THE BOYS Diabolical Breakdown: Easter Eggs & Things You Missed | Part 2

The Boys are back in town with the second part of our Diabolical breakdown.

The entire series is filled with easter eggs, comic callbacks and a lot of things that tap into the greater Boys lore. As I mentioned in my first video, Amazon Prime sent these out for review in a different order than what they released so when I prepped my first video in advance based on that. However, they switched it up for the release so this video probably won’t be in the order you watched them in.

For that reason, in this post we’re breaking down One Plus One Equals Two, Boyd in 3d, BFFS and lastly John and Sun-Hee. The other episodes are in my part 1 video.

One Plus One Equals Two

One Plus One Equals Two is the Homelander origin story we’ve been all dying to see and much like all the episodes that preceded it we open with Billy Butcher’s dog Terror chewing a leg. Though he didn’t eat any Supes perse in the comics there was a cover where he could be seen chewing a bloodied mask which this may be a reference to. However, there are lots of body parts in this entry so probably that instead, you mug.

From here we cut to Stan Edgar the CEO of Vought who you’ll know as being played by Giancarlo Esposito in the main show. He voices the character and we also get work from Anthony Starr aka Homelander along with Elisabeth Shue who reprises her role as Madelyn Stillwell.

Vought are unveiling him to the world and they say that Vought hasn’t been this excited by a superhero since Soldier Boy. Soldier Boy is basically a Captain America parody that will be played by Jensen Ackles in Season 3. In the comics, there were several versions of him including one that actually slept with Homelander which will be interesting to see if they do it in live-action.

Now he explains his backstory and it’s very much the quintessential all-American one you’d expect from an all-American hero. In Season 1 Episode 6 he took us on a tour of his quote-unquote house and very much gave us a Superman-esque tale about how he had a great home life with his mother and father. Homelander called his bedroom the baseball hall of fame and we see flashes of him apparently playing the sport as a kid. He also mentions the Whitehall tigers, which he had flags of in his home during that entry.

However, as we know from the series, this is all a story used to humanise him for the masses and the truth is far more horrifying. We see the human experimentation that was carried out on him and this opening really shows you why he’s a complete sociopath.

Black Noir

Now he introduces Black Noir who takes the spotlight away from Homelander and completely overshadows him. Madelyn says is a contingency plan for Homelander and in the comics, we learn that this is put in place to kill him if he ever goes rogue. Unfortunately, to talk about this episode in depth we also have to spoil one of the big twists in the comics but I’ll give you a heads up before we jump into that.

Black Noir is clearly watching him and he stalks The Homelander throughout the episode…also we should probably drop the the. Sounds better just Batman and not the Bat…sorry wrong video.

Now at this point, we get Homelander’s first mission against the CLF which has taken over the Cruz Chemical Plant. This very much feels like a play on Ace Chemicals which is often where Batman inadvertently created his worst enemy the Joker. The group have taken the staff hostage because they’re poisoning water to the point that babies are born severely deformed but being a corporation Vought wants to protect them. In any other superhero story, it would be about stopping the evil company from ruining people’s lives and it’s a clever subtext to subvert that to the point where Homelander is basically brought in to protect corporate interest.

Desperate to get the limelight Homelander rushes in and in a move that Superman often does he wraps metal bars around someone. Whereas this is normally seen as a pacifist move that won’t hurt the person, this means they can’t breathe. He also heats a gun in another Superman technique but unlike the DC universe, this just makes it explode and blow the person’s hands-off. Really really great ways to actually deconstruct these classic moves and it shows how these kinds of things would actually operate in real life.

He gets to the central room and after trying to talk everyone down he disarms them. This is a far cry from what would happen down the line where he would normally just eye laser them without even aiming for the gun. After getting PTSD he ends up killing them because they refuse to see him as a hero.

Homelander kills the entire group at least it seems that way and Black Noir watches him from afar. The pair end up fighting with noir using several smoke bombs akin to Batman and he tricks Homelander into killing someone by pinning them to a flammable tank. Homelander spams his eye lasers again and this blows the entire facility apart, killing even the journalists outside.

There’s a sole survivor however Noir kills her and the two bury the hatchet.

Noir writes him a cover story and the public buy it.

Spoiler Alert

Now if you don’t want any comic spoilers then skip ahead!

You gone…good you schmuck, didnt like you anyway. Now in the comics, it’s revealed that Noir is actualy a clone of Homelander. Though the series has unmasked him and shown that they’re different races I did wanna give the spoiler alert just in case they end up doing something like that. Now in the comics, because Noir looked like Homelander he could commit crimes like him too. The character dressed up in the costume and went out and brutally murdered several people and he then took photos of it. Noir then sent these images to Homelander and he believed that he’d black out whilst this was happening as he couldn’t remember it. It slowly sent him insane and it is possible that noir killed those people in the episode whilst Homelander was having his PTSD flashes. Being a clone he actually has all the same powers as Homelander does and thus he could’ve also moved at super speed.

Just a theory but yeah something to bear in mind for the show.

Boyd in 3D

Now the next episode is Boyd in 3D which features a man and woman taking cream that alters their appearance. The woman ends up turning into a cat person and this may be the hero we saw at OD’s party in Episode 1.

We join Boyd, a dog walker and in a bit of product placement early on you can actually catch an Amazon delivery van as he gets pulled across the street. He also lives in apartment 3D hence the title of the episode.

Now, this is clearly a commentary on social media, filters and how we all alter the way we appear to seem more attractive, successful and so on. This is shown early on when Cherry returns home after getting dumped and she takes a photo to make it seem like she’s happy even though she’s completely devastated.

After applying to be a test subject he rubs some cream on his face called Envision which changes his appearance. One of the doctors is Kumail Nunjani and this episode feels like it’s also playing on the Feat Of Clay Batman Animated series episode. In that Matt Hagen was severely disfigured and he ended up rubbing specialised cream into his face which changed his appearance. However, he became hooked on it and eventually ended up transforming into Clayface.

Much like how it destroyed Hagen, the reveal at the end shows that the entire thing is somewhat of a fantasy and that he actually died in the chair. This aesthetic has been used in things like Total Recall where the fantasy could potentially start once he goes to the doctors and I love the reveal.

In the dream he also realises that he wouldn’t have been happier either as the pair both end up using the cream, they become social media sensations, end up cheating and lose their jobs at vought. This is overseen by Ashley who you’ll of course know from the main series and she’s just as brutal as ever.

With nothing left the pair end up fighting and they lose the last drop of envision down the toilet. Cut to one month and the pair rekindle their love after Cherry brings him a letter which reflects how he wanted to give her one in the beginning. They realise they’d be happier without the cream but it’s too late and he dies before any of it plays out.

BFFs

Next up we have BFFs which is written by Awkwafina. The Shang-Chi star also voices the main character Sky and this is a highly anime-inspired entry about a sentient piece of poo.

Sky is forced into a drug deal and gets paranoid when he sees a picture of the Deep who pops up throughout the episode. We see signs for Oceanland and Deep did a commercial for in the main series. They crash into Aquapets and Sky ends up with some Compound V in her pocket. There’s a lot of talk of weed and Seth Rogan voices the dealer. Rogan is of course known for a lot of his Weed comedies and he’s been very outspoken on how he smokes it every day.

Now I forgot to mention that Seth Rogan and Evan Goldberg make an appearance in Laser Baby’s Day Out but we’re doing it here, didn’t miss it, I just forgot.

There’s also a reference to the Kyle Vine Meme.

Sky creates a sentient poo and she forms a friendship with it as it’s basically an extension of her. She constantly does on a count of seven which is a reference to Seven and even has some sweet corn in her cheeks which…lovely bit of attention to detail.

They have an ET moment in which they’re connected and as always, it’s all connected.

The Deep

Now elsewhere the Deep wants the V as he thinks it’ll convince the seven to let him back in the group. He gets a shark to eat the dealer in a death that could be riffing on the shark one from Licence To Kill.

There’s also a Queen Maeve doll in Sky’s room and eventually, Vought offers to pay her settlement after the Deep attacks. As always it’s super low and Sky rescues the poo, flushes her down the loo and takes on the Deep, deep in the…sew…sewer.

Harnassing the powers of an anime finale Sky reveals her powers which is to control turds and she unleashes an army of them on the Deep.

The episode ends with her living with the brown gang in the happiest moment ever.

Sh*t happens.

John and Sun-Hee.

Now, this is one of the standout episodes of the run and it’s very much a metaphor for cancer, loss and acceptance. The piece stars Randall Duk Kim as John and you might recognise this actor as playing the Key maker in The Animatrix. Now, this is important on several levels as both Rogen and Goldberg stated that they wanted to make Diabolical in the same vein as the Animatrix.

This anthology was completely groundbreaking at the time and the entry even has nods to the Matrix-like when we see the cancer monster stopping bullets.

Written by Andy Samberg we watch as John steals Compound V from the lab before taking it to his wife Sun-Hee.

Vought try to cover up what’s happening and this unleashes the monster which devours all in its path mercilessly. As it’s cancer it of course doesn’t hold back and though John and Sun-hee do whatever they can to try and stop it, the disease is relentless. This devastates John who we see from a photograph early on has spent the majority of his life with the woman he loves.

His bills are past due, he can’t really live without her and thus he makes a desperate attempt to save her no matter what. The name Sun-hee of course sounds like Sunny and the entry ends with a beautiful goodbye.

At the Seven’s headquarters, John passes the mural for the group which was also featured in the show. After the pair flee they end up going to the woods where cancer leaves her body and it attacks all that come close. This is devastating to the environment and much like cancer, it’s completely ruthless. We even catch the inner workings of it which look like cells and it seems unstoppable.

Vought is close in and gets wiped out and though John and Sun-hee could escape, she convinces him to stay behind even though it means that she won’t survive.

She leaves him with some parting words that show how much she cared about him and tackles the cancer head-on which ends the episode.

Brilliant entry and like I said in my first video I really loved the series. I know anime anthologies like this can be a bit hit and miss but the season was great and I had a lot of fun with it.

I’d obviously love to hear your thoughts so make sure you comment below and let me know.