The Boys/YMMV

• Anticlimax Boss: After Black Noir is revealed to be a clone of Homelander, who is even stronger than the genuine article, the fight between the two takes place off-panel. After Homelander fires a laser burst and Black Noir gets a mean left hook in, a mutilated Black Noir shows off Homelander's remains a few panels later before a hail of gunfire downs him.
• Anvilicious: Yes, we get it. Superheroes and America both suck.
• Crossing the Line Twice: Almost every issue.
• Darkness-Induced Audience Apathy: The series set out to be a Darker and Edgier Deconstructive Parody of the superhero genre. Ultimately however, The Boys ended up being such a Crapsack World that it was deemed just as unrealistic as the worlds of Marvel and DC, simply on the opposite end of the spectrum, and it was hard to care for anyone.
• Fridge Horror: When Tek-Knight sent Laddio away to visit all the other superteams in a effort to keep himself from involuntarily raping the boy, he explicitly said to even visit the G-Men and all their spin-off teams. We never see Laddio again after that.
• Memetic Loser: The Seven are often seen as such among superhero debates given how it's frequently made clear that they're nowhere near as powerful as the DC or Marvel heroes they're copying. Though there are some hints that the Seven are much more powerful than they realize, it's just that the lack of supervillains means they never pushed themselves to discover their true limits.
• Moral Event Horizon: Homelander settled himself in the Believe arc, issue 46, The Muller family had just won the BELIEVE meeting prizes, a new shining car and a dinner with Homelander, the hero was kind enough to take the car and family flying to their reserved tables; that was what the family thought, the "Superhero" took the Mullers for their final ride as he dropped the car, already above the clouds with the family screaming in fear, in cold blood while reveling that the BELIEVE meeting was just a farce.
  • Then there was that time with him eating babies and hearts, laughing no less...
    • As of issue 65, the above was a subversion. That was Black Noir.
• Narm: Frequently played straight in-universe.
• Nightmare Fuel: Issue 63: Homelander's face after he kills Queen Maeve and has Annie in his sights as a possible next target
• Shallow Parody: Every superhero is transparently patterned after a Marvel and/or DC character and their personality is largely made up of every crude joke about that character. The only exception is Black Noir who is more Superboy/Bizarro rather than the Batman expy he's presented as.
• Squick
• Wangst: Played with; many's the time that Wee Hughie's basically been told to shut the fuck up, stop moaning about things and just get over it by the other characters, and he does display a tendency to mope about and wallow in self-pity over the problems in his life. Then again, a lot of the people who are telling him this are themselves homicidal borderline-sociopaths who find it unsettlingly easy to shrug off various atrocities, so they probably aren't the best examples to follow in terms of getting in touch with your emotions.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: In Butcher's case, Played With. He wasn't exactly a nice guy early in his life. But he gradually became a better person when he met his wife, Becky. Then she got raped by Homelander, really Black Noir. And then she died when the child crawled out of her womb. He's implied to have Death Seeker tendencies, and in issue 65 after Black Noir and Homelander are dead, he admits, with tears in his eyes, that Becky would loath what he has become.
  • Ironically enough, as of issue 65, Homelander of all people. Throughout the series, we see him cross the Moral Event Horizon multiple times. And yet it turns out that he only got to this point because of atrocities he thought he committed, believing that he was far beyond saving. In truth, Black Noir, who turns out to be his clone, committed several of these crimes (including the baby eating) in an attempt to get Homelander, once truly as ideal and good as he was portrayed as, to the point where he could perform his purpose: to kill Homelander. Hits even more when Homelander dies trying to enact Death Equals Redemption. Even Butcher seems to feel some sympathy for him.