Studying Time: 2 minutes
The brand new Netflix collection Boots has obtained overwhelmingly constructive critiques from critics.
However it’s additionally obtained some very harsh criticism from a really high-profile supply.
The collection focuses on a closeted homosexual teenager from Louisiana who follows his finest pal, Ray McAffey, into the US Marine Corps.
A screenshot from the brand new Netflix collection ‘Boots.’ (Netflix)
“After impulsively joining the U.S. Marine Corps, a bullied teen finds new purpose and unexpected brotherhood with his motley team of fellow recruits,” reads the present’s official logline.
Based mostly on the memoir The Pink Marine by Greg Cope White, which is about in 1979, Boots strikes the primary storyline to the Nineteen Nineties — and it’s attracted the ire of high navy brass in 2025.
The collection hits streaming simply days after Secretary of Conflict Pete Hegseth delivered an sudden speech through which he knowledgeable an viewers of generals and admirals that “dudes with dresses” weren’t welcome in US fight forces.
A screenshot from the brand new Netflix collection ‘Boots.’ (Nerflix)
He went on to clarify that every one new recruits should meet “male-level” health requirements to face “life and death” conditions.
“Standards must be uniform, gender-neutral, and high. If not, they’re not standards. They’re just suggestions. Suggestions that get our sons and daughters killed,” Hegseth mentioned on the occasion.
Whereas there are not any questions on the primary character’s bodily health to serve in Boots, and he isn’t “gender neutral,” however Pentagon press secretary Kingsley Wilson nonetheless lashed out on the present in a latest assertion to Leisure Weekly.
“Under President Trump and Secretary [Pete] Hegseth, the US military is getting back to restoring the warrior ethos. Our standards across the board are elite, uniform, and sex-neutral because the weight of a rucksack or a human being doesn’t care if you’re a man, a woman, gay, or straight,” mentioned Wilson.
“We will not compromise our standards to satisfy an ideological agenda, unlike Netflix whose leadership consistently produces and feeds woke garbage to their audience and children.”
The Trump administration has been occurring the assault in opposition to entertainers and media retailers whose views don’t completely align with their very own, however up to now, these assaults have had the other of the meant impact.
For instance, Jimmy Kimmel loved a large rankings surge after he was briefly faraway from ABC following public stress from FCC Chair Brendan Carr.
And in its first week of launch, Boots has confirmed to be a large hit for Netflix. There’s no saying how a lot of that success is because of free publicity from the present’s critics.
