Jack Quaid’s Hughie Campbell went on an undercover mission in a parody of the Batcave in the sixth episode of ‘The Boys’ Season 4 last week. Colby Minifie’s Ashley and Derek Wilson’s Tek Knight sexually assaulted Hughie in one scene, and he later mentioned feeling violated to Erin Moriarty’s Annie.
The episode drew large criticism on social media for treating male sexual assault as a joke. Variety’s Jennifer Maas questioned Eric Kripke on his decision to include the scene in a chat after its release. The writer said:
“Well, that’s a dark way to look at it! We view it as hilarious. Obviously, Tek Knight is our version of Batman, and we wanted to really play around with that trope: Batman’s fascist underpinnings as a really wealthy dude who hunts poor people, and then profits off the incarceration. So that was one. Tek Knight was already set up to be a freak, so we were kind of already halfway there.”
He added:
“And in the comics, there’s a great storyline where Hughie goes undercover disguised as a superhero. That was a story that Jack had always asked us to do. So part of it is, always be careful what you ask the writers for. Then we finally had this Webweaver character and the idea of Spider-Man going down to be kink tickled in the Batcave is just too good to pass up. I’m sorry, I just couldn’t leave that on the table.”
The Backlash Against Kripke And The Series
Forbes’ Erik Kain wrote an article criticizing both the controversial scene and the writer’s attitude towards it following Kripke’s interview. He wrote:
“Kink tickled? I’m sorry, this wasn’t ‘kink’ this was entirely non-consensual. The fact that the show’s creator views it as ‘hilarious’ and waves it off as some kind of funny sex dungeon scene is more disturbing than the scene itself.”
Many of the show’s fans agreed with Kain’s point on X. Someone commented:
“I’m so glad I’m not the only one that’s noticed how much ‘The Boys’ cast and showrunner are just openly glorifying sexual assault. Such bold ignorance, stupidity and hypocrisy on full display here…”
A user described the showrunner’s words as ‘incredibly gross and tone deaf,’ while another noted:
“Very interesting that such a left-leaning progressive show like ‘The Boys’ would feature an extended r*pe scene with the male protagonist that’s played for laughs….? Especially weird because earlier seasons went out of the way to explore the trauma of SA with women.”
‘The Boys’ has two more episodes left. The Prime Video show is set to return for a fifth and final season in the upcoming years.
