Books: The Boys

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The Boys
Vol 1: The Name of the Game
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2007



Available now from Islington Libraries
You can reserve this item for free here:
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The Boys
Vol 2: Get Some
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2008



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You can reserve this item for free here:
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The Boys
Vol 3: Good for the Soul
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2008



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The Boys
Vol 4: We Gotta Go Now
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2009



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The Boys
Vol 5: Herogasm
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2009



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The Boys
Vol 6: The Self-Preservation Society
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2010



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The Boys
Vol 7: The Innocents
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2010



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The Boys
Vol 8: Highland Laddie
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by John McCrea and Darick Robertson
2011



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The Boys
Vol 9: The Big Ride
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by John McCrea, Russ Braun and Darick Robertson
2011



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The Boys
Vol 10: Butcher, Baker, Candlestickmaker
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2012



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The Boys
Vol 11: Over the Hill with the Swords of a Thousand Men
Written by Garth Ennis
Art by Darick Robertson
2012



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I have an unwritten rule about swearing on this blog: namely - I don't do it - and try to keep things as clean and wholesome and cussword-free as possible (like Kurt Vonnegut says in Hocus Pocus: “profanity and obscenity entitle people who don't want unpleasant information to close their ears and eyes to you.”). But I feel that I've just gotta quote the following line (from Vol 9 of The Boys) in order to help explain what these books are about - and the way I figure it - it's ok seeing how I'm not the one doing the swearing: I'm just quoting (but - nonetheless: brace yourself): (ready?): ok then:

"As the old saying goes. "With great power comes the total fuckin' certainty that you're gonna turn into a cunt."[1]

One. Yes - ok: haha. That's like the famous Spider-Man line - hell - you could even call it the Spider-Man philosophy if you wanted - or even maybe "founding tenet"? [2] - except he's swapped the bit where it goes "...great responsibility" and replaced it with some naughty words: and isn't that funny? Because it's like a reference isn't it? And yeah - for those of you that haven't read it maybe you're hoping that the whole series will be like that - and yes - don't worry - it's got loads of little comic book references for you to enjoy (yay!) [3] and plenty and plenty of swearings and bloody gory violence (because - hell - that's what comics books are for - right?).

But (and this is much more important): Two: it's also the hidden philosophy (hell yeah: "founding tenet" even) of the motivation/driving force behind everything that happens in The Boys. There's this Nine Inch Nails song Capital G (off Year Zero [4]) and a lyric that kept swimming around my head as I tried to get this down: "Don't try to tell me that some power can corrupt a person / You haven't had enough to know what it's like." Because - what these books are all about - beyond the jokes and the references and the fights - it's all about power. What it does. How it works. And how it's always messing people up in strange, ugly and nasty ways.

There's this xkcd cartoon (if you can't be bothered to click the link (but - oh my god - how lazy are you?) then: it's a roadsign that says: "you're in a box on wheels hurtling along several times faster than evolution could possibly have prepared you to go.": because - yeah - cars: they're kinda crazy and designed to travel at speeds that our bodies haven't really been built for [5]) and one of the - well - "morals" (however quaint that word sounds when talking about books that include gross-out scenes featuring - well - I've leave that for you to find out) of The Boys is that human beings just aren't really equipped to deal with too much power: that once you give them the keys to a car and the ability to go faster than they've ever been before - well - they're going to crash.

And seeing how there are superheroes spilling off every page: this means that for those willing to venture inside it's pages - we have depictions of super-powered heroes who (for a variety of reason) just aren't able to cope with their superpowers [6]. But instead of feeling sorry for them - well - see that quote up at the top again.

What I really wanted here was an extract from an Garth Ennis interview - because - having been an avid reader of his ever since - well - Preacher I guess (yeah - it's not exactly the most sophisticated comic ever written: but - hey - there was a point in time when I just a teenager ok?) - I feel like I have an understanding of some of the motivations behind why The Boys (no doubt totally wrong - but hey - whatever): of course not wanting to trawl my way through the internet in order to find the quotes I wanted I decided just to make the whole thing up [7]:

INTERVIEWER: Hi Garth. Thanks for joining us today.

GARTH ENNIS: Hi. No worries. Thanks for having me.

INTERVIEWER: So - I just wanted to talk to you about The Boys and some of the - well - motivations behind it.

GARTH ENNIS: Ok - let's do this.

INTERVIEWER: For all of us who've followed you from your auspicious beginnings writing Judge Dredd at 2000AD on to your big mainstream comics breakthrough with Preacher (well - you know - mainstream for comics) and up and beyond and into the big leagues - you've never really been one to disguise your contempt...

GARTH ENNIS: Burning hatred.

INTERVIEWER: Right. Sorry - burning hatred - for superheros: comics' genre of choice. As far as I'm aware you've never really written a Superman story or a Batman story. And in fact - the only time you've included Batman in one of your books was in Hitman which is - well - a series about a guy who...

GARTH ENNIS: Goes around killing superheroes.

INTERVIEWER: Well - yes (I'm detecting a theme here). So - I guess my first question - is what gives? Every other major mainstream comic book writer - from Alan Moore to Warren Ellis from Frank Miller to Grant Morrison - has seeming been more than happy to take on the men in tights: but the closet you ever get is with Hitman or with The Authority and your A Man Called Kev books - that only ever show superheroes through the viewpoint of a "typical bloke" - why is that?

GARTH ENNIS: Well - I don't like superheroes.

INTERVIEWER: Yeah - I get that. But where does that come from?

GARTH ENNIS: Well - thinking it over - I guess - as a comic book writer I've always really loved the comic book - well - medium and all the things that it can do - and all the different types of stories it can tell and all the genres it can tackle - and there's just something about it's narrow focus on superheroes that's always struck me as being a little - well - regressive almost. Like - it's as if comic books has been stuck in a condition of arrested development - and it's not really something that I've wanted to contribute to. I feel like - nowadays - we have enough stories about Superman and Batman and Wonder Woman and the rest of them - and I felt like - let's have some new stories and so mainly that's what I've been concentrating on - writing stories about things that interest me. Things like war and the military and men and just guys sitting in a pub and just talking about things that have some sort of relevance to my own life - not a bunch a make-believe heroes flying around in capes and stuff - I mean - that sort of stuff doesn't have any sort of meaning for my own life - and it just doesn't interest me.

INTERVIEWER: Ok - so then - what changed?

GARTH ENNIS: Well - one reason is that after all these years of being in the business - it's becoming harder and harder for me to avoid them. I mean - I haven't sought it out - but it's not like I haven't had offers to revamp this title or do this thing or whatever - but the thought of writing some kind of space epic with Madame Whatsherface and The Amazing Super-Crew - I mean - that's just not me. And the second reason is that - well - after all this time - superheroes have become more than just something that I didn't want to be part of - and more like - I dunno - a sort of totem of all the things that I just can't really stomach: they're like a really potent mix of all the worst excesses of celebrity, the military-industrial complex, American Exceptionalism and every jerk everywhere who does what they want because they're bigger than everyone else on the beach - do you know what I mean? And it sorta got to the point where all these ideas started to come together in my head and I realised that - actually - here was a story that I wanted to write about - here was a bunch of really powerful - I dunno - it was like: I had this chance to exorcise these thoughts inside me and get them down on to the page - where hopefully - you know: they wouldn't bother me anymore. You know?

The Boys then: An ever-so-slightly deranged gang of individuals who go around - basically - beating up superheroes and having the time of their life while they do it - while each trying to ignore their own dark and troubled pasts. They're the A-Team of costumed-hero take-downs. The Bash Street Kids of vigilante justice aimed exclusively at masked vigilantes. A bunch of lads - mucking around - inflicting grievous bodily harm on those who they judge to deserve it. The kind of people who attract and revel in all the wrong sorts of attention.

For all of you who've followed Garth Ennis from his auspicious beginnings writing Judge Dredd at 2000AD on to his big breakthrough with Preacher and up and beyond and into the big leagues - you'll know that he's never really disguised his contempt (hell - burning hatred) for the dominant genre of men (and let's face it - it's mainly men) in tights. (Best example before this: Hitman). And for those of us that never really understood the reasons why - The Boys is here to lay out all of the reasons why. Namely what they stand for. (And here they're a potent mixture of all the worst excesses of celebrity, the military-industrial complex, American Exceptionalism and every jerk everywhere).

With a promise from the author to "out-Preacher Preacher" presumably referring to the extreme violence and sexuality that were that series' hallmark and The Boy's constant fixation on bodily functions and bodily fluids (I defy you to read the series without once going "ewwww gross.") certain bear that out. But beneath the juvenile gross-out humour (that felt to me a little like pandering to gallery) and extended gags about sex with hamsters you'll find an intelligent (albeit pretty brutal) take-down on the idea of "the superhero" that's as thoughtful as anything else out there. See especially: the depiction of how superhumans would have dealt with the events of September the 11th (that left me feeling chilled all the way down to my bones). For a while it seems like it's just one book a mission and every mission skewers a different superhero/superhero team and then (around Vol 7) everything feels like it's coming undone and losing it's focus before - appropriately enough with Vol 9 (The Big Ride) everything starts to fall into place with tangible sense of awfulness and all the unexploded ordinance carefully left scattered around the place - well - it all starts to go off.

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[1] My original opening was slightly more ostentatious and went: "Who watches the Watchmen? Answer: The Boys." But - yeah - let's try and move past that.

[2] I'm pretty sure someone somewhere has written an in-depth analysis of what that means and stuff (this is the internet after all) - but - hell: it's all pretty simple isn't it? It's just comics and all that)

[3] I mean - I'll admit that I got a kick laughing along (oh look! It's like Batman!) but if that's all it was doing it would only all be worth reading once through and then throwing away. But having made my way through them all The Boys feels anything but disposable.

[4] No - that's not a Frank Miller Batman prequel. 

[5] Normally I would try and find some links to back this up - and a bunch of statistics to show how many car crashes there are in the world each day or something: but come on - I'm guessing by now this is just something we all know? And let's try and stay on topic (for once?).

[6] See also: Mark Waid's Irredeemable.

[7] Hey - that's allowed right? And - you know - I'm sure it helps me make my point about absolute power corrupting absolutely (making stuff up on a blog? Heavens - whatever next?).

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Links: Sean Maher's Quality Control Review, The Beat Garth Ennis Interview, Comic Book Grrl Article: The Boys: A Comic About Bad-Ass Men, Slutty Women, And *Very* Slutty Women, Tearoom of Despair Article, Playtime Magazine Article: Sex and Superheroes in “The Boys” (NSFW).

Further reading: The Authority, Preacher, Wanted, Hitman, Supergod, Transmetropolitan, Animal Man, Watchmen, Irredeemable.

Profiles: Garth Ennis.

All comments welcome.