top of page
Writer's pictureG.C.Nightwalker

The First three Episodes of The Boys: Gen V, Perfectly sum up the struggles of a Gifted Child.



Marie describing how much she hated herself
I felt that

The Last time I covered the Boys, I said that it is in some sense just an exaggerated representation of the real world, which I mean, Duh, Satire. But that is more poignant because of the way compound V is presented, it takes whatever you have and makes it more, it makes you more... you.


So I guess it is only Natural that when making a show about a school for gifted youngsters, it makes it all about how gifted children are treated in real life.


Parents of gifted children (often rightfully so) feel elated beyond measure, and see the child as a gift from god, but more often than not they forget that it takes more to raise a gifted child than a normal child, many parents make the mistake of assuming that the gifted child is "ahead" of the other children in development, when in reality gifted children simply have a higher potential and aptitude towards certain things, but in order to tap that potential, it takes more work not less.


I heard this analogy from a youtuber and streamer called doctor K, he said, if you are not gifted, you have the blueprint of a regular house, but if you are, the blueprint is that of a mansion, but a mansion is more work and takes longer to build, so by the time everyone is done with their house, you have only finished like the first few floors, and so you feel terrible in comparison.


Many parents miss this, because they are too happy being elated by their "gifted child" so when inevitably the child fails to meet their unreasonably high expectations they get met with disappointment.


This was also emphasized in the boys diabolical with Red River, where parents send their "gifted" children when they don't have the "big ticket" powers.

the intro to the second episode of the Boys presents Diabolical: An Animated Short Where Pissed-Off Supes Kill Their Parents
why is that nurse such a mood?

It's worse in the Boys universe because these people were given an illegal drug by their parents to put them in this situation.


In the real world, a lot of fishes are judged by their abilities to climb a tree, as in they are judged by abilities that their caregivers want them to have not the ones they naturally develop.


So institutions like red river exist, because their parents chose to jam them full of illegal drugs and didn't like the outcome they got.


Gen V expands on this side of the story, around parents who do not like their children for their gifts.

Cate and Marie sharing their pain

In real life parents of gifted children can raise them to be amazing children if they are understanding and raise them as children should be, but in this context all the parents are people who just look as gifted children as trophies, obviously, because they chose to pump them full of drugs for this.


And we get all the negative sides of gifted child parenting, we have cate, whose parents feel unsafe around her and blame her for sending their son away, even though she had no idea she had powers, and the fact that she does, is kind of their fault.


We have Marie whose parents couldn't understand that their daughter is having her first period and barged in on her, also... where is sex ed, in the scene it is clear that she was disturbed by the fact that she was bleeding.


And then we have Jordan whose parents are on a whole another level, so they are obviously looking for a son, didn't get that... like it doesn't matter that they are in the top ten(top 2 originally, but they fell) This is about being a boy.

Jordan arguing with their parents
That they did

But that is not the main reason I chose to focus on this topic, I focused on this due to episode three where every one of the main cast is paraded around like a show pony in the shows own words.


this sequence reminded me a lot of how the media treats certain gifted children like money printing machines, because everyone loves to look at kids, and then there is of course the fact that they are capable of things some people can only dream of.


I still remember as a child that on certain news channels I would see six to seven year olds paraded around as the second coming of Christ, sometimes literally. It even happens on a much lesser scale when they decide to interview the current board exams topper or whatever, like sure, they are older, but they are still kids, unneeded popularity aside, it promotes an unhealthy competition mentality where every parent wants to see their kid on the television.


You know come to think of it, a lot of our culture relies on the exploitation of kids. Or maybe its just exploitation in general.


But all that said, it is interesting the show chose this approach, because in the original boys comic Godolkin university and the G-men (an obvious parody of X-men) revolved mostly around John Godolkin being a... lover of children... I thought brink was originally going to take Godolkin's place, what with his extra friendly relationship with Jordan, but then Golden boy burnt him.

Golden Boy kills brink
If you look at it carefully enough you too can see what my degenerate brain sees

Not gonna lie when I first saw this scene I legitimately thought this was some weird foreplay and brink and golden boy were doing and brink would just re alive himself, you know... cause he is a supe, and he was groaning... Also because of the source material.


Well you know on an overall scale I am happy this show isn't about young gifted students being subjected to p*dophilia because lets be honest, if you knew the original boys comics, you know that a lot of it was just the most juvenile jab at super hero culture that Garth Ennis could think of.


Like literally the definition of, "you called me ugly? Well your mama is gay!" okay don't actually use that, because you know its okay to be gay and the kid in question could be in a family where their parents are a gay couple.... Why am I dissecting this again?


Anyways to the point, we have the following showcases:


1.This is superman but he eats babies.(yes Homelander ate babies in the comics)

Homelander eats a baby

2. Captain America but he's a f*cking coward who got his entire team killed... also he wet his pants.(man this person reminds me of Jenson Ackles so much).

Soldier boy pisses himself

3.We have Iron man, but he is a pervert.(that better not be foreshadowing.)

Iron man being a true man
you go king!

4. These are the X-men but professor X is that uncle your mom warns you about.

John Godolkin is that man your mom warned you about

Goddammit Garth Ennis, I get that you are bitter but seriously dude.


Here the dark underbelly of God U is a shady underground experiment ring called the woods, where god knows what is happening there.(well episode 6 is out already, but like lets pretend I released this on time shall we?)


*Sigh* Now I must deal with Tek Knight innit? Why Gen V? you were going so great!



Kommentare


bottom of page