As “The Boys” heads into the last couple of episodes in its fifth and final season, creator Eric Kripke is aware of online chatter about “filler episodes,” emphasizing the importance of bringing each character’s story to a proper conclusion.
“None of the things that happen in the last few episodes will matter if you don’t flesh out the characters,” Kripke told TV Guide in an interview published Wednesday. “I’m getting a lot of online dissatisfaction, to put it politely. And I’m like, ‘What are you expecting? Are you expecting a huge battle scene every episode?’”
Over the course of the final season’s run, online chatter has criticized some of the show’s plotlines, with many viewers calling certain episodes “filler” and voicing how they think the series could be improved.
Ayra Starr has a message for the directors of ‘The Boys’ 😂❤️ pic.twitter.com/al0EE7UoHd
— HYPETRIBE (@hypetribeng) May 6, 2026
“One, I can’t afford that. And two, it would be so empty and dull, and it would just be about shapes moving without having any import,” Kripke added.
“At no point during the writing of it was I like, ‘Oh yeah, we’re making filler episodes. So who cares?’ We all thought at the time we’re really getting these important character details,” he said. “We have something like 14 characters, maybe 15. And I owe it to all of them — in that television is the character business — I owe it to all of them to flesh them out and humanize them and their stories.”
Kripke also defended the work of his writers’ room, saying that in the process of writing, it felt that “crazy, big things” were happening in every episode. “It’s just sometimes it’s a giant character movement. But apparently, just because it’s not plot, you’re like, ‘Nothing happened!’ I’m like, ‘Nothing happened, what?’ The craziest, biggest moves happened. It just wasn’t someone shooting someone else and going, pew, pew, pew. And if that’s what you want, you’re just watching the wrong show.”
The creator also said some of the criticism may be a byproduct of the weekly release model Prime Video has used for the series.
“For as much as I love the weekly release — because we should take time to have people talking and arguing about the show — my guess is if you were bingeing it or watching it all at once, you would have a very different experience than watching one episode a week that you might find slow or slower than usual, and then you have to wait a whole other week for the next piece. I think that aggravates people, probably,” he said. “To be clear, I’m a proponent for this release schedule, but I’ve been wondering if that was one of the side effects.”
The final episode of “The Boys” airs May 20, 2026 on Prime Video.
