Amazon's The Boys season 1 finale recap: You Found Me

In the season 1 finale of Amazon Prime’s The Boys, it seems nothing will remain quite the same for season 2. Plus, there’s at least one major death!

The Boys delivered many startling revelations in the lead-up to the season finale. This episode offers another shocking death and will leave viewers guessing about season 2’s direction (probably in a good way). It begins in Syria where Homelander (Antony Starr) takes over a military operation against an apparent terrorist stronghold. As his laser eyes blast terrorists apart, he looks rather terrifying. Also, when he steps on and crunches someone, it’s obvious he views the person as a mere ant compared to his power (and it’s never just because he’s a “good guy,” if you’ve been following the series).

When the superpower-creating drug Compound V is found, a politician named Robert Singer (Jim Beaver) accuses Madelyn Stillwell (Elisabeth Shue) of corporate fraud — though he can’t quite prove it. Stillwell mentions how Naqib (Krishan Dutt) and other “super-terrorists” can easily survive standard military hardware, so her superhero team of The Seven is mankind’s best hope of surviving their attacks. Meanwhile, the CIA’s Susan Raynor (Jennifer Esposito) tells Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) that they’re dabbling in classified info that can’t be used as proof. On top of that, The Boys are now fugitives with Vought International, the supes and feds all against them. Talk about a triple whammy!

Starlight lives, but not all is well

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There is some good news with the bad: Starlight/Annie January (Erin Moriarty) is definitely alive and well, even after being shot at by Billy Butcher in the last episode. However, the drama is replenished when she asks her mother (Ann Cusack) about Compound V. Donna admits she helped administer the drug to her, saying that God brought Vought into their lives. She also admits that Annie’s dad leftover guilt for drugging his daughter. This further cements Starlight’s distrust of Vought and The Seven.

For their part, Billy Butcher and Hughie Campbell (Jack Quaid) track down Grace Mallory (Laila Robins), co-founder of The Boys. She hesitates to help them at all after Lamplighter burned her grandkids alive. However, while Billy and Hughie are meeting with Grace, the other Boys are more directly in trouble. The Female/Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) is tracked down by agents and gets a tranquilizer dart in the leg. As she’s dragged away unconscious, Frenchie (Tomer Capon) and Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso) are captured and thrown in a cage.

Hughie breaks up with Butcher/The escape

As all this is happening, Butcher wants to blaze an independent trail to get Stillwell, believing she’s the only person Homelander cares about (other than himself). Hughie disagrees with Butcher and they basically break up. Hughie soon tracks down Starlight, attempting to mend their relationship and to consider working against The Seven. He tells her that Vought has created supe terrorists. He also suggests that Starlight saved him just by being there for him. She rejects all of his points. Later on, Queen Maeve (Dominique McElligott) encourages Starlight to continue being herself.

Soon after this scene, Homelander meets Stillwell. In addition to mentioning his meeting with Vogelbaum (John Doman), he admits to her that he created “super jihadis” with Compound V to create villains only they can fight. They have an awkward quickie, and he makes her promise there will be no more secrets between them (he learned he had a child). Meanwhile, for spying on Vought, Hughie is thrown in the same cell holding Frenchie and Mother’s Milk. Frenchie, a world-class lockpick, uses metal from Hughie’s retainer to pick the lock and they begin their escape. Frenchie is non-fatally shot, but at least Kimiko is saved. Although Hughie shoots at guards, they close in on The Boys, and it seems like they’re dead meat. However, Starlight actually saves them!

Then, to their surprise, a mostly healed A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) shows up and starts fighting Starlight. However, he relents when he admits that Hughie didn’t kill Popclaw (Brittany Allen). He soon has a heart attack (like an O.D. on Compound V). Starlight calls in the heart attack, deciding to potentially save A-Train. However, she tells Hughie and the others to leave. Earlier, A-Train had used more of the drug in order to heal his broken leg, telling his brother Nathan (Christian Keyes). While pulling an actual train and straining himself, Nathan left him, saying “Bet you can’t outrun this.”

Billy visits Stillwell

The Boys wraps up with Butcher strapping bombs to Stillwell, knowing it will eventually draw Homelander’s attention. When the superhero menace shows up, he’s holding Stillwell’s baby, knowing Billy will be less likely to trigger the explosion. Homelanders says he did sleep with Buther’s wife, Becca (Shantel VanSanten). Homelander also asks for proof that he killed Becca, which Butcher can’t provide. Then Homelander gets Stillwell to admit that she’s afraid of him.

When she says he means everything to her, Homelander disagrees, saying she means everything to her job. With that, he gruesomely kills Stillwell with his laser eyes. Butcher suicidally triggers detonation. However, he unexpectedly wakes up on a lawn. It turns out Homelander quickly saved him from the explosion and brought him to meet Becc, who is very much alive. We also
meet Homelander’s newly discovered son (Parker Corno), the result of her affairs with Homelander.

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Finally, while this is the actual end to season 1, it pays to mention a brief moment with The Deep (Chace Crawford), whose career has been stalled due to his sex scandal against Starlight. After discussing loose-fitting prospects for his floundering career with a man named Jeff (Brendan Beiser), he takes a look at himself in the mirror, shaves his head and repeatedly calls himself stupid. While it’s not clear exactly what this means, it’s an obvious character transformation of some kind.

Be sure to check out the season 2 trailer here!

What are your thoughts on The Boys and their season finale? Let us know in the comments!

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