CS Interview: Karl Urban & Laz Alonso Talk The Boys Season 2

ComingSoon.net had the opportunity to speak with The Boys stars Karl Urban and Laz Alonso about the upcoming second season, premiering today on Amazon Prime Video, including what it was like to film the already infamous whale scene. You can check out the interview below!

In Season 2, The Boys are on the run from the law, hunted by the Supes, and desperately trying to regroup and fight back against Vought. In hiding, Hughie (Jack Quaid), Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso), Frenchie (Tomer Capon), and Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) try to adjust to a new normal, with Butcher (Karl Urban) nowhere to be found. Meanwhile, Starlight (Erin Moriarty) must navigate her place in The Seven as Homelander (Antony Starr) sets his sights on taking complete control. His power is threatened with the addition of Stormfront (Aya Cash), a social-media-savvy new Supe, who has an agenda of her own. On top of that, the Supervillain threat takes center stage and makes waves as Vought seeks to capitalize on the nation’s paranoia.

The Boys is an irreverent take on what happens when superheroes, who are as popular as celebrities, as influential as politicians and as revered as gods, abuse their superpowers rather than use them for good. It’s the powerless against the super powerful as The Boys embark on a heroic quest to expose the truth about the supergroup known as “The Seven.” The show retains most of the comics (available for purchase here) boundary-pushing violence and sexuality while exploring the dark side of superhero celebrity and fame.

The series was created by Evan Goldberg and Seth Rogen, who are responsible for another subversive comic book-inspired series, AMC’s Preacher, and Supernatural creator Eric Kripke.

Season 1 is available for streaming on Amazon Prime Video.

CS Interview: Karl Urban & Laz Alonso Talk The Boys Season 2

ComingSoon.net: What is the emotional weight on Billy between the finale and when we see him return?

Karl Urban: Without giving too much away, I think you’re going to specifically see at some juncture what happens to Butcher in between him waking up on the lawn and when you see him come down the stairs and, ‘Daddy’s home.’ But certainly, that revelation about Becca Butcher is a complete game-changer, it becomes finding Becca is Butcher’s main focus and drive for season two and the question is how far is he willing to go to achieve that goal.

In season one, Butcher was very obsessed and driven to take down The Seven and he made choices that involved turning his back on The Boys and that didn’t turn out too well, so it’ll be interesting to see going forward in season two, has Butcher learned from that? What’s the price that he’s willing to pay? Butcher’s journey and M.M.’s journey is very similar in the way that, like all the characters, season two rips that element that is most cherished and most valuable for that character away from them and sort of poses the challenge of how is that character going to deal with it.

CS: What was shooting the whale sequence like?

Urban: One of the funniest days on set was getting to work inside that whale carcass. It was like beached on an actual beach, it was this huge, gigantic-sized whale and we were deep inside and it’s gotta be like 90 degrees outside and I just remember looking over at Laz at one point and there’s sweat pouring down his face and I’ve never heard this in my entire career. An actor say, ‘Can we please get some A/C in the whale?’ [laughs]. It was a lot of fun and we were drenched in blood.

Laz Alonso: Can I defend myself, please? Just to put it into context, at the beginning of the season, when Eric told us about the idea of the whale with David, the first AD, the first thing David told us was, ‘Don’t worry guys, this whale is a state-of-the-art whale, it’s got A/C built in it, it’s got a tube feeding cold air in it, so you’re going to be fine, you’re going to be fine.’ We get to the whale, it’s 90 outside and like 120 inside the whale, I ask for the A/C!

Urban: ‘There’s no A/C in the whale, where’s the A/C?!’ [laughs]

Alonso: I was like, ‘David there’s no A/C, where’s it at?’ They told me that they couldn’t fit the tube somehow, the tube they thought they could fit didn’t fit inside the whale, so the joke’s on me, I wanted A/C inside the whale.

Urban: I mean, fair enough, it was just so insane and so indicative of the show and the crazy shit we get to do that we’re even working inside a whale in the first place, let alone the fact that it’s an un-conditioned environment and reeking because it’s just rotten whale guts everywhere. Welcome to The Boys season two!

CS: Would everyone accept Hughie as a leader?

Urban: The thing about Hughie is that he’s not just some cute piece of booty, he’s there for a function, all of the members of The Boys have a specific function. M.M. is particularly meticulous, he’s got a brilliant mind and also on a deeper level serves as a moral compass for Butcher and I really feel like The Boys, even though Butcher is really thought of as the leader, what we come to see in season two is Butcher pushes The Boys and asks too much of them or asks something that they feel is egregious and they’re not gonna do it, so it’s very much an evolving situation that’s a bit more democratic situation.

But, you know, Butcher is very much one who’s going, ‘Follow me, Boys, into the breach this way,’ and 90 percent of the time, The Boys go, ‘Alright, let’s go.’ At the end of season one, Butcher ostensibly abandons The Boys and in season two he now needs The Boys and he’s on the back foot. He’s vulnerable and he’s desperate and the fracture in that relationship is where we start season two and we address it really quickly. Butcher needs The Boys to get his wife back.