It’s finally here, the fifth and final season of The Boys. It has been a long journey following Butcher (Karl Urban), Hughie (Jack Quaid),Frenchie (Tomer Capone), Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara), Annie/Starlight (Erin Moriarty), and Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso) as they face Homelander (Antony Starr) in an attempt to bring him down, but as we discovered in the last season, the only way is a virus that will also kill every other supe.
We last visited The Boys universe with Gen V Season 2 where Annie and A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) met up with Marie and Annabeth Moreau, Jordan Li, Cate Dunlap, Emma Meyer, and Sam Riordan to recruit them for the resistance, teasing big things for this final season. The question that we all have to ask is, “Does this final season do a great job of keeping up with its promises?” Well, the quick answer is that this first episode will tell you all you need to know about how it’ll handle some of its characters.
As the episode opens, we find ourselves at the Vought International Annual Meeting of Shareholders, which bears resemblance to the manosphere speeches that are held today in public. Homelander descends as everyone cheers for him and chants “USA”. While he’s giving a speech, we see Annie undercover as a Firecracker (a dancer) sneaking off into a security room but not unnoticed as Black Noir II (Nathan Mitchell) watches from above. Homelander continues to give a speech about stopping the Starlighters and moving into a new golden dawn, continuing to spread the false lies about Annie and the rest of the gang.
Black Noir II enters the room, fighting Annie, who can’t use her powers, as it interferes with the upload taking place. Without her powers, she struggles in the fight but overcomes, taking him out. The upload completes, and footage from the Flight 37 incident from the first season is shown to the entire audience, everyone witnessing for the first time the horrors of what took place. Enraged, Homelander’s eyes begin to glow a hot red, ready to eradicate the entire audience, but the voice of reason, Sister Sage (Susan Heyward), puts a hand on his arm, nodding, hinting that it’s not the right decision.
The Homelander theme that plays as the footage plays is terrifying, and it always is because it fits Homelander’s broken, unpredictable mind. The Boys is a show that’s so crazy that in a moment like this, I genuinely thought they were going to slaughter everyone in the audience and start the show off with a bang. I’ve also got to be honest, I’m glad they didn’t because it would’ve been for pure shock factor, and there’s already enough of that in this show.
Sister Sage plays it off as an AI-generated video, which comes as no shock, as The Boys is making light of a situation that’s growing quite rapidly in reality with AI-generated videos popping up everywhere. It’s only about time before a political figure claims a heinous video they appear in is AI. Teenage Kix members Jetstreak (Dylan Colton) and Sheline (Emma Elle Paterson) are seen remixing the video into a dance trend, which is yet another issue the world faces, as Gen Z struggles to discuss news without turning it into a meme. There are constant threats of WWIII every day, yet young people still decide to make jokes out of a serious situation.
We cut to the White House, where Ashley (Colby Minifie), who’s revealed to be the vice president, continues to spread the word of the video being AI-generated by Marxist Starlighters. It’s revealed here as she opens the floor to questions, taking a question from Chris Hayes, who plays himself, that she’s able to read people’s minds.
At Sister Sage’s office, we see how Homelander is struggling to deal with how the public perceives him, noting that everyone loves Sage, but people are calling him a murderer, and maybe he did something to his son, which Sage denies and says people know he’s at boarding school, a story that’s holding with the public. What Homelander wants to know is how Annie was able to get into the building and is infuriated that he was humiliated.
While Sage thinks Homelander is joking at first about making it a crime to make memes on him, he’s being incredibly serious. Homelander asks Sage to leak that they’re going to execute Hughie, Mother Milk and Frenchie in hopes of stringing out Annie and Butcher so he can end it once and for all.
Speaking of the three, we arrive at the Vought Freedom Camp, where they’re all being held with supes like Love Sausage (Derek Johns) and Cindy (Ess Hödlmoser) watching over them as guards. While Frenchie is dealing and being oblivious to his surroundings with Hughie saving him from an attack, Mother Milk is participating in fights with other prisoners for entertainment.
When Eric Kripke and his team are writing The Boys, they’re looking at the state of current America and predicting what it could be like if superpowered people were involved, and it’s scary to see the use of camps like this to imprison people who don’t support Homelander and Vought. It’s not the best commentary we’ve seen in The Boys, but it’s still frightening nonetheless when you link it back to reality.
In London, Butcher visits his father, Sam, who instantly berates him for being a wanted man showing up. It’s revealed that he’s come to London due to the passing of his mother, whose father failed to invite him to the funeral, saying he didn’t know how to get ahold of him. His father asks why he’s shown up, and you can feel the fear in his voice and mannerisms, knowing that his son is capable of hurting. It’s not known what happened, but with the sound of Butcher’s tentacles and his words to his father, it’s likely that he killed him, revealing how Butcher has changed over the past few seasons, becoming almost similar in ways to Homelander.
As Homelander is preparing for his appearance on The Truthbomb with Firecracker (Valorie Curry), he’s noticing the heartbeats of the people around him and how they fear him, which continues to bother him. Firecracker arrives, and Homelander laughably gets even more infuriated at how her heartbeat just flutters away. They start the show where we learn that they’re also telling people that the Thomas Godolkin massacre at GodU was also AI-generated before they take a deep dive into the video which shows Homelander having seven fingers on one of his hands. The things the media will do to hide the truth and protect people in power (literally).
This episode is sending us around the world as we find ourselves in Manila, Philippines. Kimiko, who appears to be looking after a kid, sends him off when she notices something. She sees a window open and attacks the intruder she sees in the shadow before it’s revealed that it’s Butcher, who quickly gives her the rundown of Homelander’s plan to execute their friends trapped in the Freedom Camp. It’s also wise to note that on the wall, news clippings of Frenchie are seen, showing that while Kimiko was in hiding, searching for Frenchie the entire time.
What’s confusing about all of this mess is that last we saw her, Frenchie got taken by Cate, and she was restrained by Sam, but I’m struggling to understand why Sam would let her go. How did she escape and make it across the world, and is this something that they’re going to mention, or are we just going to pretend like none of it matters and continue onwards? This episode runs into an issue that The Boys universe has found itself in before, and that’s setting up a huge change for the characters and quickly reversing it in the first episode of a new season.
This first episode inserts a lot of timely jokes, such as The Deep (Chace Crawford) and Black Noir II running a manosphere podcast, and the most annoying thing that runs old pretty quickly is Kimiko’s ability to talk fluently. I’m glad that she no longer resorts to the ‘Asian female who can’t speak’, but instead of making it a major point that she can fluently talk, it’s just another crux to insert many jokes.
She’s incapable of keeping thoughts in her head and accidentally saying things that she didn’t mean to say out loud, which once again doesn’t make sense when, in this same very episode, she mentions being able to stay silent on the flight over with Butcher. For a joke like this to work, the writers need to at least get the continuity straight with their characters and especially within the same episode.
As Hughie, Mother Milk, and Frenchie continue to plan their own escape, Butcher, Annie, and Kimiko begin devising their own plan and that begins with Butcher going to meet someone called the Worm (Ely Henry).
Homelander invites The Deep and Black Noir II in for a conversation with Gavin, the stage manager decapitated and on display for his betrayal, as he liked Starlighter posts and memes about him. We’ve known how scared of Homelander The Deep is, and we see his fear more in this scene as he tries to throw blame at Black Noir II, but when that fails, he instantly gets annoyed when it backfires on him.
What frustrates Homelander is that it has been a year, and they’ve been unable to find anyone, hinting that it would be suicidal if they were f***ing up on purpose. As they leave the room, it’s revealed to us that Homelander is keeping Soldier Boy’s deep freeze containment in his room, watching over it.
We finally meet a new supe, O’Father (Daveed Diggs), who’s married to Ashley, and we find them in the middle of an interview with Firecracker. The interview is cut short by Sister Sage, who requires talking to Ashley urgently about how Homelander wants more Starlighters arrested, including people posting defamatory things about him. In the midst of it all, it’s mentioned by Ashley that Chappell Roan and Tyler, the Creator got arrested; it seems like not everyone can speak freely in Homelander’s world.
At the Worm’s house, who is seen writing a spec script for Reacher, we find Butcher, who arrives to get Worm’s help and threatens to use the “creepy texts” he sent Miranda Cosgrove against him. Butcher doesn’t wait for him to give him an answer but tells him the location and time, expecting him to show up, as Worm also has problems against Vought, as they’ve replaced all their writers with AI.
The first mention of Gen V‘s Marie Moreau is made as we learn that they’re helping out in the background with raids. We finally get to see A-Train, and his introduction, like many things, just doesn’t make sense. When we last saw him in Gen V Season 2, he was ready to help out with the resistance, but now that they require help to break out Hughie, Mother Milk, and Frenchie, his focus is on his family and not their movement that could help change the world.
It’s strange because it’s like there are episodes of The Boys I’ve missed with how some of these character developments are being written. It feels like they’re trying to rush to that finish line and have just jumped across several plot points that would’ve been worth covering for the extra context, considering this is the final season.
Hughie runs into Homelander back in the dorms as he comes across the flood of dead bodies and blood across the room. Homelander’s teases to Hughie are by far the funniest thing to happen this entire episode, and it all comes down to Antony Starr’s performance, which has always been at an all-time high each season. Homelander questions why Annie and Butcher would waste away their lives to try and come save Hughie, and he responds with “Because I’d do it for them,” which is clear; Homelander doesn’t understand.
Once again travelling across the world, we find A-Train in France as he meets up with his brother, Nathan (Christian Keyes), as they discuss their past and how his brother used to say that he never saved anyone, but that’s changed now because he’s alive and still breathing. It’s a clear setup for why A-Train is likely going to return to help them, but it still feels like such a rushed and poor storyline that could benefit from writers who cared about these characters.
The Deep arrives in France, but A-Train has already taken his family away to a new location. The Deep mentions he’s going to keep searching for his family and tries to play it off that he’s living the life with Homelander, calling himself a sigma. The fear once again is seen in Deep’s eyes as he tries to play off not being scared, but it doesn’t work because A-Train has been there before. A-Train makes the valid point that it’s just a vicious cycle and that The Deep hasn’t got any real protection.
It’s now time for the breakout, and we witness how the Worm uses his powers as he eats the dirt as he digs, which flies straight out of his ass. What can you expect from The Boys when it comes to its grotesque humour that constantly involves *ss and d*ck? It was funny the first few times, but when they’re in every season and spin-off, it quickly grows stale. They make it into the camp with Butcher and Kimiko running into the dorms to fine Homelander who has Hughie, Mother Milk, and Frenchie hostage.
Kimiko’s lippy mouth gets her body lasered in half by Homelander, who questions where Annie is and says, “It doesn’t feel like a party” without her. He gets distracted as he sees through Butcher and sees his tentacle monsters inside him, admiring them and calling it devotion and saying that Butcher is the only one that’s ever challenged him. Butcher and Homelander are the signs of a real rivalry with how much they’ve gone through to slight the other.
Annie interrupts Homelander’s speech by blinding the entire room, allowing for everyone to escape. Butcher manages to subdue Cindy, while Mother Milk has his rematch with Love Sausage and thankfully puts an end to this terrible joke of a character. Annie notices Frenchie and Kimiko, who are busy making out, in danger and rushes to them, taking out the armed forces and sticking to the plan by escaping with Frenchie first. Homelander interrupts Butcher’s fight by blasting him across the room which he survives and sneaks away from.
Homelander gets his hands on Hughie and prepares to kill him. Butcher is not able to reach him in time, but time slows as A-Train arrives with The Boys, finally giving him his heroic quicksilver moment as he runs around moving things into place. As he saves Hughie, he’s scraped by Homelaner’s laser. He runs off with Homelander giving chase. Annie returns, but Hughie’s left upset, thinking she was ready to just leave them behind to die.
The chase continues with A-Train and Homelander, with the latter beaming down trees in his path. A girl in the street causes A-Train to dodge as we don’t want a repeat of how this all began in the first place but trips, knocking trees down as he hurtles down the woods. “Looks like someone can catch the A-Train after all,” Homelander says when he finally catches him. A-Train laughs in his face, calling him “f*cking nothing”, taunting him, and calling him pathetic, weak and a “snivelling f*cking loser”. This enrages Homelander as he continues to strangle him, but with A-Train’s continued laughter, Homelander snaps his neck and drops his lifeless body, bringing the episode to a silent, distraught close.
If you guessed that A-Train was going to die in the first episode, well then you were correct and probably should take part in the lottery. A-Train’s death comes across as cheap and added for that shock-factor value that The Boys loves so much. His character was going in a nice direction in Season 3 with it fully shifting in Season 4, but The Boys Season 5 proves that Eric Kripke and the team truly had no plans for the character and what to do with him, bringing his character’s story to an end.
This feels like a death that should’ve taken place later in the season after he helped out with the Boys, which would’ve made it more impactful and emotional, giving it some reason.
The Boys Season 5 Episode 1 is not the start to the final season that one could hope for and feels like the start of many issues down the line. The writers fail to handle their characters such as Kimiko and A-Train with any real care; the political humour has run dry with some of the jokes running their course, and the final season feels like it’s trying to rush to the finish line as we don’t get to spend enough time with Hughie, Mother Milk, and Frenchie in the freedom camp.
What this episode does do well is handle Homelander as a character and set him and Butcher’s rivalry up for this season. Antony Starr once again gives a great performance, which is likely going to be a consistent phrase that I’ll be saying each week.
