Gen V – Season 1 Review

Yes, yes, yes, one thousand times yes! It’s basically My Hero Academia or Sky High in the dark and gritty world of The Boys. Great writing and an engaging story make this series interesting from beginning to end.

Plot

Marie Moreau has lived a hard life. After accidentally killing her parents when her compound V triggered hemokinetic powers first materialized, Marie was raised at the Red River Institute in Thornwood, New York. This is a facility run by Vought, an arms company rebranded into a superhero company that if you’ve seen The Boys, you already know is pretty sus. The Red River Institute basically funnels young “troubled” youths or orphans with super abilities into adult facilities (not places anyone wants to be).

Marie, having just turned 18, has been accepted to Godolkin University, a premier university for supes. She has one shot, one opportunity to seize everything she has ever wanted in one moment. Will she capture it, or will she just let it slip away? Gotta love a fun Eminem reference, but for real, she has one shot to get out of the system. If anything goes wrong and she gets kicked out of school, she could very likely get sent to an adult facility to live the rest of her life.

Because of this, Marie is committed to being super serious about her time at Godolkin. Her dream is to get into the university’s School of Crimefighting and become a superhero. One of the best. Maybe if she gets into The Seven, she’ll be able to track down her younger sister and prove to her she’s not a killer.

All her hopes of this come crumbling down though after a night of fun with new acquaintances leads to a woman’s throat accidentally slit by one of the University’s favorites. Marie very publicly saves the woman’s life, unwittingly setting herself up as a fall guy. She gets called into the office of Professor Richard “Brink” Brinkerhoff thinking she might have finally gotten accepted to the crimefighting school, but instead she is expelled “for the greater good.” The expulsion is short lived though, because shortly afterward Brink is murdered by Luke, the number 1 rated student at Godolkin University, who was also one of the students she had gone out with the other night.

A small fight breaks out with Marie (who witnessed Luke killing Brink), Jordan, and Andre all trying to hold off Luke. You think that his friends might have gotten through to Luke as he hugs Andre and whispers something to him, but suddenly Luke flies into the air and uses his pyrokinesis to commit suicide, exploding all over the front lawn.

Marie’s ratings shoot up into the top 10 as she’s branded a “Hero of Godolkin” and accepted into the crimefighting school. She has nearly everything she wanted, but there’s just something not quite right about Gogolkin University. As the school’s dark secrets are revealed Marie and her new friends have to decide whether to keep their heads down and reap the rewards or put their necks on the line to become the heroes they always wanted to be.

My Thoughts

This series was great! If you are a fan of The Boys, Gen V is a must for you. It adds some context to The Boys and has several of the same characters.

For those of you unfamiliar with The Boys, Gen V has the vibes of a very adult version of Sky High or My Hero Academia. The stories aren’t the same of course, but it’s about a university for superheroes with majors like Crimefighting and Hero Management. I do wish that more could have been focused on the different, quirky classes students were taking, but really the story was focused more on its characters and… other things than the academic side of the school.

There is something to keep in mind about Gen V if you’re thinking about watching it, though. There are a few characters in the series whose super powers involve self-harm. If something like cutting or bulimia is something you’re sensitive to, Gen V may not be the series for you. There’s also some really… interesting… nudity scenes that might catch you off guard and make you either cringe or laugh out loud (maybe both).

That’s it! Pop some popcorn and check out Gen V! Let me know how you like it! <3