The Boys finale changed a scene because of Karl Urban's "heartbreakingly great" acting – and the showrunner thinks he deserves awards

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"He's delivering top shelf, Emmy winning work here consistently"

Karl Urban and Jeffrey Dean Morgan in The Boys season 4
(Image credit: Prime Video)

The Boys creator Eric Kripke has explained a last-minute change he made to the season 4 finale, and how it was all down to Karl Urban's "top shelf" acting as Billy Butcher in the emotional scene.

"So this Butcher scene KILLED me. Originally, we planned to cut back & forth between him & Hughie," he told his followers on X, formerly known as Twitter. "But was so heartbreakingly great, we just held on him. He's delivering top shelf, Emmy winning work here consistently."

In the sequence, and be warned, we're going to get a little spoiler-heavy from here on out, Hughie and Butcher share an achingly melancholy (but predictably lewd) phone call, as the latter recovers in the hospital after falling unconscious at the bar in the previous episode.

"We need your help," Hughie says over the line, but Butcher starts trailing off in only a way Butcher can. "When I was a lad," he begins, "I heard about this place in Nevada. A steakhouse, where the birds get their baps out when they bring you a ribeye. Lenny nearly pissed himself when I told him," he continues, mentioning his late younger brother. "Thought it was the funniest thing he ever heard. We was gonna go there someday. Well... Funny what you think about when your time's up, innit?"

"Butcher, where are you? I can come to you. We can figure this out," Hughie replies solemnly, to which Urban's character says: "Do us a favor, would you, Hughie? Go there. For me and Len, would ya? And tell the Boys I'm sorry, would ya? Tell the Boys I'm sorry for, uh... Just tell 'em I'm sorry. Goodbye, Hughie."

Kripke recently teased what to expect from The Boys' upcoming fifth and final season, suggesting it'll present "the show's version of the apocalypse" as the titular anti-Supe group make a last ditch attempt to stop Homelander from, well, taking over the world?

"The Boys are at their lowest point; most of them are captured, and we worry for their future," he told LadBible. "I always look at it [like we're at] the end of the second act of a movie, where everyone's really at their low point, and they've all faced their own personal demons. Now, they need to really come together in the fifth season and save the world."

The Boys seasons 1-4 are streaming now on Prime Video. The Boys season 5 is currently in development. For more on the show, check out some of our more spoiler-heavy explainers below:

Amy West
Amy West

I am an Entertainment Writer here at GamesRadar+, covering all things TV and film across our Total Film and SFX sections. Elsewhere, my words have been published by the likes of Digital Spy, SciFiNow, PinkNews, FANDOM, Radio Times, and Total Film magazine.