I can't help but notice, repeatedly these days, how much we all today live in the world created by Alan Moore (even if he has had his name removed from it).

There are so many 21st century shows and comic books - all the ones which pose the question 'But what if superheroes lived in the real world?' - that all lead directly back to the books Moore was writing 20, 30 years ago. This particular one is greatly indebted to, most obviously, Watchmen, but also to his great superhero cop series, 'Top 10'.

'The Boys' is horribly cynical, crass and violent. It feels the product of a generation raised on Grand Theft Auto, and emerges from the same bleak, empty, hollowed out void that Joker and Too Old To Die Young crawled out of. There's an awful, depressing, god-shaped hole at the centre of it all, with no more heroes or anything else left to believe in, seeing only the worst in everyone. Predictably, all the male superheroes are evil, while all the female ones are either good or conflicted. No change there, of course, but I keep wondering what these kinds of messages, now so common in popular culture (and everywhere else) are doing to the glue holding civilization together.

Anyway, all this is made bearable only by the fact that it is also very clever, surprising, and genuinely laugh-out-loud funny. I'm three episodes in and I have no idea where it's going to go. And I do like being surprised.

Karl Urban's accent is a thing of bewilderment and wonder, dogpaddling all the way from the Docks of London to Auckland harbour and back, often in a single sentence. There's a (seemingly mandatory in 2019) #MeToo subtext to the plot that emerges as the story goes on, but I have to say, it's at least dealt with interestingly and intelligently, without any placard waving, and seems believable in the way it unfolds.

The script is witty and sharp, with many memorable lines scattered throughout it. The placement and meaning and delivery of the sentence "Don't you ever besmirch Billy Joel" has so much more depth and poignance than one would have thought at all possible.

I also want to add, even though it's now a very common thing to remark, the show has a first-rate soundtrack - whoever's choosing The Damned and Jane's Addiction and Bill Withers has a fine record collection.