Amazon Prime’s The Boys season 3 will potentially follow Hughie Campbell’s (Jack Quaid) story with Congresswoman Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit), which is bound to impact Billy Butcher’s (Kal Urban) narrative arc. The Boys season 2 finale ended with the explosive reveal that Neuman herself is a supe with formidable powers, having popped off the heads of CIA director Susan Raynor and Alastair Adana, whilst orchestrating the havoc during the Vought hearing. While Neuman’s exact motivations are unclear at the moment, it is only a matter of time before Hughie stumbles upon the truth, as he will be closely working with her as Senior Analyst in the Federal Bureau of Superhuman Affairs.

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It is important to note that Hughie’s decision to join Neuman’s office springs forth from a need to take down Vought’s corruption the right way, coupled with the urge to stand on his “own two feet.” Throughout seasons 1 and 2 of The Boys, Hughie worked closely with his team amid truly dire circumstances, and despite his many clashes with Butcher, in particular, he has grown particularly fond of the wild, unpredictable man. The same can be said of Butcher himself, who, despite his devil-may-care attitude and tough exterior, finds himself emotionally tethered to Hughie, evident in the scene in which the latter gets grievously injured.

Season 2 ended with former CIA Deputy Director Grace Mallory offering Butcher a job in a secret CIA team for monitoring suspicious superhero activity, an endeavor funded off-the-books in order to prevent rogues like Stormfront from destroying the world at large. While Butcher does not explicitly accept this offer, season 3 could pick up directly from this point, wherein Butcher will be seen working as a CIA operative to hunt down potentially dangerous supes. As Hughie is currently working closely with Neuman, he is bound to cross paths with Butcher and his team, which could technically lead them to work together once again, especially if they realize that something is amiss with Neuman. However, it is also worth noting that Neuman is playing the long game, and her current affiliations and agendas remain unclear, making her more dangerous than she seems.

In terms of Butcher, in particular, Hughie’s absence would mean the lack of an emotional tether, which is exacerbated by the fact that he lost his wife, Becca, fairly recently, and it is unclear as to how he would react as a result of this grief. This aspect of Butcher’s behavior is somewhat in sync with that of the comics, as the Garth Ennis source material portrays Butcher as cruel and uncompromising, going so far as to murder his team in order to carry out mass genocide. While Butcher’s arc in The Boys is markedly different, it is worth considering as to what might drive his actions in season 3. Revenge and love have been strong motivators for Butcher so far, but with Becca’s death, Butcher might lose himself in a sea of hapless rage. Will the zeal to punish supes for their cruel machinations be enough to ground Butcher’s actions?

The rest of The Boys ventured down their respective paths at the end of season 2 – while Frenchie and Kimiko embark on their own journey, Mother’s Milk reunites with his family. In order for the team to get back together, season 3 of The Boyswill have to trigger a high-stakes catalyst that inevitably brings them together. With the Herogasm arc coming up, along with the introduction of a much more nuanced and thematically darker Soldier Boy, The Boys might have to team up together once again to stop corrupt forces from wreaking havoc on the world. There’s also Homelander, currently on the verge of sanity and complete breakdown, who might choose to come after Butcher and his team by orchestrating the odds in his favor. Irrespective of how things go down between Hughie and Neuman, it is crucial in terms of the narrative for him to reunite with The Boys and Butcher in particular, as it would allow for the latter to move forward without wishing to destroy everything in his path.

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Debopriyaa Dutta
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Apart from being a features writer and critic at ScreenRant, Debopriyaa is a news writer at /Film. She is also a contributor to High on Films & Fansided, and an editor at Digital Mafia Talkies. Her poetry has been published in a wide array of journals, such as Gideon Poetry, White Noise Magazine, and Literaria. Find her on Twitter @angelusatani.

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