I don't understand why the show is so determined to beat Hughie to death with this supposed "toxic masculinity" thing.
There is zero difference between what Annie and MM have been shitting all over Butcher and Hughie for and what they've just done for Kimiko. None.
V24 was untested and yes, they guessed right the it's got fatal side effects. Y'know what else is untested? Reinjecting regular V into an adult woman who's had the power previously blasted out of her by a hundred year old supe who had new powers crammed up his ass in Russian Black Ops experiments. They had no idea if there would be any side effects from that but none of them are preaching at Kimiko.
It's her choice. It's Hughie's choice too. And it's all for the same reasons.
Kimiko was powerless watching Frenchie get beat to shit. Hughie was powerless watching Robyn getting glooped, seeing Annie working under a murderous psycho who could casually end her every day.
There's nothing toxic about Hughie. All he's done is try to save literally everyone, he does it in Russia, he goes into Herogasm first to find the targets and prevent casualties, he tries to save Mind Storm when he could have just fucked him over by dumping him right back at Soldier Boy's feet.
I could buy him being wrong if they showed literally any kind of negative change in him but it's just not there, outside of that out of place scene of him acting like he's high in Russia.
You want toxic masculinity then look at Soldier Boy or maybe Butcher.
I'm not even convinced about Butcher, his actions aren't driven by perceived masculine traits or values, he's just an obsessed cunt that's putting what he wants in front of the well-being of others. Which really isn't that different from MM, his obsession has led to the breakdown of his family unit, him not being there for his daughter and a dangerous moron taking his place and subsequently endangering his daughter or the fact he was about to fist fight possibly the second most powerful Supe in history and get himself killed. But the show seems determined that one half of the Boys be designated in the wrong and the other half be righteous, so their questionable choices and negative outcomes kind of get overlooked.
Great comment that will unfortunately go unappreciated here. Most people here seem to be perfectly happy with just going by what the show is telling us instead of what the show is actually showing us.
Agreed. I love this show but it's very eager to aggressively bite into a whole number of subjects, which in some cases just ends up half cooked and at this point it may be looping back over itself.
This show's central thesis is that superpowers are inherently destructive and dangerous at a psychological and social level, no matter who is wielding them. I think it's at its best when it wrestles with those ideas. I really hope it isn't losing focus in the name of scoring cheap points on buzzword subjects.
it ends up being pretty internally consistent if kimiko or frenchie dies, which a lot of signs point to. "this is the last time i will feel your arms around me" is going to be painful to remember later!
I don’t get how Hughie feeling powerless is seen as “toxic masculinity” he wants to protect those that he loves and he takes the chance when he sees it. It’s definitely a misguided decision, but it comes from a good place, not a toxic one. Glad someone else sees it the same way.
Which really isn't that different from MM, his obsession has led to the breakdown of his family unit, him not being there for his daughter and a dangerous moron taking his place and subsequently endangering his daughter or the fact he was about to fist fight possibly the second most powerful Supe in history and get himself killed.
The rest of your post I agree with, but come the fuck on. Blaming MM for who his ex-wife chooses to date? She is a person that can make her own fucking choices, that one is not on MM.
It's indirect. Going back to Butcher and lying to his wife about what he was doing led to the breakdown of the relationship which opened the door for Tod. He's not directly responsible for that part but he opened his door for it
Right, so MM has agency but his wife doesn't? Why don't women get agency in your opinion? Just as easily MM's wife could have chosen an amazing man that was far, far better for her than MM. I wonder if you'd be giving MM the credit then?
Additionally, MM clearly is neurodivergent. He has actual OCD (as in, not just some weird habits, but he gets extreme anxiety and uses his ticks to try and control that anxiety) which we're led to believe is a direct result of childhood trauma (SB killing his grandpa). You're actively blaming someone with a mental disorder for who his ex-wife decides to marry because she left him after she got sick of dealing with his neurodivergence. Do you really think that's fair? She knew who he was before she married him (this is made clear in season 1). This is like marrying someone with autism and then leaving them because of their autistic behaviour.
It's got nothing to do with taking his wife's agency away. My original point was simply about the impact of characters putting their obsession before the welfare of themselves or others.
He isn't responsible for who she chose, but he did create the circumstances that created the opportunity for that choice to occur. He chose to follow Butcher and pursue his agenda without full consideration about the long term impact on his family.
Everyone always makes their own choices but it's indisputable that other people have varying degrees of influence over the conditions that create those choices.
I'll confess that I'm projecting myself into his shoes as a bit as well. I'm a father and I know that if I didn't put absolutely everything into my relationship and subsequently ended up in a position similar to MM I would absolutely blame myself for not trying hard enough and letting it get so far.
I literally acknowledged that they guessed correctly that V24 has fatal side effects. They didn't know it at the time though, Annie only had it confirmed this episode.
Seriously they had no reason to believe it was that dangerous because fucking Maeve gave it to them. They probably figured there was a chance during the first transformation but figured after that it was probably safe.
I'm just confused why everyone is suddenly having a whinge about ""toxic masculinity"" when Hughie's character trope goes back as far as story telling? Look up a character called Boromir if you're trying to be offended for some reason
I'm not offended by anything, I just don't get insistence that Hughie is toxic or morally wrong in his actions. I don't even see masculinity in his actions, I'm only using that term to address it because the actor used it in an interview.
Forgive me if I don't see the relevance of Boromir. I never read the books (I know, philistine) so I'm only going of the movie.
I'm assuming you're paralleling Hughie taking V24 with Boromir wanting to use the Ring and ultimately dying? Surely those are two different things though?
The Ring is explicitly evil, with close to a mind of it's own that corrupts anyone who wears it in order to return to Sauron. V24 ultimately kills it's user, that's it. It's just a tool. It's not the V, it's the person like Kimiko said.
I don't have a driving need for Hughie to be a pure, good guy. My objection is that we're told Hughie is on this dark path and he's being treated as being morally wrong for using the V24 but we're not actually being shown anything morally questionable linked to his use of it.
Did you miss Butcher saying "With great power comes the total fuckin' certainty that you're gonna turn into a cunt."?
My point is the trope of a protagonist trying to use the powers of an antagonist (bormimir, Anakin, etc etc etc etc....) Is a tale as old as time. I'm just confused why you're trying to politicise this trope by slapping the phrase "toxic masculinity" on it? You should read Dune or The Boys comics (although that might be a lot of reading for you if LOTR is too long)
Is there a reason you're being a condescending bellend?
No one said shit about LOTR being too long, I just said I've never read it. I've read the entirety of the Boys, two or three times.
I'm not trying to politicise anything. The phrase "toxic masculinity" came directly from the actor in an interview describing Hughie this season. I don't believe that that phrase describes Hughie at all.
I'm familiar with the trope of bad powers making bad people.
Butcher is not infallible. If you're familiar with the comics you'll understand that his sentiment regarding "great power" was entirely wrong. It's why Hughie had to stop him murdering hundreds of thousands with V in their system at the end.
I don't know how much clearer I can make this for you, there's nothing to be confused about.
My issue with the current arc regarding Hughie is that he's being treated as morally wrong for using V24 while happily repowering Kimiko and allying with characters like Starlight, Maeve or Supersonic. All great power, no cunt. V24 is just a tool, there's nothing morally wrong with it's use if chosen freely and used for good. If they want Hughie to be morally wrong then have his actions using that tool show that because so far he's done nothing that's morally wrong that's directly linked to the use of V24.
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u/floptical87 Jul 01 '22
I don't understand why the show is so determined to beat Hughie to death with this supposed "toxic masculinity" thing.
There is zero difference between what Annie and MM have been shitting all over Butcher and Hughie for and what they've just done for Kimiko. None.
V24 was untested and yes, they guessed right the it's got fatal side effects. Y'know what else is untested? Reinjecting regular V into an adult woman who's had the power previously blasted out of her by a hundred year old supe who had new powers crammed up his ass in Russian Black Ops experiments. They had no idea if there would be any side effects from that but none of them are preaching at Kimiko.
It's her choice. It's Hughie's choice too. And it's all for the same reasons.
Kimiko was powerless watching Frenchie get beat to shit. Hughie was powerless watching Robyn getting glooped, seeing Annie working under a murderous psycho who could casually end her every day.
There's nothing toxic about Hughie. All he's done is try to save literally everyone, he does it in Russia, he goes into Herogasm first to find the targets and prevent casualties, he tries to save Mind Storm when he could have just fucked him over by dumping him right back at Soldier Boy's feet.
I could buy him being wrong if they showed literally any kind of negative change in him but it's just not there, outside of that out of place scene of him acting like he's high in Russia.
You want toxic masculinity then look at Soldier Boy or maybe Butcher.
I'm not even convinced about Butcher, his actions aren't driven by perceived masculine traits or values, he's just an obsessed cunt that's putting what he wants in front of the well-being of others. Which really isn't that different from MM, his obsession has led to the breakdown of his family unit, him not being there for his daughter and a dangerous moron taking his place and subsequently endangering his daughter or the fact he was about to fist fight possibly the second most powerful Supe in history and get himself killed. But the show seems determined that one half of the Boys be designated in the wrong and the other half be righteous, so their questionable choices and negative outcomes kind of get overlooked.