The Boys Season 4 Episode 7 Review: An Ambiguous Episode Before The Grand Finale
Cast: Karl Urban, Jack Quaid, Antony Starr, Erin Moriarty, Jessie T. Usher, Laz Alonso, Tomer Capone, Chace Crawford, Karen Fukuhara, Nathan Mitchell
Director: Philip Sgriccia, Frederick E.O. Toye, Eric Kripke, Catriona McKenzie, Shana Stein
Streaming Platform: Prime Video
Filmyhype.com Ratings: 4.5/5 (four and a half stars)
The Boys Season 4 Episode 7 out now series is moving fast towards the last episode of its fourth season. Everything is now in chaos and the certainties are becoming less and less for the viewer, as well as the characters themselves, who do not know what will really happen in the eighth episode next week. This seventh episode sets the table for the last supper of this penultimate season, shuffling the cards and throwing several characters into the abyss, who have no choice but to climb back up while waiting for the final showdown. If you think about it carefully, it can’t be easy at all to make the episode before a season or series finale. Like all things, in any medium, that requires balance, you have to approach it with a lot of finesse: on the one hand, the goal is not to give away too many clues or information to the viewer, thus opting for an episode with a more bland, measured tone and pace; on the other, the risk of coming out of it is a confusing mess and consequently, you still want to throw something compelling and impactful into the mix. And so on, ad infinitum, forming an ouroboros, a snake that bites its own tail.
Well, The Boys with this seventh episode has bitten its own tail a bit in an attempt to give as little information as possible about a hopefully sensational season finale, without giving up on offering its usual distinctive entertainment scenes – and also because, apparently, it has become martial law to get to the hour or so of running time regardless. The result? A bizarre episode marked by too many ups and downs, which certainly sets the mood for next week with some excellent, well-placed shots, but which at the same time drags out the storylines too much with repetitions and storylines, when all is said and done, were just fillers in and of themselves. The Boys Season 4 has not always shown, so much so that we have often talked about how some situations cyclically repeated themselves, like in a loop, without a real resolution, referring to other seasons and circumstances already seen. This is not the case with the seventh episode which, despite a bit of confusion that we will talk about later, manages to attract the viewer’s attention, capturing him given a finale that promises to be great.
The Boys Season 4 Episode 7 Review: The Story Plot
Many situations evolve in The Boys Season 4 Episode 7. Going in order, Butcher confesses his plan regarding the virus to the group, with Marvin who, due to the illness he had in the previous episode, decides to pass, for the umpteenth time, the reins of the group to Butcher. While the Boys will go on a mission to understand Homelander’s plan, Marvin will have to decide between family and war. Homelander and Firecracker are on the hunt for the real mole, while Ryan is forced to host a Vought Christmas show. Sister Sage will be less and less taken into consideration by Homelander, who now also has an Abyss at his disposal and has nothing left to lose. The coup is getting closer and the plan of the Super #1 seems to be working, for now.
As usual, let’s first answer the age-old question of what actually happens in this episode: Butcher (Karl Urban), Hughie (Jack Quaid) and Annie (Erin Moriarty) follow a lead regarding Sage (Susan Heyward) and a possible attack on the future President of the United States, which would pave the way for Victoria (Claudia Doumit); Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) and a Frenchie (Tomer Capone) who has been forcibly released from prison instead help Sameer (Omid Abtahi) stabilize the virus; finally, at Vought, Homelander (Antony Starr) tightens the noose around the mysterious mole who is helping our protagonists.
Now, if last week we finally cheered for a clear step forward in the narrative (here you can find our review of The Boys Season 4x06), we have to do the exact opposite, because it is an episode that for long stretches does not know exactly what to do and it is not easy to explain it without making spoilers, so we will remain as vague and generic as possible. For example, it is the moment in which it becomes clear that some storylines of the season have not had any kind of importance and impact on the events, despite the consistent running time – and yes, the reference to Frenchie is a must here, all resolved with a sudden and banal dialogue, in addition to being at the center of a couple of forced statements. Not only that, the contradictions around the figure and actions of Homelander reach a peak that borders on nonsense, episodes and episodes of a build-up and a huge plan are essentially erased in a couple of scenes.
The Boys Season 4 Episode 7 Review and Analysis
Even before talking about everything that worked and what didn’t in this seventh episode, a parenthesis on A-Train must be made. The character, always a Super “secondary”, has revealed himself in this season as one of the most beautiful surprises of the series, which has not only been able to enhance his characteristics and his dilemmas but has also created a real impeccable narrative arc for him. A-Train is the principle from which The Boys is born and develops, but he is also the container of every moral discussion seen in the series in these four seasons. And now, having reached the end, he is also the symbol of a radical, courageous, and noble change, that almost no character has managed to have: from anti-hero to true hero, A-Train in Four Seasons has become the most successful character of The Boys.
The Boys Season 4 didn’t shine on several occasions, both because of a script aimed at buying time while waiting for the fifth and final season, and because of some redundant circumstances, which failed to bring anything new to the series. The seventh episode is not one of the best ever made, but at least from this point of view it puts some meat on the fire given the finale, and I don’t smoke. Undoubtedly some situations do not satisfy and often remain too vague, left at the mercy of events, such as Frenchie’s release from prison and his moral doubt or Marvin’s constant push and pull between family and Boys, but also the management of the character of Sister Sage, from apparently fundamental to a simple appearance, and we could go on. What this episode succeeds in doing, however, unlike others this season, is to put tension in the soul of the viewer, who for one of the first times this season really doesn’t know what to expect. The seventh episode stimulates curiosity and generates hype for the finale, curiosity that had been a bit lost along the way.
Choices that we cannot understand and that reset his character and what surrounds him for the umpteenth time, unless there are some sensational twists in the finale – which we sincerely hope for. Finally, it is an episode where the characterization of many characters seems to repeat itself and go around in circles excessively: all traumatized people who repeatedly reiterate that they cannot recognize themselves, that they cannot look at themselves in the mirror, an exasperated and generalized drama that paradoxically makes the individual paths lose strength. What The Boys have shown is probably the most important task, that is, preparing the ground and the atmosphere for the finale. Throughout the season, we have heard the various protagonists often discuss how the situation is tragic and how close to a hypothetical end of the world.
If there was a moment in which Kripke and company had the obligation to make this threat tangible and almost inevitable, it was this one and they have done it masterfully, through a simple yet effective twist and some fascinating sequences in a last-minute effort to resolve conflicts with words. In short, however, troubled by problems and forcing, the penultimate episode of The Boys triumphs where it counted most, in setting the table. Now let all hell break loose. So everything is ready for the conclusion of The Boys Season 4, which who knows what surprises it will have in store for us and what doors it will open for the fifth season. The last episode, coming next week and which we invite you to follow with us, will be decisive for the final judgment of this fourth season.
The Boys Season 4 Episode 7 Review: The Last Words
Let’s state it straight away: the seventh episode of the fourth season of The Boys is gripped by several problems. For example, it is the moment in which some secondary storylines prove to have had no impact on the season or on the characters themselves, despite the consistent running time. There is also some narrative forcing that is too much, especially on Frenchie and Patriota, the latter above all the victim of yet another reset that makes everything that has happened in the season up to now almost useless – unless there are sensational surprises in the finale, which we sincerely hope for. Without forgetting the merry-go-round of some characters, now characterized identically. An episode that basically for long stretches did not know what to do to fill the imperative and categorical duration of an hour. Where, however, The Boys still managed to shine in setting the mood and the truly apocalyptic atmosphere for the finale, which was perhaps the most important task. Now we must keep these promises.
