{"id":362002,"date":"2026-04-03T13:54:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T13:54:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/362002\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T13:54:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T13:54:08","slug":"amazon-almost-pulled-the-boys-season-4-finale-showrunner-reveals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/362002\/","title":{"rendered":"Amazon almost pulled The Boys’ season 4 finale, showrunner reveals"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Boys<\/a> is a stinging satire of American politics and culture that confronts the real-life rise of fascist nationalism<\/a> and the way America meddles in the affairs<\/a> of other nations. But sometimes, parody and reality have lined up a little too closely. In the show’s season 4 finale, originally titled \u201cAssassination Run,\u201d Homelander (Antony Starr) plots to kill the newly elected President Robert Singer (Jim Beaver). This title name was dropped in favor of the generic \u201cSeason Four Finale\u201d after Donald Trump was shot at a campaign rally<\/a> on July 13, 2024, less than a week before the episode was scheduled to be released on Prime Video. But it turns out, Amazon almost pulled the episode entirely.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt created a lot of anxiety because I directed that one,\u201d The Boys showrunner Eric Kripke tells Polygon ahead of season 5’s release. \u201cI had a lot of emotional eggs in that basket, and there was a very real possibility that they were going to delay its airing. It went all the way up the chain to Andy Jassy, the head of Amazon, and he was okay with airing it. All that came back was, \u2018Just change the title. It’s a tasteless title considering, but it’s different enough, and we will back it.\u2019 Thank God that they did. I had a really stressful 24 hours, but it all pales in comparison to the madness in the real world.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Homelander
\n Photo: Jasper Savage\/Prime Video<\/p>\n

That madness has provided Kripke with a lot of material since The Boys premiered in 2019. The news is once again driving the show\u2019s fifth and final season<\/a> which sees the Trumpian hero Homelander<\/a> running the U.S. with the help of supes running right wing talk shows<\/a> and manosphere podcasts<\/a>. Kripke says that he\u2019s found it cathartic and therapeutic to have a place to channel his frustrations about the political climate, even though it \u201cdoesn\u2019t feel great\u201d that the world seems to regularly be catching up with his outlandish plots.<\/p>\n

\u201cOutside of the people, the thing I’ll miss the most from the show is reading a maddening headline and having a place to put it, knowing that I can process it with these writers, we could broadcast it out to a couple million people. I’m not saying it moves the needle or changes the world,\u201d Kripke says. \u201cBut you had a place to process it, and now I don’t have a place to put it anymore, except to be frustrated like everybody else, and I don’t love that feeling.\u201d<\/p>\n

The first two episodes of The Boys season 5 will premiere on Prime Video on April 8. New episodes will be released weekly on Wednesdays through May 20.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Boys is a stinging satire of American politics and culture that confronts the real-life rise of fascist…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":362003,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[156,111,139,69,437],"class_list":{"0":"post-362002","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz","12":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362002"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362002\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/362003"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}