#even at herogasm - everyone is (rightfully) concerned that soldier boy is gonna freak out and won't be able to control himself

[lithiumache]

just finished watching 3x06. one thing about the last two episodes that stayed in my mind was the inevitable comparison between annie and hughie’s relationship and kimiko and frenchie’s relationship. both hughie and frenchie are not supes, they’re both physically weak men (in comparison to their girlfriends and also to the men around them) in love with super powerful women, they both have to deal with violence, they both have not-so-good relationships to their fathers... hell, even their names have the same cute shortening (-ie).

and yet they deal with these situations in such different ways. I think the biggest difference comes from the fact that frenchie is not interested in making himself seem powerful in the eyes of other men - he cares mostly about doing his job, and after meeting kimiko, he cares more about her safety and happiness than about any delusions of power. even when (spoilers!) nina is trying to make him feel bad and ashamed about being submissive, about taking orders so well, he is not really concerned and we as an audience don’t see any indications that he has any shame about his sexual preferences - he cares more that kimiko will think him a monster for the violent things he has actually done.

meanwhile, hughie is all ego. male ego, to be more specific. he doesn’t care about what annie wants, in fact, he ignores her multiple times. he is completely caught up in his own fantasy of being a hero, being powerful and being “worthy of respect”.  he even says in the last episode, after taking compound V, “now i can finally help!”, as if he wasn’t helping them before, as if he was useless because he was phisically weaker. in the end, his male fantasies are not so different from homelander’s. he doesn’t care about building a better world, or even about destroying supes - he cares about the way other people perceive him.

#the boys #the boys s3 #frenchie the boys #hughie the boys #the boys meta #just ranting again #but i agree with what butcher says about the way compound v serves only to reveal what was already there #power does not corrupt. it merely reveals what was already rotten inside a person #in hughie's case #a rotten ego. a rotten sense of self and a disgusting need to be seen as better and as a Strong Man #even at herogasm - everyone is (rightfully) concerned that soldier boy is gonna freak out and won't be able to control himself #and in the end it is hughie who acts like an uptight nun and almos ruins the whole ambush by picking a stupid fight with a-train #all this after a-train refuses to give him what he wants - a reason to be mad #when confronted with a-trains sincerity #hughie simply doesnt know what to do