The Dictatorship

Why ‘The Boys’ and ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ became must-watch series for our political time

Published

2 years ago

November 19, 2024

Why ‘The Boys’ and ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ became must-watch series for our political time

During Donald Trump’s first presidential term, Margaret Atwood’s “The Handmaid’s Tale,” or rather the Hulu series based on Atwood’s original novel, which just teased its sixth season for early 2025, became a shorthand symbol in the battle for reproductive rights. With its dehumanizing vision of a world that reduces women to breeding vessels held captive, abused and forced to bear childrenfor the wealthy and privileged in a repressive state,the show felt ominously, if not fantastically, aligned with where this country appeared to be heading. But as Trump prepares to re-enter the White House, I see a different streaming show that speaks more directly to this unsettling political moment: Amazon’s dystopian superhero satire “The Boys.”

Since its premiere on Amazon Prime in 2019, the series has often felt like a cautionary tale, a not-so-thinly veiled rumination on the political and media climate that laid the groundwork for Trump.

It might be easily missed behind the colorful spin on comic-book tropes and its abundant helpings of gore and kinky sex, but the series removed its mask long ago when it comes to its warnings about how a toxic stew of celebrity, hero worship and disinformation can lead to autocracy, enabled and fueled by corporate greed, corruption and lust for power.

Adapted from the comics, “The Boys” concluded its fourth season with a chilling resolution setting up its final arc, which isn’t expected to arrive until 2026. In it (and spoiler alert for those yet to take the plunge), a psychologically broken man-child, the Superman-esque Homelander (played by Antony Starr), gained control of the government and claimed sweeping powers under the guise of security and restoring order.

Since its premiere on Amazon Prime in 2019, the series has often felt like a cautionary tale, a not-so-thinly veiled rumination on the political and media climate that laid the groundwork for Trump. After the 2024 election, the similarities, even if cartoonish, feel harder to ignore.

Showrunner Eric Kripke acknowledged as much in a 2022 interview with Rolling Stone, saying that Homelander, with his volatile mix of emotional insecurity and power, had “always been a Trump analogue for me,” adding that the character reflected a “bigger issue” — namely, “the more awful public figures act, the more fans they seem to be getting.”

Leaning even more heavily into politics in its most recent season, the series added a new superhero character, Firecracker, who parrots the conservative views espoused by avery Fox News-like TV network, owned by the shadowy corporation behind the superheroes, Vought International. Kripke told Entertainment Weekly that Firecracker represents “the super extreme right-wing news media.”

Like Trump, who leveraged his carefully sculpted and edited image on “The Apprentice” as he segued into politics, “The Boys” resides in a world where Vought uses TV, movies and other media to market the “supes,” so they’re called, to the unsuspecting public.

As depicted in the series, little about the show’s underlying political message is subtle, including a conspiracy-minded group within the show that evokes QAnon. Vought meticulously exploits the gullibility of those true believers, working to blur the lines between entertainment and news under its vast corporate umbrella while wrapping Homelander and his brethren in the American flag and faux patriotism.

Indeed, the cynicism at the heart of “The Boys” is that if you can play the hero convincingly enough, it’s possible to get away with all sorts of terrible behavior.

In an ironic twist, “The Boys” has pursued this unflinching vision of autocracy and unbridled capitalism while arguably becoming Amazon Prime Video’s signature franchise, spawning spinoffs (including “Gen V”) and plans for a prequel to carry on once it’s gone. At a time when Amazon founder Jeff Bezos has drawn criticism for his decision not to endorse a presidential candidate in another asset, The Washington Post, a fanciful superhero series has forged ahead, hiding its politics in plain sight.

The cynicism at the heart of “The Boys” is that if you can play the hero convincingly enough, it’s possible to get away with all sorts of terrible behavior.

Reality intruded on “The Boys” in another way when an assassination sequence in the season finale, which premiered close to the attempt on Trump’s life in July, prompted Prime Video to change the title and add a disclaimer to the episode, which was actually filmed last year.

With “Handmaid’s Tale” due to end next year and “The Boys’” climax to follow, neither of these programs will continue long into a Trump second term. But each in their own way has spoken through fiction with anger and urgency, warning that the threat of fascism isn’t necessarily the stuff of old black-and-white images. They have also shown the ability to tackle issues in a thoughtful and provocative way, setting forth a challenge for future shows wrapped in a cloak of entertainment to pick up that colorful gauntlet.

Brian Lowry

Brian Lowry is a media columnist and critic, most recently at BLN, and before that Variety and the Los Angeles Times.

The Dictatorship

Senate confirms Jay Clayton as Trump’s director of national intelligence

Published

15 hours ago

July 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Senate confirms Jay Clayton as Trump’s director of national intelligence

Christmas. 28, 2026, 7:14 PM EDT

The Senate voted Tuesday to install Jay Clayton, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, as director of national intelligence despite a tense confirmation hearing that eroded the once broad bipartisan support for his nomination.

Clayton was confirmed 51-47 along party lines, with all of the chamber’s Republicans and none of its Democrats voting to hand him the reins of the nation’s sprawling intelligence apparatus.

The final vote came after a combative July 16 confirmation hearing before the Senate Intelligence Committee, during which Clayton said under oath that he is not an “election denier” but refused to directly state that President Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential election to former President Joe Biden.

That unnerved Democratic lawmakers on the panel, some of whom had expressed support for Clayton’s nomination amid their enthusiasm to replace acting Director Bill Pulte, the Federal Housing Finance Agency head and a Trump loyalist. Since taking over for former National Intelligence Director Tulsi Gabbard, who resigned from her Cabinet-level position after a tumultuous tenure in May, Pulte has overseen multiple rounds of layoffs across the agency.

In Clayton, who served as chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission during Trump’s first term, some Senate Democrats had seen an experienced public servant who could be entrusted to lead the nation’s 18 intelligence agencies after more than a year of clashes with Gabbard, who they accused of making false election fraud claims and furthering Trump’s political agenda.

But his refusal to answer questions about who won the 2020 election and his stumble during a series of questions about Trump instructing Gabbard to attend an FBI raid of the election office in Fulton CountyGeorgia, earlier this year swiftly shattered that support.

During a heated exchange with Sen. Jon Ossoff, D-Ga., Clayton said he had only been made aware of Gabbard’s presence at the raid during a private conversation with the Georgia senator the day before the hearing.

“The first time you learned that Director Gabbard was present at that raid was in my office yesterday?” Ossoff asked, visibly stunned.

“It was the first time that, in my recollection, I’ve thought about it recently,” Clayton answered.

Democrats and election experts have repeatedly warned that Trump is launching an unprecedented effortto discredit and potentially steal the midterm elections. They have expressed fears that Trump will ask Clayton to attend another FBI raid in November involving the seizure of ballots and election records, as Gabbard did. Clayton’s performance in the confirmation hearing, which took place hours before Trump delivered a primetime address to the nation in which he said with no evidence that the country’s elections are being “rigged and stolen,” did not assuage those fears.

“I’m bitterly disappointed,” Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the intelligence committee, told Clayton of his refusal to say who won the 2020 election and his answer regarding Gabbard’s role in the Fulton County raid as the hearing wrapped. The committee narrowly referred Clayton’s nomination to the full Senate in a 9-8 vote the following week.

“You’re going to be in a room with [the president] many times, and at times you should have a difference of opinion. And if you can’t disagree with him when he’s not in the room, are you going to be able to disagree with him when you’re sitting across from him in the Oval Office or Situation Room?” Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., asked Clayton at one point, reflecting the growing tension in the hearing room.

After Clayton’s confirmation, Warner called on the new director of intelligence to resist pressure from Trump to manipulate intelligence for political gain or use it to cast doubt about U.S. election results or interfere in U.S. elections.

“Having known and worked with Jay for years,” Warner said. “I came away from his confirmation process with serious reservations about whether he would be willing to stand up to political pressure when it matters most. Now that he has been confirmed, I sincerely hope he proves those concerns unfounded.”

“Clayton now has an opportunity – and the responsibility – to demonstrate that intelligence will never be shaped to fit a political narrative, that analysts will be free to deliver their best independent judgments, and that the extraordinary authorities entrusted to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence will never be used to manufacture doubt about the integrity of our elections or justify interference in their administration.”

David Rohde contributed to this report.

Sydney Carruth is a breaking news reporter covering national politics and policy for MS NOW. You can send her tips from a non-work device on Signal at SydneyCarruth.46 or follow her work on X and Bluesky.

The Dictatorship

Partial block of Texas’ censorship law is upheld in court

Published

15 hours ago

July 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Partial block of Texas’ censorship law is upheld in court

Happy Tuesday! Here’s your Tuesday Tech Drop, some of the past week’s top stories from the intersection of politics and technology.

Texas’ censorship law still partially blocked

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit upheld an injunction partially blocking a Texas law aimed at preventing minors from being exposed to harmful content. The portion of the SCOPE Act that requires some digital service providers to adopt monitor-and-filter strategies had already been hit with an injunction, which the 5th Circuit upheld after Texas appealed.

Administration sued over alleged database

Privacy and civil liberties advocates have sued the Trump administration, accusing it of adopting “a secret policy of collecting, maintaining, and using personally identifying information of protestors and observers.” The lawsuit centers on claims — some of which have been made by federal immigration agents — that the government is maintaining a database to spy on critics of the president’s racist anti-immigrant crackdown.

SpaceX’s stock collapse

SpaceX’s stock price fell again Monday amid ongoing concerns in the market about spending on artificial intelligence. The stock’s overall collapse since its peak after its initial public offering in June has reportedly played a role in erasing owner Elon Musk’s trillionaire status.

Watch Bloomberg Tech’s report below.

Trump administration exempts SpaceX

Speaking of SpaceX, the Trump administration — perhaps, in keeping with the president’s campaign vow to “make life good” for people like Musk — agreed to exempt the company’s Starlink routers from the Federal Communications Commission’s ban on foreign-made routers. Starlink makes some of its routers in Vietnam.

High-tech voter suppression

AlterNet published a report on the high-tech tools enabling conservatives to challenge voters’ eligibility en masse, posing potential threats to voter participation in the upcoming midterms.

Senate crypto bill in danger

A Senate bill regulating cryptocurrencies — and banning federal officials, including presidents, from issuing digital assets like Trump’s crypto coins — is at risk of languishing as Democrats raise concerns that the bill’s ethics provisions aren’t strong enough.

Kalshi’s midterm moves

Kalshi, the glorified betting platform that has financial ties to Donald Trump Jr. and which has been used to promote baseless election conspiracy theories, unveiled its “midterms hub” ahead of this fall’s elections. What could go wrong? Plenty, it seems. A Kalshi board member joined MS NOW’s “The Weekend” to discuss the scrutiny the company is facing.

Watch the interview here.

MAHA misinformation

“Make America Healthy Again” influencers are spreading misinformation about women’s menstrual cycles, and The Guardian spotlighted how the influencers are spreading falsehoods about women’s luteal phases — claims that seem designed to malign birth control and fuel pronatalist talking points that have gained steam in the MAGA movement.

The Dictatorship

Tuesday’s Mini-Report, 7.28.26

Published

15 hours ago

July 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Today’s edition of quick hits.

* The latest on the Japanese earthquake: “A 7.1-magnitude earthquake hit Japan’s southern Kumamoto prefecture on Tuesday, knocking out power to thousands of homes, rupturing roads and leaving some trapped and others presumed dead inside a partially collapsed shopping mall. Speaking to reporters from her office in Tokyo, Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said authorities ‌were still assessing the full extent of the damage in the area, which was devastated by a deadly quake a decade ago.”

* Tehran contradicts Trump: “Iran’s skies have been free of the sound of explosions and airstrikes for the past several days, after a bout of renewed fighting with the United States. But Iranian officials say they have not agreed to a cease-fire and are in no hurry to hold direct talks with American negotiators. Instead, Iranian officials insist that they are in a position of strength, military leaders boast of battlefield successes, and diplomats dismiss U.S. claims that they are eager to return to negotiations.”

* The six-month mark: “Soon after the war began on Feb. 28, President Trump declared that Iran was ‘totally defeated and wants a deal.’ Then in March, Mr. Trump said the U.S. military would wrap up its campaign against Iran in two to three weeks. ‘We will be leaving very soon,’ he said. Now the conflict is entering its sixth month and a period of deep uncertainty. After nearly two weeks of attacks and counterattacks, Mr. Trump has held off a major escalation. But major issues between the two sides remain unsettled.”

* Putin’s latest offensive against dissent: “The Kremlin has initiated a new crackdown on anti-war voices ahead of Russia’s parliamentary elections in September, barring candidates from running if they show any sign of opposing the bloody, expensive and increasingly unpopular military operation in Ukraine.”

* The latest ethics probe: “The House Ethics Committee said in a statement Monday it is investigating Rep. Lance Gooden, a four-term Texas Republican. It’s unclear what the committee is probing, but the Office of Congressional Conduct, an independent investigative branch of the House, sent over findings regarding Gooden to the committee June 10.”

* A striking report out of Louisiana about how state and local officials agreed to give a tech giant everything it wanted as part of a secret deal: “The New York Times’s examination shows for the first time how Meta used secrecy and speed to pave the way for its giant project, which it calls Hyperion. At a pivotal moment for the A.I. boom, Hyperion could be a blueprint for other companies intent on avoiding local opposition in order to get massive data centers built fast.”

* Evidence of a toxic political climate: “Last week, former Justice Department lawyer Liz Oyer testified in the Senate against the confirmation of Todd Blanche as attorney general. Then came the death threats.”

* The pressure on McConnell persists: “Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear has asked Sen. Mitch McConnell to ‘directly and verbally address’ their constituents or resign, the Democratic governor’s latest demand for transparency regarding the 84-year-old Republican lawmaker’s condition as he recovers from a fall and pneumonia.”

See you tomorrow.

Steve Benen is a producer for “The Rachel Maddow Show,” the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He’s also the bestselling author of “Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans’ War on the Recent Past.”