Hegelian Tragedy for The Homelander: A Character Analysis
The following is a philosophical analysis in the pop-culture space. I like the overall concept and I might write a couple more in the future. Enjoy! Amazon Prime’s The Boys has become somewhat of a cultural phenomenon – it came out towards the end of a long-running global Marvel fever in 2019, and completely flipped their altruistic (admittedly well-worn) formula on its head. With the fourth season currently underway, we have had enough time to see the birth and evolution of arguably one of the most terrifying villain characters in recent television history: the Homelander. I do not want to focus on the technical aspec ts of writing a good villain, nor do I care much about the in-universe canon elements – believe me, there are experts on the Internet who could do a much better job writing about that than me. However, on trying to analyze Homelander’s psyche, I have come to realize a particularly interesting perspective to do exactly that, and it comes from classical German philosop