WARNING: Spoilers ahead for The Boys season 3, episode 4
Amazon Prime's The Boys takes place in a world where superheroes are injected with a drug, Compound-V, as children and then develop their abilities over time. Throughout its first two seasons, Billy Butcher, Hughie Campbell, and the titular boys have struggled to combat Vought International and its corrupt/abusive “Supes.” The Boys season 3 introduced Temp-V or V-24, which levels the playing field by giving the powers for 24 hours.
At the beginning of The Boys season 3, Queen Maeve gives Butcher three vials of V-24. Despite his reluctance and hatred for Supes, Butcher takes a dose and easily overpowers Payback member Gunpowder while searching for the weapon that supposedly killed Soldier Boy. Ironically, Butcher gets laser eyes, super strength, and invulnerability, akin to his arch-nemesis, Homelander. After discovering Butcher's V-24 experiment, The Boys season 3, episode 4 sees Hughie ask to try some. Butcher refuses, saying “it’s not power. It’s punishment. You don’t deserve none of it.” However, Hughie ignores Butcher and grabs some of the V-24 for himself, gleefully teleporting away soon after.
In a recent interview with TVLine, Kripke explains the dichotomy between Butcher and Hughie’s reactions to V-24. While Butcher views the drug as a necessary evil, Hughie wants a taste of the power he’s been subjected to for The Boys' two seasons. Read the full quote below:
“It was very intentional, and we specifically discussed the both of them having very opposite reactions. For Butcher, he hate superheroes so much, and it’s so painful for him, it’s inevitable that he would hate the V. [For Hughie,] toxic masculinity is seductive, and the idea of actually being strong and powerful, especially when he’s had sand kicked in his face his whole life, is something that he’s really getting really high on. So he loves it...a drug he’s shooting in his veins, so as you can imagine, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere good. [Hughie’s] had to deal with a lot this year, and so he’s reacted in this big way.”
Episode 4 begins with Homelander once again threatening Hughie before he’s saved by his girlfriend Starlight/Annie—which exacerbates his anger, insecurities, and decision to inject himself with V-24. At the end of the Boys episode, Hughie is seen experiencing a sort of euphoric high, iring his previously broken arm and indifferent to the dire state of Kimiko following Soldier Boy’s attack. V-24 is a drug. Hughie and Butcher are on the path to becoming junkies. Now, their limited supply is depleted, and they’ll inevitably try to figure out how to get some more—whether that means begging Maeve or stealing from Vought. Suffice to say, the introduction of V-24 applies that age-old idiom about absolute power to one of The Boys’ most moral characters.
It’ll be interesting to see what lingering effect V-24 will have on Hughie. Before vomiting all over Hughie, Butcher experienced a variety of concerning symptoms. It almost seemed like he was having withdrawals and developing permanent powers. If that’s the case, and they manage to retain their souls, it’d certainly help to solve their Homelander problem. However, nothing is ever that easy (and The Boys has already been renewed for a season 4). Furthermore, the epitome of toxic masculinity, Soldier Boy, now appears to have new energy powers that cancel out the effects of Compound-V, in all its forms.
The Boys season 3 releases new episodes Fridays on Prime Video.
Source: TVLine