I have a free Amazon prime account and I sift through mounds of shit to watch old westerns and whatnot. I just opened the home page and I see they're advertising a new episode of 'The Boys' coming this Thursday.
What do they show to entice viewers to watch it? Two women. A redhead and a dyke looking black chick with braids.
Fucking lol not even a show that's explicity called 'The Boys' is immune. I know this isn't surprising in the slightest and just because a show is called the boys doesn't mean it's only dudes. But still I got a good chuckle when I saw it.
I watched season one and thought it was okay considering how low my expectations were. Then I heard about season two and never even gave it a chance.
Wasn't it obvious that The Boys was always cultural propaganda? I mean homelander is literally evil superman. It's difficult to make it more obvious than that.
It always was meant to be, but it failed to accomplish its task hard in its first season.
Which is why they've been trying to triple down on everything as hard as possible to push their agenda, yet people still keep liking Homelander and the Soldier one more than the clear "good guys." Including when they do offensive or evil things that are supposed to make them look bad.
Its a real poster child for misunderstanding your audience and writing so bad you end up a parody of yourself instead of them.
Soldier Boy really was the biggest backfire for them ever.
They tried so hard to make him the villain, but funnily enough, despite his upbringing, he still turned out to be one of the most loyal and honourable characters on the show and held steadfast to his word.
Despite his flaws and shortcomings, Soldier Boy showcased what it meant to overcome your roadblocks and get the job done no matter the cost.
It's funny because his content is all over social media being used by a lot of guys to basically showcase that he was a badass and an overcomer, and what it means to be a real man. Lots of those shorts have gone viral featuring him, and Jensen Ackles did a superb job humanising him and making him root-worthy.
I guess that's why -- as you mentioned -- they had to triple down on everything and push their propaganda even harder.
I've heard it called the archie bunker effect (from the 70s sitcom, all in the family, one of the first such instances of this happening)
The conservative character, even if flawed, even if written to lampoon the right, ends up becoming the most beloved and identified with. The left says it's because we're media illiterate. No, the characters are still well liked even when that's not what the authors intended, we get that they are attempts at satirising us, but they still end up being refreshing, based, and relatable.
Archie bunker of all in the family
Ron Swanson of parks and rec
Soldier boy of the boys season 3
Liberty prime and joshua graham of fallout maybe
Even some early Colbert, lampooning fox and rush and hannity and the like, he has some funny moments. Even if you disagree that it was 'good', what quality there was has fallen sharply away since he dropped that schtick. He was at least far better when he was that conservative character
What further helps is that the people the lefty authors are writing to put their points across are then unlikable, they are mary sues, they are insufferable Californian dweebs who try to give lectures. So yes, the tough texan character is a welcome relief and quickly becomes the favourite
And there is a lot of 'action' from those characters too, Archie bunker would apparantly still do a lot of good things, like you said with Soldier Boy.
I'm sure you can think of some more characters that fit the bill.
But I think it extends further, beyond just characters.
Whole games and movies that are well written in parts get the same treatment. From barbie to bioshock. Bioshock is absolutely a critique and dystopian view of randian objectivism and the galt-wannabes, but the libertarians loved the series. They get that its a critique, but it's well written and researched and not overly mean spirited, there's some fun in there too, it's not just preachy. So it's enjoyed more than it otherwise would be. Like with barbie though, it doesn't always elevate something to 'good', but it elevates it above where it was. We could also talk about helldivers, 40k and starship troopers here. It just keeps happening. And I think early 'the boys' had some of this going for it too, before they crossed a threshold.
Precisely... Rorschach is another character that fits the bill. Alan Moore tried to make him such a parody of the American Conservative Right that a lot of what he had Rorschach do and say actually resonated with reasonable people who felt like being hard on crime and removing government padding and social systems is a good thing.
We also saw it happen recently with a resurgence in popularity with The Punisher, which is why Marvel has been going way out of their way to emasculate and humiliate the character as much as possible, especially during these times.
I guess in these times, you can just go right down the list of Lefty writers trying to portray a certain Right-wing-adjacent character as a villain only for their moral code and conduct to widely resonate with the general audience and for Lefties to inevitably go... "No, you're not so supposed to react to the character like that!!!"