Spoilers forward for “The Boys” Season 5, Episode 7, “The Frenchman, the Feminine, and the Man Referred to as Mom’s Milk.”
Season 4 of “The Boys” ended with Annie/Starlight (Erin Moriarty) on the run from Homelander’s (Antony Starr) regime, after which Season 5 picked up a 12 months later together with her resistance efforts not making a lot of an affect. In between that, Annie guest-starred on Season 2 of spin-off “Gen V,” which ended together with her recruiting the present’s teenage forged of heroes to her resistance.
The “Gen V” leads (whose personal sequence was lately canceled) lastly put in an look for the penultimate episode. The blood-bending Marie Moreau (Jaz Sinclair) and her boy-girlfriend Jordan (London Thor/Derek Luh) drop off some key intel to Annie and MM (Laz Alonso), however Annie tells them to pack it up as a result of Homelander, who received the immortality-granting V-One within the final episode, has principally already gained. Marie throws a few of Annie’s personal phrases again in her face: “Since when did hopeful and naive turn into the identical factor?”
Annie’s complete arc, going again to when she joined the Seven in Season 1, has been testing how a lot that hopefulness can stand. In Season 5 she’s gotten way more cynical and now, lastly, bottomed out. She impressed folks to withstand underneath her banner as “Starlighters,” and solely received them killed.
On this episode, when she and MM infiltrate a screening of a Homelander propaganda movie, Annie asks if individuals are even value saving when so lots of them worship the unhealthy guys. However when Homelander’s goons begin killing that viewers for not being devoted sufficient, Annie nonetheless leaps into save them. Annie’s personal hope restored, she and MM return to Marie and Jordan, as a result of they want their assist in any case.
Can Marie assist depower Homelander in The Boys finale?
Again in “Gen V” Season 2, former Vought CEO Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito) revealed that Marie was created by the identical firm venture that birthed Homelander. To catch up viewers who have not seen “Gen V,” MM mentions Marie has “Homelander-level power,” however Marie says that is an exaggeration.
So, what function do Annie and MM want Marie and Jordan for? There’s an opportunity they solely meant that they wanted the pair to shelter the folks they rescued, however the best way the episode leaves the scene hanging it makes it really feel like there’s extra to it. Marie’s blood-manipulating powers might plausibly take away the Compound V from Homelander’s blood, leaving him weak sufficient to kill.
But when that was an answer, it feels just like the Boys would’ve considered it earlier. Marie’s dialogue even explicitly disputes the thought she will be able to take Homelander. Throughout this episode, the Boys had been dosing Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) with radiation, hoping she will be able to develop the identical Compound V-destroying nuclear blast as Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles). That units Kimiko as much as be the one who takes away Homelander’s powers, not Marie.
It stays to be seen what function the “Gen V” children will play within the endgame of “The Boy,” however they served their goal this episode by including to Annie’s arc. “Gen V” was about younger supes not but corrupted by greed and/or violence who nonetheless needed to do real good, the best way Annie has persistently been. This penultimate episode reaffirms Annie because the closest factor to an actual superhero in “The Boys,” as a result of she realized a lesson shared by Spider-Man, the X-Males, et al: Individuals will not at all times be pleased about you saving them, however that is not why you save them.
“The Boys” is streaming on Prime Video.
