The Boys

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This article was published on 8/3 and republished on 8/5.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t see this coming. Yes, I know The Boys season 4 is over, and Batman: Caped Crusader is brand new, but The Boys is huge and Amazon Prime Video’s biggest shows tend to stick at #1 for ages. But now, there is clearly enough interest in the wildly well-received Caped Crusader for it to surge into that #1 spot instead.

The 1940s noir version of Batman from Bruce Timm, JJ Abrams and Matt Reeves has debuted to stellar critic scores, a 98% on Rotten Tomatoes. Audience scores are lower mainly for “woke” reasons, so those can be safely ignored. Having seen the whole series in the last 48 hours I can agree that yes, it’s incredible.

Still, I am surprised it has instantly attracted this much of an audience to surge to #1. Again, it’s hard to understand just how much staying power Netflix’s biggest shows have. After months, Fallout is still #3 most-watched on the service (now with a fun “17 Emmy nominations” badge in the thumbnail).

Batman: Caped Crusader has already been renewed for season 2 before season 1 even aired, so no need to worry about its performance either way. It ends with a pretty major tease, so safe to say that everyone is going to want to see that realized in a second season. As for how long it goes, that’s unclear. The original Batman: The Animated Series ran for four seasons and 60 episodes, albeit that was a different era. But based on how this show is going, I’d easily watch 50 more episodes of it.

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The rest of the list has a mix of old and new entries. My Lady Jane is hanging on at #4 and has performed well for being a relatively low profile addition to the Originals list. The somehow-this-exists Sausage Party: Foodtopia is at #5. A second series of Troppo, which I haven’t heard of, is at #6. And everyone is gearing up for the return of Rings of Power later this month as that show is at #8 on the last due to rewatches or those trying to get into it for the first time.

I’m just very happy to see Batman: Caped Crusader perform this well, as it’s a hit of nostalgia that feels excellent, even if I’m deeply missing Kevin Conroy’s voice. It’s a fresh take on Batman in an age where that’s pretty hard to do, but glad to see Bruce Timm pull it off.

Update (8/5): A few days later and Batman Caped Crusader has hung onto the #1 spot, which I find impressive. It’s also expanded its audience as more reviews are rolling in, and it’s created a certain controversey among circles that enjoy complaining about the woke-ification of media, which seems like every Marvel, DC or Star Wars thing these days, according them.

This has played out in a few ways. On Rotten Tomatoes, with 56 reviews in, Caped Crusader lost its perfect score because of a single reviewer who said it checked all the “DEI” (Diversity Equity and Inclusion) boxes. What this is referring to is changes made to certain characters.

The “problems” this person and other audience-scorers and YouTubers claim are alterations like a female Penquin, an Asian Harley Quinn, a black Commissioner Gordon and Barbara and a public lesbian relationship between Quinn and Montoya, which is deemed “not era-appropriate” with the show set in the ‘40s.” They say they’d rather watch Batman the animated series, but this is by the same guy, Bruce Timm, who wanted to mix things up with this new production. Outside of this specific, often very loud group, the show continues to be very well received and again, it’s already been greenlit for season 2.