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Redemption was never an option for The Deep, explains The Boys showrunner Eric Kripke
Sometimes you gotta let bad people get a bad end to help give The Boys a satisfying finale.
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The ending of The Boys is here, and boy, do people have lots of big feelings about it. There were plenty of deaths on both sides, and there is a sense that the world is going to struggle to put itself back together. Though the newly-coined VCU is continuing with Vought Rising, we’ve seen all there is to see of The Deep. According to The Boys showrunner Eric Kripke, they were never going to give The Deep a redemption arc because he simply didn’t deserve it.
Below are some major spoilers for The Boys Season Five finale, now streaming on Amazon’s Prime Video.
It has been hinted at all season, as well as in every season of The Boys, that The Deep, this world’s Aquaman knockoff, might get a redemption arc in the future. He always seemed irritatingly close to turning on Homelander, but never quite made the jump. So, his story ends not with him finding value in being a human but in getting dropped into an ocean full of fish that are Samuel L. Jackson levels of angry at him.
“He was never going to have a redemption arc,” admits showrunner Eric Kripke in a recent interview. “I think his behavior in the pilot was really unforgivable, ultimately. And then he just proceeded to do terrible things. Now we very specifically gave him opportunities. We were giving him opportunities all the time. Just make the right choice, dude! You could honestly go off and be happy if you just accepted your love for Ambrosius, for example.”
However, The Deep, like many other bullies and insecure people in positions of power, can’t help but double down on their own bad behavior, even when faced with the inevitable consequences of their own actions. “At the very, very end, Annie gives him one last chance to just accept responsibility for the shitty shit you have done. Don’t be a baby, take responsibility,” Kripke continues. “He has this Braveheart-like cry of ‘No!’ So he’s been given plenty of chances, but he’s too oblivious and scared and believes this myth of his own machismo, and it costs him.”
If you’d like to see a terrible person get ripped apart by sharks, then maybe give The Boys Season 5 finale a watch. He won’t learn anything from the experience, but we’ll all feel a bit better because of it.
They are brash, unforgiving, and a little rough around the edges... and they're the good guys! The heroes of Prime Video's The Boys, led by Karl Urban's Butcher, go up against the 'superheroes' that is the Seven, led by Anthony Starr's Homelander, leader of the Seven. With that show's five seasons plus spinoffs such as Gen V, Diabolical, and reportedly more, there's a lot to the Boys Franchise, and we're here to help... with:
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