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This article contains spoilers for The Boys season 5 episode 6.
It feels like there are only two ways The Boys could end with its final season: either Homelander lives, or he dies.
In the sixth episode of season 5, everyone’s favorite superhero psychopath finally injected himself with a dose of V1, thanks to his biological father, Soldier Boy, and his old WWII-era teammate, Bombsight. This should now render him immune to the Supe virus that Frenchie has managed to recreate, as it has Soldier Boy.
Homelander was already pretty hard to kill, but now he’ll never really age and can go about his reign of terror forever. Or can he? Homelander might seem immortal at this stage, but there’s still at least one way to get rid of him.
We Know What Works
Butcher and the gang have burned through a lengthy list of plans to take out Vought and Homelander. The trouble is, he’s pretty clever and avoids traps easily. Butcher’s first attempt to kill him by strapping explosives to his chest in season 1 was laughable. Homelander easily thwarted the plan, even rescuing Butcher and taking him to see Becca and Ryan, rubbing his face in how little he knew about what had happened behind the scenes.
But when Soldier Boy came into the mix during season 3, there was suddenly a real option on the table. People have been trying to kill Soldier Boy for a long time, but he’s basically indestructible. The experiments that the Russians performed on him also gave him the ability to generate and release radioactive energy blasts from his chest. Not only can he completely incinerate people with those blasts, but he can also neutralize the powers of other Supes.
Butcher soon realized that Soldier Boy might be his only hope in the fight against Homelander. If he could just get Soldier Boy on his side, he could convince him to use one of those blasts against his son, rendering him powerless and easy to kill.
Unfortunately, this didn’t go the way Butcher planned when Ryan’s presence threw a spanner in the works at the end of season 3, but Soldier Boy is still around, and so are his powers.
Soldier Boy Is Still the Key to Killing Homelander
It’s clear that Soldier Boy still has the necessary might to neutralize Homelander, even with the V1 in his system. He managed to use his chest blast against Bombsight swiftly at the end of episode 6, removing his V1 immortality and his powers. When Homelander approached them, all Bombsight could do was run away and hope for the best.
But as we’ve seen throughout the season, Soldier Boy has been warming up to his son. He ruined Mister Marathon and Malchemical’s plan to kill him, massacring everyone in the vicinity. Then, when he had the chance to destroy the V1 and stop Homelander from ruling over America as its new god, he realized that old flame Clara Vought, a.k.a. Stormfront, would want Homelander to have it, and that’s all that mattered to him in the moment.
Still, Butcher has been very keenly watching old videotapes of the Russian experiments on Soldier Boy back at The Boys’ HQ and appears to be concocting a secret plan. Could he still find a way to turn Soldier Boy against his son, or is he more interested in exactly how those powers work?
Butcher might have one more trick up his sleeve after all.
New episodes of The Boys season 5 premiere Wednesdays on Prime Video, culminating with a finale on May 20.
The post How Could Homelander Be Killed on The Boys? appeared first on Den of Geek.
