The Boys Vol. 1 and 2

Vol. 1: The Name of the Game, Vol. 2: Get Some

Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson, 2007-2008

(January 2013)

This’ll do. This’ll do just fine.

  

It’s felt like I’ve been in a bit of a rut with my reading recently, more of which anon, so I needed this. Since I’ve finished Transmetropolitan, I’ve had a vacancy for a grotesquely violent, blackly funny, morally problematic, anarchic, dystopian comic book series. The Boys walked the application process and I’m looking forward to a long and fruitful working relationship. You also get the added bonus of guest appearances from Simon Pegg and, in Get Some, a comedy Russian accent. Yeah, this’ll do very nicely indeed.

Take drink, comrade! I go clean up - - Then you and I, we kick all asses needed!

Watchmen on scag, The Boys has another pop at deconstructing the whole superhero thing, raising the obvious point that most superheroes come by their powers pretty much by accident and really have no idea how to use them. It’s not like there’s an accredited training course you can go on. And even if there were, how would you make them go? They have superpowers, so coercion isn’t really an option.

It’s just struck me that this might me a bit of a sly pop at the gun lobby. So you get these lunatics running around with powers they’re barely in control of, with the corollary that the powers that be also seem unable to restrict or control them. This leads to an enormous amount of collateral damage. Someone has to keep things from getting too out of hand, and that’s where our heroes come in. Well, I say heroes. Psychopaths really.

This is going to be interesting. And more importantly, this is going to be fun.