Good catch! My eyes kinda suck (I could use some V) so I didn’t even notice it. Now that you mention it, the first set he looked at were indeed empty. This is why I need episode discussions like this.

True. Most of us are too paranoid or anti-social. (Including myself, to a fair degree.)

Likewise. Though judging from the Lemmy community for my province and it’s biggest city, maybe 3 people would show up.

A few assorted thoughts:

• I really have to stop watching this show while eating dinner. I should know better by now.
• While it was pretty obvious what was going to go down as soon as Homelander stepped into that lab, they did a great job of building the tension until the culmination of that ending scene.
• The scene where Ashley runs into A Train in Homelander’s apartment seemed a bit forced. They’re obviously setting it up so one uses it against the other, but Ashley seemed terrified of Homelander last episode. I don’t think she’d be dumb enough to risk his wrath for such petty revenge. Plus, they seem to have built up that Homelander has an uncanny sense of smell. He can probably figure out whose shit it is just by smelling it.
• The security in their private apartments seems ridiculously lax, especially being that Homelander is apparently keeping the world’s supply of V in his.
• I’m really interested to see where Butcher’s story is going, especially with what exactly happened after he blacked out.
• I suspect if any of this happened in the real world, the non-supes in The Boys would have been taken out looooong ago by Vought. But, I get it - we need to suspend our disbelief on that one for the sake of having a story.
• I guess we know what that needle thing was in the scene where Sage and The Deep were making out. That definitely defied my expectations, but was well played for her storyline.

Overall a really great episode. We’re at the halfway point in the season and things are starting to pick up.

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Jesus. Sorry about all the deleted replies. It looked like my reply was being posted as a top-level comment. Here’s what I was actually saying:

Sadly this seems completely realistic these days. Not with most mainstream media, of course, but the particular base Firecracker plays to eats that up.

That picture is forever burned into my mind when I think of Reddit.

I’d love to see one for Lemmy. I suspect it’d be largely the same except about 25% of us pasty nerds would be trans women, and there would be a lot of Linux merch on display.

Anyone pick up what the camera panned to in the scene where The Deep and Sage were making out? I couldn’t tell if it was a needle or something else.

I’m still not sure what she’s up to, but now I’m less convinced she’s planning to take down Vought from the inside, and beginning to think she’s trying to take it over for herself.

The battle request was great, but for me the ice rink scene topped it. That friggin’ song and the insanity that occurred during the chase sequence were great.

I somehow missed that but you’re right. That’s so in character for him to do after being disappointed in his son.

A few assorted thoughts:

• I was not expecting a Will Ferrell cameo, but he was great as always. That’s the perfect sort of role for his comedy style.
• Also in things I didn’t expect to see: When Frenchie and Kimiko were standing outside that sauna door. I expected them to walk in on gay sex. What I didn’t expect was an ass-eating human centipede done by the same guy. It’s like they saw that similar scene in White Lotus and said, “You know what would make this better? If instead of two guys there were 6 and they were all the same guy. Also, let’s really let the scene simmer for a bit.” Never change, showrunners.
• I knew from the last episode that A-Train was going to get a redemption arc, but I didn’t expect it to start so soon in the season. I think he’ll have a few more twists on his path before the season is up.
• It’s also becoming more obvious that Ryan is going to turn on Homelander, but it’s almost seeming too obvious. I can still see him embracing the dark side, at least until the latter half of S05.
• The look on the little girl’s face after she was “saved” by Ryan yeeting the choreographer into the wall was priceless. That kid has a bright future in acting if she can already express that sort of incredulity at such a young age.
• Of course Homelander couldn’t keep from inserting himself into his son’s first save.
• Also, HL’s reaction to Ryan crying. Of course he’s so out of touch with humanity that he thought Ryan was upset at being upstaged rather than for killing someone.
• The fight scene at the end was great, especially the setup of a bunch of dick-swinging naked men barging into the celebration with guns. Also, when Firecracker stopped mid-fight to livestream her Jewish Illuminati conspiracy theories. What I hated about that fight was when they took cover behind an overturned table while taking fire from assault rifles. I know this is a show about superheroes so I can’t expect realism, but both people there were human and that table would do jack shit to stop those bullets. It’s a super minor criticism, but that just felt lazy in an otherwise great scene.
• I still have no clue what Sage is up to. She does seem to be seeding chaos in the ranks of the Seven, so maybe she is trying to take them down from the inside.

You’re reminding me that I’ll have to prioritize watching Gen V asap. I think I’ll catch up on the current episodes of this season of The Boys and then jump over to that while I wait for ep 5 to drop next week.

Either way, you bring up some great points and seem to have a better grasp on the lore of the show than I do. As I said in my comment, I spent half the episode trying to remember all the in-progress plot points from last season, but it’s starting to come back to me.

Speaking of changed appearances… Erin Moriarty. I literally don’t think I’d be able to recognize her if comparing S01 to S04.

I’m all for people doing what they want with their own body, but that sort of plastic surgery just really makes me sad. I wonder how much of that is caused by filters and social media in general ruining people’s perceptions of what is normal.

Like, I understand if people want surgery to correct a significant disfigurement or for gender-reassignment. I’m sure there are also countless people out there with minor plastic surgery who still look great. It’s when you hate how much you look to the point where you start to make yourself look unnatural that I get bummed out. I hope if that’s really caused by some form of body dysmorphia that she’s able to find peace. If I’m wrong and that’s just genuinely the look for her, then I suppose I’m happy for her. Again, I stand by the fact that how she looks is her choice, I just can’t help but worry when someone changes their physical appearance so drastically.

I’ve spent most of this episode trying to remember what happened with the story this far as it’s been a while since I watched S03. With that being said, here are my loose thoughts (which are mostly questions):

• Was it previously established that Starlight can no longer be tracked by Vought? I assume the CIA removed her tracker but don’t remember it happening.
• Was Victoria Neumann’s supe origin ever established? She seems like she’s a naturally-born supe but Hughie made a comment where he asked her if she had shot her daughter up with V, which to me implies that she’s on V herself.
• Speaking of Neumann - her Supe status isn’t known by Vought right?
• I’m interested to see where the storyline of Homelander’s kid goes. On most shows he’d realize the truth about his bio dad and turn against him. With this show, though, I can just as easily see him going full Sith.
• It felt inevitable that Homelander would escape justice for that murder. This show parallels modern-US politics pretty brazenly, and people like that constantly escape real justice in real life.
• “An eye for an eye might be in the Jew section of the Bible, but it’s still in the Bible.” Jesus, this show never fails with quotes like that. I can literally see that being said by a modern talking head on TV.
• I really missed the Ashley Barrett character (the redhead Vought exec). That actress is so great. Her facial expression when The Deep was about to go down on A-train was hilarious.
• I don’t understand why Sage would even consider joining the Seven. If she’s that smart I feel like she’d instantly know it’s bad news. Unless maybe she feels like she can take it down from the inside, but based on her actions this episode she seems like a true believer. *The scene where Homelander ordered the other Supes to beat those guys to death, A-Train hesitated and didn’t end up directly killing anyone himself: I suspect a redemption arc in his future. I don’t expect it until late in the season though.
• That plot point also seems to heavily parallel modern conservative politics. The unwashed masses are all just tools to them, to be used and disposed of as needed.

Overall I think it’s a strong start to the new season and I look forward to seeing how it develops. I understand it’ll end after season 5, so I expect things to progressively get crazier leading up to that.

Given their infamous quality issues, robot guessing at building a car sounds about right.

Ooooooo. I haven’t listened to this in years, but it was a staple in my early 20s. I think I’ll be taking this album for a spin this week.

It seems like the consensus of this thread is that the name isn’t holding it back. That was my thinking going into it, but the article makes some very valid points such as the name (being related to a sexual and sometimes derogatory word) making it a non-starter in some organizations.

I have it installed on all our computers at work for basic image editing, but we’re a small business and never gave it much thought. I can absolutely see it being problematic in a school setting, however. More to the point, Adobe has ably demonstrated: get them hooked on your software in school and you’ll dominate the market. Imagine if kids had been learning GIMP instead of Photoshop all these years.

Anyway, I’ve got no dog in this fight. Just pointing out what I see as a valid point in the article.

Also, I like their original name possibility of IMP much better. The mascot could have been a cute little imp instead of … whatever it is now.

Good call mentioning pre-orders as well. I never did it back in the age of physical media, but there was at least a reason for it then. Now the only reason to do it is to get some bonus skins or other garbage with your buggy game.

I mean, let them try? I, for one, basically stopped buying new games (with the occasional exception for an indie dev). By the time the worst bugs are fixed, it’ll be on sale for 50% off anyway.