Editor’s Note: The following contains spoilers for ‘The Boys’ Season 4 finale.
Beyond its inventive gore or shocking examples of how superpowers could destroy a world, whereThe Boysreally excels is its characters. Whether it be terrifying supervillains or embattled anti-heroes, thisEric Kripkeseries stuns in creating character arcs that perfectly surmise the many aspects of a deeply damaged world (both the show’s, and its viewers'). And as the series has evolved from being focused on super-powered gore tohow powers would only exacerbate the terrors of a flawed political and capitalistic system, the characters have reflected that — our long-standing castgrowing more complex as the narrative around them doesas well.
They all do this to different degrees, but there is one character who perfectly captures what the show has to say about the destructive power of humanity’s greed. A character who, through her backstory and actions, showcases the deep horrors at the root of this world and exemplifies the multi-faceted storytelling that this television series has become known for. Because of her past and how her intricacies perfectly mirror the show’s,former Vice President Victoria Neuman(Claudia Doumit) is absolutelyThe Boys’most important character —andthe show just killed her off in the most disappointing way possible.
A group of vigilantes set out to take down corrupt superheroes who abuse their superpowers.
Victoria Neuman Isn’t Like Any Other Character on ‘The Boys’
The Boys’expansive universe is filled with terrifying villains. Whether it be the sadistic Superman stand-in Homelander (Antony Starr), whose thirst for world domination (and others' approval) has led him to commit countless massacres, or the immortal racist Stormfront (Aya Cash), the series excels at creating antagonists who show how horrific a world filled with powers could be. Their actions are utterly human, though;The Boysreiterates that it’s a person’s personality that causes them to commit such atrocities, andpowers are just a tool used by already terrible peopleto play out their sick fantasies.
Human greed and an unjust system that prizes profit over human lives are really the cause of all these empowered narcissists and their actions,their abilities only being possible because ofthe megacorporation Voughtthat creates Supes as the ultimate act of marketing. As the seasons have gone on, the capitalist dread this business represents has steadily intertwined with been disturbing bloodshed of the show’s antagonists, a fusion that, while unnerving, has taken some time to really find its groove. Victoria’s role in this horrific portrayal, though, has been perfect from the start.
When first introduced, viewers hoped that Neuman signaled a positive change forThe Boys’central team of anti-heroes, this seemingly moral politician standing in the face of Vought with her push to hold Supes accountable for their crimes. She became integral to the group’s actions throughout the show’s second installment, the caring mother and courageous lawmaker serving as an ally in their fight against Vought and Homelander,making her reveal as a Super murderer so shocking.
Audiences learn that not only is Victoria Neuman a Vought plant whose political bravado hid her role in helping the company gain control of the U.S. military,but that she’s also an ultra-powerful Supe who can manipulate blood. A young Victoria accidentally killed her parents and was sent to the Red River Institute, a “home” for orphaned (unmarketable) super-children where she suffered for years before being adopted by Vought CEO Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito), who began to groom her as a pawn for Vought. Victoria’s backstory is unlike anyone else’s in the show, not only spotlighting some of this world’s most horrific aspects, but also emphasizing many of the horrors that make upThe Boys’central themes.
‘The Boy’s Killed Victoria Neuman Unceremoniously
In another world, Victoria Neuman is the superhero who savesThe Boys’world. And viewers get evidence of this inthe main series’ spin-off,Gen V;Marie Moreau (Jaz Sinclair) has an extremely similar backstory to Neuman’s, both of them having the ability to control blood, accidentally killing their parents, and suffering through years at the Red River Institute hoping for an escape.Neuman found her escape through Edgar turning her into an agent of corrupt politics and shady dealings,while Marie was lucky enough to find flawed but good-hearted people at Godolkin University, growing from these relationships and working to save innocents from this corrupt, super-powered world.
While not on Moreau’s level, Neuman is shown to be much more moralistic than her wholly evil contemporaries.Gen VandThe Boyssee her fight for Marie to have a good life and betray countless peopleto provide her daughter, Zoe (Olivia Morandin), with the comfort she never had— Neuman knowing that in a world as twisted asThe Boys’you must do horrible things to save the people you love. Her character emphasizes that it doesn’t matter if a world has superpowers or not: it’s the utterly human horrors of modern society that make people like Neuman have to do truly terrible things to survive.
Killing Neuman undercuts so much of the storyThe Boyshas spent years telling, removing the one villain who truly represented its multi-faceted evil — a combination of outright violence and interpersonal inhumanity — and leaving audiences with the simplistically brutal antagonists/anti-heroes the series seemed to be growing past. Not only does this disrupt storytelling, but nothing can excuse the fact that her death was so lame! She has been one of the strongest Supes of the entire series, capable of popping anyone’s head just by being near them andeven withstanding Homelander’s attacks.
To see her get ripped apart by a newly empowered Butcher, not putting up a fight despite knowing that her daughter was nearby and in danger as well, was not only disappointing, but a huge setback for the series as a whole. While so much of the early installments were focused on the brutish power plays of Butcher and Homelander, the shift away from each one’s blatantly bloody conquest to Neuman’s ability to destroy this country with one lawfurthered the show’s core message of human evils trumping any kind of super-powered villainy. By killing her off (and doing so in such an underwhelming way), the show revealed its inability to carry out the nuanced story it’s been building up for four seasons — and lost its most important character in the process.
‘The Boys’ Season 4 Crushes Another Diabolical Milestone
You just can’t keep these good boys down.
‘The Boys’ Lost Track of Its Own Story
Season 5 ofThe Boyshas already been confirmed, and even without Neuman, there are still many other characters the program can focus on to showcase the horrors of society (both super-powered and otherwise).Sister Sage (Susan Heyward), Homelander’s right hand and the smartest person ever, also highlights how it’s a terrible world that creates villains rather than the possession of powers itself. But even though some characters could take her place to a degree, none of them can meet the disturbingly devastating standard set by Neuman and all she meant to the show.
Her removal in such an underwhelming moment lost this series a huge aspect of its main storyline and cost viewerswhat could have been one of the biggest fight scenes of the entire franchise. The chance for her to reappear and continue counseling Marie inGen Vis zapped, hurting that story as well, and has putThe Boysat risk of returning to the needlessly “edgy” storytellingof its past. Neuman was one of modern television’s most intriguing and thematically powerful characters; her role inThe Boysallowed the show to build off of its super-powered gore to tell a compelling message about why humans destroy any chance for real superheroes to exist. By killing her in such a lackluster way, the series not only lost its most important character, but it showed that it’s not quite capable of taking on all the complexities that a narrative like Victoria Neuman’s demands.
The Boysis available to stream on Prime Video in the U.S.
