Gen V Series: The Unholy Offspring of The Boys

What began as a roast of the superhero genre with The Boys continues as an attempt at woke ideology through the Gen V series on Amazon Prime Video. Generation Vought is gratuitously gory and needlessly cavalier about violence.

Gen V also has an unsubstantial and so-so plotline which comes across as a faint echo of The Boys series. But there are solid action sequences, a cast that looks stunning, and some great acting.

The Plot of Gen V Series

Gen V or Generation Vought alludes to the fact that all superheroes in the Vought universe are MADE from compound V and not born. This series revolves around the newest generation of compound V-powered superheroes that literally go to superhero school. The premise here is, considering how flawed their superhero mentors are, how effed-up will their successors be?

I wonder if the practice of rating the superheroes in the superhero school in a top-100 rating system refers to the dated American Idol series. All superpowered students do anything they can to get into the top 10 so that they can get into the Seven at Vought.

The very first scene of the first episode deals with a lot of disgusting blood and guts where Maria Moreau discovers the terrible potential that is stored in her being. The entire scene is deliciously disorienting where you see blood doing things it's not supposed. The closest thing to it would be the Aether or the reality stone in the MCU.

What can you look forward to in this spinoff of the clearly successful "The Boys" series - at first you think it's just a glimpse of the characters from the original series. But when you patiently watch the first few episodes of the series you confirm the same. Although it does get interesting with each episode and it probably will tee up a big cross-over team-up.

You get to see a lot of pandering to the youngins in this series, with an ambitious attempt at explaining bisexuality through a character. The character is named Jordan Li and is played by two people - the cute-as-a-button London Thor and the handsome Derek Luh.

Jordan Li is bi-gendered where they can switch between genders in a second. I think conceptually this is a good way to explain bisexuality, but I'd love to hear what you guys think.

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The Cast of Gen V

Gen V has an exceptionally good-looking cast ranging from Jaz Sinclair who plays Marie Moreau ( cool name btw) to Patrick Schwarzenegger who plays Luke Riordan/Golden Boy (on-the-nose much?).

There's also Maddi Phillips playing the Telepath Cate Dunlap and the Antman equivalent Emma Meyer played by Lizzie Broadway.

Andre Anderson played by Chance Perdomo gives out a real Victor Stone vibe even though he possesses the power of psycho-kinesis.

The entire cast does a bang-up job of acting, with almost zero bad performances even if the script and screenplay slows down in a few places.

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Season 1 of Gen V

Gen V is a bit like beer in that it will be an acquired taste for those who aren't familiar with The Boys series on which this is based. Even if you are a big fan of The Boys like me, it still takes a lot of patience to sit through the first few episodes which seem mindless.

You get to see the supe underdog Marie Moreau getting into Superhero school shortly after you see her traumatic childhood. Statues of superheroes are strewn all around the Godolkin University of Crimefighting from Crimson Countess and LampLighter to The Deep and more. I have to assume this is a clear attempt at depicting how we idolize those we shouldn't.

Next, you see the young supes socializing with others while something shady goes on in the lower levels of the supe school. The shady place is called "The Woods" and the shady thing is experimentation.

One scene I like is when the band of young superheroes at Godolkin all are sucked into a mass delusion and can't seem to separate reality from thought. This is when they are trying to uncover why they are all losing chunks of time from their days without any memories to account for them.

What I like about this series is how different powers can be leveraged to win in a fight, much like when I play the mobile game Shadow Fight 4. I used to play Mortal Kombat 3 when it first came out with my friends all the way till MK 11 I think - it was hours of fun.

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While the series is engaging, I am worried about the message this sends out to the younger generation about the use of violence. But gore seems to be central to the plotlines of The Boys and Gen V and I hope it pays off. Not too thrilled about using an Indian as the big bad in this series although her motives do have a gleam of redemption.

So far, moral ambiguity is far more prevalent than it was in The Boys with the youngins looking to do the right thing and failing most times. Also, as expected, there are a lot of sex scenes, what with them being randy teenagers and all.

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Should You Watch It? Maybe

Unlike The Boys, Gen V comes with a lot of background story and the payoff is not immediate. There is no new ground being broken in this spin-off with identical plotlines with microscopic changes to the story.

If you are into exploring new series or are a fan of The Boys, this might be a good watch for you. Since the series is still in play, I can't fully recommend you watch this series.

If you are bored and like superhero content, check this out.