Homelander has never been scarier to Starlight fans. This week’s episode picks up with Homelander on his soapbox to the public, raving about the awful destruction that Starlight and her followers have done. To take her down for good, Homelander tells the people that he has a new team of seven supes who will help him featuring the new Sister Sage, Firecracker, and his son Ryan. However, at this event and the planning before it, Sage had been uninterested in Ryan being a supe on the team, as this makes it harder for her to disband. She also recognizes with time that Homelander is a loose cannon and not as easy to control as she thought. However, Sister Sage has successfully shunned Ashley as CEO becoming her replacement for the job. Ashley’s spot on the team has now become close to that of a mascot.
Sage has also been making her moves of influence over The Deep as well. In the episode’s final scene, we see that he comes over to check on her out of pure colleagueship and the pair end up entangled on the couch together. This felt a little bit far from character for Sage, as just in the prior episode she had made a gripe at Ashley for using her sexuality for edge at work, only to turn to this herself. It also seems beneath her as she is the smartest person in the world and would not truly have feelings for Kevin. It feels as though it was written out of proportion with her values and how far she would go. Despite this, it is exciting to see her antagonizing The Seven from the inside.
Despite The Boys getting smaller, Butcher is now trying to make more attempts at getting to know his son, Ryan. He decides he needs to talk to Ryan and explain his lack of parenting. Not only this, but he has promised Joe Kessler that he would poison Ryan. However, there are theories that Joe Kessler could be a hallucination as Butcher suffers from an alcohol addiction and has a tumor in his brain causing him to see Becca as well. He invites him over for cookies and board games. Ryan appreciates this as it is nursing his estranged feelings for his father Homelander, and his recent fake save that ended in the death of a participant of the plan. Instead of trying to wish away Ryan’s empathy or wrongdoing, Butcher tells Ryan that he isn’t wrong for how he feels and that he’s experienced that pain. Butcher takes this moment to apologize for not being there when Ryan was young, explaining that he was just a bad guy who had no business raising a kid. Leaving him was not intentional. By the end of this encounter, the two of them can not only forgive each other but also themselves.
Kimiko and Frenchie are suffering in silence, being unable to open up to each other. In this episode, Frenchie fails to help Kimiko wrangle Shining Light henchmen because he is on drugs. When he finally comes to and tries to fight, he almost hits a girl who looks just like Kimiko’s sister. Kimiko begs him to let her go and nothing more. At the end of the episode, Kimiko makes huge progress as a more emotionless character and goes to Frenchie to see how he is feeling. She asks him to let her help in any way she can. Frenchie doesn’t let her into his head and only throws her own emotional absence right back at her. However, with both of their mindscapes taking a spiral for the worst, they have a lot of potential to change their vices and rely on each other for the rest of season four.
In this episode, there is also an uncovering of Firecracker’s grudge for Starlight, and it is (too) crazy and unbelievable. Starlight decides to break into Vought and confront Firecracker. She reminds Starlight of their past lives as pageant queens together. All until one day, Starlight spread a rumor that would end then Sparkler’s preteen-pageant career. Starlight said that Firecracker had been ‘gangbanged by the judges’ to have a spot to compete. After this had spread–then named Sparkler–had been taken out of all competitions, leaving Starlight the winner. Not only is this just a flabbergasting thing to do in general, but it is just plain out of the scope of normal behavior of 10-year-olds. With this dug up from the past, it seems the writers want to either elicit empathy for Firecracker’s character or disdain for Starlight by explaining Firecracker’s grudge. However, this is not felt because it feels far from Starlight’s personality to do something this drastic. Maybe it could’ve been dialed back just a little bit. As Starlight has a pretty calm, kind, and demure attitude, this just seemed out of the ordinary.
In the last episode, we learn that Hughie is unhappy with his mother being his father’s legal caretaker at the end of his life. Starlight and Hughie go to a lawyer to try to fight this but to no avail. Hughie decides to try instead and talk to his mother about the past and his resentment. Through this Hughie’s Mom explains that it was her suicide attempt and postpartum depression that she wanted to hide from her son, not herself, and not for his whole life. She extended an apology and although Hughie still has emotional wounds, they seem to grow closer together.
Hughie’s feelings change again as A-Train proves his loyalty to The Boys. Hughie eavesdrops on Homelander and Sister Sage, asking Victoria Neuman to help eliminate anti-Supe government policies and tell the world she is a Supe. Hiding in an airing vent, Hughie blows his cover, being scarily sniffed out by Homelander. Hughie finds himself seconds away from eating Homelander’s heat-ray vision when A-Train saves his life. This changes the way Hughie considers the possibility that people can change and believes that his mom could also be redeemable.
Rating: 7/10