A superhero can only take so much on The Boys. In “The Only Man In The Sky,” Homelander (Antony Starr) celebrates his birthday while Butcher (Karl Urban) and the Boys search for answers about Soldier Boy.
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY!
It’s Homelander’s birthday and Vought planned a big extravaganza to celebrate. It will be televised on all the Vought TV channels. Oh, and The Deep (Chace Crawford) has a new movie called, Not Without My Dolphin. Ha!
Butcher has nightmares about taking the Temp-V. On one hand he wants to so he can take down Homelander. On the other hand, it will turn him into the one thing he hates the most. Ryan (Cameron Crovetti) calls him when he wakes up but Butcher is very agitated. Ryan thinks he’s mad but Butcher assures him that everything is okay.
Homelander is trying to get some birthday love from Stormfront (Aya Cash). She has shut down physically and mentally though. She doesn’t even tell him Happy Birthday, so he leaves.
Hughie (Jack Quaid) tells Starlight (Erin Moriarty) about Victoria Neuman’s (Claudia Doumit) super power. They look into the Red River facility. It was a Vought group home. They assume that’s where Victoria grew up. Hughie feels like an idiot for trusting her. He has to keep up the appearance that he knows nothing so Victoria doesn’t kill him. And he doesn’t want to tell Butcher.
Starlight goes to rehearsal for Homelander’s birthday extravaganza. She encourages Supersonic (Miles Gaston Villanueva) to make waves to get into the Seven. She also discovers that Homelander revised the script for the show.
SOLDIER BOY TELL ‘EM!
Butcher visits Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso) to ask about Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles). MM doesn’t want to talk about it. Butcher thinks MM will rejoin the team to bury Soldier Boy once and for all, but he refuses. His father was obsessed with Soldier Boy and ignored his family. MM won’t do the same to Janine (Liyou Abere). But! He does give Butcher information on Gunpowder (Sean Patrick Flanery), Soldier Boy’s sidekick. Afterward, MM falls down a rabbit hole, going over newspaper clippings.
Frenchie (Tomer Capone) and Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) go to a superhero amusement park where Crimson Countess (Laurie Holden) is performing. Kimiko wants to ride the rides. Frenchie says they will play after the talk to the Countess. They attend the Crimson Countess show dedicated to Soldier Boy. From this show we learn that Soldier Boy was a WWII hero and was in a relationship with Crimson Countess.
The two go backstage and pretend to be big fans. Kimiko throws the Countess against the wall so Frenchie can ask her about Soldier Boy. Things go completely wrong when a real fan comes into the room. Crimson Countess runs away, causing havoc in the amusement park. She blasts a man dressed as Homelander, splattering blood all over the park guests. Kimiko is disturbed by the sight of the kids covered in blood.
PARTY POOPER!
Homelander wants Starlight to sing Happy Birthday, Marilyn Monroe style. She refuses and Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito) backs her up. He says Starlight is the bigger star and more people are turning to watch her instead of Homelander. Homelander threatens to walk to which Edgar says, “it’s your party, you can cry if you want to.”
Ashley (Colby Minifie) gets a new assistant, Also Ashley (Sabrina Saudin). They meet with A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) who wants to rebrand himself. He wants to get back in touch with his roots and present himself as a strong Black man. He even redesigned his suit to be more cultural. Ashley thinks it’s a bad idea. Even his publicist thinks it’s a bad concept. He says everyone knows A-Train doesn’t care about his African roots.
Hughie goes to the Red River group home. The director recognizes him so he has to say he and Starlight want to adopt a supe child. The director shows him the files on the children in the home. Hughie is able to download the center’s files. He finds a video of Edgar telling Nadia that she is going home with him.
Edgar wasn’t able to adopt Victoria, but he is like a father to her and grandfather to Zoe (Olivia Morandin). Victoria thinks someone at Vought told Tony (Kyle Mac) where to find her. It can’t happen again. Edgar promises to take care of everything.
THE ONLY MAN IN THE SKY
Butcher finds Gunpowder at a gunshow. He approaches him in the bathroom and quickly makes Gunpowder angry. Butcher says he knows Soldier Boy sexually abused the sidekick. Gunpowder denies it and leaves. Later, Gunpowder tries to shoot Butcher, hitting him in the leg and grazing his face. Butcher gets away, but only after setting off a few car alarms.
Homelander is called in to stop a young girl from committing suicide. Ashley is on the ground when news comes in that Stormfront committed suicide. Homelander switches off his hero mode and rants about how heroes are torn down by the public. This day isn’t his real birthday. It was chosen by the marketing team. It’s not fair that this girl should be saved when a beautiful goddess has to die.
Homelander tells the girl to jump but she changes her mind. She starts to cry for God. Homelander says the only man in the sky is him. The girl ends up splattered on the ground. Not sure if she jumped or if she was pushed. Homelander couldn’t care less.
MM laid out all of his newspaper clippings on his bedroom floor, forgetting about the food he was cooking for Janine. The smoke alarm goes off and MM loses it trying to turn it off.
FALLING INTO OLD HABITS
Hughie gets to work and is startled when Victoria approaches him. He’s a little thrown off when Victoria asks about the man looking for Nadia. She says he’s also been missing work and wants to know if there’s something she should know. Starlight shows up and takes the blame for Hughie’s strange behavior. They pretend to have a fight so Victoria leaves them alone.
Hughie shows Starlight the files from the Red River home. He’s upset that Victoria lied to him. He felt like things were going right with this job and he became good friends with Victoria. And it was all a lie.
MM takes Janine home to her mother. Monique’s (Frances Turner) partner Todd (Matthew Gorman) invites him to stay for dinner. They are celebrating Homelander’s birthday. Todd is a big fan of Homelander. MM declines. He talks to Monique about his OCD and anxiety returning. He tried to stay away for Janine’s sake, but this Soldier Boy thing is making him crazy. Monique tells him to go back to Butcher and settle things. He asks her not to tell Janine about any of it. He doesn’t want her to be a part of any of it.
Kimiko is still upset about the amusement park. She tells Frenchie that it’s not about the roller coasters. She feels like she took away a childhood from the kids at the park. Kimiko and her brother didn’t have a normal childhood themselves. She blames the V in her blood.
BUTCHER’S WAY
Butcher patches himself up and watches a video that Ryan made. It’s a a Lego video set to a phone message from Becca (Shantel VanSanten). He calls Hughie afterward to tell him that he was right. Everything is good right now and Butcher should leave everything alone.
Hughie tells Butcher that Victoria is the head popping supe. And she’s basically Edgar’s daughter. He feels like the past year has been a waste of time. If they are going to take Vought down, they have to do things Butcher’s way.
Butcher faces Gunpowder once again, asking why he’s protecting Soldier Boy. Gunpowder shoots him directly in the stomach. He thinks he killed Butcher, but Butcher gets up. He took the Temp-V and is bulletproof. The two “supes” fight it out, giving Butcher a chance to see what he can do. He is stronger than Gunpowder so the real supe gives in. He says he doesn’t know what killed Soldier Boy. Gunpowder says they were working with the CIA and their case worker was Grace Mallory (Laila Robins).
Gunpowder told Butcher everything but it doesn’t change anything for butcher. He continues punching the supe until his eyes glow. Lasers come out of Butcher’s eyes. He turns around and the lasers keep coming. When the lasers stop, Butcher sees that he killed Gunpowder.
NO APOLOGIES
Supersonic opens the Homelander celebration with a cringe-worthy, pedophile song. A-Train comes out to introduce the guest of honor and he’s in his new cultural suit. Ashley loses it in the control room. Starlight addresses the crowd first. She announces her Starlight House project that helps homeless and at risk youth.
Someone from the crowd yells out that Homelander’s Nazi died. Starlight tries to recover but Homelander has had enough. He takes the mic and he’s not like everyone else, he’s better. But people have tried to control him his entire life. If they can control him, they can control everyone else. Homelander is done apologizing and being persecuted for his strength. The world needs Homelander to save them. He’s the real hero.
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News Editor, Senior Contributor, and Press Editor. Coordinate breaking news, trailers and press releases. I also contribute reviews, recaps and interviews. Creator of the Indigenerd Wire, a column dedicated to the Indigenous creatives in pop culture.
GGA's resident Indigenerd, a little bit rez, a little bit classy...with a love for all things Star Wars, zombies, science fiction, and Indigenous. My ultimate goal is to start my own podcast.
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