The Boys star Chace Crawford has said that a scene in the show in which he had to simulate sex with an octopus almost gave him a panic attack.
The Amazon Prime Video series returned for its fourth season last month, with just the final two episodes now left to premiere (on July 10 and 17, respectively).
The superhero series, adapted from the comic books written by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson and developed for the screen by Eric Kripke, follows the titular team of vigilantes as they combat superpowered enemies who abuse their powers.
In episode six of season three, Crawford’s Kevin Moskowitz, aka The Deep, whose powers include the ability to breathe underwater and communicate with marine animals, makes love with an octopus voiced by Tilda Swinton.
Speaking to Rolling Stone, Crawford, who rose to fame in Gossip Girl, talked about first reading the script for the episode in question.
“Oh God, how’s this going to work?” he said he asked himself. “I was in total denial about it. And then it got 24 hours out from the first day I had to shoot it and I almost had a panic attack.”
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He recalled speaking to Kripke about the logistics of the scene. “How are we gonna do this? What are the angles gonna be? How naked do I have to be?”
He said that in the end, the scene went smoothly. “Just the act of picking up the octopus and getting a wet octopus in the bed was so funny and weird,” he quipped.
In a four-star review of the new season, NME wrote: “With season five already confirmed, the return of a few familiar faces and a lot of characters confronting their pasts, this season sometimes feels like the set up for an eventual endgame scenario. Fans will note that spin-off show Gen V recently introduced a potentially supe-killing biological weapon. Luckily, all that plot never slows down the pace in what is another urgent edition of TV’s best superhero show.”
Some fans of the show labelled the twists and disturbingly graphic scenes in the sixth episode of the new season as “fucking diabolical”.
Nevertheless, it was named by NME as one of the best TV shows of 2024 so far.