The Boys: Dear Becky

“The Boys” has become a big hit for Amazon’s Prime streaming service.  Longtime readers will recall that I was generally a fan of Garth Ennis’ effort to take his hatred of superheroes to the next level with Darick Robertson, Russ Braun, John McCrea, and friends along for the ride.  So when it was announced that Ennis and Braun would be reuniting for another story about “The Boys” I was intrigued, even if the timing was a bit suspect.  The original series wrapped up pretty conclusively, so what else could the creators have to say about its characters without having it feel like they were cashing in on the success of the streaming series?  The answer lies in the title.

Becky was William Butcher’s girlfriend before the start of the series and her tragic death took away the support this violent, self-destructive man needed to rebuild his life.  She was talked about in passing during the course of the main series, and we got to see her in person as she played a critical role in Butcher’s solo miniseries.  The thing is that we never got to see how Becky and Billy were when they weren’t together for the purposes of advancing the plot of the series.  It’s this idea that supports “Dear Becky” as we get another look into its world before the series started and after it ended.

As for the “after it ended” part, the series starts in the present day with Hughie and Annie hanging out in Scotland as the former tries to sell his parents’ house and hangs out with his fully transitioned best friend Bobbi.  It’s an existence that treads water in an agreeable fashion for all those involved, until Hughie gets a package in the mail one day.  He doesn’t think much of the book it contains until he opens it and realizes that it’s Butcher’s diary.  A diary the  man kept of the time he made the decision to try and kill the memory of what Annie meant to him.

This causes the series to unfold itself over multiple timelines after the first issue.  We have Hughie in the present day reading the diary and trying to process what it means while keeping its existence secret from Annie.  There’s Butcher in time when The Boys were still being run by Mallory, and find themselves having to deal with an upstart new supergroup from Vought-American’s mediacorp wing.  Then there’s the time when Becky and Billy were just two people in love, living their best lives.

It’s that last timeline that feels the least tangential to the main plot, and that’s a bit of a shame.  Ennis writes the two as a couple very well as they dote, prod, and needle each other in a way that feels genuine but not saccharine.  We also get some insight into how Becky’s love helped Butcher rein in his worst impulses, to the point where he didn’t feel the need to unleash them on society.  Even if these scenes don’t have any direct impact on the main story, they still succeed in showing us what Becky meant to Billy and why he would feel the need to purge her memory to deal with the superheroes.

Which is what we get to see in the Mallory era as Butcher and company have to deal with the Skorchers.  They’re an Authority-esque team meant to disrupt the status quo, and their existence signifies a possible rift in Vought-American that The Boys want to exploit.  It’s here that the book works best as we get to see the team at work as they try to puzzle out what’s really going in a satisfyingly investigative fashion.  There’s also some effective character work as we get to see the working relationship between Butcher and Mallory start to fray, and some glimpses at how ruthlessly effective the former can be when dealing with superheroes.  The scenes that deal with the latter, however, do have a tinge of awfulness to them, now that we understand why he’s doing these things and how he’s using his time with Becky to make them worse.

Then there’s the present-day scenes as Hughie goes deeper into the diary.  While the resolution to his journey is ultimately satisfying, as it involves appearances from not one, but three characters from the original series.  As well as all the bad blood that last statement implies.  What drags it down a bit is the whole secret-keeping business with Annie, as it feels redundant and a bit regressive after all that kind of business the two went through in the main series.  There’s also a bit of moralizing on Ennis’ part regarding The Way Things Are Today, which is honestly getting tiresome after going through it in previous series like “Jimmy’s Bastards” and “A Walk Through Hell.”  Ennis’ saving grace is that anyone shooting their mouth off about this usually needs to be taken down a peg, as Annie does to Hughie, eventually.

Russ Braun returns  to illustrate this series, and as the man who illustrated the back half of “The Boys,” his work is everything you could have hoped for.  The man has a grasp of facial expressions and caricature that rivals original series artist Darick Robertson and the late, great Steve Dillon.  It’s easy to be drawn into the story with characters who emote as well as the ones that Braun draws.  He’s also great when it comes to handling the overall storytelling with the action on the page flowing naturally from one panel to the next.

While not perfect, “Dear Becky” is about as good a return to the world of “The Boys” that I could have hoped for from its creators.  The story for the main series may have felt complete in the end, but the additions this series imparts slot in well around it.  It also compares favorably to a lot of what I’ve read from Ennis over the past year.  It’s bitingly cynical without feeling despondent.  There’s meticulous planning which doesn’t crowd out the characters.  And it tells a compelling story that’s necessary for its characters.  In short, if you were worried that “Dear Becky” was going to feel like a cash-in effort from Ennis and Braun, don’t be.  This absolutely deserves a slot on your shelf next to the preceding volumes of “The Boys.”