Just Glad To Be Here

Someone worded this better than I could - the beauty of Antony’s Starr’s portrayal of Homelander is that he had no other performance / interpretation to base it off of.

He had the comics (bad and also different) and a vague “Superman but evil”. He had to (or rather got to) craft the character into his own vision of who Homelander should be, with very little to go off of.

Every choice made is Starr’s interpretation to who Homelander should be.

Kripke even said by season 5 Antony was deciding most of the character moments for Homelander that Kripke had forgotten about - for example it was Antony who added that Homelander would try to impress his dad by drinking bourbon, because at the end of the day Homelander himself is still a child seeking approval. That kind of brilliance was all Starr, with very little influence or direction, at least in the beginning.

It would not be wild to say Antony Starr’s Homelander rivals Heath Ledger’s Joker as the best superhero villain in filmed history. That isn’t to say he *wins* necessarily (obviously it’s hard to compare a 5 season show vs. 1 movie).

Kripke’s problem is that Homelander has to take on two conflicting roles in the show.

Homelander is, regardless of Kripke’s intention, one of the most interesting and complex villains maybe in recent TV history, an exploration of capitalism and corruption and how victims transform into abusers.

AND he’s a satirization of Donald Trump.

In spite of what everyone else is saying - I think Homelander begging pathetically is the ending we needed for him. Too many people misunderstand what he is supposed to represent, and that kind of power will ALWAYS go out self-serving and pathetically.

But it’s unfortunate that for that to happen, we have to disregard his first identity as related to the story. Vought and Stan Edgar standing tall, as realistic as it may be, is not as hopeful as Kripke may think it is.

is it perfect? absolutely not.

are there valid criticisms around the show perpetuating racial stereotypes? absolutely.

but that was truly one of the first shows that had a predominant female / feminine cast, where female / feminine characters were the “default”, where there wasn’t a “token girl”, where there were LESBIANS and they KISSED and GOT MARRIED, that centered positive mental health lessons such as the importance of grounding, feeling our emotions, letting go, processing grief