconic conception of the Justice League, for what Superman stands, and exactly what it means to have a Superman expy who is a raging jerk. They've just already seen this concept recently.

[NigelWalmsley]

Well 'The Boys' comics started in 2006 so....

Yeah. And the TV show feels like it's trying to adapt it without modernizing any of the themes. The scraped out a bunch of the Garth Ennis, but it's still fundamentally about politics and superheroes as they existed in 2006 (Stormfront is something of an update on the former front, but that edges towards stuff that we're not supposed to talk about here).

Made doubly weird because the guy in charge of (cinematic) Justice League for the past 7+ years is the poster child of doing superhero deconstructions (including both a movie version of Watchmen, and deconstructive takes on Superman and the Justice League), none of which have exactly been resounding successes.

Part of that is because "actual Superman, but a jerk" doesn't really work. Superman is very strongly tied to being Good and Just and Right. Trying to sell "Superman but bad" with Superman himself is like if Ambercrombie had written his deconstructive fantasy with Gandalf as the wizard character.

[Rodin]

Yeah. And the TV show feels like it's trying to adapt it without modernizing any of the themes. The scraped out a bunch of the Garth Ennis, but it's still fundamentally about politics and superheroes as they existed in 2006 (Stormfront is something of an update on the former front, but that edges towards stuff that we're not supposed to talk about here).

What themes do you feel are out of date?

The primary theme is "Beware the Superman", and that trope has existed for decades. Ditto the corruption of Hollywood and fame, the latter of which goes back centuries. Evil corporations are just as relevant today as they were 15 years ago, and were relevant back in the 1980s when Robocop was taking potshots at them. The show also takes shots at a lot of religion and politics, and I have yet to see anything that has ceased to be an issue in the last 15 years.

It's difficult to discuss in-depth (because politics and religion), but I've never felt that the show seemed dated in any way. If anything I feel uncomfortable with how relevant a lot of it is to stuff happening [I]right now.[/I

[GloatingSwine]

What themes do you feel are out of date?

The primary theme is "Beware the Superman", and that trope has existed for decades. Ditto the corruption of Hollywood and fame, the latter of which goes back centuries. Evil corporations are just as relevant today as they were 15 years ago, and were relevant back in the 1980s when Robocop was taking potshots at them. The show also takes shots at a lot of religion and politics, and I have yet to see anything that has ceased to be an issue in the last 15 years.

It's difficult to discuss in-depth (because politics and religion), but I've never felt that the show seemed dated in any way. If anything I feel uncomfortable with how relevant a lot of it is to stuff happening [I]right now.[/I

Supes in The Boys are a metaphor for people who can do anything they please and face no consequences. It's very explicit that it's really about corporate entities who actually are like that because they have so many ways of deflecting or minimising consequences. The bits of its politics that would specifically date it are actually removed in the TV version, (because in the original it was about defence contractors in the age of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars)

Made doubly weird because the guy in charge of (cinematic) Justice League for the past 7+ years is the poster child of doing superhero deconstructions (including both a movie version of Watchmen, and deconstructive takes on Superman and the Justice League), none of which have exactly been resounding successes.

That's because you have to understand things to deconstruct them. Zack Snyder doesn't understand things, he looks at the surface of them and refuses to engage with anything deeper than that.

[Traab]

About the only part I can agree with being a bit outdated is the justice league instead of the avengers lineup of knockoffs and thats only due to current popularity. DC basically was a resounding meh in the movie race and so we have the literal dozens of big success marvel universe films to draw on for public reaction to a deconstruction to the characters of them rather than the current second stringers in overall popularity. (Though oddly a more enduring group reputation than marvel imo)

[Saph]

Well, I figured I'd give this show a try, and watched the first episode.

I kept getting this weird sense of familiarity, like "haven't I seen this before?", and I couldn't put my finger on it until I got to the credits and saw the name 'Garth Ennis', and that was when it clicked. The Boys is basically his runs of Preacher and Punisher, just with a different setting. Crazy sociopathic hyper-violent villains with creepy sexual habits going up against similarly hyper-violent 'heroes', with lots of people getting killed in showers of blood with flying body parts.

[Willie the Duck]

That's because you have to understand things to deconstruct them. Zack Snyder doesn't understand things, he looks at the surface of them and refuses to engage with anything deeper than that.

Oh, I have a lot to say on Zack (particularly somewhere without this board's policies). Regardless, I like that someone like him was allowed to do these things, I just didn't like the results.

About the only part I can agree with being a bit outdated is the justice league instead of the avengers lineup of knockoffs and thats only due to current popularity. DC basically was a resounding meh in the movie race and so we have the literal dozens of big success marvel universe films to draw on for public reaction to a deconstruction to the characters of them rather than the current second stringers in overall popularity. (Though oddly a more enduring group reputation than marvel imo)

I'm pretty sure that is peoples' primary point. This would have made more sense before Man of Steel and Justice League (and, yes, Avengers being the new big thing which one might try to deconstruct). However, I think GloatingSwine makes a good point -- this series also seems to have baked into it (explicitly in the comics, but they still bleed through into the show) allegories we can't dissect here that seem very appropriate to events of the 2000-2010 era.

[Rodin]

I'm pretty sure that is peoples' primary point. This would have made more sense before Man of Steel and Justice League (and, yes, Avengers being the new big thing which one might try to deconstruct). However, I think GloatingSwine makes a good point -- this series also seems to have baked into it (explicitly in the comics, but they still bleed through into the show) allegories we can't dissect here that seem very appropriate to events of the 2000-2010 era.

I'll preface this by saying I'm not talking about the comic at all - that was written in 2006 and it should be unsurprising that it presented allegories for then-modern issues.

What I'm disputing is whether the allegories still present in the TV show are outdated. The issues of the Noughties didn't stay there, they impact us today and in many cases are more pressing because we never dealt with them.

I keep writing more and then deleting it, because I feel like I'm treading very close to the line on what is or is not permissible. So I'll stop there.

Moving to safer ground, I feel like the decision to not lampoon the Snyderverse or the MCU was very deliberate. They're taking the most iconic version of these characters and playing with them, so Snyder's darker take is out. The MCU characters don't fit the mold required to deconstruct them. None of them have the squeaky-clean image of older superheroes, and many have traits that make them unsuitable for the setting.

Tony Stark is a mess of a human being to start with.

Hulk is similar.

Captain America is already being represented by Homelander.

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Stormfront/Liberty can also be seen as a Captain America analogue.

Hawkeye and Black Widow are non-super humans. Batman is missing for the same reason.

Thor is a god/alien and is hard to present in this format. Martian Manhunter also notably missing.

Ant Man is a former burglar. Doctor Strange is a wizard. Captain Marvel and GotG heavily involve aliens.

[Willie the Duck]

I'll preface this by saying I'm not talking about the comic at all - that was written in 2006 and it should be unsurprising that it presented allegories for then-modern issues.

What I'm disputing is whether the allegories still present in the TV show are outdated. The issues of the Noughties didn't stay there, they impact us today and in many cases are more pressing because we never dealt with them.

I keep writing more and then deleting it, because I feel like I'm treading very close to the line on what is or is not permissible. So I'll stop there.

Agree on the tiptoeing. 'These issues are still pertinent' is valid.

Moving to safer ground, I feel like the decision to not lampoon the Snyderverse or the MCU was very deliberate. They're taking the most iconic version of these characters and playing with them, so Snyder's darker take is out.

The MCU characters don't fit the mold required to deconstruct them.

Oh, absolutely. My point, at least, is not that the Snyder version of DC, nor the Avengers at all, would be appropriate to this type of deconstruction, but instead that it is interesting that they are producing this series now, when the Snyder interpretation is the most recent version many-to-most viewers would be familiar, and also while the MCU characters are the most prominent superhero characters at the moment.