99: The Boys Read The Boys FINAL PART!!!

Summary
In this episode of Comic Dudes, hosts Dave, Matt, and Erik reflect on the final volume of 'The Boys' comic series. They discuss character arcs, themes of love and loss, and the dark humor that permeates the narrative. The conversation delves into the complexities of the characters, particularly Butcher and Hughie, and how their journeys intertwine. The hosts also share their thoughts on the series as a whole, including their favorite and least likable characters, and conclude with recommendations for further reading.

Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Context Setting
03:01 The Boys Episode Overview
05:48 Character Dynamics and Plot Developments
08:45 Thematic Elements and Emotional Resonance
12:00 Climactic Confrontations and Resolutions
14:59 Reflections on Love and Loss
17:55 Final Thoughts and Series Conclusion
25:50 Creating Your Own Narrative
28:00 Emotional Impact of Character Deaths
30:00 Final Thoughts on the Series
31:00 Comparing the Comic to the TV Show
33:02 Humor and Over-the-Top Moments
34:58 Controversial Themes and Imagery
38:00 Final Reflections and Series Conclusion
40:22 Exploring Alternative Endings
42:55 The Duality of Loss: Butcher and Huey's Journey
43:59 Outrageous Moments and Character Analysis
46:01 Least Likable Characters: A Discussion
48:05 Character Favorites and Confessions
53:59 Wrapping Up: Reflections on the Series

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Original Music by Alex Productions
Show notes include some AI generated content

Transcript

Dave Survived (00:02)
Welcome back to the Comic Dudes, a podcast about comic books and comic book related things. My name is Dave with me as always, my friend and co-host Matt. Matt, how are you doing? How are you feeling?

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (00:15)
Dave, I'm doing well. I'm feeling pretty well too. I really hope, you know, not to spoil this is the grand finale here. I really hope we can all stick around for the next volume, unlike some characters in the end of this trade. So, but I hope we can all reconvene at some point.

Dave Survived (00:31)
It's a really dark thing to start out with. I'm gonna just move on from that as quickly as possible. It is a boys episode, which means that also with us are other co-hosts, sometimes here, sometimes not. Eric, Eric, how you doing?

Up Next, Girls? (00:35)
and

I'm doing well. And I think that's a pretty good description of me in general, sometimes here, sometimes not.

Dave Survived (00:54)
I don't feel that that's super accurate, you seem like a pretty reliable force in my life.

Up Next, Girls? (00:58)
No?

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (00:58)
you

Up Next, Girls? (01:04)
Well, thanks for saying that. That was a really nice thing to say.

Dave Survived (01:06)
I wouldn't describe you as sometimes not here. Physically not here. Yeah, I'll give you that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (01:11)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's like on episodes sometimes here, sometimes not my relationship with reality sometimes here sometimes not you know

Dave Survived (01:20)
Yeah. You guys are really dark today. What's going on? Try to keep the vibes up. Y'all are doing gloom.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (01:22)
You

I'm always dark.

Up Next, Girls? (01:27)
Listen, I didn't say we're gonna die before the next thing we record.

Dave Survived (01:31)
Technically Matt didn't either he just said I hope we all survive. Which could be a threat I don't know.

Up Next, Girls? (01:36)
I also hope that.

Yes, true. That's true.

Dave Survived (01:42)
I either way You know who we are if you'd like to interact with us Outside of these episodes you can join our discord. That's the best way to do it We talk about comics and video games and movies and sports and stuff in the discord It's it's a fun time. So the link to join is in the episode description You can find it there and follow us there or join us there. You can also follow us The podcast has official accounts on Instagram and tik-tok

And then if you'd like to follow us as individuals, Eric and Matt have Twitter accounts. Those are in the description as well. I am on blue sky. You can follow me there. I'll follow you back. I need followers. My blue sky is pretty, it's pretty quiet right now. I only have like 20 followers. I could use some more. I'm still new. I'm still figuring it out over there.

Up Next, Girls? (02:30)
Give it time.

Dave Survived (02:32)
I will. I will. I'm also going to keep badgering my friends about joining or following me so I can follow them back when they do join Matt.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (02:44)
Okay, okay, I will.

Up Next, Girls? (02:46)
Okay.

Dave Survived (02:48)
He downloaded it and joined already.

Up Next, Girls? (02:51)
He just doesn't want to follow you.

Dave Survived (02:52)
No. Shut up, man. Come on.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (02:53)
I don't know how to. I'll figure it out. I'll figure it We'll talk offline. That's just, there's a lot. There's a lot. I'm getting into Instagram.

Up Next, Girls? (02:55)
It's just the same as Twitter.

Dave Survived (03:01)
We gotta teach, we gotta teach the resident boomer here how to use social media.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (03:04)
I've been getting into Instagram, like five years late and it's like the greatest thing ever. think it's like the greatest whatever.

Dave Survived (03:09)
Bro, you're not five years late. You're like 10. Yeah. Yeah, you're.

Up Next, Girls? (03:10)
You're like 10 years late.

I think it was like 2015 or 2016 that everybody was there and was like, you got to try this. And I was like, I'm a little late to the game, but

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (03:23)
I'm a little late to the game guys, I don't know. It's all good vibes over there. I love it.

Dave Survived (03:25)
You're perpetually late. Anyway, like I said, and Matt said, this is a boys episode. It is the final boys episode. It is also our 99th episode of the podcast. Yeah. I've been doing this for almost two years now. Yeah. So if you're new here, please do not start with this episode. Go back and start at the beginning. Damn it. This is not the right time to start with.

Up Next, Girls? (03:38)
Holy shit.

That's cool.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (03:49)
I'll start again.

Dave Survived (03:54)
this podcast or with the let's read stuff. Go back to the beginning, please. Yeah, but if you're if you're stubborn like me and you're still here and this is your first episode or you've forgotten, I'll remind you how this works. Every year we pick something to read. We read it together monthly. Then we do an episode. We talk about it in that episode. I'll recap what we read. I'll hit the high notes. I'll leave some stuff out. So if you do want to read this yourself or you haven't read it before, there'll still be some new stuff for you to discover.

Up Next, Girls? (03:59)
It's a very odd place to jump in.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (04:00)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (04:23)
After that recap, I'll take a beat and then Matt or Eric will kick us off talking about the things that we liked about that episode or that volume we read, which is the good. We'll also talk about the things we didn't like, the bad. And in the case of the boys, there's always some outrageous, awful shit happening. So we've got a little section carved out to talk about those things too. And then we'll wrap it up with our favorite and least likable characters from that volume.

Matt, Eric, anything else you'd like to add before I begin my final boys recap?

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (04:54)
No, I'm sad. I'm good. I'm good.

Up Next, Girls? (04:57)
Yeah, I'll just say that part way through this, I was a little like, man, why did these guys pull me into this? But now that we're at the end, I look back on this year, and I'm really thankful that the two of you invited me to join you. Not just because in the end, I enjoyed this book, but I've enjoyed spending this time with you.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (05:09)
Jesus.

Dave Survived (05:19)
Agreed. Well said. Yeah. You know, we're doing that. We're recording this in December. You know, it's the holiday season's times of togetherness and reflection on the previous year. We will be doing a lot of reflection, let me tell you. But without further ado, we start off this final volume with Butcher seemingly hunting down Foss, who is love sausage, if you've forgotten.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (05:19)
It's the end of the season for now, and it's very nice.

Up Next, Girls? (05:34)
We will.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (05:34)
You

Dave Survived (05:48)
it's a very quick confusing start to this final volume and then we just like cut to New York City and Huey and the rest of the boys are kind of wanting to just call it quits and then butcher shows up and actually suggests to everyone that they should take some time off before they can even Say anything to butcher about it and he says, know what take like three months at least Vought is also

up to its neck in legal action right now. If you remember from our last volume, shit hit the fan with Homelander and Black Noir. Supes tried to take over America. It was very bad and many people died. So Vought Man and Ms. Bradley are strategizing how to prevent getting thrown to the wolves in all of this because they suspect that someone needs to swing. Someone's going to be the face of this failure and they

Obviously don't want it to be either of them. We also find out Starlight is alive. Thanks, I guess, for giving us nothing from the last time we saw her until right now when she is leaving New York City and Huey as well. Like she gets into a cab and she basically gives him the finger and says, if you're serious, you know, you can call me, but don't call me unless you're serious. Moving on to the next issue in this volume, the boys have all of their visas revoked by the CIA.

As they're trying to distance themselves from the boys now that everything seems to be over But he was trying to do something about it He has a chat with monkey to try to set things in motion to like let them keep their status in America and Mother's milk also goes to see Janine his daughter who is fucking 12 years old

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (07:36)
Doesn't look like it.

Up Next, Girls? (07:36)
Yeah. What? Yeah, right.

Dave Survived (07:39)
Yeah, so it's because of the V that she she aged faster because of the V. But just I just want to just for a second remind everyone that she did a mother daughter porn with some random dude that looked like Hulk Hogan kinda few volumes ago. So I am unhappy and shocked to say that we had child porn in the boys as well. So.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (07:44)
Oooookay.

Up Next, Girls? (07:54)
Yeah, yeah that happened.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (08:00)
Wow. Okay.

Dave Survived (08:08)
While they're trying to talk things out, I guess

Up Next, Girls? (08:11)
wait, bingo. That just, I just got bingo.

Dave Survived (08:15)
What? good. Looking horrible. Well, it's going to make transitioning. It's going to make transitioning back to the recap hard after that one. So Janine admits to M.M. that Butcher showed up and killed the porno guys and her mom right in front of her, which obviously enrages M.M.

Up Next, Girls? (08:16)
A child porn was the last open space on my The Boyz Bingo card.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (08:19)
Hahahaha

I I was well played. That's why we keep you around. That's why we keep you around.

Up Next, Girls? (08:33)
Sorry.

Dave Survived (08:45)
Huey also figures out that, he got like a text message or an email or something. and it was from Voss and it was right before butcher killed him and he was starting to like put two and two together here. we also see butcher go and kill the legend. So moving right along Huey, M.M. Frenchy and the female, they get together to talk about what they're going to do about butcher.

They've figured out now that he is behind a whole lot of awful shit that's been happening He's also Planning to use the unstable V from I think volume 2 or 3 from when they're in Russia Like that unstable V that you played the right frequency to made all their heads explode He's going to use that to kill every soup on earth Meanwhile the trial for Vaught is underway miss Bradley

has like this weird sort of experience. She goes in like the front of the courthouse and then Vought Man is like, they didn't tell you to come in the side? sorry. Not subtle foreshadowing, but it's technically foreshadowing. Also Butcher and M.M. run into each other at the Flatiron. They fight and Butcher kills Mother's Milk.

At the start of the next issue, we have a very interesting reveal that Miss Bradley is fucking Vought Man. Seems like a bad idea, but again, the foreshadowing here is not so subtle. You've probably figured out what's going to happen to her already. If you don't even read the comic, just by me telling you these things, you probably know what's coming. Meanwhile, Huey goes up to New Hampshire. He figures out that Butcher has kept the creator of V alive, who he was supposedly

the instrument of that man's demise many, many years ago at the start of the boys when Mallory sent him after him, he didn't kill him. Vogelbaum, I think was his name. He didn't kill him, kept him alive. And he's using him to like help work through this plan to create this unstable V that he needs to kill all the Supes. I've lost my place. Okay, so Huey ends up being too late. Vogelbaum was already dead.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (10:41)
Yeah, probably.

Dave Survived (11:02)
And to this point, the butcher calls Huey on his cell to tell him all of his plans, like any good villain would do. Meanwhile, Frenchie and the female are back at the Flatiron. There's a bomb in it. And then there's an explosion that they supposedly die in. I believe that Frenchie died. The female, if I remember correctly, had some pretty impressive healing powers.

Maybe I'm conflating this with the show a little bit, but I think there's a chance that maybe she survived that we never see bodies, but it's assumed that they're He was actually about to walk back in the Flatiron building when that bomb went off. He got thrown into a car and survived. So at this point, he was the only one left and he knows that he has to be the one that stops butcher. It was possibly the worst scene in this whole comic. He goes to see Mother's milk's mother.

I know we're going to talk about that later, so I'm not going to tell you what happens, but Huey does drink of the mother's milk. And then he, he finds out that butchers the butchers at the empire state building. He had it evacuated, claiming there's a terroristic threat. Huey goes up to the top of the empire state building to confront him. He charges that butcher, butcher easily, like just sidesteps. Huey falls out a window, butcher saves him.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (12:02)
Just...

Dave Survived (12:30)
But then the glass breaks that butchers holding on to that is keeping them both inside of the Empire State Building and then they both fall. Butcher breaks his neck in the fall. Huey somehow impales his leg on this giant iron metal. I don't know something like I don't know how that happened because the thing was like curled down and he was like, I don't the physics there don't really make sense to me, but it's a comic book, so I'm to let it go. There was elongated like

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (12:46)
Yeah.

It's like physics, physics.

Dave Survived (12:59)
tendril nipples one issue ago. you know, I'm willing to accept anything at this point. So this entire issue is just Huey and Butcher sitting face to face on the Empire State Building talking about what's happened, what needs to happen and what that particular thing that needs to happen is, is Huey killing Butcher because he's now paralyzed and he doesn't want to live anymore. And

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (13:02)
spoilers

Dave Survived (13:27)
After some egging on by Butcher, Huey eventually gets enraged and stabs him in the heart. Voteman unsurprisingly also sets up Miss Bradley to take the fall for everything that VotAmerican has done. Which brings us to our final issue. Huey meets with Voteman in Central Park. He plays his hand, lets him know they'll be watched. He tells him about the V that would kill all of the Supes and that, you know, things don't seem right.

He can just kill everyone and he will. He also gets monkey promoted and in the process screws over director Rainer and in public in very embarrassing fashion at a political rally as she's running for Senate. think I remember the Senate or the house or something that was Senate. The last thing that we get in the boys comic is Huey reuniting with Starlight at the rebuilt Brooklyn Bridge. They say I love you. And then we end on a kiss in front of the bridge.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (14:11)
Yeah, it was Senate. It was Senate, yeah.

Dave Survived (14:28)
Boys over.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (14:35)
It was a love story, guys. It was a love story the whole time. It really was.

Dave Survived (14:40)
It was many things. It was a love story. was also, know, there's, learned a lot about butcher in this last three volumes, specifically, you know, like the one with his dad and then this one that really,

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (14:48)
Yeah. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (14:51)
Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (14:53)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (14:59)
I know we'll get into it. I'm just going to pause there. Let's go to the good.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (15:08)
It was a love story, it really was. Love was a strong motivation in this book. Like you said, I feel like we didn't get, I wish we kinda got Butcher's motivations a little bit earlier on, it worked out. But literally everything he did was because of missing Becky. It really was. Even though a lot of it was jacked up and it was really.

horrible, all the stuff he did was he was always thinking about Becky, you know, and like, I would like to think that I would not go to that extent, to the extent that he had if I had that power, but you know, if you were that madly in love with someone, I don't know, like love makes people do crazy things, you know, so I kind of sympathize with him a little bit. And then like Huey and the Starlight journey, you know, like,

I have some criticisms of that that I'll talk about in the bad a little bit, but I did like seeing that kind of and come, you know, too fruition. That was a huge part, I feel earlier on in the book, and it definitely kind of got derailed towards the end a little bit. But I like seeing it kind of come together. I also like the Huey and Butcher thing, like

In my mind reading this, Butcher was never gonna kill Huey. He viewed Huey as a little brother, and he was always protecting Huey, even though he put him in some compromising positions. But I also felt like, of all the characters and the boys, Huey did kill Atrein, but Butcher pretty much was holding that pistol as well, He was manipulating Huey because he knew he could, just like his own demise.

Dave Survived (16:48)
Yeah, he was manipulated into doing that.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (16:53)
all of the other characters had a lot more literal blood on their hands than Huey. Like Huey was just always in these weird positions and that's kind of where he was. And my last kind of like good thing that I liked about this book was like there was a lot of threads that started out in this book and they were kind of they went all the way through and that were paid off. There were some weird detours but like I don't like the

the guy jacking off under their door, finding out like, Hey, the reason he did that is because butcher wanted him to move out. never knew why we just thought that was something that was happening. And then like, I remember, I feel like we talked about it on the podcast, but when they did the flashback with Mallory, like Vogelbaum getting killed, I feel like one of us was like, I didn't see a body or maybe I thought that up in my head or something, but I was like, I was like that. We didn't see anything. I'm like, I don't believe.

Dave Survived (17:44)
I don't remember.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (17:49)
Comics have taught me like, if I don't see the body, like it's not, you know, it's not there. And then, yeah, sometimes true story. And then like the whole unstable V thing, like you said, that paid off to like trade number three or something like that, you know? And the Miss Bradley stuff as well too. So that was just some of the stuff that I picked up on that I thought was interesting.

Up Next, Girls? (17:55)
Sometimes even if you do. Yeah.

Dave Survived (18:12)
I will say, just in commentary attached to what you kind of said about how this was a love story, I agree. And it's also, well, like obviously Huey and Starlight are the most plain love story that's playing out in the comic. This is a story about the things that Butcher loves.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (18:41)
Mmm.

Dave Survived (18:41)
and how he lost every single one of them. The only things, there are four things that Butcher admitted to loving throughout all, however many issues of this comic we read. His mom who passed away, his little brother who also passed away, Becky and his dog, Terror, and he lost all four of them.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (19:04)
Damn, I didn't think about that.

Dave Survived (19:07)
Man had nothing left.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (19:09)
Yeah, that dog will put you over too, man. That dog will put, I'm telling you, those dogs will put you, you care about those dogs more than people, I'm telling you. Like, that'll put you over. Damn, I'm thinking about Steve. That's deep. That's some shit I would expect from Eric. I'm not gonna lie. That's good analysis by you. That's some Eric analysis right there. That's good shit. I knew you were gonna, I knew you were gonna take it. knew you, I knew you gonna, no, no, I knew you were gonna take it that way. I'm just gonna, I was just supposed to, that, I don't know.

Up Next, Girls? (19:26)
It is.

Dave Survived (19:29)
I'm gonna be, I mean, that feels a little insulting. I'm gonna be honest. Like you didn't think I was fucking smart. think I'm some kind of idiot. How else you want me to take it? that's some shit the smart guy usually says. Man, fuck you. The hell.

Up Next, Girls? (19:39)
You

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (19:40)
That guy with the glasses on, that boy knowledge, that boy knowledge with the glasses on.

Up Next, Girls? (19:43)
I don't know, don't call me that.

There's a lot I like about this, this volume, mostly that this volume exists because when we got through 10 and 11, my brain went, that's the end of the story. Why is this going to keep going? And then as I got into it, I went, there was more story to tell, which leads me to the next thing I like is that man, really Garth Ennis really pulled one over on me because he was playing the long game with this. And so many threads pay off here. And I think if I went back and read it again,

Dave Survived (20:14)
Mm-hmm.

Up Next, Girls? (20:18)
I'd pick up on even more threads that are paying off here. I really like that some of the things I hated the most about this volume were things that I kind of loved about this volume, but you're killing everybody off to tie up loose ends. I was like, part of me hated that but part of me loved that that's what happened. I, I really liked the relationship in the end with butcher and Huey.

that Huey is the one person that never really let Butcher down and sort of like behind the scenes the whole time, Butcher was keeping Huey there because he knew he had to bring somebody good into the fold to stop him from doing what he was doing. And in the end, Butcher kind of Anakin Skywalker, Darth Vader, the whole thing by going, kill me and stop this from happening. Do the right thing. Like Butcher was sort of his own hero by sacrificing himself through Huey and I thought that was pretty

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (21:05)
Hmm

Up Next, Girls? (21:14)
I was going to try and play this off, but I'm just going to come right out and say it because it probably makes for more interesting content. I read this on my phone. I got to the last frame of 71, I guess it is that said the end and I went fuck what a wild ending. And as you were doing the recap, you started talking about him, you know, talking to Vaught man and reunite I was like, what the fuck? What are you talking? And I had to like open it up and I'm like,

Holy shit, was more past where it said the end, because I've never read a comic that said the end that didn't end at the end.

Like usually, you know, it I did not realize there was one more issue. And I'm looking at it I'm like, I'm a little bit disappointed that there was more because I kind of loved that ending with just him and butcher sitting on the rooftop and butcher dead smiling. And Huey like what the fuck did I do?

Dave Survived (21:53)
no.

Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (22:06)
Man, you just got me crossed up for a second. was like, did I not finish it? But I did read on. Okay, good. I did. I messed up. I messed up. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (22:12)
No, I think you both did. I'm, I like, I, I looked at it on the computer and then I like went to my phone and I'm like, holy fuck 80%. How did I not finish this volume? I had no idea. and I hate kind of hate that they were united at the end because I was

Dave Survived (22:12)
Yeah.

Yeah

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (22:29)
Hold up, so you didn't know about the whole Starlight Bigin' Pian? Until just now?

Up Next, Girls? (22:33)
No, because I, I was still on my thing about starlight is Garth Ennis, because part way through the book, she just goes, I'm out, go ahead and ruin your lives and destroy the world. I don't want any piece of it. And I'm like, that's still him. That's him saying I'm stepping away from this stuff. So the fact that she comes back at the end, I'm like, that just destroys my whole theory.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (22:36)
That's incredible.

That's incredible.

Yeah.

Yeah.

Dave Survived (22:55)
Sorry man.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (22:57)
How did you like your ending of the book though? Right? That's why, that's why. That's funny. We can talk about that later actually, cause that is funny. Yeah, yeah, I got something for that too.

Up Next, Girls? (22:59)
Loved it. I loved my ending. Damn.

So anyway, that's the stuff that I liked.

Dave Survived (23:11)
Alright, so I don't have a ton that hasn't already been spoken to, but one of them, and this is just... I don't think it's even good, but I thought it was nice to finally get confirmation on this, that the legend in fact does not have feet.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (23:28)
Yeah, you talked about that in previous volumes.

Up Next, Girls? (23:29)
Right, they showed the prosthetics. Yeah. They never addressed it before.

Dave Survived (23:31)
Yeah. Cause I remember a few volumes ago, we were like, what, doesn't have fucking feet. Like, what is that? Yeah. Now we know. Yeah. He does not. He doesn't have feet. I love, I love the helium starlight reuniting. was obviously one of the things that I think most people would be rooting for unless you're weird. I you probably want that. it sounds like Eric might be weird cause he didn't, he didn't like it. Sorry.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (23:35)
Yeah, you talked about that before.

Up Next, Girls? (23:39)
That is good. I had that same moment.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (23:52)
you

Up Next, Girls? (23:54)
weird. Yeah. You you probably know that about

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (23:55)
You

Dave Survived (24:00)
Eh, weird subjective.

Up Next, Girls? (24:01)
I like it. I listen that was the way the way I read it without that last volume, which is really odd that it said end because usually that's the end of a story. I wondered if you know, maybe this issue was released after the fact is like a one shot, but that kind of wouldn't make sense.

Dave Survived (24:15)
Maybe, I don't know. I don't remember. But the other thing that I had in my good section was that issue that Eric didn't read, that wrap up. I thought that was a really nice kind of bow on top of everything that had happened. It took place six months after that scene on the Empire State Building. So there's been some time. And there was a more assertive,

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (24:16)
Yeah, I know what my though.

Yeah.

Dave Survived (24:44)
Almost butcher like Huey in that issue that I thought was really really interesting. You know, was Huey's been kind of a bitch We've all said it Individually, we've all said it at least two times In the last year and he stopped being a bitch finally I don't know if it was killing butcher that that finally put him over the top there But I really liked the version of Huey that was in that last issue An awful lot like the way he handled Vought man on the bench. I thought that was really really cool

The way you kind of manipulated the the monkey and Rainer situation has just I don't know it was like it was almost like What butcher would be if all that awful shit hadn't happened to butcher Like butcher with a conscience

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (25:33)
Yeah, exactly, yeah. It's true. Good point.

Dave Survived (25:39)
That's it. That's my good.

Up Next, Girls? (25:40)
These were released sequentially. It came out the next month.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (25:43)
That's a, okay. Yeah.

Dave Survived (25:47)
Sorry man.

Up Next, Girls? (25:50)
It's just an interesting moment to be like, wait a minute, there was more to the story that I didn't catch.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (25:54)
I love that you just made your own continuity. You're like me. You made your own story. I love it. Just cut the bad stuff out.

Up Next, Girls? (25:59)
Yeah. What the fuck?

Hold on everybody. Hold on for 10 minutes. Let me read this. I'm just kidding.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (26:07)
Yes. I'll be back. And we're back, everyone.

Dave Survived (26:12)
I mean, with the magic of editing, you could go read it and then we could just pick up where we left off.

Up Next, Girls? (26:17)
Well, listen, I'm looking at it. I'm seeing what's happening here. You gave me the recap.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (26:22)
Dave gave you a good recap, it's like not overly involved.

Dave Survived (26:22)
Yeah. Yeah. Hey, now you get to do what other people get to do, which is go and read without having everything spoiled. There's still some stuff in there that you don't know about yet because I didn't say everything that was in the recap. So you can go experience it for yourself. I don't know. Let's move on to the bad.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (26:33)
Absolutely.

Guys, I... go ahead, go ahead. No, I always go first. You can go first.

Dave Survived (26:44)
I'll go first, I guess. no, no, you can go. All right, I'll go. I'll say I would have loved a little more build up or threading of the butcher heel turn, which is sort of a weird term to use because he was kind of always the there's always a heel, but it was still a heel turn in some respects because he turned on the boys.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (26:59)
That was a great turn. That was a great turn.

Up Next, Girls? (27:04)
He was kind of an anti-hero to begin with,

Dave Survived (27:07)
Yeah, yeah, but then just turned into a straight villain. And you know, I think Eric, you made an interesting point, which was, if we went back and read this now, knowing what we know, we would probably see some things that we didn't really pick up on before. I would, I do have to, at the start of this, I said that I did really like Garth Ennis, but I there's a lot of people that really hate the boys and.

Up Next, Girls? (27:11)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (27:33)
Not all of his stuff is for everyone. He does do a lot of work that is just out there and hard to really justify and enjoy. But the man is an incredible writer and I have to give him that. And I I assume that there is a lot of buildup and threading in this comic that I just didn't know about because I didn't know how it ended yet. So, know, kudos to Garth and...

I don't know if I'll reread it anytime soon, but I think there'll probably be a reread at some point just to see what's different. But still.

Up Next, Girls? (28:07)
I mean, we could start next month. Yeah, take two.

Dave Survived (28:10)
The boys read the boys again.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (28:13)
Reload it.

Dave Survived (28:17)
I did write down I never deleted it I wrote down killing mother's milk after I finished that issue where he killed mother's milk not knowing that he was gonna fucking kill everybody else do But I think that's the one that is the most upsetting to me because I loved mother's milk so much I think he's a great character. I was sad that he ate it the way he did

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (28:41)
Can we put a stick in that real quick? A little pause in that one real quick. That was my number one thing I did not like. And I think, no, I think it's just my love of buddy cop movies. I love, and I don't know if it's some weird representation thing that I love, but especially when there's a black dude and a white dude together, the inner city black guy. I know it's tropey, but like.

Dave Survived (28:44)
Yeah. Yeah.

I'm sorry.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (29:08)
Whenever it's that pairing together, I especially love it. And when he said the line, like, to Mother's Milk, like, I don't fucking deserve you, dude, like that broke me. Like that made me so sad. Like, so it's like everything I love in like action movies and stuff. It was, it was bad, man. It was bad. That was, that was tough. That was tough.

Dave Survived (29:27)
Yeah, that was a tough one. Yeah, that was a tough one. my other, I had two more. The other is, starlight survival from volume 11. Just it was off panel. Like really she's in like, a very heated exchange with queen Maeve and homelander. And then just, that's it. We see next time we see her, she's getting in a cab to leave. That felt a little lazy, a little lazy. She was a pretty important character. And I feel like she.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (29:38)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (29:55)
got put on the back burner pretty hard these last couple of volumes and I didn't really like that.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (29:56)
to me.

She was one of the main characters. I thought she was the main character for the longest time. Like one of the mains.

Dave Survived (30:03)
Yeah. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (30:04)
Same.

Dave Survived (30:07)
And then my last bad, and I can't believe I'm gonna say this, there's no more boys. Sad it's over. I ended up really, really, really enjoying this and it bums me out that that was the end.

Up Next, Girls? (30:23)
listen, I'll say it too. I ended up I ended up really, really enjoying it too. Big time.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (30:25)
That makes me so happy, audience.

Dave Survived (30:29)
Yeah. Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (30:33)
I think you covered all...

Up Next, Girls? (30:33)
And I'll say to anybody, if you start the boys, finish the boys. If you got to a point where you're like, I'm fucking out, I'm done with this, pick it up and get to the end. It'll make it worth it.

Dave Survived (30:38)
Mm-hmm.

Yep. Yeah, Matt, you're vindicated for sure.

Up Next, Girls? (30:47)
Yeah, yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (30:47)
I got off the hook starting at volume 10. Like I was screwed until volume 10, I think. I was with... Alright, it came together.

Up Next, Girls? (30:53)
maybe even a little ahead of that.

Dave really liked nine more than even we did. you know, so.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (31:00)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (31:00)
Yeah, I did.

It ends strong.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (31:04)
I think you did. You hit on like all my things, Dave. I have so many questions. Like have so many questions about this TV show that I want to ask off of.

Up Next, Girls? (31:08)
There's no way the TV show can live up to this.

Dave Survived (31:11)
No, I almost don't want to finish watching this show now.

The way that the last season ended, I am almost assuredly not going to enjoy whatever comes next because it was so goofy and weird.

Up Next, Girls? (31:25)
Yeah, I kind of agree.

Was that all your bad? Matt, do you have more bad?

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (31:29)
man. No, Dave, I mean, he hit on all mine. The only, the only one that I think I was just, no, you're good. That's why I said I always go first. So like I had the mother's milk fight. I just said, where was starlight through all this? Like completely just gone. Like, yeah, nothing. I did not like the butcher heel turn. Like I would, I don't know. I wasn't a fan of it, but I can, that goes to another point I have the other thing I just thought.

Dave Survived (31:34)
Mmm, sorry.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (31:59)
Vought Man did Ms. Bradley dirty. just like after I read that I just said put nasty work like that was just I didn't see that coming that was nasty work man. That's all. You were kidding. Yeah.

Dave Survived (32:09)
I was, I had a feeling it was coming. And then when, when she saw that newspaper with her face under the headline, I was like, she's hooked. It's over.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (32:17)
Yeah. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (32:22)
that that's one of my bads is that listen, I know Vaught is bad, right? They've done nothing to make me think that anybody at Vaught is redeemable in any capacity. But I was low key kind of shipping Vaught man and Vaught woman. I was like, maybe these two people can find some happiness in the midst of this fucked up thing. And then that happened. And I was like, goddamn, Vaught is the evilest, the evilest. I know it's not a word, but it's the best word for this situation.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (32:36)
Yeah.

Yeah

Up Next, Girls? (32:51)
But yeah, didn't love that. But I also kind of enjoyed that. Like all the things in this book that I could list as bad, I could also list as good. Because I kind of loved to hate some of those moments.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (33:02)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Dave Survived (33:08)
I can give you that. I agree.

Up Next, Girls? (33:09)
Yeah. So I've got some ridiculous things to talk about.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (33:15)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (33:15)
Let's talk about ridiculous things.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (33:19)
I mean there's only one thing.

Up Next, Girls? (33:20)
You want me to start? Yeah, okay. Okay. The the frame where they're sort of flashing back to what happened at the White House, and it's all of the flying superheroes, but then just Spider-Man floating in the sky next to them, like actually kind of in the fort. What let's let me let me see if I can find it. I'll tell you right where it is. Because it stood out so much to me. And I was like, why it's not even like most of the time when they do superhero stuff, like there's

Dave Survived (33:21)
Yeah, you just queued it up, man. Go.

I didn't see that.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (33:35)
Missed that. Completely missed that.

Up Next, Girls? (33:49)
a scene where the legend like falls on a bunch of comics or there's some in the background on the wall. And I'm sure all of it is references to existing things. And they usually change it enough. But okay, so let's see. This is in part three of the bloody doors fell off. It's like the fourth page in and it's

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (34:09)
Okay.

Dave Survived (34:09)
I to go look downstairs. I don't have my iPad or anything up here that I can look.

Up Next, Girls? (34:12)
here, I'll just give it to both of you. But it's just straight up Spider-Man.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (34:17)
Not even like a webbed character, like a pretty much a Spider-Man guy flying around.

Up Next, Girls? (34:21)
Yeah, it's pretty much just Spider-Man here. I'm gonna put it in chat for you.

Dave Survived (34:27)
and shatter in Discord.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (34:28)
Discord chip.

Up Next, Girls? (34:29)
I'll put it in Discord.

Dave Survived (34:30)
All right, I'm excited to see this.

Up Next, Girls? (34:33)
There you go. And I was like, wait a minute, of all the characters that fly, why Spider-Man right in the front in a Spider-Man pose and everything, not even in a flying pose.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (34:41)
Yeah, that's... yeah.

Dave Survived (34:42)
Yeah.

That's fantastic.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (34:46)
That's how did I miss that? I don't remember that page.

Up Next, Girls? (34:49)
that one was a big standout for me. I know everybody's going to talk about Mother's Milks mother.

Dave Survived (34:54)
Let's talk about it now. Yeah, let's talk about. Let's talk about it.

Up Next, Girls? (34:57)
the hentai tentacle titty monster.

Dave Survived (35:01)
Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (35:03)
This is gonna be the most racist thing I've ever said but The that I named that creature Mammy the Hut. I'm sorry. I Can say it that's why you need a black guy suck it am I wrong you can't unsee it That was the first I read this at work, and I was like this is Angela mama. This is Mammy the Hut. I'm sorry I Knew I was gonna get a chuckle. I didn't want to say anything all day. I wanted to take a picture and send it to the group

Dave Survived (35:04)
Go ahead.

Jesus Christ.

Up Next, Girls? (35:13)
feel like I shouldn't have laughed.

Dave Survived (35:17)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (35:24)
you

Dave Survived (35:26)
I'm

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (35:32)
But I didn't. I had to sit on this. So I'm sorry. I had to get it off my chest. I'm sorry if we get canceled because of it. It is the truth. my gosh. That's it. I don't know what else needs to be said.

Dave Survived (35:36)
No, no, I you're the one that's allowed to say it.

Up Next, Girls? (35:44)
I loved it.

Huey went there to find it and discovered what was going on and still was like, I'm going to drink it anyway, but did not benefit from it. Got nothing from it.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (35:51)
Yes. Yeah, he was like, you might as own it now. Yeah.

Dave Survived (35:57)
No, yeah, it up being completely meaningless.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (36:00)
What did you call it? An elongated

Up Next, Girls? (36:03)
Yeah, it's like a hentai tentacle. I don't know. Dave, are you out of focus? Or are you just low quality?

Dave Survived (36:05)
Yeah. Like.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (36:11)
He's fragile.

Dave Survived (36:11)
probably out of focus. Yeah, definitely out of focus. There we go. Now I'm in focus.

Up Next, Girls? (36:17)
Yeah, she that that was a special moment.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (36:17)
my gosh.

Very special.

Dave Survived (36:21)
you know that speaking, I'm not done yet with that moment. I'm sorry. yeah. So the panel where he finally says, like, I forget what he says exactly, but he's like, okay, fine. and his mouth is open and he looks angry and it's just like a nipple, the size of his fucking open mouth, like moving towards it. that, that was, that was when I had had enough.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (36:25)
We're not moving on from there.

Up Next, Girls? (36:25)
Mm. Carry on.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (36:43)
you

You're crazy.

Dave Survived (36:48)
That was a bridge too far for me. The prehensile super long nipple can't do it.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (36:54)
That was a lot.

Up Next, Girls? (36:55)
It's funny because is it okay, we're, this is getting a little bit granular here. But was it a elongated nipple or like tentacle titties with a normal nipple?

Dave Survived (37:07)
pretty sure it was just an elongated nipple, but I'm not sure. All right.

Up Next, Girls? (37:10)
I'm going back to look at it. No tentacle titty with a normal nipple just big. Look at look at it.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (37:15)
Yeah, it's a bit of a big nipple.

Dave Survived (37:17)
Alright. I can't. I don't have the comic in front of me.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (37:19)
I need my iPad. He's like, I got you again. Bring your homework next time you come to class.

Up Next, Girls? (37:20)
okay. All right, hold up. Here you go. The shit's wild.

Dave Survived (37:29)
Yeah. It's usually, you know, honestly, usually I do have it just in case I needed to reference something. And I just, I didn't bring it up today.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (37:32)
Yeah, I bet. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (37:33)
All right. There you go. It's in chat, but it's you'll see it's just a long sort of prehensile breast.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (37:39)
Dude, Huey's face in the sheer terror. It's just incredible.

Dave Survived (37:40)
Yeah, sure is.

Up Next, Girls? (37:44)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (37:45)
Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (37:49)
Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (37:49)
wow, I did not- I missed the my boy part too. That's something there. Okay. Thanks Garth.

Dave Survived (37:54)
Yeah. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (37:58)
Yeah, that's some good stuff. Other over the top stuff was the images of how Mother's Milk is killed. The final hand over the mouth ending things was kind of a lot.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (38:00)
you

Up Next, Girls? (38:16)
yeah, I mean, there was probably other stuff, but those were the big ones.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (38:20)
What was that group at the end, the new Vought group where I just saw something or John Hall Klansman they were wearing all white. I can't remember what their name was, but then they were just Vought man was just like, that's the deep with the helmet on. I started crying. I don't know why. Yeah. I don't know why that that made me laugh, but he was just like the true or so. Yeah. He was just like, that's just the deep. And I was like, that was funny to me for some reason. I don't know.

Up Next, Girls? (38:26)
I saw that.

Dave Survived (38:27)
what was their name?

Yeah, like that's obviously the deep. And his was the only point he heard.

Up Next, Girls? (38:40)
true. They're just called true.

Dave Survived (38:43)
that's right.

Probably because that's like the only, that is the only thing that VotMan was involved in that actually was funny. That man was in nothing but serious scenes the entire comic until that.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (38:57)
Yeah, that's...

That's true.

man, that's funny.

Up Next, Girls? (39:08)
I like that that dude was like, there's not supposed to be blood in my cum. That's not normal. Why is there blood in it? There's not supposed to be.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (39:13)
Yeah, yeah. Once again, just in this. Yeah, just in this. I have a statement and I chuckle because of what Eric said in his experience reading volume 12, but I kind of would have liked the series to end at volume 11 personally with butcher just killing everyone and just leave it at that and.

roll credits, move on. Like that was kind of like where I ended it. didn't, and I think for me, I didn't love the butcher heel turn. Like it made sense, but I don't, I don't know if I'm just over the, like the overly comic book, like I'm going to destroy the world plot or whatever. Like I just kind of liked it.

Butcher getting his revenge and the story just kind of faded to black and we moved on from there. Like I was totally down with that, but yeah, I know that might be weird, but that was like one of my hot takes.

Dave Survived (40:13)
No, mean, that's your opinion, man. You're entitled to it. Might be wrong, but you're entitled to it.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (40:17)
Yeah, so absolutely, absolutely.

Up Next, Girls? (40:20)
Hahaha

Dave Survived (40:22)
I'm not saying it's wrong. Other people might say it's wrong. I think you make a case for the comic ending there for sure.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (40:29)
Or honestly where Eric ended it originally. I was like Huey Gittin, you know. That probably is a more fitting ending. I didn't really think of that until Eric just said that now. But that ending also probably works better for me. I don't know. It's just more poetic maybe. It's just like the butcher knew he couldn't. He needed someone to take him out and that was the end. We didn't really need the reuniting. I don't know.

Up Next, Girls? (40:29)
You could.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (40:59)
I just, either of those two endings I would have liked better.

Up Next, Girls? (41:02)
What you're saying, Matt, is that if you ended after 11 or if you ended at 71, you're ending Butcher's story. This was all Butcher's story. If you read through 72, this is Huey's story.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (41:10)
Yes.

That's a good point, yeah.

And we've just gotten so much, maybe it's just because we've gotten a lot more butcher as of recently, know, the origin story of him. Like maybe that's why I was just like, you're more in a butcher vibe. Like you should end butcher story and not turn into Huey story. But also get what Dave was saying about, you know, it kinda, the look that was on Huey's face and that when you pick back up later on, it kind of reminded me of like butcher with terror on the bench. Like,

very confident, know, like, so that kind of comes full circle. So I get it. But yeah, that's probably psycho. Yeah. So that's probably over analyzing it too much, but.

Dave Survived (41:53)
What if, go ahead, what? Where I cut you off. Nah, no such thing. There's a lot of stuff that's open to interpretation. That's why we talk about it. Speaking of things open to interpretation, what if this is both of their stories? And really it's a story about lost love and what you do after. And.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (42:02)
That's true.

Dave Survived (42:22)
Hughie's lost love happened very early on in the comic when he was in Scotland with his girlfriend, I forget her name, and A-Train inadvertently kills her. And Butcher lost several loves along the way and they went on divergent paths as to what happens after you lose something that you thought was the most important thing to you. And it ends with them together and only one alive.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (42:30)
Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (42:50)
Sort of two sides of the same story, right? It's what happens when that loss consumes you and what happens when you overcome that loss. You see Huey find love again and move on. You see Butcher just spiral.

Dave Survived (42:55)
Mm-hmm.

Yep. I don't know. It's food for thought.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (43:09)
Steve? Steve?

Up Next, Girls? (43:10)
Interesting.

Dave Survived (43:12)
I have one outrageous thing we haven't talked about to bring things back to the silly. I think it was in the scene where Butcher was killing the legend or it was a flashback with the legend in it. There's a comic on the table or the floor or something. It's the Adventures of Tech Knight number 25 by Slurp Dixon.

Up Next, Girls? (43:16)
Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (43:24)
You

Up Next, Girls? (43:32)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (43:34)
spelled D-I-C-K-S-O-N.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (43:39)
Is that a shot of Chuck? Is that a shot of Chuck Dixon there? I don't know, is he got heat with Chuck Dixon?

Dave Survived (43:40)
Thought that was, huh? I guess, I don't know. I mean, you I can take or leave Chuck Dixon. That man, like when he's on, I've enjoyed a lot of his stuff. When he's off, bro, it sucks. It's bad.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (43:54)
I got you. Interesting.

Dave Survived (43:59)
Anything else in the outrageous before we go on to favorite and least likable?

Up Next, Girls? (44:03)
I mean, you brought it up at the beginning, but mother's milk starter being 12 and wearing a shirt that says lumps.

Dave Survived (44:10)
Mm-hmm.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (44:10)
not catch that whatsoever.

Dave Survived (44:14)
And having her own apartment. How does she get an apartment? She's 12. She can't work. You need job.

Up Next, Girls? (44:20)
She's I mean, she's fairly well adjusted, like mentally for a 12 year old. That's in that situation.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (44:25)
Yes, I would agree.

Dave Survived (44:30)
Yeah, I'd say that she's probably actually about to have like a manic episode really soon once all this stuff starts to sink in. that is a person that is right. Yeah. But she's in like massive denial at that point. No one's acting normal after doing a threesome with your mom at 12 years old and then watching your skull get crushed in front of you by your uncle. No one's okay after that.

Up Next, Girls? (44:36)
Yeah, well, I mean, she also just lost her father.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (44:39)
Yeah.

Hehehehehe

Up Next, Girls? (44:52)
No.

Dave Survived (44:59)
Alright, well, I would be shocked if we have a different least likable. I think our favorites might be different, though. I'll defer to the two of you. Whoever wants to go first, please feel free.

Up Next, Girls? (45:00)
Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (45:13)
Eric, give us some insightful thoughts.

Up Next, Girls? (45:17)
really difficult for me to choose a least like.

Because I think, you know what, it's it's Vaught, man. Fuck Vaught, man. That's my least liked. It would be easy for it to be butcher because he killed characters that I've come to care about. But also, it was an important part of the story to get us where we needed to be at the end. I think everybody couldn't have lived, it couldn't have been a happy ending.

Dave Survived (45:43)
Who who did who was your favorite you say favorite do we just start with least likable? Okay No, no, we already did least likable. Yeah Yeah, well and positively. All right. Yeah, that's fair. He's a scumbag

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (45:47)
Now you reach, she said.

Up Next, Girls? (45:48)
I started with least. Did you want it? You want me to go? Did you want to go the other way? Yeah. Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (45:51)
Let's positive. Let's end positively. Yeah, yeah.

I'm a simpleton, pick Butcher just cause I don't like how they did him in that volume.

Dave Survived (46:04)
Yeah, me too. Yeah, least likable, easily, easily the least likable.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (46:11)
Fopman could be up there. I can definitely see it though, like I said. Like I said.

Dave Survived (46:13)
Yeah, very unlikable.

Up Next, Girls? (46:15)
Vought man was a really one dimensional unlikable, just a piece of shit, just manipulative and self serving and an asshole. And yeah, I mean, yes, but also, I mean, butcher used Huey, right? He manipulated Huey into doing what he wanted in the end, which was, you know, stop me from doing this.

Dave Survived (46:21)
Yeah. I mean, so is butcher.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (46:23)
I think you bought-

He saw, he just saw a glimmer of hope in that Vought man, Miss Bradley relationship and they pulled it away. They pulled it away from you. That's why it puts you, they flipped it on you. The old Garth, Garth doing his thing. But yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (46:42)
did. I did. They they flipped it on me. Yeah.

Dave Survived (46:42)
Yeah.

I do want to say one thing about that whole subplot. When Miss Bradley realizes what's happening, she falls to her knees and she screams. She pulls her hair out. And I had been wondering this whole year why Ashley in the boys TV show constantly pulls her hair out due to stress. Because I knew that she was the Miss Bradley.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (47:01)
What?

Yeah.

Dave Survived (47:20)
In the show and I finally got to figure out why. So that was nice. That was a nice little tip of the cap.

Up Next, Girls? (47:25)
huge difference there in the sense that Miss Bradley is very much framed as a character with a conscience doing the right thing. And that's absolutely not the way it translates in the TV show.

Dave Survived (47:38)
No.

Yeah, wildly different characters, that was the... didn't just decide to make Ashley pull her hair out. Like they saw it in the comic. They're like, okay, well, I think that's cool. We'll use it, but we're gonna use it in a much different way. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (47:43)
That makes sense. That's an interesting thought. I didn't consider that.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (47:48)
We're gonna use that, yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (47:49)
Yeah, yeah, completely different way. Hmm, interesting thought. That's a good thought. There were a couple of things in here that I'm like, this somewhat inspired something that happens in the TV show, but they did it in a totally different way.

Dave Survived (48:05)
Yeah. Yeah. And I'm finding now a lot of ways that they did it worse in the show.

Up Next, Girls? (48:12)
definitely worse. I gave him so much credit early on. I'm like, they they you know, they developed the characters in a way that just was a lot more relatable made a lot of sense. It was right for the story. And now I look at it. I'm like, I you know what, maybe early on that made sense. But I feel like they've got nowhere to logically go with what they've done. Maybe they'll surprise us. Yeah. Yeah, totally different thing.

Dave Survived (48:17)
I know.

Yep. It's just its own thing now. It's a totally different thing.

Alright fellas, favorites?

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (48:41)
Mine was Huey. think that they frame the book that way. Like, that's just kind of how, you know, it, it, I feel like things just went downhill and went so fast. Like it went so fast that there really wasn't an opportunity for, in my opinion, another favorite character. Like the other characters were there, but they really didn't do much, didn't have much screen time outside of like conversations with Huey. So it really, it was tough to pick anyone else besides him in my opinion. So, I don't know.

Dave Survived (48:44)
Yep.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (49:13)
Just my thoughts.

Dave Survived (49:14)
I agree. Mine was Huey. For all the reasons you just said, I couldn't say it better myself.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (49:19)
There wasn't like lot of action. action with other characters. was just like, yes. Yeah. Some would say let him know mother's milk. But.

Dave Survived (49:22)
Yeah, no, Garth led this horse to water and I drank up Huey as my favorite character.

Up Next, Girls? (49:34)
I don't think I've once said Huey. I think I've said Huey is least favorite once or twice.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (49:37)
I don't think you have it,

Dave Survived (49:37)
I don't think so either.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (49:40)
Yeah, I think so.

Dave Survived (49:41)
Yes.

Up Next, Girls? (49:43)
But overall, I think he was the only character I could choose other than the female.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (49:51)
You love the female you love the female She just doesn't get She murders mafia members. So she's kind of likable like these horrible people like

Up Next, Girls? (49:52)
She disappears partway through this book and yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think, I think Huey. I don't know if that's who I would pick as my most, like my favorite character from the entire series, but from this volume, I'd say Huey.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (50:11)
Yeah.

Dave Survived (50:16)
boys, I have a confession to make.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (50:19)
These are my confessions.

Up Next, Girls? (50:19)
Confess.

Dave Survived (50:21)
I read Dear Becky.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (50:24)
Really? Good. Good.

Up Next, Girls? (50:24)
did you?

Dave Survived (50:25)
I did. I did. When I finished when I finished this final volume, I was like, I need I need more and I need more right now.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (50:32)
But I got it. There's Dude, he's a fiend. You need more than mother's milk. You need more.

Up Next, Girls? (50:35)
Mmm.

Dave Survived (50:40)
I did. I did. so I bought, I bought the digital, yeah, I bought the digital Dear Becky collected edition and I read the whole thing before we recorded tonight. I started it on like Monday or yesterday and then, I finished, it was eight issues and I finished it and I would recommend you, you both, if you feel like doing it, I would pick it up and read it. So it's set 10 years after the last issue.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (50:44)
He paid for it. my god.

Really?

Thank

Dave Survived (51:09)
Huey and starlight are in Scotland and Somebody sends Huey butcher's diary So he is reading in this diary all of these letters that butcher wrote to Becky after she died and There's there's so much more to butcher if you

read Dear Becky, would highly recommend you do so I really really enjoyed it. It's a good read. There's a ton of flashback stuff because he's writing in the diary like back in the day when she had just recently died and he had just joined up with Mallory and it was at the start of the boys so butchers in it in those flashback scenes you get a lot of like butcher and Mallory stuff really good.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (51:42)
Mmm!

Interesting.

Up Next, Girls? (52:00)
Okay. Do you have, when you look at the entire series, a specific character that, like, you're like, that's the character. Not to say you think they're good or, you know, whatever, but that ended up being the one that you look back on and, you know, you like. would, you know, you'd buy a figure of it to put on the shelf.

Dave Survived (52:25)
If you wouldn't have said that last part, could have answered. I ain't nobody I'm buying an action figure of from this comic, I'll tell you that.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (52:27)
Yeah, yeah

Up Next, Girls? (52:33)
Okay, take that part out. The one that you like the most.

Dave Survived (52:35)
Hahaha.

Up Next, Girls? (52:39)
or was your favorite?

Dave Survived (52:40)
I, you know, without giving it a ton of thought, I'm just gonna answer with my gut and it's a recency bias, but it's probably Huey.

Up Next, Girls? (52:47)
Hmm.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (52:48)
Wow, that's so cute.

Dave Survived (52:52)
But I've got a different perspective because I've read stuff that you haven't and I'm sorry for that, but you should read Dear Becky.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (52:56)
Here, Becky.

Up Next, Girls? (53:01)
Okay, I wouldn't have thought it, you know, four volumes ago, but I think in the long run, I look back and I think to me, this is this is butcher's story. And I think that's the character that is most interesting to me overall.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (53:20)
I would say Mother's Milk from the TV show that I haven't seen and I prefer the fat version, not the skinny version. The normal version, the extra large version, not the skinny guy. Not like fat, yeah, he lost a lot of, yeah, I want the muscular version.

Dave Survived (53:23)
You

Up Next, Girls? (53:24)
Ha ha ha

Okay, yeah, that's fair. Yeah.

Dave Survived (53:28)
Alright, sure man, whatever.

Yeah, he wasn't even I don't think he was fat. I think he just like he was muscular. Like the dude was just like. Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (53:32)
Yeah, I like that too.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He dropped some muscle. Yeah. It's funny in the comics that went the other way. Like he didn't start out as huge. But like, there was that one where I'm like, he hulked out and he never got smaller from there. He just stayed gigantic.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (53:41)
Yes.

Dave Survived (53:47)
No, yeah, that's because I think Derek Robertson didn't draw a lot of comics for the the comic after that I think Derek was drawing much differently than a lot of those fill in artists were

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (53:53)
Yeah.

Up Next, Girls? (53:59)
Yeah.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (54:01)
I really want to watch the show and see how different it is now that I've read the whole thing. He said good luck.

Dave Survived (54:06)
Yeah, I mean, good luck. Yeah. Give it a try. I have I have a little I spent some time writing us a little wrap up sort of a send off to this year. If you guys have no other thoughts to share, I'll close us out with that.

Up Next, Girls? (54:06)
You should.

Do it.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (54:28)
Close it out.

Dave Survived (54:29)
All right. So before I get to that, just a reminder for bi-weekly podcast. So we'll be back in a couple of weeks, with some Christmas comics, because it the season motherfuckers. beyond that, we still don't have a let's read for January to kick off 2025 let's read. So get those, recommendations in and then Matt and Eric, need to probably have a, an actual decision at some point with all of the various things we've been throwing out. Obviously.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (54:49)
Yeah, I have to pick something.

Dave Survived (54:58)
Eric is campaigning for the girls right now, I think. It's only four volumes.

Up Next, Girls? (55:00)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I figure we read we read the boys. Well, I mean, you know, we could read that. Okay.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (55:00)
you

Dave Survived (55:05)
We have to do like a Luna Brothers year. Read Girls, Alex and Ada, Ultra, I don't know what else. That's eight, that's eight months.

Up Next, Girls? (55:19)
I mean, how many months?

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (55:19)
I forgot about the girls.

Dave Survived (55:19)
One of the Lunar Brothers wrote a comic called Clone, think. It wasn't both of them. It was just the one. That was pretty good. Maybe it wasn't. I don't know. Anyway, if you have suggestions for what we should read next year, join the Discord. Let us know. And my final thoughts, and I think I speak for, I'm going to say I speak for all of us, but you know, if I don't just keep it to yourself. We don't need to say that that was wrong. But I'm just going to.

Up Next, Girls? (55:23)
Hmm.

Dave Survived (55:49)
Put a bow on it. In the year 2000, in an interview with Rolling Stone, Axl Rose said, life sucks, but in this really beautiful way. If you change the word life to the boys' comic book, you'd have a pretty accurate one line description of our year with Garth Ennis, Derrick Robertson, Butcher, Wee Huey, M.M. Frenchie, the female starlight, Homelander, Monkey, Love Sausage, Auntie Sis,

Blarney Cock and the rest of the teenage kicks, Jack from Jupiter, fuck him, Mallory, Becky, RIP, Jessica Bradley, Director Reiner, A-Train the Deep, Queen Maeve the G-Men, Stormfront, Tech Night, and of course Vot Man, and mountains upon mountains of racist, homophobic, sexist, ableist, transphobic, and just outright fucking mean text.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (56:19)
you

You

Dave Survived (56:44)
We'll see you in a couple of weeks. My name is Dave.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (56:47)
And I'm mad.

Up Next, Girls? (56:48)
And I'm Eric.

Dave Survived (56:50)
Take care of yourselves everybody. Bye bye.

Up Next, Girls? (56:53)
Bye.

Matt - Fan Of Mother Real Milk (56:53)
Peace.

Dave Survived (56:55)
I want my dickies sucked.

I had to get one more in.