Hot off the heels of the success of The Boys comes Gen V, a spinoff set in the same universe. It’s like The Boys, but with more raging hormones: The new Prime Video series follows Marie Moreau (Jaz Sinclair), a freshman at Godolkin University specializing in crime fighting. The university is fiercely competitive, right down to its widely publicized rankings to see which superheroes—known in Gen V as “supes”—are best-in-class. And what better way for these teens to relieve all that stress than through some wild sex?
The Boys cinematic universe has never been one to shy away from sex scenes. But Gen V takes the fornication to the next level in the fourth episode—and that’s saying a lot, since Season 3 of The Boys opens with a character practically exploding his partner's penis, killing him. But Gen V brings a whole new meaning to the phrase, as coined by showrunner Michele Fazekas, “cocksplosion.” And instead of just being a wild sex scene, it’s also a powerful way to tell a sexual assault story.
(Warning: Disccussions of sexual assault and spoilers for Gen V ahead.)
There’s a lot going on in Gen V’s fourth episode. Marie is trying to find her roommate, Emma (Lizzie Broadway), who’s helped an extremely powerful supe escape from Godolkin’s secret underground laboratory. There’s one supe at Godolkin that can help Marie: a clairvoyant named Rufus (Alexander Calvert).
Rufus isn’t one of those mediums on television who uses generic questions to fake their way to the top, but an actual, bonafide psychic who can actually pinpoint Emma’s location. But Rufus’ behavior is creepy from the jump. He makes multiple passes at Marie before agreeing to help her out of kindness, though onlooker Jordan (a bigender supe with the hots for Marie) is clearly suspicious of Rufus. It turns out that she was right to be: Moments later, Marie finds herself waking up in Rufus’ dorm room. Jordan, who smartly followed Marie after she met up with Rufus, bangs on the door, demanding Rufus open up. He refuses, and we see that Rufus is facing away from Marie in nothing but a robe, revealing his naked body. Between that and Spandau Ballet’s “True” playing, it’s abundantly clear that this is exactly what she thinks it is: Rufus is about to sexually assault Marie.
But Rufus has woefully underestimated his desired victim—surprising, given that he mentions Marie’s high ranking, but that’s unabashed male chauvinism for you. Marie’s ability to manipulate blood has proven her to be an incredibly powerful foe. The show makes it clearer than ever in this scene, with the big cocksplosion.
Rufus is shocked to discover that his penis is growing. And it’s not going from flaccid to erect, mind you; his penis is rapidly engorging. This naturally terrifies him, and not just because his freaking penis is blowing up like a balloon, but because the complete control he thought he had over the situation has completely reversed.
Marie after ... ya know.
Prime Video via YouTubeIt doesn’t get better for Rufus (and frankly, it shouldn’t): When Jordan finally breaks down the door, Marie makes Rufus’ penis explode, sending blood flying all over the place, most of which lands on Marie’s deeply disturbed face. With Rufus lying on the floor crumpled over in agony, Jordan helps Marie out of the room—but before leaving, she drops one hell of a one-liner, calling Rufus a “piece of dickless shit.”
In true Gen V fashion, Rufus’ rapidly expanding dick isn’t merely suggested—it’s shown in extreme close-up. We see the penis grow and explode, the camera refusing to cut away and protect us from the gruesome image. It’s hard to make a scene where someone tries to sexually assault another person funny, but Gen V does it brilliantly. And that’s because it isn’t trying to make you laugh, but the reality of a cocksplosion is so thoroughly ridiculous that one can’t help but laugh at it—which helps distract from the scene’s disturbing context.
Producer Eric Kripke explained it well in an interview with Variety, published after the episode’s premiere last week. “You have to treat your characters with empathy and humanity,” Kripke said. “In life, there’s gallows humor, and people make jokes so they can cope. The cocksplosion sequence allows us to feel Marie’s fear, and Jordan’s desperation to help Marie.
The rape-revenge narrative is a common one, made famous by the 1978 film I Spit on Your Grave. (Roger Ebert famously called it “a vile bag of garbage.”) These stories often confront the audience with a graphic sexual assault, before exploring how the victim (usually a woman) gets takes on her assailant. It can be a deeply distressing experience for those watching, particularly viewers who have their own experiences with sexual assault. But prevents the assault entirely and immediately empowers Marie to save herself—allowing the utterly shocking eruption of genitalia to be incredibly gross, tremendously funny, and even a bit cathartic.
While still acknowledging the awfulness of sexual assault, Gen V uses the moment to explore uncomfortable power dynamics at play, and how Rufus’ ignorance leads to a dramatic shift in that power. And all it took was a literal penis explosion.
