The Boys is an American media franchise, consisting of an action-drama and satirical black comedy superhero television series which follow the residents of a world where superpowered individuals called "Supes" are recognized as heroes by the general public and work for a powerful corporation known as Vought International, which markets, monetizes, and (secretly) creates them, with most being selfish and corrupt outside of their heroic personas. Based on the comic book series of the same name by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson, originally published by DC Comics under its Wildstorm imprint before moving to Dynamite Entertainment, the television franchise debut has garnered success both financially and critically. The first season of The Boys, developed by Eric Kripke with executive producers Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, was released in July 2019, with an ensemble cast led by Jack Quaid, Erin Moriarty, Karl Urban, and Antony Starr. A second season, with Colby Minifie and Aya Cash joining the main cast, was released from September to October 2020, a third season, with Claudia Doumit and Jensen Ackles, was released from June to July 2022, a fourth season, with Cameron Crovetti, Susan Heyward, Valorie Curry, and Jeffrey Dean Morgan, was released from June to July 2024, and a fifth and final season, with Daveed Diggs, was released from April to May 2026, with an animated spin-off anthology series, The Boys Presents: Diabolical, releasing in March 2022, and an Audible podcast, The Boys: Deeper and Deeper, starring Chace Crawford, Katy Breier, and Leigh Bush, releasing in June 2022. The series were released via Amazon Prime Video, while on YouTube, sponsored promotional episodes of Death Battle! were released from 2020 to 2022, the web series Vought International was released from 2021 to the present, and its sub-series Seven on 7 and Deep Thoughts With The Deep were released from 2021 to 2022 and 2022 to 2026, respectively. The franchise continued with a live-action spin-off series, Gen V, with an ensemble cast led by Jaz Sinclair, centered around the corruption of the Vought-run "Supe" college Godolkin University, and loosely adapted from The Boys comic series' story arc We Gotta Go Now by Ennis, Robertson and John Higgins, which premiered with its first season in 2023, and aired its second season, adding Sean Patrick Thomas and Hamish Linklater to the main cast, in 2025, with two other live-action spin-off series in production: Vought Rising, a prequel series set in the 1950s and centering the characters of Soldier Boy, Stormfront, and Bombsight from The Boys, with Jensen Ackles, Aya Cash, and Mason Dye reprising their respective roles alongside a new cast, and The Boys: Mexico, a series set in Mexico and starring Diego Luna and Gael García Bernal. Kripke has stated that additional spin-offs are in early development, and that the television side of the franchise had been internally referred to as the "VCU" ("Vought Cinematic Universe").
Development
Origin
The Boys television franchise is based on the comic series of the same name, which was originally published by WildStorm (DC Comics) from October 2006 to January 2007, before being cancelled and moved to Dynamite Entertainment, where it was published from February 2007 until November 2012. Several spin-offs of the series were published by Dynamite during the latter run, initially known simply as Herogasm, Highland Laddie, and Butcher, Baker, Candlestickmaker, before being rebranded as regular volumes of The Boys for the series' omnibus re-release. The series was created by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson. Following the launch of the television adaptation for Amazon Prime Video by Eric Kripke, an eight-issue epilogue series to The Boys comic series, Dear Becky, was published from June to November 2020. All 98 issues of the series have been faithfully adapted into seven full cast audiobooks produced by GraphicAudio beginning in May 2020. All volumes are a combined 31 hours in length.
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