The Boys Season 4 made Hughie suffer; he was sexually assaulted a lot, he lost his dad, and he watched his friend become a foe – but it’s for the greater good.
Lest we forget, Hughie’s pain was the catalyst that set The Boys’ events in motion. In the opening episode, he saw the love of his life splattered to smithereens, leading him to his fateful encounter with Billy Butcher.
Whenever his life seems to stabilize, something goes wrong; for example, at the end of Season 2, he left the crew to take down Vought “the right way” with Victoria Neuman… not knowing she was arguably the most dangerous supe next to Homelander.
Even his heroic moments have a sad edge. In Season 3, he showed off his balls of steel by standing up to Homelander during the ‘Homelight’ arc (thank God that’s over), but when Starlight stepped in, you could see how emasculated he felt; he wanted to be super, but he’s just a man.
Season 4 was Hughie’s final gauntlet
However, The Boys Season 4 treated him like a punching bag. To recap: his dad had a stroke, his mother – who abandoned him! – returned and expected forgiveness, and then his father went on a Compound V-fueled rampage before Hughie had to mercy kill him like a sick dog.
Before he could mourn such an enormous loss, he went undercover at Tek Knight’s mansion, where he was sexually assaulted by his favorite childhood hero (and Ashley, who tickled his feet and smeared her wet fingers on his face). Oh, and he was nearly cut open so Tek Knight could hump holes of his own making.
If that wasn’t enough, Shape Shifter kidnapped Annie and pretended to be Starlight, even duping Hughie into an engagement and raping him 20 times – and when she was freed, the real Starlight blamed him. Then he watched the light fade from Butcher’s eyes as he tossed him aside and murdered Victoria Neuman. “Don’t, it’s suicide,” he warned the others.
The treatment of his ordeal – particularly compared to the fallout of The Deep assaulting Starlight – understandably sparked criticism. Eric Kripke didn’t do himself any favors by saying he viewed it as “hilarious”, with some fans feeling it was a broader reflection of lax attitudes toward male sexual abuse.
They have a point. I laughed in Episode 6, but it left an icky taste in my mouth; as Kripke also said, “always be careful what you ask the writers for.”
But the show’s cruelty to Hughie, while particularly tough to stomach in this chapter, is essential. He needs to be the show’s equalizer; a normal guy who can withstand as much horror as any supe and not succumb to darkness.
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Time and time again, Hughie has proven himself to be the best of The Boys. Even when he got a taste of power with Temp V in Season 3, he rarely lost control – he even tried to sacrifice himself when Soldier Boy nearly blasted Homelander at Herogasm.
That’s not to say he’s innocent: he did indulge himself with his brief superpowered stint, he punched A-Train when he tried to apologize (to be fair, wouldn’t we all?), and he accidentally killed a man after punching him through the stomach. His only reaction? “Oops!”
But imperfection doesn’t make him a villain, and unlike his pals (and even Starlight), he rises above his trauma and faults and doesn’t let it all define him.
The Boys is full of powerful people who abuse their strength to soothe their own struggles. In Season 4, Homelander avenged his torturous childhood by murdering the Vought scientists who experimented on him, while Grace Mallory’s death seems to have driven Butcher to full-blown genocide.
Weak-willed people fall into temptation, but Hughie’s moral compass is steadfastly sound (bar the odd wobble; the average human experience in a nutshell). “We’ve all done bad sh*t, what’s insane is that our solution to every problem is murder… violence isn’t brave,” he told the group.
Remember in Season 2, when Butcher and Starlight visit Hughie in hospital? “He never gives up on you… he’s too good for either of us,” she tells him, and he agrees.
If anything, Kripke’s unsavory treatment of Hughie only serves him better as a character: even when the show is determined to make his life hell, no matter how deplorable it gets, he takes it – and if Season 5 follows the comics, he will endure to the bitter end.
Make sure you check out our breakdown of The Boys Season 4’s ending, our ranking of every death in Season 4, and everything we know about The Boys Season 5.
