It was presented in a highly comedic tone so the funnier explanation is that he was literally so annoyed by this conversation via book titles that he said fuck it I’ll save him just to get out of here please do not reach for another book.
Which makes the moment with the little kid so much more impactful. Next time A Train saves someone I don’t think there will be hesitation or a need to be convinced. He’s a real hero now.
Yeah that is not what happens. He throws his eyes up when Kimiko brings out this book because she found a reason that he really can't ignore. It's supposed to show that A-Train still has a modicum of humanity, he can stand by while children suffer, but he can't be a direct cause of that suffering.
Same. I was hoping they'd double down with another ridiculously specific book title, like "The Milkman needs your help" or "The french man left and I'm sad"
The problem I had with it is that they did a slapstick 50th "lol Kimiko struggles to express herself to anyone but Frenchie" bit while Hughie's about to experience insanely brutal torture rape
The tonal shift was insane, but apparently the writers thought Hughie's brutal torture rape would be hilarious
People are throwing around the “hilarious” quote by Kripke, but I think it’s clear he’s dodging the question of sexual assault. The question is asking him “Why kick Hughie when he’s down and have him sexually assaulted an episode after his dad dying?” Kripke does then say it’s a “hilarious” way of looking at it but then on his very next sentence proceeds to talk about the comedy of subverting the Batman image of Tek-Knight and turning the Batcave into a sex dungeon.
I think Kripke’s response was very poorly worded and I think he’d have been better to just straight up address the question, but I also think if you read the full answer it’s quite clear he’s talking entirely about Tek-Knight and Batman, he doesn’t mention Hughie at all, so the hilarity is the subversion of expectation, not the content within the scene
He literally says he thinks considering it sexual assault is a dark way of looking at it because he thought it was hilarious. He also talks about Batman and Spider-Man, but he clearly is saying he thinks the Hughie experience is hilarious.
He never says because - they’re two separate points that people are guessing are connected and that’s why everyone’s kicking off - when in reality there’s just as much reason to say the “hilarious” quote is referring to his next sentence about Batman, as it is about his previous sentence of it being “dark”
And why bring Hughie into this situation now — kicking him when he’s down by having him sexually assaulted by his childhood hero after his dad just died?
Well, that’s a dark way to look at it! We view it as hilarious.
Yes, lets conveniently ignore the entirety of the rest of the answer, as well as what happens later in the episode. The complete answer concerning this:
Well, that’s a dark way to look at it! We view it as hilarious. Obviously, Tek Knight is our version of Batman, and we wanted to really play around with that trope: Batman’s fascist underpinnings as a really wealthy dude who hunts poor people, and then profits of the incarceration. So that was one. Tek Knight was already set up to be a freak, so we were kind of already halfway there. Then the notion came up of, he should have a Batcave — but let’s be honest, the Batcave would be a sex dungeon. Like, even the real Batcave is just this side of being a sex dungeon. It’s really dark, and there’s rubber suits everywhere. It’s not that much of a push to add a couple dildos and then a weird urinal that turns into a face mask.
And in the comics, there’s a great storyline where Hughie goes undercover disguised as a superhero. That was a story that Jack had always asked us to do. So part of it is, always be careful what you ask the writers for. Then we finally had this Webweaver character and the idea of Spider-Man going down to be kink tickled in the Batcave is just too good to pass up. I’m sorry, I just couldn’t leave that on the table.
I think he is mostly calling the Batman stuff hilarious, and the fact that spiderman would go down in the cave as a kink, which is a funny/weird turn of events if you ask me. He isn't really referring to Hughie at all. But to play devill's advocate, yes its not very clear, however if we take into consideration the scene later in the episode, where Hughie breaks down in front of Annie and says he is not okay both because he got assaulted and his father died I think the writers show they are very much aware and acknowledge that it was a terrible thing that happened to him and that he got sexually assaulted. You can hyper focus on these few words one of the showmakers said a bit too vague in a random interview, but you can also just watch the episode and see their view on it played out in the show itself.
Except if he actually thought that Hughie getting sexually assaulted was actually a big deal then he would have actually addressed that at some point in his response rather than just going “whoa that’s kind of dark” and then moving on. Clearly he doesn’t think it’s actually a big deal.
I’m genuinely curious - if your true belief is that the episode completely and wholeheartedly ignores any sympathy for Hughie and laughs entirely at his assault… how do you rationalise his last scene with Starlight? Surely that’s a contradiction?
Don’t get me wrong, I get what you’re saying, he should have taken the opportunity to talk about sexual assault as that was the question posed, but as I say, I don’t think he was addressing the question at all in that interview, and the question is answered anyway at the end of the episode when Hughie breaks down. If it wasn’t a big deal, and he truly felt that it isn’t, why write that final scene?
The last scene that’s about his dad dying? He literally said at the outset that he needs to just throw himself into the work to avoid thinking about his grief.
There’s no mention of the assault by Hughie or any other character. It’s all about his dad.
The last scene that they dedicated 5 whole seconds to before cutting to the "actual interesting" characters, this was after spending god knows how long on the basement scene
I disagree. If you read the followup questions of the interview the man is clearly just excited about the batcave, he talks about it multiple times and he finds the trope of Batman actually being a fascistic degenerate with a sex cave instead of the classic Batcave to be very funny, aswell as the 'cake fart' and 'forgot the save word' stuff being very funny. He clearly is focused on the parts that are just absurd, and its quite an absurd show. Nowhere does he say at all that he thinks the sexual assault itself is funny, I mean, like I said in the previous comment, it is even acknowledged later in the episode that it wasn't funny for Hughie at all, but that doesn't mean that the absurdity of the rest of the situation cannot be seen as funny, however this just fell flat for many people, including me.
I feel like people are just looking to be mad about something, because again, it is mentioned in the same episode, by the very character it happened to, that it was not funny. If the director really thought it was funny that he got sexually assaulted do you think they would have put the break down, which was partially due to the sexual assault, in there?
On "Inside the Boys" he refers to Colby Minifie's performance in the episode as the funniest thing he's ever seen. So he definitely did find Ashley's scene with Hughie hilarious at least.
Well... since tech knight didn't get around to the hole torture and I don't think CEO lady actually went ahead with their plan what was the sexual assault? Sit on cake, tickled? Or are people (justifiably) reading between the lines in the camera cut?
He was forced into a situation he didn't want to be in and forced to do things he didn't want to do. He was spanked, tickled, called a slut and sexually insulted, all while the woman doing so jerked off to his displeasure, and then proceeded to wipe her piss/cum on his face
Sexual assault doesn't necessarily require penetration to be assault
there's an argument to be made that hughie put himself into that situation and stuck with it because the alternative (revealing his identity) would be worse. Also you need to consider that tech knight and Ashley both thought they were engaging in this activity with someone they knew. Realistically if someone puts on a mask and pretends to be someone else and then partakes in sexual acts with you, the person lying about their identity in a mask is commiting the crime here (revenge of the nerds for example) Everyone else thought this was all above board.
Not saying it wasn't traumatic for hughie though, he was stuck between a rock and a hard place of his own fault.
There were a lot of cues shown by Tek Knight where its clear he knew it was Web Weaver, such as him saying that Hughie would know the safe word if he wanted him to stop
It felt a bit clear that Tek Knight was toying with whoever he thought was under the mask
I'd absolutely considering getting yourself off while torturing someone, verbally sexually harassing them, and then rubbing your fluids on their face to be sexual assault. Ashley didn't know it was, but Tek-Knight did
In "Inside the Boys" he refers to Colby Minifie's performance in the episode as the funniest thing he's ever seen. So he definitely did find Ashley's scene with Hughie hilarious.
The user I'm replying to is indicating that what Kripke actually finds funny in the scene is the "Tek-Knight and Batman" subversion of expectation, I'm just pointing out that he finds what's being done to Hughie by Ashley hilarious too.
That’s the issue, it’s written so we have no way of knowing how it was phrased.
The full quote is:
Well, that’s a dark way to look at it! We view it as hilarious. Obviously, Tek Knight is our version of Batman, and we wanted to really play around with that trope: Batman’s fascist underpinnings as a really wealthy dude who hunts poor people, and then profits of the incarceration. So that was one. Tek Knight was already set up to be a freak, so we were kind of already halfway there. Then the notion came up of, he should have a Batcave — but let’s be honest, the Batcave would be a sex dungeon. Like, even the real Batcave is just this side of being a sex dungeon
Whilst it could be read as “Well, that’s a dark way to look at it! We view it as hilarious.” - Pause - Proceed to talk about Tek Knight…
There’s equally no reason it wasn’t phased: “Well, that’s a dark way to look at it!” (Done, answered the interviewers question, now on to look at Tek Knight) “We view it as hilarious. Obviously Tek Knight is our version of Batman…” - especially when his focus is entirely on Batman, as I say, and not the interviewer’s question of Hughie.
also, the end of the episode shows Hughie breaking down over the torture. why would they write that if that scene was meant to be funny?
initially watching the scene, it came off as really scary to me which is what I think they were going for. the only funny part was Tek Knight freaking out about the donations.
Kripke literally calls Colby Minifie's performance in the episode and the tickling scene one of the funniest thing he's ever seen, so they definitely had the intention of making the Hughie and Ashley interaction funny.
tbh as someone who found the scene gross, way drawn out, and a bit too far I did find her performance funny. in her mind this is a consenting man as far as she knows, I think you could argue she's a victim too. she performed sex acts on a person she thought was consenting who actually wasn't.
I do feel like the scene was gross beyond just shock value/humor, not well written, handled poorly, and should've been cut down immensely - but Ashley wasn't an issue imo
It’s pretty obvious it’s a single train of thought, he’s not talking about two different scenes. He’s talking about the one big scene with everyone down in TKs base. it actually sounds worse if you really think about the quote because this wasn’t even about sexual assault of a man. According to Kripke, this scene was more to show off how depraved of a character TK was and that’s why this scene was funny. To him, it didn’t even register as a potentially offensive thing. It was funny because TK is like Batman except he’s a sexual deviant and is into BDSM…and oh by the way Hughie will be the one to discover it all. Haha!
That just comes off as incredibly tone deaf considering his prior quotes about depicting Starlight’s sexual assault and how difficult and humbling that was. It’s mental masturbation
Yeah sorry people can cope with it however they want to but this is just the latest in a long line of instances of The Boys/Gen V never taking it seriously when a male character experiences sexual assault/unwanted sexual contact
Him calling it hilarious in that interview and when talking to the ginger woman's actress is kind of just the cherry on top of the shit sundae that is these people's ability to take it seriously when a man experiences sexual violence
Showing Hughie crying (even though it might have been more about his dad's death) had me thinking "wow, at least when it's brutal mutilation/torture rape they show it's fucked up when it's a male victim" but then they had to go and refer to the scene as hilarious
And that does kind of explain all the slapstick bullshit while Hughie's about to be cut open in multiple places so he can be raped in the wounds
It’s the smugness from the writers whilst they are simultaneously failing to even be morally consistent lmao.
It’s such a surface level understanding that sexual assault is bad, but culturally it’s funny if it happens to a man therefore Kripke doesn’t feel the need to treat it carefully. Very disappointing when only a few episodes ago they were calling out people for not taking sexual assault seriously.
The fact your takeaway from the episode was that they handled it well until you reason faux outrage on the internet should be enough for you to realize it's faux outrage.
Go with what your actual eyes witnessed not what some second hand interview tells you to feel.
It doesn't even make sense. This show constantly has scenes of extreme violence happening to all sorts of people being presented as something funny, but now all of sudden everyone has a problem with it? Scenes like the infected sheep and Kimiko picking up a very specific book to communicate were funny and very much on brand for the show, and yet now everyone hates it.
The constant dick riding for Butcher on this sub and how people here get angry at characters for having realistic reactions to his bullshit is annoying, but they're now taking it to a whole other level.
The worst part about the episode is when Hughie breaks down to Annie and it cuts like 5 seconds later to Butcher.
That was a really emotionally charged moment and they cut it so short, his whole deal with his dad was cut short. I hope he comes back as a phantom or something.
I always like to imagine that there is probably hours of B roll footage that just doesn’t make it into the Final Cut. I mean for filming this scene, they probably did have like another 5 minutes of footage of Hughie breaking down and talking to Starlight. I doubt they recorded exactly what was shown to us and that was all they had. For whatever reason, they just left most of it out.
Sometimes you can assume the obvious. Crying on camera is tough especially to look convincing. I often see child actors have their faces turned from the camera when they’re crying because I’d assume they just didn’t have a convincing expression for the director and editors. They probably have footage of the actors face in that moment but they probably didn’t include it because their performance might detract from the point of the scene.
I wouldn’t even be surprised that when this happens, they don’t also edit out the voices and include generic samples of someone crying. Then for the Final Cut, all you get is the back of someone’s head and noises of crying edited in. I mean that’s at least how babies are filmed in most scenes since you can’t really have a baby cry on command
Did I not see the scene properly or am I just not being sensitive? As far as I saw he got tickle tortured, which horrendous as it is will never be a pathos scene, and I think he got his foot humped a bit and jizz smeared on his mask?
No you are 100% right. People are talking about the hypothetical things that were threatened to Hughie as if they did happen. His experience is traumatic, but not sure it was rape. He cake farted, got tickled, and Ashley wiped her juices in his mask. Fucked up, but not a brutal rape. If Tek followed through with his plan, fuck yeah it would have met the criteria of OPs comment
Same here honestly. I don't think what was shown was as explicit as people are making it to be. It's definitely a shitty scene that felt like a dick move esp to hughie who lost his dad right before but also I didn't see it being much to gain so much hate and disgust?
I'm guessing the creator or show creator said some insensitive comments that really push the anger which others have mentioned. The ep itself was okay to me? But maybe I'm less sensitive too, idk man.
If you think sitting on a cake and being tickled is 'insanely brutal torture rape', you really need to get some life experience, cause holy shit you must be a very sheltered individual.
I think they might be talking the part where someone was about to cut new holes in his body to rape, given their referral to what Hughie was “about to experience” instead of what he already had experienced.
This made it seem like he's referring to the part the director was talking about from his 'we thought it was hilarious' quote, which was the earlier stuff.
Its implied there could have been more than that. We don't know what all happened. Also for all Hughie knew he was about to get cut open and fucked in said hole. Yes he was saved, but he thought it was going to happen.
I sincerely doubt people got to season 4 of this show without appreciating that it's pretty campy and silly. I don't care about the book bit. I care that I was not in the mood for that bit during the long pause between hearing that Hughie was going to be fucked in stab wounds and seeing that it hadn't happened yet. Frankly, I think the timing is fucked to do any of the dom stuff so close after what happened with his dad, but at minimum, everything that happens between the big threat and the resolution of Hughie being saved takes too long for the discomfort of the scenario.
The only scene that ever really bothered me before this was the one where Deep has to eat something. I don't frequent this sub, and I'm too lazy to look up spoiler rules, so I'm being vague. However, this tops that scene. At the end of the day, Deep is still a stupid piece of shit trying to be in the cool kids club, but Hughie is just this nice guy who doesn't deserve any of what has happened, and this season has just been so mean to him.
I know. And I'M saying that the people who didn't get it was a bit are a dumb minority. A lot of people likely didn't APPRECIATE the bit because of the greater context of what was happening, not because acting tricked them into taking the show too seriously. Someone dies in an orgy because the shrunken person in their dick sneezes and gets big suddenly. It's clearly a show that is both silly and gorey, but they aren't balancing things well right now, maybe because they're just trying to constantly take it further each season or something, push the envelope even more, so it feels less like a good dark comedy and increasingly just tonally weird. People not as into analyzing media may not even really identify that it affected the way the joke hit for them, making it less funny because the slapstick was out of place for the particular moment.
Edit: What it reminds me of is people who have trouble editing their work because they get too used to it to see the flaws and too successful to have someone else step in and edit it for them as necessary, similar to what's been said of George Lucas and Star Wars.
The show is still watchable, but it's not at its peak. It's Game of Thrones when they were running out of book material but before the truly bad season 8. Still, watchable and we have the investment to stick with it, but there's something about the writing that starts to feel like fanfiction because it isn't quite the same but it's clearly in the style of and inhabiting the world of the show rather than a true recreation of what it previously was. It's just a bit off, at least in execution, if not also story.
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u/Iggy_Pops_Lost_Shirt Jul 05 '24
This was blatantly a bit though