Warning: Spoilers for Gen V episodes one and two below.
Jeff Bezos is truly sick (in a good way) for inventing the three-episode premiere model and then utilizing it for a show as bloody and disturbed as Gen V. After a premiere filled with gore, death, and dicks, the show’s follow-up episodes (released simultaneously) gave us more insight into the bigger mystery fueling this season and the role our dangerous little idiot supes have to play in it.
We met parents, we pondered on whether flashy jewelry makes poor people sad — spoiler: they already are — and we absurd hero antics that definitely won’t make it into anyone’s In Memoriam tribute video. Here’s where the WTF leaderboard stands after episodes two and three.
6. Cate’s Jumanji Moment
The hazmat crew had barely mopped up her dead boyfriend’s intestines before Cate Dunlap decided to start wielding her mind influence for good. She’s saving the world one unfunny frat bro at a time, powering the economy in the process and making fans care about baseball again. That’s real hero behavior. Was it worth the small brain bleed to tell some incel asswipe he should go to Dicks Sporting Goods, purchase a Louisville slugger, and have a crack at his own balls every hour while shouting “Jumanji” at the top of his lungs? Honestly, yes.
5. A Freudian Scavenger Hunt
Andre’s got bigger problems than almost murdering a girl in a nightclub and watching his best friend have a very public, very fatal meltdown: His dad is here. The only thing worse than being stuck with powers and the responsibility that comes with them for Andre is having a parent who lived that superhero life before you did. The senior Polarity is stagedad-ing hard in these episodes which makes the campus scavenger hunt Andre and Cate go on to find a clue left behind by Golden Boy all the weirder. Shoving your hand into your dad’s bronzed penis to retrieve your dead bestie’s cell phone is no one’s idea of a good time. Except maybe Sigmund Freud. Sigmund Freud would’ve loved this show.
4. That Nancy Reagan Reference
Like The Boys, Gen-V isn’t afraid to get political but, unless you’re intimately familiar with the search engine results when you combine “Nancy Reagan” and “Throat Goat,” this reference might’ve gone over your head. Never fear. Even without knowing the oral history of a former First Lady, watching a girl gag herself on her own tale for likes is still nauseating.
3. When Flashlights And Starfish Turned Sexual
Cate risked another aneurysm in episode three to save Andre’s life after a rescue attempt gone wrong in a moment that proved heroic moments come in all shapes, sizes, and sexual innuendos. Using her telepathic abilities, Cate manipulated two guards who seemed ready to transport Andre to “The Woods,” influencing one to simulate oral using a flashlight before the other threatened to stick the organically-lubed battery-operated torch up his “chocolate starfish.” Disgusting, but effective.
2. Sam’s Hulk Out
We’re finally clued into what caused Luke to spiral in the premiere when Andre and Cate discover Sam (the brother Golden Boy believed was dead) is the kid that almost escaped back in episode one. He’s clinically insane and suped up just like his big bro, which might be why the school is experimenting on him in “The Woods.” Of course, we’re not advocating child kidnapping and torture, but watching Sam get so angry he punched a guy’s intestines through his mouth has made it clear: this kid needs help.
1. Q-Tips By Cricket
Emma deserved a hero moment after the suffering she endured in the show’s first few episodes. Feeling pressured to purge herself to satisfy a guy’s kink, having her eating disorder disclosed for likes, being betrayed by a friend, and having to field exploitative reality TV pitches from her own mother meant Cricket needed a win. Would we qualify swimming inside a guy’s ear canal only to emerge in a pool of brain matter and blood as a win? Eh. Knowing Cricket’s mom, there has to be a way to spin this into a brand deal with Q-tips.