The Boys Season 2 finale recap: What I Know

In the previous episode of Amazon Prime’s The Boys, Homelander (Antony Starr) and Stormfront (Aya Cash) took custody of Ryan (Cameron Crovetti), wresting it away from his mother, Becca Butcher (Shantel VanSanten). There was also quite an amazing moment of heads exploding at a government hearing on Vought International’s use of Compound V to create superpowered humans. One of those who died was Jonah Vogelbaum (John Doman), a leading Vought scientist and pseudo-father to Homelander.

The season 2 finale begins with Vought’s push to provide Compound V for first responders, as they hype up the dangers of supervillains. Meanwhile, Congresswoman Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit) tells The Boys that the attack on the hearing wasn’t an outside terrorist, but that it was a Vought-launched coup attempt. Not everything is bad news, however. There’s also a brief moment in this episode of Starlight (Erin Moriarty) making amends with her mom (Ann Cusack).

How do The Boys react to the Capitol attack?

As the episode continues, there might be an obvious question for Billy Butcher (Karl Urban): Should they kill all the bad supes or play it subtle and find a reliable witness whose head can’t be exploded? Meanwhile, The Seven have their own unique issues regarding the attack. Homelander seems to be thrown off by it, as it’s not something he was involved with. He thinks Vought CEO Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito) orchestrated the head explosions. In any case, Stormfront is busy with her Nazi-like aspirations to make sure only “the right people” get doses of Compound V (those who followed season 2 thus far will have a decent idea of what criteria she has in mind).

Elsewhere, Hughie (Jack Quaid) and Starlight meet Queen Maeve (Dominique McElligott). Maeve thinks nothing will change and urges them to leave, and they soon do, further demonstrating a sense of her apathy/jadedness. Next, Becca shows up for Billy and The Boys, and she wants them to help her protect Ryan from Homelander. Of course, it’ll be a tricky operation because they’d also need to deal with Stormfront, who is also quite a force to be reckoned with.

Power-wrangling

The Boys adds additional layers of power-wrangling scenes, with Church of the Collective leader Alastair Adana (Goran Višnjić) meeting Vought’s Stan Edgar about The Deep (Chace Crawford) rejoining The Seven. However, because Stormfront hates The Deep’s pal A-Train (Jessie T. Usher), Edgar doesn’t want either of them back. Meanwhile, the political dimensions of parental control come into play when Ryan asks Homelander if he can call his mom. Homelander responds with a distraction tactic, taking Ryan to the “Planet Vought” restaurant, in an attempt to win him over.

Homelander’s plan backfires because Ryan doesn’t like all the attention his dad gets, which almost makes him look like a freakshow curiosity. The parenting theme also happens in a conversation between Hughie and Starlight, when Hughie tells her that his mom left his family when he was six. However, the discussion’s cut short when A-Train shockingly appears in their car. Fortunately, he’s not there to fight but hands them documents considered crucial to getting Stormfront booted from The Seven.

Saving Ryan

Additional surprises follow, including a meeting between Billy Butcher and Stan Edgar regarding (a) getting Ryan back under his mother’s care, (b) hopefully in a better secret location, free from Homelander and Stormfront’s warped tutelage. On that note, there’s a disgusting (yet fascinating) moment where, indeed, Stormfront tells Ryan that “bad guys” want to hurt the three of them for the color of their skin. As they try to instill this propaganda, The Boys leak Stormfront’s Nazi background to the public, including that she was married to Frederick Vought and that she was buddy-buddy with Nazi high command.

At around this time, The Boys implement their plan to rescue Ryan. It begins with an intense frequency sound generator that screws with Homelander’s mind, momentarily incapacitating him (and, unfortunately, Ryan is also impacted, at least temporarily). Becca and Billy arrive. Though Billy had a deal with Stan Edgar, he decides he can’t willfully separate Ryan from his mother and decides instead to go with the CIA’s plan.

The showdown begins

Under the loose-fitting collaboration between Vought and The Boys to rescue Ryan, a number of Vought security officers show up at Homelander’s location, with vague hopes of arresting him. However, when Homelander cuts one of the men in half with his heat-vision, it becomes clear that they have bitten off more than they can chew. Similarly, Stormfront throws the car that Becca’s in, obviously not caring if Becca lives or dies. Stormfront then accuses Starlight of using “deepfakes” as an explanation for all the Nazi images. Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) starts laughing, suggesting it’s time to fight.

Although Kimiko does a commendable job against Stormfront, Stormfront ends up twisting Kimiko’s neck. Of course, because Kimiko has Wolverine-like healing powers, it ends up just slowing her down. Fortunately, Queen Maeve and Starlight show up and force Stormfront to flee, and she finds Becca. To her credit, Becca finds a weakness in Stormfront, viciously (yet understandably, under the circumstances) stabbing her in the eye.

Ryan’s big stand

The fight isn’t over between Stormfront, Becca, and Billy, who are trying to prevent Homelander from ruining Ryan. Stormfront, still upset about her eye, chokes Becca against a tree. This is when a big moment occurs: Ryan basically fries Stormfront in a blind rage! Unfortunately, Becca is also gravely wounded in his attack, profusely bleeding from the neck.

Becca’s last words implore Billy to keep Ryan safe and to “tell him he’s good.” Moments later, an already bloody Homelander shows up to find a badly burnt, mutilated Stormfront. In addition to losing his disgusting, Nazi love interest, Ryan also makes clear that he rejects Homelander. This is when Queen Maeve shows up, telling Homelander to leave them all alone or she’ll release the air crash footage wherein Homelander actively refused to save passenger’s lives and, in fact, even killed some innocent people on board.

The aftermath

More than even some other episodes of The Boys, this one’s pretty jam-packed with developments. After the apparent demise of Stormfront, PR-savvy Stan Edgar publicly blames Stormfromnt for the Washington attack that left many headless. Also, somewhat surprisingly, Homelander publicly apologizes to Starlight (though we have absolutely no reason to believe his sincerity).

Then, in another surprise, the Church of the Collective’s Alastair Adana (Goran Višnjić) confronts A-Train about data leaks but suggests he’s glad he took initiative and suggests A-Train will find his way back into the roster of The Seven (The Deep is still excluded, however, because “one hero is redemption and two is weakness”).

There are a few more emotional moments, too, such as Hughie and Starlight kissing and Billy giving Becca’s necklace to Ryan. However, Grace Mallory (Laila Robins) shows up, presumably to take Ryan somewhere safe under a protection program. Mallory also says all charges against Billy and The Boys are being dropped and that Victoria Neuman is to be “Czar” at the Office of Supe Affairs. Meanwhile, a disheartened Homelander is shown coping with his problems in his own freakish way on a rooftop (let’s just say he’s coping in a physical way).

Another big revelation

In some of the final moments, we see Victoria Neuman talking to Alastair about a tax-exempt status for his Church, for his spilling more info on supes. However, rather than do what he wants, she makes his head explode, suggestive of a very strange superpower, and that she was actually the one who killed people during the Congressional hearing. Later, Hughie asks Victoria for a job, not knowing of her true nature, and we can safely assume he’ll regret the job in season 3.

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