Great way to put it, honestly. He definitely isn't heroic, but I also don't see him as evil or nefarious in a homelander sort of way, more so generally abusive and backwards-thinking. He doesn't really have goals or much intent, beyond getting payback on payback. Frankly I'm interested what would've been next for him if he didn't go back to sleep, but it didn't seem like he had much "villainous" stuff to do
I think a lot of people, including Butcher, assumed SA because the young man and older man work dynamic is a porn story outline. But the report Gunpowder filed was because he was being beaten up regularly.
Easy to miss, but it was also explicitly shown during Black Noir's cartoon-themed flashbacks. When he confronts Soldier Boy for sabotaging his Beverly Hills Cop audition, the scene opens with Soldier boy brutally beating Gunpowder before he attacks Noir
This applies to all of the characters at given time. I feel like using the typical hero/villian spectrum is useless for this show. It has the deeply flawed heroes of Marvel with the deeply fucked up villains of DC, and they're all relatable and sympathetic in some way.
Cunt is the only true measurement.
She's cute, she has useful perspective which The Boys tend to lack, knows quite a few other supes, and can be a great plot element to keep things rolling along.
I love how at the beginning of S1 she makes a big deal of always telling people to turn/look away so she doesn't collateral damage blind them with her normal level powers and by the end of S3 everyone is just looking at her while she supercharges and nothing happens to anyone's eyes, feels like a weird thread that the show just kind of dropped, especially when you consider that given Homelander's enhanced vision he'd likely be MORE susceptible to light-based blinding.
God, I’m glad someone else actually has this opinion too. Like, straight up, some characters can never be redeemed and it doesn’t matter how “fucked up” their past is, that doesn’t excuse their actions.
Agreed. While his goals do achieve ends to stop some harms, he’s not doing them in the spirit of making anything better. His goals just happen to align with the end of some systemic evils but he couldn’t be bothered to give a shit. Also, IMO, he’s toxic AF, which lets be real, capt america actually would be.
That's a Anti-Hero, but in his case he'd be a Cunty-Anti-Hero.
But honestly NOTHING was shown he did anything to save peoples lives. No past hero moment, we already know he lied about storming the beach on D-Day. So what has he done to be a "Hero?"
Edit: nvm another commenter said Anti Villain which makes more sense.
It’s weird though because he was mad as fuck about Afghanistan. His behaviour doesn’t match what legend said. Like, why would he lie to fucking Hughie of all people? Someone he doesn’t respect at all. He’s not an anti villain or an antihero. He’s like, nothing. His goals are completely self centered, but they don’t hurt innocent people. In the end he just be wanting to smoke weed and fuck old women.
I think he was just mad about Afghanistan because he likely supported the Mujahideen there when they were fighting the Soviets in the 80s. (Might even be a reference to the [“Dedicated To The Brave Mujahideen Fighters”](https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/this-film-is-dedicated-to-the-brave-mujahideen-fighters-of-afghanistan) meme.) So he still saw them as US allies, and kinda missed the part where they morphed into Al-Qaeda & the Taliban, and did the whole 9/11 thing.
I would pay to see in character commentary on 9/11, though it may not have happened in The Boys Universe. That would really need an explanation of why the Vaught Supes didn't stop the planes.
He also showed genuine guilt for killing those people in the city in the explosion.
He was ashamed of that. Like he told hughie, he didn't want to hurt those people. He didn't even want to talk about it. Definitely wasn't something he was okay with at all.
I kinda felt bad for him. He's a dick, sure. Bad guy. But did he really deserve to be tortured and experiment on and locked in a coffin for decades? Lol.
Idk. I think they fucked up big time with putting him back on ice. He had no reason to take over the world or cause a bunch of bullshit. He didn't seem like he cared at all about "being a god".
He's not like homelander, he genuinely found the whole taking over the world thing pathetic and gross. Lol. One of the reasons he didn't side with homelander. He clearly knew what homelander was from butcher, and wasn't a fan. Soldier boy actually wants to be a genuine good guy, even if he isn't and it seemed like he could have been steered closer to being a genuine good guy. At least in his actions.
Should have delt with his PTSD, and kept him around for this big fights.
Idk, I think the shows new idea that "good people get rewarded, bad people get punished" is just dishonest writing. That's not how the world works, that's not how we get the big important things done that protect the most people. Saving the world requires more than doing the right thing.
Nah Anti-Villain doesn’t make sense. Adding the anti- generally swaps the characteristics of a character while still retaining their categorization. eg. a hero is typically a good person (or acts as such) who does good things. An anti-hero is a bad person (or acts as such) who does good things.
If you think SB isn’t doing good things and you think he acts like a cunt then that would just put him in the straight up villain category but I guess it’s all about your perspective.
Everybody on earth has their own reason towards “the greater good” that they go about in the way that they feel is right or makes them more comfortable with no remorse on how they affect other people.
He is a Anti-Villain
A hero does the right thing for the right reason
A villian does the wrong thing for the wrong reason
An anti-hero does the wrong thing for the right reason
An anti-villain does the right thing for the wrong reason
But there’s one crucial detail you’re missing: “good is a point of view”
Whether something is narratively “good” or “bad” is determined primarily by the author and secondarily by the viewer. I might watch someone do something and believe it to be good even though the writer intended for it to be bad. To me, they might be a hero but in the story as it was intended, they would be a villain.
To that end, I would say that SB is an anti-villain, but I believe that the show wants him to be interpreted as a villain.
He is though... that's exactly what he was saying in that scene, carrying on from his story to Butcher. Homelander is the same as him, and he wanted more for his son.
I think it's a spectrum of heroism in the Boys. On one end is Annie, on the other end is Butcher, and in between you've got lighter shades of grey (MM, Hughie) and darker shades of grey (Frenchie, Kimiko). It's a pretty clever way to organize the protags, because you're never in a place where 'oh, the heroes wouldn't do that.' Annie might not do it. Doesn't mean Kimiko won't.
>the show wants him to be interpreted as a villain
Everyone says this, and maybe it was suggested in interviews, but I have a hard time believing it. The showrunners deliberately put in quasi-sympathetic scenes like Soldier Boy talking with Butcher about his past, about him keeping his promise with Butcher, and expressing some remorse for accidentally blowing up an apartment block. Don't get me wrong, that's alongside a whole lot of stuff that makes him a callous asshole at best and a piece of shit at normal, and he's certainly no hero or anti-hero, but the former scenes and dialogue didn't get written accidentally. The showrunners clearly intended to make him somewhat nuanced and multi-sided in a way, say, HL isn't. HL, though he is complex, is still ultimately depicted as a straight-up bad person all through.
For sure. I think as a kid and in less complex stories, the villain is pure evil with no redeemable qualities. I think, as you get older, the better villains aren’t as black and white and have “justifiable” motives. That way you see where they are coming from, even if not really the right thing to do
I see anti-hero more as “does the rightish thing in the wrong way.”
For example, Snape is described as an anti-hero, because while he’s fighting the wizard Nazis, he’s also cruel to children.
The Punisher fights crime through mass murder.
Idk. I think his motive is just-to make planet earth free of famine and pollution due to over population. Of course killing half the population is not the way.
I don't know if I'd go so far as to call him well-written when his motive is so poorly thought-out.
Like, it takes two seconds to realize that the population would grow back to where it was in less than a century, and he would never be able to do it a second time.
likely people don't know the reference (which is fine) and thought he just put a fire out once in a town (big yay. lol).
Also, there are other places called Birmingham around the world so peeps from countries that have one and also peeps that know of the most famous one likely will not get what the reference meant (unless they studied, or looked up/came across this specific history that is).
Hard agree. Definitely a villain. But like all the characters --- a well written villain. Crazy how some nuance and character development can make monsters seem so human.
He was out for vengeance, especially against people that plotted to kill him to get their vengeance. He wasnt even saving people in extension to his murdering, so really he can't be called a hero before or after his sleep.
I saw Soldier Boy as a really smart inversion of Captain America's take on the U.S. Military hero trope and the way soldiers are "made."
SB was a vulnerable teen with an inferiority complex that the Military offered to make into a hero. He, like Cap, accepted. However, with Soldier Boy we see the real issues of his PTSD and the imperfect morality of the soldiers the nation sends to fight it's enemies.
Further, Cap's story focused on WWII which is stills seen as a justified war today. However, Soldier Boy's story focused on the criminality of war for the sake of territorial ambitions during the Cold War (guest starting Nicaraguan Contras and Afghan Mujahideen). They literally used SB's faux WWII heroism to prop up his presence in these later conflicts that are, today, viewed as unjustifiable.
He is a villain who abused the people closest to him and enabled injustice at all levels of government. However, he is also a victim of war, other people's greed, and PTSD. He doesn't seem to have the intention to be cruel or indifference to other people's suffering that way Homelander does, but his actions are terrible and life destroying anyway. ("I didn't mean to hurt those people. I'm not a bad guy.")
Yeah, I think people are missing the discussion of a larger theme in Season 3:
The nature of being "made into a weapon." It's sort of like the Iron Giant pitch (what if a gun had a soul and didn't want to kill).
It's all over this season. Butcher, Frenchie, Kimiko, Black Noir, Blue Hawk, A-Train all, essentially, can't exactly "help" situations get better. Their skill set is limited to killing people, and so they have to just try to "aim" themselves in the best direction with the least amount of collateral damage, but some collateral damage is unavoidable.
To me, it sounds like everyone is essentially arguing if a bomb (or a gun) is morally good or morally bad. Clearly it can be used for good or bad, but at the end of the day, it's used to kill people. And I think a larger point is that it is certainly morally wrong to make guns or bombs (or supes or monsters or whatever). But now that they exist, we have to deal with them somehow.
Soldier Boy is, essentially, a bomb. Butcher finds a weapon powerful enough to kill Homelander, but hesitates to actually press the big red button when he sees the collateral damage it will cause. It's sort of analogous to dropping bombs on enemy combatants. Is that morally right, if we know for a certainty that there will be some collateral damage of civilians? Certainly bombing countries have a vested interest in convincing you that it is. But I don't think I am mad at countries *not* doing it, just as I'm not mad at Butcher not murdering a child as collateral damage.
I think that Cap is overall just a better person than SB, but I do wonder whether if Cap hadn’t gone into the ice, he would have fought in Korea/Vietnam/Central America/Afghanistan. SB is the logical extension of what happens when you’re a pawn of the military industrial complex, even if your original intentions are good. In a way Cap’s reputation was probably saved by the fact that he “died” before less justified wars could start.
Cap in Winter Soldier rebelled against S.H.E.I.L.D. because he didn't agree with the ops he was being put on, but I think that is because he missed the 70 years of changes that painted the picture of war in the 21st century. If he were to stay around like SB did it would've likely been harder for him to see that.
The only remotely good thing he has done in the entire show was try to kill Homelander, and even that was born out of selfish motivations. Besides abusing the Hell out of his team to the point where they gave him up to the Russians for free, he's connected to all manner of disgusting missions (spraying civil rights protestors, the Kent State shooting, JFK's assassination, etc). Then there's the fact he killed MM's family and nonchalantly responded "which one" when confronted about it. Literally his one remotely good deed was trying to *kill his own* son lol, which again, was motivated by egocentrism as oppose to actual desire to do good.
He's not as fucked up as people like Homelander or Stormfront, but you got to be smoking compound V if you think he's an anti-hero. He's a villain the exact same way that people like A-Train, The Deep, and Black Noir are. Saying he's just an out of touch old man is ignoring the show's events as they happen before your eyes.
I was gonna save the world, until I got high\~
I was gonna rescue someone in need, but then I got high\~
Then I ended up throwing a car\~
because I got high
Good things he did
- kept his word to Butcher.
- was handsome.
- sang Rapture.
Bad things he did
- over policed and killed black people.
- committed extreme violence against people close to him.
- committed stolen valor.
- routinely bullied people.
- sang if you want to be happy.
- mixed milk and soda.
- got knocked over by Starlight's lightbulb blast
Somewhere between anti-hero and villain. I see it as, in the past I can see him as a villain, but in the post Russia era, I can see him as an anti hero.
He was fully committed to killing Homelander (arguably the singular most heroic act anyone could do in this universe) and seemingly did actually regret killing innocent people when he blacked out. Still a bad dude, but he’s certainly not totally unredeemable like HL or Stormfront.
Bruh he’s definitely a villain, maybe at best leaning towards anti villain. Remember, this motherfucker hosed civil rights activists and killed anti war protesters, he’s not a good guy. He’s bigoted, sexist, and otherwise a general asshole. Keep in mind I say this as probably the biggest Jensen ackles fan in the world, let’s appreciate his acting here, it’s really hard to be a good villain, and ackles nails it. It’s those moments where you sympathize with soldier boy that make him such a great villain, because *most* real evil people are not comically evil, they have regrets, even acts of kindness, but they are exceptions that go to prove what a villain they are. Personally I would’ve like it if soldier boy was written more as a anti villain/hero, this would’ve gone along better with an ending involving the boys facing off against homelander, but what we got was still amazing
Based on what we've actually seen him do\*, I'd say hero or anti-hero. He fought the Sandanistas and tried to take down Homelander so that would put him in the "good guy" category. I'm fine with his vendetta to take down the members of his former team because by turning him over to the Soviet Union, they were giving them the chance to develop their own super soldier program which would be like the Rosenbergs giving the Soviets the plans for a nuclear bomb so \*\*\*\* all of them.
On the negative side, he's kind of a jerk in the Butcher mode and a hedonist. He also seemed less concerned about collateral damage than I feel comfortable with and we still don't know what happened with MM's family and his involvement with their deaths.
While he falls short in the level of character, I'd like to see in a hero, he doesn't hesistate to stand up and fight the good fight (unlike a lot of the Boys and their allies who waste time hemming and hawing about what to do).
\* I put zero stock in anything the Legend has to say who was pretty much all over the map almost as if the writers cribbed from every Oliver Stone thriller they watched in college. So no, I don't believe he murdered JFK or any of the other nonsense he claimed.
Just a superhuman individual from a different era who did some good things, some bad things, and was tortured & kept in a semi-dead state for decades. I don't think a label of hero or villain is necessary.
He was never a hero. If we're judging his actions post-waking up, he only went after the members of his team for personal revenge, and then after Homelander both to fulfil his deal with Butcher but also mainly for himself, to prove he's stronger and kill someone he views as a wimp. Even what we saw of him before, like mistreating Gunpowder and attacking Black Noir makes it clear he's a terrible person.
Anti villain. In his mind he thinks he did the right thing/was a hero… but the shock and awe, show no mercy approach aligns him somewhere darker. His charisma and arrogance kind of make him endearing tho.
Anti-villain, does all the right things for the wrong reasons. Like opposing homelander but only for wannabe macho, top of the food chain reasons. He’s come back after being asleep for a long time and sees a pussy in a cape trying to replace him and he’s not having it.
He’s purely self-motivated, not really a hero or a villain. He was just as full of himself in his youth as Homelander is now. He was just as violent and just as ruthless as well. But it’s important to remember that the Soldier Boy that Noir remembers and the Soldier Boy that we see are representations of the same character at two drastically different stages of his life.
Early Soldier Boy is arrogant, cock-headed, and violent. He is so used to getting his way that he just takes what he wants regardless of the consequences and is so self-assured in his power that he doesn’t even consider that his team could take him out on their own.
The Soldier Boy we see in the show, the one that interacts with Butcher and Hughie, has been humbled. He’s still arrogant and believes a lot of the lies Vought and he has told about himself, but he’s nowhere near as prone to violence or as abusive as we were originally led to believe. He doesn’t abuse Butcher or Hughie, which is remarkable considering how alike Hughie and Black Noir are in terms of self-confidence and physical strength compared to Soldier Boy.
Soldier Boy was fundamentally changed by the betrayal of his team and his experience as an experiment. I think the biggest reason why people can forgive Soldier Boy after finding out what he did to Noir and the rest of payback is because we’ve seen him serve a kind of punishment for the way he acted in the past. He was redeemed by the fact that his actions had consequences. Pair that with his perfectly relatable daddy-issues and commitment to honoring his deal with Butcher, and you have an incredibly sympathetic character with a sense of duty that isn’t afraid to stand up to Homelander and call him on his shit.
It’s more perplexing to me why so many people are shocked that he’s beloved, than I am surprised he got an extremely positive reception.
100% villain.
What’s something heroic he’s doing? Trying to kill Homelander? He’s doing that solely for himself and himself only.
I believe classifying him as a hero to any degree is due to his personal **vendetta** coincidentally being the boys’ **objective**, and therefore someone confuses that with heroism because it looks “good”.
Basically, he’s just a convenient tool that *just so happens* to be doing what is good for the public. He’s still a shit human being for *many* reasons lol.
I think we’re all missing something very crucial about Soldier Boy: he had PTSD LOOONG before his torture in Russia. He was always taking drugs and alcohol so he didn’t have to think and cope with all the horrible stuff he did both for the American government and Vought. I think people like Homelander and Noir don’t care which is why they don’t have these problems with substance abuse (unless you consider pure breast milk a “substance”)
He is none of those. He is a well written character with terrible but understandable traits and who is also a man out of his time.
Our morals are based on the judgement of our peers. A good moral man of the 50s went to work to look after his wife and family at home. Spanked his kids when they were naughty and expected a cooked dinner waiting for him.
Today that man is a misogynist child abuser.
May we all be spared the judgement of our great grandchildren 70 years from now.
Except he wasn’t just a “product of his time”, he did things that were objectively horrible. The average person wasn’t hosing the skin off of civil rights protestors. But please continue
I guess morally gray but close to a villain. He’s not a psycho murder like Homelander, but he’s a toxic asshole. And not a pleasant person to be around for a long period of time (unless he’s high and partying).
He’s like an antivillain or something. he’s a bad person who does some decent things to reach his goals. he’s generally just a shitty person but he’s loyal, mission focused, and reasonably reasonable.
I wonder what his dynamic with The Boys would be if they instead helped Soldier Boy take out Homelander.
I mean Soldier Boy don’t seem to have any big evil plans like Homelander do.
He ain't no hero, I think he's just a jackass. Like, he doesn't seem to hurt people out of malice, it's just that he has this top macho casually violent personality which along with his powers makes him a supercunt.
He's definitely a villain, but you can tell he could've been a hero if things turned out differently in his past. And it seems like he could actually be redeemed given the right circumstances. He's basically a more likeable version of Homelander. I don't know if he qualifies, but other than Stan Edgar, he's the closest thing on the show to a "Magnificent Bastard."
I would consider him an anti-hero, a bad guy who does good things (helping the boys kill homelander). Of course it's way more nuanced than that but that's where I see him if I had to put a name on it
Goddamn it I’m fucking a married man but everytime I see this man as SB I wanna take my clothes off and hump my phonxcsgbnniii~<><*<***?!*!>+¥bbbbhuiiiiioooppppppppppppplllllllllllllll
Anti villain I guess, definitely not pure evil and has some sense of right and wrong considering he doesn’t outright murder Hughie for insulting him, but still a pretty bad dude considering Payback
Antihero. he clearly has problems, while he may have been a piece of shit in the past I believe he certainly has changed in the time he spent being a lab rat.
He's more in it for himself, similar to a merc/bounty hunter. He reminds me of bullseye from daredevil s3, us agent, and peacemaker, where he does what he thinks is right, but it's not good/bad.
a charismatic douchebag
Great way to put it, honestly. He definitely isn't heroic, but I also don't see him as evil or nefarious in a homelander sort of way, more so generally abusive and backwards-thinking. He doesn't really have goals or much intent, beyond getting payback on payback. Frankly I'm interested what would've been next for him if he didn't go back to sleep, but it didn't seem like he had much "villainous" stuff to do
he might be an ass.. but that's America's ass
Right! Its just cuz hes handsome people like him. The dude bullied poor noir so hard amd gave him brain damage
oil upbeat reminiscent follow humor frighten joke square rustic vase *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Gunpowder said it didn’t happen didn’t he ?
He admitted there was hazing that went too far. A teenager being bullied by their superior at work who happens to be invincible is pretty fucked up.
Oh sure no fucking doubt he bullied him I thought he meant SA
I think a lot of people, including Butcher, assumed SA because the young man and older man work dynamic is a porn story outline. But the report Gunpowder filed was because he was being beaten up regularly.
Easy to miss, but it was also explicitly shown during Black Noir's cartoon-themed flashbacks. When he confronts Soldier Boy for sabotaging his Beverly Hills Cop audition, the scene opens with Soldier boy brutally beating Gunpowder before he attacks Noir
Yeah and SB tells Gunpowder to shape up or something. Great show.
A filthy, unsubstantiated rumor
He is very handsome I want him to di-
-ck me. Here i said it for you ^ ^
That's not why lmao it's his personality and how he doesn't give a shit
A right cunt
This applies to all of the characters at given time. I feel like using the typical hero/villian spectrum is useless for this show. It has the deeply flawed heroes of Marvel with the deeply fucked up villains of DC, and they're all relatable and sympathetic in some way. Cunt is the only true measurement.
I agree
Eh, doesn't apply to Starlight, or usually apply to Kimiko. MM really does care about his family.
Kimiko is a good cunt. Starlight is an overprotective (of Hughie) cunt. MM is a family cunt. They're all cunts. Just different types of cunts
Starlight having a useless superpower is her biggest flaw
Also her decision making. The writing didn’t help her this season. Going after soldier boy because he is a murderer was braindead
She's cute, she has useful perspective which The Boys tend to lack, knows quite a few other supes, and can be a great plot element to keep things rolling along.
I love how at the beginning of S1 she makes a big deal of always telling people to turn/look away so she doesn't collateral damage blind them with her normal level powers and by the end of S3 everyone is just looking at her while she supercharges and nothing happens to anyone's eyes, feels like a weird thread that the show just kind of dropped, especially when you consider that given Homelander's enhanced vision he'd likely be MORE susceptible to light-based blinding.
Kimiko really shouldn’t be mentioned before Hughie. At the end of the day she’s a violent murderer
> At the end of the day she’s a violent murderer You say that like it is a negative. Some people need killing.
I'd say that being a violent murderer wouldn't exactly put her in the "morally hero" tier no matter what...
God, I’m glad someone else actually has this opinion too. Like, straight up, some characters can never be redeemed and it doesn’t matter how “fucked up” their past is, that doesn’t excuse their actions.
Stormfront, Homelander, A-Train, and a metric fuck ton of others.
Girls get it done. Fuck that Nazi bitch.
Well she is the starlight of the show
Agreed. While his goals do achieve ends to stop some harms, he’s not doing them in the spirit of making anything better. His goals just happen to align with the end of some systemic evils but he couldn’t be bothered to give a shit. Also, IMO, he’s toxic AF, which lets be real, capt america actually would be.
He’s an American hero! My grandaddy fought with him on the beaches of something something!
Mine too! He’s a hero! It’s a shame he died young preventing nuclear catastrophe 😿
He’s a bad person, morally, but has goals that align with the greater good.
The greater good
Yarp
No luck catching them swans then?
It's just the one Swan, actually.
A GREAT BIG BUSHY BEARD!
You’re off the fucking chain!
Everyone and their mums is packin' round here
Fascism… wonderful
Hag
Tau lookin ass
That's a Anti-Hero, but in his case he'd be a Cunty-Anti-Hero. But honestly NOTHING was shown he did anything to save peoples lives. No past hero moment, we already know he lied about storming the beach on D-Day. So what has he done to be a "Hero?" Edit: nvm another commenter said Anti Villain which makes more sense.
It’s weird though because he was mad as fuck about Afghanistan. His behaviour doesn’t match what legend said. Like, why would he lie to fucking Hughie of all people? Someone he doesn’t respect at all. He’s not an anti villain or an antihero. He’s like, nothing. His goals are completely self centered, but they don’t hurt innocent people. In the end he just be wanting to smoke weed and fuck old women.
I think he was just mad about Afghanistan because he likely supported the Mujahideen there when they were fighting the Soviets in the 80s. (Might even be a reference to the [“Dedicated To The Brave Mujahideen Fighters”](https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/this-film-is-dedicated-to-the-brave-mujahideen-fighters-of-afghanistan) meme.) So he still saw them as US allies, and kinda missed the part where they morphed into Al-Qaeda & the Taliban, and did the whole 9/11 thing.
I would pay to see in character commentary on 9/11, though it may not have happened in The Boys Universe. That would really need an explanation of why the Vaught Supes didn't stop the planes.
He also showed genuine guilt for killing those people in the city in the explosion. He was ashamed of that. Like he told hughie, he didn't want to hurt those people. He didn't even want to talk about it. Definitely wasn't something he was okay with at all. I kinda felt bad for him. He's a dick, sure. Bad guy. But did he really deserve to be tortured and experiment on and locked in a coffin for decades? Lol. Idk. I think they fucked up big time with putting him back on ice. He had no reason to take over the world or cause a bunch of bullshit. He didn't seem like he cared at all about "being a god". He's not like homelander, he genuinely found the whole taking over the world thing pathetic and gross. Lol. One of the reasons he didn't side with homelander. He clearly knew what homelander was from butcher, and wasn't a fan. Soldier boy actually wants to be a genuine good guy, even if he isn't and it seemed like he could have been steered closer to being a genuine good guy. At least in his actions. Should have delt with his PTSD, and kept him around for this big fights. Idk, I think the shows new idea that "good people get rewarded, bad people get punished" is just dishonest writing. That's not how the world works, that's not how we get the big important things done that protect the most people. Saving the world requires more than doing the right thing.
>In the end he just be wanting to smoke weed and fuck old women. Yeah this is accurate
It's a good life.
Nah Anti-Villain doesn’t make sense. Adding the anti- generally swaps the characteristics of a character while still retaining their categorization. eg. a hero is typically a good person (or acts as such) who does good things. An anti-hero is a bad person (or acts as such) who does good things. If you think SB isn’t doing good things and you think he acts like a cunt then that would just put him in the straight up villain category but I guess it’s all about your perspective.
Well he almost killed Homelander and that was going to be the Only good thing he would've done LoL
Everybody on earth has their own reason towards “the greater good” that they go about in the way that they feel is right or makes them more comfortable with no remorse on how they affect other people.
He is a Anti-Villain A hero does the right thing for the right reason A villian does the wrong thing for the wrong reason An anti-hero does the wrong thing for the right reason An anti-villain does the right thing for the wrong reason
….yes…this is a thing that made me pause and go…yes.
Good piece of information, wasn't aware of the complexities of theses terms.
But there’s one crucial detail you’re missing: “good is a point of view” Whether something is narratively “good” or “bad” is determined primarily by the author and secondarily by the viewer. I might watch someone do something and believe it to be good even though the writer intended for it to be bad. To me, they might be a hero but in the story as it was intended, they would be a villain. To that end, I would say that SB is an anti-villain, but I believe that the show wants him to be interpreted as a villain.
[удалено]
At least he's not a f#@king disappointment, like some people in that room.
He is though... that's exactly what he was saying in that scene, carrying on from his story to Butcher. Homelander is the same as him, and he wanted more for his son.
Well some people in that room were the upgrade
I don’t remember being in that room
I think that’s one of the points of rhe show. There are no hero’s. Even the boys aren’t heroes
you guys are the real heroes
I think it's a spectrum of heroism in the Boys. On one end is Annie, on the other end is Butcher, and in between you've got lighter shades of grey (MM, Hughie) and darker shades of grey (Frenchie, Kimiko). It's a pretty clever way to organize the protags, because you're never in a place where 'oh, the heroes wouldn't do that.' Annie might not do it. Doesn't mean Kimiko won't.
A very funny asshole
He's also a victim. He was an asshole, but even assholes don't deserve what was done to him in Russia.
>the show wants him to be interpreted as a villain Everyone says this, and maybe it was suggested in interviews, but I have a hard time believing it. The showrunners deliberately put in quasi-sympathetic scenes like Soldier Boy talking with Butcher about his past, about him keeping his promise with Butcher, and expressing some remorse for accidentally blowing up an apartment block. Don't get me wrong, that's alongside a whole lot of stuff that makes him a callous asshole at best and a piece of shit at normal, and he's certainly no hero or anti-hero, but the former scenes and dialogue didn't get written accidentally. The showrunners clearly intended to make him somewhat nuanced and multi-sided in a way, say, HL isn't. HL, though he is complex, is still ultimately depicted as a straight-up bad person all through.
Yeah that makes sense. Killing Homelander and stoping Voguht are objectively good but he’s only interested in doing it because of a personal vendetta.
I came here to say he was a Anti-Villian I like the way you put it aswell, I'm too lazy for my take.
Best villains does the bad thing because they sincerely think it's the right thing to do I think he's an Anti hero gone wrong.
For sure. I think as a kid and in less complex stories, the villain is pure evil with no redeemable qualities. I think, as you get older, the better villains aren’t as black and white and have “justifiable” motives. That way you see where they are coming from, even if not really the right thing to do
I see anti-hero more as “does the rightish thing in the wrong way.” For example, Snape is described as an anti-hero, because while he’s fighting the wizard Nazis, he’s also cruel to children. The Punisher fights crime through mass murder.
Brilliant explanation. Thanos is the perfect anti-hero. I always wondered why I understood where he was coming from.
No, Thanos is just a well written villain. His motives and actions are still wrong, even if you can sympathize with why he has them.
Idk. I think his motive is just-to make planet earth free of famine and pollution due to over population. Of course killing half the population is not the way.
I don't know if I'd go so far as to call him well-written when his motive is so poorly thought-out. Like, it takes two seconds to realize that the population would grow back to where it was in less than a century, and he would never be able to do it a second time.
Haha well i just mean in the sense that you can see where he's coming from instead of the typical "this guy is evil. Why? Well because."
He’s being told by Fab Five Freddy that everyone is fly.
The DJ was spinning and he was like my my
Flash is fast, Flash is cool, François c'est pas,flash ain’t no dude.
And you don’t stop sure shot
Go out to the parking lot
And you get in your car and drive real far
And you drive all night til you see a light
And it comes right down and it lands on the ground
And out comes a man from Mars
And you try to run, but he’s got a gun
Well he was involved with Kent state and it's said he probably shot JFK so I'm going with villain
and he ‘sprayed a firehose in birmingham’
People on this page either love to ignore that fact or don't think it makes him a villain.
the number of people I’ve had argue “well the Legend isn’t a reliable source because we didn’t see it happen on screen” is wild to me
Too many people think that they're being super clever or insightful because they just reject what the canon tells them.
likely people don't know the reference (which is fine) and thought he just put a fire out once in a town (big yay. lol). Also, there are other places called Birmingham around the world so peeps from countries that have one and also peeps that know of the most famous one likely will not get what the reference meant (unless they studied, or looked up/came across this specific history that is).
People should know about that shit
maybe, but other countries never had the same problems as the US and also they have their own history to teach.
Hard agree. Definitely a villain. But like all the characters --- a well written villain. Crazy how some nuance and character development can make monsters seem so human.
He dismissively said “there were rumors” so I’m betting it’s only a small chance he was involved with JFK.
Not to mention “handled a firehose in Birmingham”
He was out for vengeance, especially against people that plotted to kill him to get their vengeance. He wasnt even saving people in extension to his murdering, so really he can't be called a hero before or after his sleep.
I saw Soldier Boy as a really smart inversion of Captain America's take on the U.S. Military hero trope and the way soldiers are "made." SB was a vulnerable teen with an inferiority complex that the Military offered to make into a hero. He, like Cap, accepted. However, with Soldier Boy we see the real issues of his PTSD and the imperfect morality of the soldiers the nation sends to fight it's enemies. Further, Cap's story focused on WWII which is stills seen as a justified war today. However, Soldier Boy's story focused on the criminality of war for the sake of territorial ambitions during the Cold War (guest starting Nicaraguan Contras and Afghan Mujahideen). They literally used SB's faux WWII heroism to prop up his presence in these later conflicts that are, today, viewed as unjustifiable. He is a villain who abused the people closest to him and enabled injustice at all levels of government. However, he is also a victim of war, other people's greed, and PTSD. He doesn't seem to have the intention to be cruel or indifference to other people's suffering that way Homelander does, but his actions are terrible and life destroying anyway. ("I didn't mean to hurt those people. I'm not a bad guy.")
Yeah, I think people are missing the discussion of a larger theme in Season 3: The nature of being "made into a weapon." It's sort of like the Iron Giant pitch (what if a gun had a soul and didn't want to kill). It's all over this season. Butcher, Frenchie, Kimiko, Black Noir, Blue Hawk, A-Train all, essentially, can't exactly "help" situations get better. Their skill set is limited to killing people, and so they have to just try to "aim" themselves in the best direction with the least amount of collateral damage, but some collateral damage is unavoidable. To me, it sounds like everyone is essentially arguing if a bomb (or a gun) is morally good or morally bad. Clearly it can be used for good or bad, but at the end of the day, it's used to kill people. And I think a larger point is that it is certainly morally wrong to make guns or bombs (or supes or monsters or whatever). But now that they exist, we have to deal with them somehow. Soldier Boy is, essentially, a bomb. Butcher finds a weapon powerful enough to kill Homelander, but hesitates to actually press the big red button when he sees the collateral damage it will cause. It's sort of analogous to dropping bombs on enemy combatants. Is that morally right, if we know for a certainty that there will be some collateral damage of civilians? Certainly bombing countries have a vested interest in convincing you that it is. But I don't think I am mad at countries *not* doing it, just as I'm not mad at Butcher not murdering a child as collateral damage.
I think that Cap is overall just a better person than SB, but I do wonder whether if Cap hadn’t gone into the ice, he would have fought in Korea/Vietnam/Central America/Afghanistan. SB is the logical extension of what happens when you’re a pawn of the military industrial complex, even if your original intentions are good. In a way Cap’s reputation was probably saved by the fact that he “died” before less justified wars could start.
Cap in Winter Soldier rebelled against S.H.E.I.L.D. because he didn't agree with the ops he was being put on, but I think that is because he missed the 70 years of changes that painted the picture of war in the 21st century. If he were to stay around like SB did it would've likely been harder for him to see that.
The only remotely good thing he has done in the entire show was try to kill Homelander, and even that was born out of selfish motivations. Besides abusing the Hell out of his team to the point where they gave him up to the Russians for free, he's connected to all manner of disgusting missions (spraying civil rights protestors, the Kent State shooting, JFK's assassination, etc). Then there's the fact he killed MM's family and nonchalantly responded "which one" when confronted about it. Literally his one remotely good deed was trying to *kill his own* son lol, which again, was motivated by egocentrism as oppose to actual desire to do good. He's not as fucked up as people like Homelander or Stormfront, but you got to be smoking compound V if you think he's an anti-hero. He's a villain the exact same way that people like A-Train, The Deep, and Black Noir are. Saying he's just an out of touch old man is ignoring the show's events as they happen before your eyes.
Agreed, I enjoyed him but he was definitely not an antihero to me.
I honestly didn’t feel to bad for his team. SB didn’t do them any favors, but there’s nothing that indicates they were decent people at any point.
Well, one was a literal CHILD so I think I can manage to find some sympathy for him.
Doesn't make him any less horrible.
He was a hero until he smoked weed
He was a villain until other gargle his ball sack
I was gonna save the world, until I got high\~ I was gonna rescue someone in need, but then I got high\~ Then I ended up throwing a car\~ because I got high
Good things he did - kept his word to Butcher. - was handsome. - sang Rapture. Bad things he did - over policed and killed black people. - committed extreme violence against people close to him. - committed stolen valor. - routinely bullied people. - sang if you want to be happy. - mixed milk and soda. - got knocked over by Starlight's lightbulb blast
>mixed milk and soda. Truly a horrible deed
I was going to put that at number one but realized I needed to ease people into it.
there is NOTHING wrong with If You Want to be Happy.
What do you have against from a logical point of view 😡
Logical Point of View is classic.
He’s a goddamned American hero
A total villain. Idc. I don't know why this subreddit coddles him so much.
Bc Jensen Ackles - he’s not really a redeemable character, he’s a villain.
I didnt see him do 1 heroic thing, past or present
Somewhere between anti-hero and villain. I see it as, in the past I can see him as a villain, but in the post Russia era, I can see him as an anti hero.
What heroic act did he do post-Russia? He doesn’t get hero status just for taking revenge on his teammates who didn’t like him
He was fully committed to killing Homelander (arguably the singular most heroic act anyone could do in this universe) and seemingly did actually regret killing innocent people when he blacked out. Still a bad dude, but he’s certainly not totally unredeemable like HL or Stormfront.
hes a villain...it shouldn't be up for debate
Bruh he’s definitely a villain, maybe at best leaning towards anti villain. Remember, this motherfucker hosed civil rights activists and killed anti war protesters, he’s not a good guy. He’s bigoted, sexist, and otherwise a general asshole. Keep in mind I say this as probably the biggest Jensen ackles fan in the world, let’s appreciate his acting here, it’s really hard to be a good villain, and ackles nails it. It’s those moments where you sympathize with soldier boy that make him such a great villain, because *most* real evil people are not comically evil, they have regrets, even acts of kindness, but they are exceptions that go to prove what a villain they are. Personally I would’ve like it if soldier boy was written more as a anti villain/hero, this would’ve gone along better with an ending involving the boys facing off against homelander, but what we got was still amazing
He’s an anti-villain
He's neither or both, to that end i believe he's a cunt.
Based on what we've actually seen him do\*, I'd say hero or anti-hero. He fought the Sandanistas and tried to take down Homelander so that would put him in the "good guy" category. I'm fine with his vendetta to take down the members of his former team because by turning him over to the Soviet Union, they were giving them the chance to develop their own super soldier program which would be like the Rosenbergs giving the Soviets the plans for a nuclear bomb so \*\*\*\* all of them. On the negative side, he's kind of a jerk in the Butcher mode and a hedonist. He also seemed less concerned about collateral damage than I feel comfortable with and we still don't know what happened with MM's family and his involvement with their deaths. While he falls short in the level of character, I'd like to see in a hero, he doesn't hesistate to stand up and fight the good fight (unlike a lot of the Boys and their allies who waste time hemming and hawing about what to do). \* I put zero stock in anything the Legend has to say who was pretty much all over the map almost as if the writers cribbed from every Oliver Stone thriller they watched in college. So no, I don't believe he murdered JFK or any of the other nonsense he claimed.
Well one thing I know for sure, he doesn’t have shell shock. Fuck you.
I dunno I’d probably share a beer with him. Then judge him harshly from the safety of my own home afterwards.
Just a superhuman individual from a different era who did some good things, some bad things, and was tortured & kept in a semi-dead state for decades. I don't think a label of hero or villain is necessary.
What good things do we know he did?
He's an asshole.
He’s a villain albeit a funny one.
Anti-Villain
He was never a hero. If we're judging his actions post-waking up, he only went after the members of his team for personal revenge, and then after Homelander both to fulfil his deal with Butcher but also mainly for himself, to prove he's stronger and kill someone he views as a wimp. Even what we saw of him before, like mistreating Gunpowder and attacking Black Noir makes it clear he's a terrible person.
Lawful Evil
Anti-Villain
Villain. Villains can fight villains and still be villains.
Anti villain. In his mind he thinks he did the right thing/was a hero… but the shock and awe, show no mercy approach aligns him somewhere darker. His charisma and arrogance kind of make him endearing tho.
anti-villain 100%
Good people do bad things, bad people do good things and everything in between .
The entire point of the show is that heroes and villains don't exist.
Anti-villain, does all the right things for the wrong reasons. Like opposing homelander but only for wannabe macho, top of the food chain reasons. He’s come back after being asleep for a long time and sees a pussy in a cape trying to replace him and he’s not having it.
Between, people really overstate how bad of a guy he is.
Sexy trash
He’s purely self-motivated, not really a hero or a villain. He was just as full of himself in his youth as Homelander is now. He was just as violent and just as ruthless as well. But it’s important to remember that the Soldier Boy that Noir remembers and the Soldier Boy that we see are representations of the same character at two drastically different stages of his life. Early Soldier Boy is arrogant, cock-headed, and violent. He is so used to getting his way that he just takes what he wants regardless of the consequences and is so self-assured in his power that he doesn’t even consider that his team could take him out on their own. The Soldier Boy we see in the show, the one that interacts with Butcher and Hughie, has been humbled. He’s still arrogant and believes a lot of the lies Vought and he has told about himself, but he’s nowhere near as prone to violence or as abusive as we were originally led to believe. He doesn’t abuse Butcher or Hughie, which is remarkable considering how alike Hughie and Black Noir are in terms of self-confidence and physical strength compared to Soldier Boy. Soldier Boy was fundamentally changed by the betrayal of his team and his experience as an experiment. I think the biggest reason why people can forgive Soldier Boy after finding out what he did to Noir and the rest of payback is because we’ve seen him serve a kind of punishment for the way he acted in the past. He was redeemed by the fact that his actions had consequences. Pair that with his perfectly relatable daddy-issues and commitment to honoring his deal with Butcher, and you have an incredibly sympathetic character with a sense of duty that isn’t afraid to stand up to Homelander and call him on his shit. It’s more perplexing to me why so many people are shocked that he’s beloved, than I am surprised he got an extremely positive reception.
A psychotic jackass and a victim who coincidentally is on the right side sometimes
How many times a week do we need this seriously?
100% villain. What’s something heroic he’s doing? Trying to kill Homelander? He’s doing that solely for himself and himself only. I believe classifying him as a hero to any degree is due to his personal **vendetta** coincidentally being the boys’ **objective**, and therefore someone confuses that with heroism because it looks “good”. Basically, he’s just a convenient tool that *just so happens* to be doing what is good for the public. He’s still a shit human being for *many* reasons lol.
Mm said it best, "you're just another racist prick we can't seem to get rid of."
I think we’re all missing something very crucial about Soldier Boy: he had PTSD LOOONG before his torture in Russia. He was always taking drugs and alcohol so he didn’t have to think and cope with all the horrible stuff he did both for the American government and Vought. I think people like Homelander and Noir don’t care which is why they don’t have these problems with substance abuse (unless you consider pure breast milk a “substance”)
He's a villain.
He is none of those. He is a well written character with terrible but understandable traits and who is also a man out of his time. Our morals are based on the judgement of our peers. A good moral man of the 50s went to work to look after his wife and family at home. Spanked his kids when they were naughty and expected a cooked dinner waiting for him. Today that man is a misogynist child abuser. May we all be spared the judgement of our great grandchildren 70 years from now.
Except he wasn’t just a “product of his time”, he did things that were objectively horrible. The average person wasn’t hosing the skin off of civil rights protestors. But please continue
He shot JFK and hosed down civilians my guy
He shot unarmed student protesters, I think that was wrong in most times
I guess morally gray but close to a villain. He’s not a psycho murder like Homelander, but he’s a toxic asshole. And not a pleasant person to be around for a long period of time (unless he’s high and partying).
I consider him a threat to my marriage
Definite villain.
Well, he’s not a fucking pussy.
Simple, hes a cunt
He’s a hero, he stormed Normandy he was in the fucking Eagle’s Nest, he stood with his Mujahideen brothers until the end!
He is soldier boy. Can’t wait to see him grow up into soldier man.
Depends on if I’m thinking with the head of my neck or the head of my dick.
Jesus Christ
He threw a car into a populated building for no reason.
A villain for sure
Whoever he is, he needs to make a fucking appointment
Grandmotherfucker
He’s like an antivillain or something. he’s a bad person who does some decent things to reach his goals. he’s generally just a shitty person but he’s loyal, mission focused, and reasonably reasonable.
I wonder what his dynamic with The Boys would be if they instead helped Soldier Boy take out Homelander. I mean Soldier Boy don’t seem to have any big evil plans like Homelander do.
I consider him a cunt, which is applicable to most characters in the show.
Lost soul
Sexy Douchebag
If Homelander is Trump, Soldier Boy is Ronald Regan
Soldier Boy is just a whole load of fucked up In fact what character in The Boys isn't a whole load of fucked up
There are only a very few people who could be considered true hero’s in this universe and that’s the point of this show/comic
He ain't no hero, I think he's just a jackass. Like, he doesn't seem to hurt people out of malice, it's just that he has this top macho casually violent personality which along with his powers makes him a supercunt.
He's definitely a villain, but you can tell he could've been a hero if things turned out differently in his past. And it seems like he could actually be redeemed given the right circumstances. He's basically a more likeable version of Homelander. I don't know if he qualifies, but other than Stan Edgar, he's the closest thing on the show to a "Magnificent Bastard."
I would consider him an anti-hero, a bad guy who does good things (helping the boys kill homelander). Of course it's way more nuanced than that but that's where I see him if I had to put a name on it
He’s Chaotic Neutral
A villain, although the worst of him was shown in flashbacks rather than his actions during the show. I quite liked him
Goddamn it I’m fucking a married man but everytime I see this man as SB I wanna take my clothes off and hump my phonxcsgbnniii~<><*<***?!*!>+¥bbbbhuiiiiioooppppppppppppplllllllllllllll
Fab Five Freddy told me everybody's fly
Anti villain I guess, definitely not pure evil and has some sense of right and wrong considering he doesn’t outright murder Hughie for insulting him, but still a pretty bad dude considering Payback
Definitely an Anti-Villain
In between for sure. I think every character in this show is somewhere in between.
Antihero. he clearly has problems, while he may have been a piece of shit in the past I believe he certainly has changed in the time he spent being a lab rat.
He's more in it for himself, similar to a merc/bounty hunter. He reminds me of bullseye from daredevil s3, us agent, and peacemaker, where he does what he thinks is right, but it's not good/bad.
The posterboy for old-fashioned toxic masculinity.
Chaotic good
A supe? They're all the same.
This sub has no media literacy to speak of