The Boys opened its fourth season with three lukewarm episodes, which gave us a good idea of what we were about to see in the upcoming few weeks. Homelander and Butcher were engaged in a battle for Ryan’s soul, with Butcher being unexpectedly influential because of his sense of empathy. That’s been causing Homelander to spiral out, and he is set to confront his past in today’s episode. Butcher got into a bit of a tiff with his old anti-supe pal, Kessler, because he was of the opinion that Butcher was wasting precious time on molding Ryan to be a good human being instead of training him to be a supe capable of killing Homelander. In addition to this rivalry, the enmity between Starlight and Firecracker was established, and the primary reason for that was Annie’s rude behavior during her fashion pageantry days. Frenchie and Kimiko were busy dealing with the traumas from their past. Meanwhile, Hughie learned that Sister Sage, Homelander, and Victoria Neuman were planning to assassinate the President, bring in Martial Law, and take over the country. Hughie was almost killed while trying to extract this information, but a reformed A-Train saved him. Let’s see how these plot threads are explored in the fourth episode.
Spoiler Alert
Homelander Revisits His Old Home
Episode 4 of The Boys Season 4 opens with Homelander arriving at the underground Vought lab, where he underwent several tests as a kid, which is a mild way of saying that he was endlessly tortured so that the scientists could learn about the extent of his powers. As soon as he enters the premises, everyone freezes up because they know that he is one of the most powerful supes out there. Marty, one of the older scientists, almost triggers Homelander by referring to him by his actual name, John. It’s interesting that Homelander refers to himself as John when he is talking to himself, but when somebody else calls him John, it irks him. Things are tense, and Homelander makes it even more awkward by asking everyone to dig into the cake he has bought while ordering Marty to tell Barbara to attend this little reunion session immediately.
Hughie Wants Compound V
The scene shifts to the hospital, where the doctor announces that Hugh has essentially passed away and has been put on life support. She says that they’ll prolong his lifeline for a couple of days, but after that, they have to pull the plug. Daphne thinks it’s the humane thing to do, but Hughie doesn’t want to come to terms with the fact that his father isn’t coming back. He is in so much denial that he seemingly wants to resurrect Hugh by injecting Compound V into his bloodstream via the IV drip.
Annie Intends To Campaign For Robert Singer
After that, we get glimpses of A-Train and Will Ferrell’s The Blind Side-esque film, Tek Knight’s show on the events at Godolkin (it’s a Gen V reference), and Cameron Coleman doing a hit piece on Robert Singer for his anti-supe bill. Annie drops by to have a chat about it with Singer, and she is of the opinion that his legislative bill is great and it’ll “drive a stake through Vought’s heart” if it gets passed. But since Singer’s marketing is really bad, Annie isn’t very sure if he is going to get the mandate that’s needed for that bill to be greenlit. So, she offers her services, which will basically amount to on-ground rallies regarding Singer’s anti-supe bill, and she promises to do it as Starlight. In the last few episodes, Annie was unwilling to be Starlight again, but it seems like she has understood the effect that persona has on people. That’s why she is willing to look past the trauma she has experienced as Starlight and use her superhero alter-ego to do what’s important, which is getting Vought out of every administrative position.
Frenchie Tries To Confess His Sins To Colin
Elsewhere, Frenchie feigns ignorance to get Colin to talk about his family (Frenchie allegedly killed them in cold blood). Apparently, Colin’s mom used to be a lawyer, and she used to work on extremely violent cases. She crossed paths with Little Nina, and it’s obvious that she ordered Frenchie to kill her. Frenchie was an addict, and he went berserk and killed Colin’s mother and everyone else in his vicinity. Colin hid under the bed and saw the marks on the ankle of the “killer.” Frenchie immediately covers his ankle with the bedsheet, which means that he is still unwilling to come clean and tell Colin the truth about his involvement in his family’s slaughter.
Firecracker Starts Triggering Annie
Annie returns to the Starlight House to plan out the next phase of their marketing campaign with Kiara (who is recovering) and Colin, but they dash her sense of enthusiasm by showing the Firecracker-led Truthbomb show that’s being organized right in front of their headquarters. Of course, Sister Sage is behind it all, as she is seen manipulating the public perception of Starlight via internet trolls and the algorithm. Then she proceeds to order A-Train to remember his talking points, rejects Deep’s advances, and gives Firecracker the ammunition she needs to take down Starlight. As Firecracker begins her alt-supe (read: alt-right) rant, Annie and his team begin to move out the kids that they are sheltering so as to safeguard them from Firecracker and her army of lunatics. MM and Frenchie walk into the premises with Butcher, which triggers Annie because she doesn’t trust him. But MM advocates for Butcher, so he stays, and Annie is forced to cooperate with him. Butcher tries to learn what kind of dirt Firecracker has on Annie, but she refuses to reveal anything. So, Butcher decides to take the ugly route, which involves infiltrating Firecracker’s party.
Homelander Literally Grills Frank
Talking about ugly, the scene shifts back to the underground lab with Homelander and the scientists. Homelander reveals that when he was just a kid, one of the older scientists, Frank, used to play waste paper basketball while subjecting John to scorching levels of heat. It traumatized him, but since Frank was “just doing his job,” he doesn’t really remember anything about those days. To give Frank a taste of his own medicine, Homelander forces Frank to get into the oven room and burns him to a crisp while he casually plays paper basketball.
Hughie Makes A Deal With A-Train
Kimiko and Hughie arrive at a pier. Kimiko doesn’t know who they are about to meet. So, she is shocked to see A-Train there. She is even more shocked to know that Hughie has asked A-Train to meet him because he wants some Compound V. A-Train says that Homelander has every vial of Compound V stored in his room, thereby making it virtually impossible to steal it. Hence, he refuses to do the job for Hughie. That’s when Hughie reminds A-Train what he did to his girlfriend, and he admits that he doesn’t want the V for himself but for his dying father. Hughie also paints this heist as A-Train’s chance to redeem himself, and since he says that once A-Train gets him the Compound V, he won’t have to do anything for The Boys again, the speedster agrees to risk everything and get Hughie what he needs.
By the way, while this whole conversation has been going on, Hughie and Kimiko are being spied upon by an unseen assailant, and as soon as A-Train leaves, they open fire on them. Kimiko spots the scarred girl from the Shining Light Liberation Army and realizes that she is there to avenge all the people that Kimiko killed in their warehouse. Hughie manages to kill one of them, while Kimiko takes on a bunch of those soldiers. Then, Kimiko calls for a truce so that she can converse with the scarred girl. It’s revealed that Kimiko used to be the muscle for the Shining Light Liberation Army, and she used to fight its trainees. The girl was one of the recruits, and Kimiko is the one who gave her that scar. Kimiko obviously wants to redeem herself by seeking the girl’s forgiveness, but it doesn’t look like the girl is in the mood to show any kind of empathy towards Kimiko.
Butcher And MM Corner Firecracker
MM and Butcher make their way into Firecracker’s vanity van. Butcher name-drops Webweaver and something about a heroin enema, and it seems like the show’s parody of Spider-Man is an addict. But instead of dwelling on that, the show focuses on Butcher’s deteriorating health. Butcher asks MM to promise him that, in case he doesn’t survive the ordeal, he’ll get Ryan away from Homelander and raise him. Before MM and Butcher can get into the details of this deal, they spot Firecracker. So, they decide to table the discussion and go and remind her of the instance when she partook in a little pedophilia during her stint at the Florida branch of Capes for Christ.
Butcher tells Firecracker that if she doesn’t reveal Sister Sage’s plans, he is going to tweet about her past and undo all the work that Vought has done to make her appear like a saint in front of her evangelical audience. Surprisingly enough, Firecracker pushes the tweet button herself, and Butcher loses his bargaining chip. Next, Firecracker interrupts Ezekiel’s “Annie is the spawn of the devil” rant to not only whitewash her spotty past but also use it as her jumping-off point for some Starlight slander. Firecracker says that Starlight has blinded innocent people during her rescue operations. Starlight tells a shocked Frenchie, Colin, and Kiara that she was learning the ropes before storming out of the room out of shame. Butcher and MM return to the Starlight House and reveal that even though they don’t have anything that they can use to threaten Firecracker, he does have the keys to her vanity van, which he hands over to Frenchie and orders him to look into it.
A-Train Makes A Deal With Ashley
A-Train infiltrates Homelander’s room and finds his pubes and the breast milk that he drinks before finally stumbling upon all the Compound V in his possession. A-Train is discovered by Ashley, who was also in Homelander’s room, to leave an unflushed piece of poop in his bathroom because that’s the only way she can get revenge for the endless hours of frustration and anxiety she has been subjected to because of him. A-Train and Ashley agree that they’re not going to snitch on each other and call it a day.
Homelander Lasers Marty
The scene shifts to Homelander, who has now set his sights on Marty, and he starts talking about the elderly scientist who used to torture him back in the day. Homelander reveals that Marty used to keep an eye on John when he was locked up in the room with the big red door. Apparently, John figured out when Marty would leave his post and used those moments of true solitude to rub one out. One day, though, Marty returned before John was finished, and he proceeded to endlessly mock the kid and even nicknamed him Squirt. Marty tries to apologize to Homelander, but he isn’t in the mood to listen. Instead of forgiving Marty, Homelander tells him to masturbate on the spot while everyone in the room watches and laughs at him, just like Marty did with John. And just to give Marty the push he needs, Homelander tells him that if he doesn’t achieve an erection, he is going to laser his “Johnson” off. A desperate Marty tries everything in his arsenal to do what Homelander has asked him to do, but he fails, and the inevitable happens as Homelander shoots a beam of laser through Marty’s pelvic area. It causes Marty to bleed profusely, but he doesn’t die. Barbara arrives to put a stop to Homelander’s insanity, and he puts Marty out of his misery by crushing his head. Then, Homelander asks Barbara to join him in the room with the red door for a relatively private conversation.
Firecracker Exposes Annie’s Past
Frenchie goes through Firecracker’s stuff and finds a bottle of metoclopramide, which is a medicine that’s used to counter nausea and vomiting. Then he moves onto her tab and finds something that shocks him. Before he can relay the information to MM, Firecracker tells her audience and the rest of the world that, six months ago, Annie got an abortion. She apparently got access to Annie’s medical files and exposed them to millions of people. The alt-right, evangelist, conservative folk equate abortion with murder, and since Annie catered to this demographic since she was a kid, they’ll turn against her after realizing they’ve been following a “false idol.” It’s a low blow, but it’s Firecracker and Vought we’re talking about; nothing is too low for them. Anyway, the aforementioned revelation causes Annie to storm out and confront Firecracker. Annie starts bashing the living daylights out of Firecracker, and it’s revealed that this was all part of Sister Sage’s plan. She wanted the racist Firecracker to get pummeled, and she ensured that it was all caught on camera so that the footage could be used to tarnish whatever was left of Annie’s reputation. And, well, it seems like she has succeeded on both fronts.
Does Butcher Still Have Superpowers?
While all that is going on on the stage, Frenchie is discovered by Ezekiel backstage, and they get into a fight. He is violently thrown out of Firecracker’s vanity van by Ezekiel. Butcher arrives to tackle the supe and when Ezekiel stretches one of his limbs to catch Butcher, he uses the liquid nitrogen that he has been carrying since the beginning of this episode to freeze and break it off. Ezekiel uses his other hand to choke out Butcher, and this triggers a blackout. When Butcher regains consciousness, he realizes that he is covered in blood, and the whole vanity van has been painted red with Ezekiel’s guts and bones. MM and Annie arrive to rescue Frenchie. They notice the state of the van and wonder what Butcher has done. However, since no one has a reasonable answer, they leave the scene because they’ve caused enough chaos for one day. While Colin is tending to his wounds, Frenchie finally admits that he is the one who killed Colin’s family. Colin lashes out and tells Frenchie to never show his face to him again.
Homelander Traumatizes Barbara
Homelander isn’t done, though, because he wants Barbara to pay for her sins. It turns out that Barbara is the most cunning of them all as she begins to manipulate Homelander with her words. She says that since Vought knew that John couldn’t be overpowered with brute force, they needed to get into his head. Hence, the best psychologists from all over the world were brought in to plant an insatiable need for appreciation and love deep into Homeland’s psyche. Homelander tries to convince Barbara and himself that he has squashed all his human desires, but Barbara informs him that it’s something he won’t be able to get rid of because it’s an integral part of his identity. Homelander changes the topic and talks about how he is going to raise his supe son, Ryan. He then probably traumatizes Barbara for the rest of her life by painting the room with the red door with the innards of the Vought employees and then leaves with a big smile on his face.
Why Does Sister Sage Need To Lobotomize Herself?
We finally learn the use of the orbitoclast that was teased in the third episode of The Boys when Deep goes to Sage to address her erratic behavior. Sage says that since she is so smart, she is unable to switch off her mind and enjoy something as normal as sex. So, she has to perform a lobotomy on herself and damage a part of her brain. Before it grows back completely, Sage is able to function like a regular girl. Just to establish how much she trusts Deep, she allows him to lobotomize her, and then they proceed to get freaky.
Annie Pays For Her Outrage
Back at the Boys HQ, Hughie watches Neuman use Annie’s latest stunt to tear her down. Annie gets there, and it’s revealed that she did get pregnant with Hughie’s child and then decided to get an abortion. They try to comfort each other, but the damage has been done. Hughie and Annie are sensible enough to see abortion as a choice, but it’s apparent that the conservative crowd is going to use it as a polling issue and drag Singer through the mud. So, Singer cuts all ties with her.
Is Hughie’s Father A Supe Now?
At the end of episode 4, A-Train delivers Compound V to Hughie. They shake on it, and A-Train leaves the scene. Butcher emerges from the shadows to reprimand Hughie for colluding with the enemy. Hughie says that the V is for his dad, and he even offers some of it to Butcher to help him with his brain cancer. Butcher says that he took some from Frenchie’s stash a few months ago, and it only aggravated his deterioration. So, he tells Hughie not to inject the drug into Hugh. When he gets to the hospital, Hughie actually does what Butcher asked him to, and he doesn’t turn Hugh into a supe. However, Daphne does the unthinkable by nicking the vial and putting it into the IV drip. That certainly resurrects Hugh, but the consequences of Daphne’s actions are bound to be disastrous. We’ll know more about it next week. In addition to this, I guess we’ll learn more about how the mixture of Compound V and Temp V led to the creation of those worms in Butcher’s body and whether or not Homelander has finally extinguished the last embers of humanity that were left in him.
