There has been a lot of discourse about this season of The Boys not having enough action or “not enough happening” while I’ve been eating up the deep dive into characterization every week. To the extent that showrunner Eric Kripke had to address it in interviews wondering if people are expecting them to just constantly blow things up – and adding if that’s what the expectation is, you’re watching the wrong show.
I wrote a whole book about the complex characters and deep themes in this show, that’s how much I appreciate its depth, so I am not watching the wrong show. And not surprisingly I liked this episode, “Though The Heavens Fall”.
WARNING – SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 5.06!
Golden Geisha and Kimiko and Hanging Onto Humanity
The Legend is back, hiding out in a movie theater working the concession stand (I love that they have a The Deep popcorn bucket – wasn’t this written long before all those memes about the Dune popcorn bucket and what teenage boys might actually use it for? Is this Kripke prescience again?? It also made me snort that The Deep has his mouth wide open and just waiting for people to shove their hand in there, which was oddly reminiscent of what he did to Starlight way back in Season 1. Also the recently deceased Firecracker does a spot on parody of Nicole Kidman’s ultra sincere “the movies will save us” advertisements for it.
The Legend is hiding from Vought due to all the intel he has, fondly reminiscing on who he’s fucked and who he’s been fucked by (Marlon Brando…) but when MM tells him Bombsight has the V1 he’s convinced to help (tho he points out that MM sounds like Butcher now, threatening to cut his balls off). Homelander’s new church crusade messed up his sweet life too.
Hughie is still arguing that they wait longer to try get V1 before they set off the supe killing virus Frenchie completed to kill Homelander (and the rest of the supes, as in Annie and Kimiko). The Legend suggests they can get Bombsight to bring it to them by going after the love of his life, Golden Geisha, who now lives in Vought Villages supe retirement home (because of course it’s The Villages…). They find her but Kimiko is reluctant to hurt her or the others, saying she doesn’t want to hurt a bunch of old people. Butcher insists they’re not people, and MM agrees. The Legend again questions what’s happened to MM, saying it’s like he’s gone crazy. This is a theme of the episode – what does it mean to be human and how do we hang onto that humanity in the face of unspeakable horrors?
They kidnap Goldie, escaping after a fight with some of the old supes who nevertheless still have powers. One guy has giant balls that he can whip around to fight with because of course he does, we need our nod to twelve year old boys. I felt for the guy. Butcher chokes him out with his own balls, but Kimiko stops him from killing the guy.
Golden Geisha claims she doesn’t know where Bombsight is. Butcher wants to torture her but Kimiko is kind to her, helping put her slipper back on and apologizing for what they’re doing.
Kimiko: I watched every episode of Undercover Geisha even though those were racist stereotypes – it meant so much to see someone like me on TV.
A little nod to the importance of representation in media.
Kimiko realizes that Bombsight stole the V1 for Goldie so they could be together forever, but she didn’t take it. For him, watching her get old would be too painful, but for her? To live forever would be torture. Golden Geisha gets the most memorable line in this episode – Summer is only beautiful when you know winter is coming.
Well written, David Reed. (I enjoyed his work on ‘The Magicians’ too).
Frenchie realizes that Kimiko feels that way too. She tells him that she and Annie don’t want to die but they don’t want to be vampires either – but they’ll do it for him and Hughie anyway.
Hughie and Annie and the Rare Good Dads
On the way to the church where they’ll let loose the virus, Annie and Hughie pause to lie on the car hood and cloud watch, like Sam and Dean stargazing on the Impala. Hughie insists she’s not dying, that they’ll have plenty of time to look for filthy things in the clouds, and Annie marvels at his unshakeable hope and asks how he manages it.
Hughie: Whenever I’d get upset as a kid, which was a lot, my dad would say life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react. I spent a year in an internment camp and had no control over anything. So fucking angry, hearing my dad’s voice in my head. I finally understood what he meant — the only thing I had left was hope. And it is really fucking hard to hang onto but I, I’m trying.
Annie: I think you might be lowkey the strongest person I know.
I love Hughie so much, I will really miss him when this series ends. Jack Quaid did such a great job showing him as just quintessentially human, flaws and all. What he learned from his dad reminds me of Viktor Frankl, the psychologist who lived through being in an actual concentration camp, discovering while there exactly what Hughie’s dad did – if you can’t control anything else, you can control how you make sense of it and how you react to it.
Hughie’s dad was a good dad.
(I put together a whole book that tackles the theme of fatherhood, toxic and otherwise, in ‘The Boys’ if you’re interested in exploring more. Hughie, Butcher, Soldier Boy, Homelander… almost all of the complicated characters have daddy issues, and it was fascinating to take a look at them with psychologists, media experts and the actors portraying them. Link at end of article for more info).
They break into the Democratic Church of America, walls lined with portraits of supe psychics. They are shocked to find Firecracker dead under a sheet. Annie is surprised to feel sad – she’s just a human being after all (again, a theme of this episode). It’s easy to forget sometimes that the supes are indeed human beings, just altered ones.
They encounter a giant gold statue of Homelander.
Hughie: Jesus Christ!
Annie: Pretty much what he was going for.
(As often happens with this show, just as this episode aired, a giant golden statue of the current US president was also unveiled with worshippers gathered around it. You cannot make this up – how far will the being prescient go, Kripke??)
Oh Father interrupts them. Annie claims she’s there to talk some sense into an old friend, who at one time was a true believer. He insists he still is, but he’s rationalized that to worshipping Homelander. Annie and Oh Father blast each other, but Hughie intervenes and threatens to loose the supe virus, which he claims Annie is immune to so they can leave.
The Deep Goes off the Deep End
Sage has been injecting test subjects with a concocted V1 but it isn’t going well – as in, the poor guy has the worst case of explosive diarrhea ever and bleeds to death as she and Homelander watch. The Deep shows up and asks where Firecracker is.
Homelander: She’s moved on to a better place.
The Deep: Orlando?
My second favorite line in the episode.
Sage sends The Deep off to do a PSA about how an oil pipeline is safe even though he knows it’s dangerous to the fish, but he once again proves his loyalty is only to Homelander and does it. Remember when The Deep actually cared about the fish? He does a PSA claiming the pipeline is “all natural and organic and not bad for the environment” – I do love this show when it’s hitting wayyyyyyyy too close to home. Black Noir listens, stewing silently. Later we see The Deep at a giant oil spill site, coated with black goo, struggling to breathe with gills full of oil and his fish friends dying around him.
Now, belatedly, he tries to do CPR on Jeremy the fish, but he dies anyway, last words “we know it was you.”
The Deep ends up sobbing back at Vought. Noir has no sympathy – in fact, he says, “payback is a bitch.” Turns out he punched a hole in the pipeline in retaliation for Deep killing Adam Bourke.
Deep is enraged over 1.4 billion fish who were his friends, strangling and then stabbing Black Noir impulsively.
Deep: You were never my bro.
He looks distraught and panicked after though. RIP Black Noir, all the kudos Nathan Mitchell!
Soldier Boy: Not So Predictable After All
Ashley is reluctant to try to read Homelander or Soldier Boy’s minds, so Sage chloroforms her to talk to Back Ashley, who does agree. Sage summons Soldier Boy so she can get a glimpse.
Back Ashley: Holy fuck, the inside of his head, it’s terrifying!
(Clarification of just how traumatized Soldier Boy is).
She also sees that he hates Bombsight, and that Soldier Boy is thinking about helping Homelander. In fact, he’s kinda proud of him but doesn’t want him to know that.
Many people seem to be shocked by this, but I can believe it. Soldier Boy wanted children. He’s disconnected from everyone he ever cared about, 100 years old and all his family and friends are dead. Other than Homelander, who is, for better or a lot worse, his son. We saw how much it impacted him when he threw Homelander in the radiation room but still when he had the chance to kill Soldier Boy after the Quinn incident, he didn’t do it. He spared him, and seemed to feel sympathy for him even, asking him “were you crying?”
And Soldier Boy WAS crying. He’s not unemotional or unfeeling, he’s damaged as all hell and incredibly dangerous and full of a lot of rage, but he still has some humanity in spite of all the torture he’s endured. He’s done horrible unforgiveable things (Black Noir’s treatment comes to mind) but he does have feelings and he does feel regret for at least some of those things.
Sage says don’t worry, she saw that coming. She cuts out her tracking chip and leaves, saying it’s time for phase 3. We do not know what that means, and Sage is a wild card right now in the series. She helps the good guys get Bombsight to bring the V1, but we’re not really sure why. Did she also predict what Soldier Boy would do next and set him up somehow, or was she as shocked as everyone else was? Hmmm.
Meanwhile, Homelander and Soldier Boy are also on the search for Bombsight and the V1. They don’t find him but they do find a laptop with an incriminating video set up to turn Soldier Boy against his son – it’s video of Homelander and a mutilated Stormfront after she was maimed by Ryan.
Soldier Boy: WTF was that?! That was Clara! So, what, you locked her in your apartment like some kind of amputee fuck doll and filmed her for kicks?
Homelander is scared, backing away as Soldier Boy advances on him, furious, insisting that it wasn’t like that, that he did everything he could to keep her alive and make her happy.
Soldier Boy hauls off and punches him in the face.
Nose bleeding, Homelander still doesn’t fight back.
Homelander: Listen to me, it wasn’t like that – I couldn’t let her go, I didn’t know how. Because I loved her. And so did you.
Soldier Boy’s lip quivers when he answers.
Soldier Boy: You’re goddamned right I loved her.
Homelander insists she wouldn’t want them fighting; Soldier Boy retorts that Homelander was with her for five minutes, he was with her for decades. Homelander says it’s a set up, that Sage is trying to separate them, she knows he can’t find the V1 without him.
Soldier Boy: Good. You don’t deserve to live forever.
(Well, that is certainly true!)
Homelander and The Legend
The Legend goes back to sweeping up the movie theater, when Homelander is suddenly there. He kills the poor concession stand boss and advances on The Legend, who denies he’s working with Butcher and says he’s on “team you, big guy”.
They go to the Boys’ hideout to look for clues, and Homelander finds a Taco Bell receipt so he knows it was Sage there, taunting him. He sits on the bottom bunk of one of the bunk beds, head in hands, looking like an upset little boy. Antony Starr is so brilliant he can make Homelander look like a terrifying monstrous grown man and then a rejected little boy longing for love and you believe them both.
Homelander: This makes no sense, you said I would get the V1, you said I’d be a god, did I do something wrong, did I fail you? I gave my boy up… please don’t leave me here to just rot…
He’s pleading with Madelyn, desperate to believe her pep talk and the prophecy that came with it.
The Legend is surprisingly unafraid; he’s lived a long time and is used to dealing with supes. He sees them differently than the rest of the world, as spoiled celebrities who are dangerous but who are ultimately human.
Legend: You’re not gonna let me walk outta here alive, so look kid, I’ve been around a long time, and this is just how it goes. All those old supes at the home, every one of them had their moment in the sun and thought it would go on forever and every one of them got shoved out at the end. Look at Goldie, she’s shilling for Vought Alert necklaces… I got shoved out too and never saw it coming.
He pats Homelander on the shoulder, fatherly.
Homelander looks shocked, touches his shoulder briefly. It’s such a small moment but so telling – no one ever touches Homelander with affection. No one ever has. All his life he wanted that, desperately, especially from a father or mother, and he never got it. That simple touch is powerful to him.
Homelander: You’re not scared of me?
Legend: No I’m not – I feel for ya, kid, I do. You’re a fucking whack job but you know, that’s talent, so no surprise there. So there ya go, do what you gotta do.
Homelander lets him go. The Legend is smart enough to take off, no questions asked. Homelander is back to being the smart conniving supe he was in earlier seasons a bit in this episode, which I liked – he gets tracking coordinates for Goldie’s Vought Alert necklace!
The End
Sage joins the Boys to wait for Bombsight, telling MM not to pretend he’s better than her – to enjoy it or don’t, it’s still mass murder what they’re doing. MM, who was at one point the moral compass of the Boys, is so far from that now, he’s really lost his way – and it’s hard to watch.
Bombsight crashes down into the warehouse with the V1.
He insists that Goldie will change her mind and take the V1. She says she won’t, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be together. Frenchie admits they intend to destroy it, that Golden Geisha is right, it’s a curse.
And then there’s a big fight scene – so I don’t know what people are complaining about who are watching for the big fight scenes! Butcher gets his tentacles around Bombsight, Bombsight tosses Butcher, bullets don’t work. In the midst of everything, Golden Geisha protects Kimiko with her force field, saying she doesn’t want anyone else to get hurt because of her.
And then Soldier Boy joins the fray (Sage texted him, knowing the two would continue their 80 year long feud).
It’s a little Vought Rising preview as the two call each other Robbie and Ben, and then Bombsight says he’s waited a long time wanting to smash in that pretty face.
Soldier Boy: Buddy, the Queen sat on this face – it’s a national fucking treasure.
A good old fashioned fist fight ensues, which is a valid criticism of the show – these are supes but they often fight just like humans anyway. MM doesn’t trust Soldier Boy but Sage insists no one hates Homelander more than he does, and that “people are fucking predictable”. Finally Soldier Boy breaks off a piece of pipe and holds Bombsight while forcing it down his throat in the most phallic way possible as everyone cringes.
Bombsight gets away and flies up through the hole in the roof and Soldier Boy reluctantly goes after him, complaining “goddamnit, I hate flying!”
(A Supernatural Easter egg perhaps, since Dean Winchester famously felt the same way).
Eventually Soldier Boy gets the upper hand again, but Robbie pleads “Ben, stop, please” – and Soldier Boy lets him go! And miracle of miracles, the two actually talk. Soldier Boy points out that Goldie doesn’t even want to take it, saying he was always gonna fuck it up with her anyway, he could never hold down a girl, it was either a smack needle up his dick or…
Bombsight: Having to stand next to you, you were everyone’s favorite from the start, especially Clara. Everything they wanted us to be, everything they were working toward, they saw it in you. I fucking hated you for it.
Soldier Boy: No. No, I wasn’t everything Clara wanted. I didn’t know how to be.
Bombsight: But you loved her. What wouldn’t you give to have her back forever?
Soldier Boy says he still hates him, but they don’t have to kill each other. Instead, he can take away Bombsight’s immortality and powers, and he won’t have to live forever alone – he and Goldie can spend whatever time they have left together.
This is the side of Soldier Boy we saw with Quinn too. He has a lot of anger left over from those days, when it sounds like a) he was an asshole and b) everyone hated him and was envious of him, chicken egg egg chicken, but he also seems to have hung onto some humanity and some empathy. Or he just really really wants that V1 – that’s what he says his reason is, anyway.
Bombsight gives it to him. Soldier Boy keeps his word. He powers up, closes his eyes, and explodes the V1 out of Robbie.
He stands up, bleeding, saying it’s the first time he’s seen his blood in… he can’t remember.
He smiles.
At that moment, Homelander descends from the sky (much to Antony Starr’s chagrin I’m sure). Bombsight wisely runs away. The boys and Sage watch as Homelander and Soldier Boy face each other.
Homelander: I don’t wanna fight you.
Soldier Boy: You know, Clara used to say the craziest shit. That I was the strongest supe alive, the ultimate expression of what we could be. But she was wrong. She hadn’t met you yet.
Almost sentimental music plays as Soldier Boy makes a decision; he hands the V1 needle to Homelander.
Butcher and the Boys and Sage watch, horrified.
She seems dumbfounded, not at all what she predicted.
Homelander: But you hate me.
Soldier Boy: I love her more. And this is what she would want.
Homelander lasers a hole in his own arm and injects the V1. His eyes glow and he falls to his knees, groaning, then laser beams burst from his eyes.
Butcher: Run!
There are lots of theories as to why Soldier Boy gave Homelander the V1. I’m going with that he still does have those human longings for connection and there are only a few people/supes he might connect to. Quinn and Robbie from his past were two; his son is another, simply because he’s his son. He has said before that if he raised Homelander, he would have been happy for him to take over and succeed – what father wouldn’t want that for his son? Is part of him starting to feel that way for Homelander? He also seems to have genuinely loved Clara, and even now wants to do what he thinks she would have wanted. Maybe it’s because I want that to be the case, even though I have no doubt Soldier Boy will die before the series ends. He’s an awful person, but I do want him to still be a person – flawed, but human.
On the other hand, I won’t be entirely dumbfounded if it turns out that Sister Sage had some kind of plan and somehow the V1 isn’t actually V1 or she knows it will actually not work on a supe made with Compound V and maybe will even destroy him. Or if Soldier Boy’s chest blast that zaps the V1 out of supes maybe zapped it out of the liquid in the syringe too since he was holding it. Honestly, nothing would entirely surprise me in this show, and I like it that way.
Two episodes left and I’m full of trepidation for this week’s. I’m really glad we have Vought Rising to look forward to because I am not ready to say goodbye to Jensen Ackles as Soldier Boy.
Stay tuned!
–Lynn
You can read the book all about the complicated
characters on The Boys, with chapters from
psychologists, media experts and the actors
who bring the characters to life. Info at:
Thinking about The Boys and the dilemma about the Supe virus killing Annie and Kimiko – surely all they need to do is get Soldier Boy to blast them back to humans again and voila, they are saved. Butcher too, if he was around at the time. Of course, that presumes Kripke is going to give us a ‘happy’ ending of any kind!
Another great recap! The lines I loved were the same: Summer is only beautiful when you know Winter is coming; Orlando?; I hate flying. I think SB’s motivation is the vestige of his humanity and his Ben self, too. I won’t be shocked if Kripke has something unforeseeable in mind and I’m here for all of it💕