The Boys Is Already Preparing You for Disappointment With Its Series Finale

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As The Boys approaches its final season, the creators acknowledge they can’t satisfy everyone. The popular Prime Video series will conclude with Season 5, a decision made by creator Eric Kripke to ensure a strong finish for the story. While ending the show now is a good thing – allowing it to finish while it’s still strong – it’s also a challenge, as crafting a satisfying series finale is notoriously difficult.

It’s become a common problem, particularly with popular TV shows over the last decade or so. The endings of shows like Game of Thrones and Stranger Things have both received strong negative reactions, and the creator of The Boys, Eric Kripke, experienced this before with his show Supernatural, which continued for ten seasons beyond his initial five-season plan. He’s very conscious of this issue, and it’s directly influencing Season 5 of The Boys through a new character, a repulsive Supe named the Worm, who talks about writing the script for a TV show’s finale.

He admitted it’s impossible to please everyone, and added that series finales are always tough. Then, he asked for people’s opinions on the final episode of Lost.

Can The Boys Have A Satisfying Ending?

The mention of Lost is significant because, before Game of Thrones, it was widely cited as an example of a poorly executed series finale. While opinions have softened somewhat over time, it still has a reputation for a disappointing ending – a perception that’s difficult to overcome. The Boys creator Eric Kripke has spoken about this fear for his show’s ending on the Creator to Creator podcast with Shawn Ryan, admitting he felt “fairly terrified” about it back in 2025.

Truly great series finales are rare – you can probably count them on one or two hands. The Shield did it exceptionally well. On the other hand, there are countless terrible finales. A show can be amazing for years, but a bad ending can ruin everyone’s overall impression, making people rethink whether it was truly good.

The show faces a tough challenge in ending strongly. After seven years, viewers are deeply invested in the characters and have strong ideas about where the story should go, which is hard to satisfy. On top of that, the show has unique problems: it’s been trying to parody a political climate that’s often more unbelievable than fiction, all while becoming the very type of superhero content it once mocked.

Honestly, ending The Boys after Season 5 feels like the right call. Stretching it further would have risked the show losing its impact, I think. The way they handle Homelander’s downfall is almost certainly going to be divisive – whether he lives or dies, and who takes him down – and I expect the same for Butcher. But I was really pleased with A-Train’s death in the first episode. It felt earned, a natural part of his story and the show’s overall direction, and not just a cheap shock tactic. That gives me hope for how they’ll stick the landing.

I’ve always been struck by something Kripke understands so well: a truly great ending isn’t about clever twists, it’s about the emotional impact. He’s explained that when he’s working on a story, he focuses on the characters’ emotional journeys before anything else. He believes plot points and exciting scenes are easy to come by, but they’re meaningless unless they reflect what the characters are feeling or represent a deeper idea. He’s said his biggest worry is creating something that feels empty and pointless, and that’s something he actively fights against in every story he tells. It really resonates with me – it’s about making sure everything means something.

This is a really solid foundation for the final episode. Balancing the storylines of key characters like Butcher, Hughie, and Annie will be challenging, but the goal is to ensure their journeys feel authentic and that their endings are emotionally satisfying.

With so much history already established in ‘The Boys,’ and new characters coming from ‘Gen V,’ Season 5 has a lot to juggle. If the show can remain focused on what makes it great – its characters, story, and overall message – it has the potential to be a satisfying conclusion. But the creators have already hinted that things might not go smoothly.

New episodes of The Boys release on Wednesdays on Prime Video.

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2026-04-13 20:41