The Boys Creator Promises Final Season Will “Blow the Doors Off” Fan Expectations

As Amazon’s hit superhero satire The Boys enters production on its fifth and final season, showrunner Eric Kripke is both thrilled and anxious about bringing the series to a close, promising major changes to the show’s universe while acknowledging the pressure of crafting a satisfying conclusion. Speaking in an interview with EW, Kripke emphasized how knowing the endpoint has liberated the creative team. “It’s just such a gift to know, as a filmmaker anyway, when your story’s ending because you know when to just blow the doors off it and completely change the world of the show,” he said. “You don’t have to maintain it because you’ve got six more seasons. You’ve got to squeeze out of it that it’s time to bring on the endgame. So, that’s what that finale was built to do.”

The Season 4 finale, which aired July 18, deliberately set up the endgame, with Homelander (Antony Starr) successfully transforming America into his personal kingdom. “Instead of having a villain talk about a thing they’re going to do, which then our heroes stop from coming to pass, it’s just so fun that he really did it,” Kripke explained. “He took over the country. It’s his country now. What does that look like in Season 5, and how do our characters fight against it? Which has led to a lot of fun in the writer’s room. I’m really excited with what we’re coming up with.”

However, in a candid interview with Collider during a For Your Consideration interview for Season 4, Kripke revealed his apprehension about crafting the perfect ending. “You can count the amount of truly great series finales on one hand. It’s so hard to land that plane, much less we’re landing eight different planes,” he noted. “I am appropriately respectful and have an appropriate amount of trepidation for how hard that job is. I’m not walking into it cocky at all. I’m walking into it like, ‘Okay, let’s second and triple guess every single decision because we really wanna land this plane.’”

The final season will build on major character developments from Season 4, including what Kripke describes as Hughie (Jack Quaid) “solidly learning what it means to be human” and Butcher (Karl Urban) “completely committing to being a monster.”

[Related: The Boys Creator Reveals First Set Photo From Final Season]

The creative team is embracing complete freedom in crafting the conclusion. “Anything can truly happen,” Kripke added. “We’re both having fun and absolute terror in the writers’ room, at the same time. It’s so fun to have all guardrails off. You’re not beholden to maintaining any storyline or character beyond this season. Nothing and no one is safe, and that’s really liberating and fun.”

While The Boys may be concluding, the franchise continues to expand. Gen V, the college-set spinoff, has been renewed for a second season, and a new prequel series, Vought Rising, featuring Jensen Ackles’ Soldier Boy and Aya Cash’s Stormfront, was announced this summer.

Kripke expressed excitement about the prequel’s historical setting, noting, “No one’s really done a period superhero show that deals with U.S. history, with Joseph McCarthy and Judy Garland and Ronald Reagan and Hoover. I think it’s just such a fascinating idea for a show whether The Boys existed or not.”

The showrunner emphasized that spinoffs “were not even a twinkle in my eye” when he started work on The Boys season 1, and each must stand on its own merits. “Quality control to me is the most important thing, that each one of these series is fun to watch on its own. It doesn’t need the other one to exist.”