S01.E08: Guardians of Godolkin

[Meredith Quill]

Quote

If you or a human loved one have been injured or killed while working at Godolkin University, you may be entitled to financial compensation. Hundreds of human employees have been victimized by Godolkin students, but the law offices of Bremmer & Bremmer have won them millions in personal injury and wrongful death lawsuits. Contact us for a free consultation at 1-888-177-2774. Know your rights!

 

[Mr. Sparkle]

Nothing? That was brutal! 

[Daltrey]

I need more...now!😆 I think I almost enjoyed this more than THE BOYS...though it was nice to see Billy.

I can't wait to see how THE FOUR find their way to freedom.

[FishyJoe]

That was pretty crushing to see Sam dump Emma. Talk about a gut punch. 

[AntFTW]

The four getting scapegoated at the end, I didn't see that coming but it's on-brand for Vought.

[CarpeFelis]

That ending made little sense to me. The two kids who were the biggest instigators got chosen as the Guardians of Godolkin and the four who tried to stop them are locked up in the Woods. WTAF?! 

My initial assumption when Homelander landed and accused Marie was that he got it completely wrong since we know he’s not exactly the sharpest crayon in the box. But the board members in the helicopter, who she’d helped to save, should have corrected that and they didn’t. Again, WTAF?!

[tired and hungry]

Ummm I think It was a somewhat good ending. I actually liked Cate. I wish they didn't make her the bad guy. I also wondered why her powers are limited to only her hands and not all of her skin(like Rogue in xmen). Now that she's lost 1 hand it makes her more susceptible I guess. 

Can't believe that pheromone guy survived all that carnage. Anyone who that bomb guy who Cate killed was talking to about his cover being blown. Did he actually even have any powers?

I wonder if A-Train and Andre will ever meet. They are in similar situtations where using their powers directly affects their health.

So Marie is basically immune to Homelander's laser eyes? She had almost no injuries!! 

I wish we got to see more of GoldenBoy too. Patrick seemed like a decent actor

[Mabinogia]

13 hours ago, CarpeFelis said:

That ending made little sense to me. The two kids who were the biggest instigators got chosen as the Guardians of Godolkin and the four who tried to stop them are locked up in the Woods. WTAF?! 

My initial assumption when Homelander landed and accused Marie was that he got it completely wrong since we know he’s not exactly the sharpest crayon in the box. But the board members in the helicopter, who she’d helped to save, should have corrected that and they didn’t. Again, WTAF?!

My interpretation was that Homelander, an all powerful pyschopath saw in Cate a possible ally in his let's go kill everyone spree and basically threatened the Board to go along. After all, the Board are just mere humans. All it would take is Homelander threatening to kill them, Cate walks over and touches them and BOOM Cate and Sam are the Guardians of Godolkin and the four are now prisoners. 

I'm curious why Marie et al weren't just killed. Even if Marie was immune to HLs laser they could have killed the other three. Then again, maybe they aren't in prison so much as in a safe house. AAAA I can't wait till next season. I'm more excited to see where this goes than The Boys, though I'm still excited about The Boys too. 

[AntFTW]

1 hour ago, Mabinogia said:

My interpretation was that Homelander, an all powerful pyschopath saw in Cate a possible ally in his let's go kill everyone spree and basically threatened the Board to go along.

I think that is a reasonable intepretation if it hadn't been complete chaos and Homelander was fully informed about what was happening and who was behind it.

Ashley says to get Homelander. However, IIRC, none of the boardmembers nor Ashley knew the full extent was what was happening. At the point where they send the message to get Homelander, it seems like none of them could point the finger at Cate and knew of her role in this choatic scenario, and the same for Sam.

I'm thinking Homelander lands on the ground in the middle of the campus, and does his Homelander thing of being lazy and just laser-eyeing everything to death or into submission. I'm thinking it's possible that Homelander did more damage once he got there and it ultimately became a cover-up for Homelander in the end. If someone ever digs up the full extent of events, they can just throw Cate and Sam under the bus as a second round of scapegoats. The boardmembers, being the scared humans that they are, just goes along with it.

Edited November 5, 2023 by AntFTW

[Chicago Redshirt]

On 11/4/2023 at 9:57 PM, CarpeFelis said:

That ending made little sense to me. The two kids who were the biggest instigators got chosen as the Guardians of Godolkin and the four who tried to stop them are locked up in the Woods. WTAF?! 

My initial assumption when Homelander landed and accused Marie was that he got it completely wrong since we know he’s not exactly the sharpest crayon in the box. But the board members in the helicopter, who she’d helped to save, should have corrected that and they didn’t. Again, WTAF?!

There are a few things that could be in play:

1. We saw that Homelander was seemingly disgusted that Marie would attack her own kind. He is a Supes supremacist above all. I'm assuming that we are chronologically where Homelander is running Vought solo and Edgar is out of the picture. So he/Vought have imprisoned our Core Four deciding what to do with them. They elevated Sam and Kate because the two of them are leading contenders to join the Brotherhood of Evil Supes.

2. Vought decides that it is easier to sell to the public that pretty white girl who was already a top-ranked student and unknown white guy are the real heroes and black girl with gross blood powers, Asian trans person, black kid who crumpled his dad's statue, and white girl with an eating disorder were the instigators and the real problems.

3. Vought might have made the decision not just on loyalty to the supes cause or who would play better in Poughkeepsie/Peoria, but also on the perceived strength of the powers of each side and the usefulness to Vought. Sam's got superstrength/flying/extreme heat generation such that Golden Boy was getting transfusions from him to bolster Golden Boy's strength, and Golden Boy was poised to have a massive contract with New York City, enough that they were going to make him a multi-million dollar suit. Emma's got the ability to push people (despite her hand being blown up real good, I assume) and read minds. I'd take those against the combined powers that Our Heroes have any day.

4. Once given an agenda to follow by fellow Supes, Sam and Cate seemingly would follow it without question. Our Heroes showed that they were going to act independently of what Vought wanted for them and to try to be actual heroes. Vought doesn't want that sort of wild card.

We don't know if our heroes are locked in the Woods or some other Vought facility. Or even in a Vought facility, though that's a reasonable assumption. There aren't too many powers that we've been introduced to that could create a slick-seeming prison with no doors like they are in beyond Vought. But the CIA might have something along those lines, and I suppose it's possible that Congresswoman Newman might have saved her blood sister, if you will, and her accomplices and have those sorts of resources at her disposal.

[AntFTW]

5 minutes ago, Chicago Redshirt said:

We saw that Homelander was seemingly disgusted that Marie would attack her own kind. He is a Supes supremacist above all. I'm assuming that we are chronologically where Homelander is running Vought solo and Edgar is out of the picture.

Yes, with Ashley as a figurehead CEO. That's where we left off on season 3 of The Boys.

[Affogato]

I, for one, am surprised that Sam and Cate survived. It is possible that Marie, shocked by what she had done, stopped Cate from bleeding out, but it looked like a sure thing. The best argument for Cate surviving is that the four of them wake up in that doorless room and don't remember how they got there.I suppose Sam may have super healing.There wasn't a lot of emergency medical help. A dead martyr, on your side, isn't bad. We will see, though. Cate 'emptied' Sam, so he is a stone cold sociopath now, if he survived. Feels good!

There is someone, not a supe (but  student age) wandering around with a sonic device that explodes heads. Who is running him?

If we are going along our current timeline gangnam style is over a decade ago. Likely not Shetty that created 'the Woods'.

It isn't a surprise Butcher would investigate, either having heard the news or if Grace sent him to see if their was any virus or anything they could use. Or just to see what happened.  His comment could simply refer to what Vought was doing, imprisoning and experimenting on children. It is possible he saw something new, though.

 

 

On 11/6/2023 at 12:02 PM, Chicago Redshirt said:

We don't know if our heroes are locked in the Woods or some other Vought facility. Or even in a Vought facility, though that's a reasonable assumption. There aren't too many powers that we've been introduced to that could create a slick-seeming prison with no doors like they are in beyond Vought. But the CIA might have something along those lines, and I suppose it's possible that Congresswoman Newman might have saved her blood sister, if you will, and her accomplices and have those sorts of resources at her disposal.

If it is what it looks like they need a teleporter. Teddy S is too young.

[Chicago Redshirt]

When I said "powers," I meant entities/agencies.

What we are seeing could be the result of a Matrix-like sim, or an actual physical location that they were teleported into, or that has a door but it's carefully shielded from ordinary vision or I'm sure a number of other possibilities.

[Affogato]

Considering the mutant connection it may well be Danger. 

[Ottis]

So the whole point of The Boys/Gen V is basically the same as the Marvel mutants vs. humans battle from X-Men? The main difference being that the "professor X" school in Gen V is actually run by someone trying to kill mutants, not protect them? Oh, and sex.

Kind of disappointed in that. I much preferred the "what happens if superheroes are assholes" approach that launched The Boys. Not sure they had to evolve it into a civil war.

A better approach might have been to explore why parents agreed to dose their babies in the first place, and the pressures and motivations that led to it. There was a little in the flashbacks about how parents reacted when the powers were frightening or went wrong, but there should be a lot more to mine there.

On 11/7/2023 at 12:05 PM, Affogato said:

There is someone, not a supe (but  student age) wandering around with a sonic device that explodes heads. Who is running him?

He didn't explode heads, did he? Didn't he just incapacitate the student, stick one of those oval devices in the student's mouth and then detonate it? You have to get close to the supe vs. use the device from afar.

 

 

[Quark]

I thought this was great, with Emma probably being my favourite character.

Loved all The Boys cameos, especially Grace. The actress has such presence.

I'm shocked Victoria Neuman revealed her powers to Marie, seemed very out of character. I was sure she would try to kill Marie instead.

I imagine we will see all these characters in the next season of The Boys, given the way things were left.

Edited December 10, 2023 by Quark

[Chicago Redshirt]

On 12/9/2023 at 6:34 PM, Ottis said:

So the whole point of The Boys/Gen V is basically the same as the Marvel mutants vs. humans battle from X-Men? The main difference being that the "professor X" school in Gen V is actually run by someone trying to kill mutants, not protect them? Oh, and sex.

Kind of disappointed in that. I much preferred the "what happens if superheroes are assholes" approach that launched The Boys. Not sure they had to evolve it into a civil war.

A better approach might have been to explore why parents agreed to dose their babies in the first place, and the pressures and motivations that led to it. There was a little in the flashbacks about how parents reacted when the powers were frightening or went wrong, but there should be a lot more to mine there.

I would say that it'd be reductionist to say either that the Boys was originally about "What if superheroes were assholes?" or that Gen V has changed that premise to a looming civil war like in X-Men.

The Boys always had Vought at the center and had as factors the influences of pop culture, corporate greed, and political power of humans. That continues with Gen V, which instead of focusing on the apex predators of supes, the Seven, is looking at people lower on the food chain, people less mature and less cynical. In three seasons of the Boys, we encountered Starlight and maybe one or two other supes who could be said to truly want to be heroic and walk the walk. All of our Core Four actually (so far) actually want to be traditional heroes. We'll see if they stay the course.

The notion that there's a looming Supes vs humans battle is not all that widespread at this point. The Boys and just a handful of others want to kill supes. Most humans admire them. The most we've generally seen is people be critical of individual supes, like whether Homelander was right to kill a person in cold blood, Blue Hawk was racist, etc. The most vocal anti-supe person other than the Boys that we've seen is a supe herself, and even she's not really pretending to advocate supes being jailed, killed or anything akin to what the antagonists in the X-men universe have in mind for mutants. Vought wants to continue controlling them, and is continuing to cover up supes' misdeeds and manage their PR.

I don't know if there is a lot more to delve into re: parents' motivations. It's been touched on in both series that they've wanted money, power, fame that agreeing to have their kids dosed would/might give them. I think that's pretty real-worldy: I'm sure if there was an injection that could give kids super-powers a lot of parents would inject their kids with it even if there were risks and even without the infusion of Vought cash, because they might be inspired by their kid potentially being the next Supe, and them getting set for life. Almost by definition, the actual Supes themselves would be more interesting characters than their parents because they have superpowers, and because the parents' motivations are likely to be the basic things that have been already mentioned. I don't know if Gen V or the Boys is going to have time or interest to develop a parent into a more three-dimensional character.

[Hanahope]

I liked that Emma discovered that there is another way she can shrink.  Looks like profound sadness or despair.  Maybe a way of just feeling incredibly small and unwanted.  Then turn those feelings around to get large.