00:00♪♪
00:11♪♪
00:13Look, we've all done bad shit.
00:15What's insane is that our solution to every problem is murder.
00:20Violence isn't brave.
00:21♪♪
00:24Violence is power.
00:26♪♪
00:28That's a spirit jam.
00:29Who wants a creamy, delicious milkshake?
00:32If we're ever going to win against monsters,
00:34we need to start acting human.
00:37Run!
00:38Ah!
00:39♪♪
00:45You're all f***ing welcome.
00:47♪♪
00:51Pushing the boundaries but also keeping it both empathetic and edgy
00:56is such a key thing, and that's true of the story.
00:59Obviously, Anthony, it's true of, you know, of Homelander.
01:02I mean, can you sort of talk about, Eric, first that,
01:05keeping that edge but keeping it relevant,
01:08and then, Anthony, taking that performance,
01:11keeping it so you feel for the guy but you know he's bad, you know?
01:16I mean, you know, we don't—
01:18we spend a surprisingly little amount of time in the room
01:22talking about being edgy or shocking
01:26or what's some shocking thing we can do.
01:29We spend almost all of our time talking about character first.
01:35How are they, you know, who are they?
01:38How do we dig to deeper psychological levels?
01:41And then we talk a lot about just what's going on in the world
01:45and how can we be a reflection of things that we see happening
01:52and just be current and literate.
01:55♪♪
01:57This country is corrupt beyond repair, so we gotta save it.
02:02♪♪
02:04It's not gonna be easy. We'll have to do some terrible things.
02:07For the greater good.
02:09You'll no longer be beloved celebrities.
02:11♪♪
02:14You will be wrathful gods.
02:17Show me a little wrath.
02:19♪♪
02:22That doesn't sound good, Ashley.
02:24We are no shit, Ashley. Sorry, Ashley.
02:28The whole world is about to burn.
02:31We need someone like you, Billy,
02:33before the Supes start rounding us up and dumping us off in camps.
02:37I have found the answer to all our prayers.
02:41A virus that kills Supes?
02:43This is insane and desperate, even for you.
02:46Well, insanely desperate's where we are, don't you think, love?
02:49And then, like, it's only, like, in the very last minute
02:52that we, you know, put in something crazy.
02:56The architecture...
02:58So I think the reason it works
02:59is because we don't really even focus on that stuff.
03:01Like, the architecture beneath it is so sound
03:05in terms of its character and characters and thematics
03:10that I think people...
03:12But the thematics of season four, though, Eric,
03:14are very specific and they're very timely across the board.
03:18Well, you know, look, it's about...
03:20Obviously, it's about an election
03:22and it's about, like, real things that are happening out in the world
03:25and, you know, we lean into that
03:30because, you know, we have a story that's about celebrity,
03:35the intersection of celebrity and authoritarianism,
03:38and that just, you know, not just in the United States,
03:40that just happens to be something that's happening all over the world.
03:44But it's also about facing your, you know,
03:49the flaws in your past and the wounds in your past
03:53and can you overcome them to move forward?
03:55And almost every character struggles with that
03:58and that's where you get an emotional connection,
04:00that's where you get an episode.
04:02You like this segue?
04:03This is where you get the episode of, like, Ant going back home to his lab
04:07and how he nails that.
04:23Come here.
04:27Come here. That's an order.
04:38I'm your father.
04:42Not him.
04:45And I always will be.
04:52Come here now.
05:00Ryan?
05:03Ryan!
05:04Can you talk about that? Yeah.
05:06I mean, that's a great example.
05:07Thank you, Eric.
05:08I did see that segue.
05:10Get that segue and run with it.
05:13So that episode was actually fantastic.
05:15I mean, it was a great...
05:17Here's the great thing about this show,
05:19the scripts come in, like you said,
05:21they're architecturally sound is a great way to put it
05:23because they come in and I know that the show is in a good place
05:30when the scripts come in,
05:31and this episode specifically came in and I went,
05:33oh, my God, the ideas are coming out.
05:35Right?
05:36It's creatively inspiring.
05:39So we knocked that around a bit.
05:40And then that's what the reason I think people empathize with the character
05:46and it's had such a mixed response in a positive way,
05:49a positively mixed response is because it is grounded.
05:55You know, in that episode,
05:56this is a guy going back to confront his demons.
05:59He's going back to confront like a group of people that tortured him.
06:07You know, the poor guy, and he doesn't know what he's doing.
06:09He doesn't know what he's going to feel.
06:11And that was important is to go in there and have a mix of,
06:14a range of feeling because to my mind,
06:20going back and doing that would be such a raft of different emotions.
06:25And I think that's,
06:26it's the truth and the reality that we anchor the character in the situation
06:30and we drape it over that architecture.
06:32And I think that is what people respond to.
06:56I can't believe this is happening to me again.
Comments