“I thought that was a perfect way to come full circle,” showrunner Eric Kripke tells Entertainment Weekly. Simon Pegg has known the guys for a long time.

It is noteworthy that artist Darick Robertson used the British actor from Edgar Wright’s Cornetto Trilogy as a model for the comic book character Hughie Campbell, which Garth Ennis co-created. It was therefore obvious to cast Pegg as Hugh Campbell, Sr., Hughie’s father, when TV producer Eric Kripke took over as showrunner for the Amazon series version.

Hugh Campbell, Sr., played by Simon Pegg in season four of “The Boys.”

Kripke needs a moment to honor his legacy now that the character is permanently leaving the show, as Pegg himself proposed.

The Boys’ fifth season episode, “Beware the Jabberwork, My Son,” included Hugh Campbell’s death played out as an emotional event for both Pegg’s on-screen family and the viewers at home. Instead of completely healing him, the Compound V that was put into his veins in the last episode made his disorientation and memory loss from the stroke worse while also giving him the ability to phase shift through solid objects.

Jack Quaid, Simon Pegg and Rosemarie DeWitt for ‘THE BOYS’ season 4. pic.twitter.com/zjsmMmWZNz

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The combination led to utter chaos in the hospital, as a frightened and confused Hugh murdered patients, nurses, and security guards alike — often by turning back into a solid form while in the middle of phase shifting through a person.

As it happens, there is a character in the comic books called Stool Shadow, who is a malfunctioning phase shifter and often can’t finish her own thoughts, thanks to the multiple concussions she suffered in her life. However, Kripke says the figure was not a conscious inspiration for Hugh. “There’s really only so many powers. You start to run through them,” Kripke tells Entertainment Weekly. “It’s always good to riff on powers that we have seen in comic book movies but get to put our Boys spin on it, which is if you stop phasing in the middle of somebody, that would be really terrible.”

Hughie (Jack Quaid) and his mom, Daphne (Rosemarie DeWitt), ultimately decide to put Hugh out of his misery so he doesn’t have to suffer the rest of his life. In a gut-wrenching moment, Hugh turns to his son and calls him “my Wee Hughie” one last time. “That came from Simon,” Kripke says. “That was not in the script. He reached out to me and he said, ‘Can I call him ‘Wee Hughie’ as one last nod?’”

“Wee Hughie” is the nickname for the Hughie of the comics, and uttering it felt like a nod to Pegg’s entire legacy with the character. “For him, this wasn’t just him leaving the show, this was him saying goodbye to 20 years of this character being a part of his life,” the showrunner adds. “I thought that was a perfect way to come full circle.”

Simon Pegg, Rosemarie Dewitt, and Jack Quaid on ‘The Boys’ season 4.

As for Quaid’s “Wee Hughie” of the show, Kripke explains how so much of his story in season 4 is about growing up.

“He’s always considered the young one, and he ends this season as a really mature, fully grown adult,” he says. “Such a big part of that journey for anyone is dealing with sick parents or aging parents. It’s just a very universal thing that everyone goes through. If you look at the episode in the very beginning, dad’s calling him, ‘You’re still that kid.’ By the end of the episode, Hughie’s making decisions that are very mature and adult and real that his parents are unable to do. It’s a little microcosm of a kid growing up.”