‘The Boys’ Season 5 Episode 4 Recap & Ending Explained: Where Is Soldier Boy?

In episode 3 of The Boys Season 5, we learned that the reason Soldier Boy had managed to survive the effects of the Supe-killing virus was because he had been injected with the earliest and most potent version of Compound V, which was called Compound V-One. So, the titular protagonists and Vought’s Supes embarked on a mission to find out where they could find this V-One. Their paths crossed at Stan’s house leading to Cindy and Maverick’s deaths. Hughie, Milk, and Annie got out of there in one piece and managed to learn the location where they might get some of that Compound V-One. Meanwhile, Deep kidnapped Stan and took him to the Vought Tower for questioning. Zoe and Sameer reunited and when the latter learned that it was Butcher, not Homelander, who had killed Victoria, he destroyed all the Supe-killing virus samples he had concocted and bolted with his daughter. Butcher and Ryan had planned to corner Homelander, hit him with the virus, and then die trying to kill him. Since there was no virus available, Butcher wanted to postpone their plan, but Ryan didn’t listen to him and confronted Homelander anyway. Predictably enough, Homelander almost killed Ryan. By the time Butcher found the kid, Homelander was already gone. What happened next? Let’s find out.

Spoiler Alert

Annie Meets Her Father

Annie goes to meet her father (those who thought that she was going to meet Marie and the Gen-V-ers, umm, keep waiting). He has settled down with Cathy and they have a son named Mason. Cathy is stoked to meet with Annie, but since Mason’s opinions are based on whatever Vought propaganda puts out there through its media outlets, he is a hater. Annie catches the vibe and she realizes that she is putting her father and his family in danger and offers to leave. But Cathy tells Annie to stay, so she stays. After freshening up, Annie has a little heart-to-heart with her father, because she wants closure regarding her past before she reunites with the Boys and resumes her fight against Vought and Homelander. Annie has been under the impression that her father abandoned her and Donna because he didn’t love Annie. 

But Annie’s father pulls out a box full of memorabilia and proves that he always loved Annie; he just couldn’t tolerate what Donna subjected Annie to and left. After all these years, he does regret the fact that he didn’t do enough to save Annie from the religion-fueled torture that she had suffer because of Donna’s delusions. But did walking out of their lives made Annie’s life any better? If you truly care for your child, you should go to any length to protect them from physical or psychological harm. Well, maybe Annie’s familial arc is a commentary on how most people out there, especially those who believe in any kind of religion like a fanatic, don’t deserve to be parents. Annie is more forgiving than I am, because if my long lost parent would have given me that flimsy excuse regarding why they abandoned me, instead of something truly substantial, I would have definitely lost it and used my superpowers on them.

Mason Backstabs Annie 

Annie forgives her dad, and she confesses how she herself has abandoned Hughie because she loves him so much that she’s afraid of losing him; and that fear of loss seems like a weakness to her. Annie’s father says that her loved ones shouldn’t be her weakness, she should see them as the source of her strength, as that’ll motivate her to fight harder (wonder why he didn’t tell himself that when he was running away from Annie and Donna). Since Mason keeps interrupting Annie and her father’s conversation, Annie decides to confront him and see if she can win him over. Mason comes off aggressive once again, but the half siblings bond over Dunkin’ Donuts (horrible product placement), and Annie considers that to be a win for her. That said, when the police show up at their doorstep because Mason called them in, Annie realizes that her half-brother is too far gone to treat her like his sibling. Annie’s father gets the police to leave and debunks the fake narrative surrounding his daughter. Does that redeem him in some way? Maybe; because you need to be really brave to stand up to fascists and fascist-enablers (most of whom are acting out of fear). Later on, as Annie is about to leave after dinner, Mason apologizes to her (I don’t know how honest that apology is). On that relatively happy note, Annie leaves and reunites with Hughie and the rest.

The Boys Go To Fort Harmony

Ryan wakes up at the Erie County School; he’s still recovering from his wounds. Butcher reprimands him for confronting Homelander without any backup. Referring to Star Wars, Butcher underscores the fact that Ryan (Luke Skywalker) is still their best chance against Homelander (Darth Vader). But if Ryan keeps throwing himself in danger without any support, then he’s going to croak before the Boys have a chance at killing Homelander. Is the Star Wars parallel some subtle foreshadowing that Ryan will actually forgive Homelander and somehow empathize with him, much like Luke did with Vader? I don’t know, but if he does, that’ll be pathetic. Anyway, when Butcher steps away to get some water for the hurting Ryan, he takes off, probably to lick his wounds and ruminate over his failure in that abandoned mansion in Russia. 

Butcher passes on that information to Milk, Hughie, Kimiko, and Frenchie, but it’s not that big of a concern because they aren’t attacking Homelander any time soon, since the virus isn’t ready; and if they aren’t attacking Homelander, then there’s no point fussing over Ryan’s whereabouts. Hence, Hughie says that they should head to Fort Harmony, which is in Clearfield, before Homelander does, so that they can use the V-One (if there’s any left) to empower themselves and keep Homelander from achieving immortality. Given how that’s the only viable option, the Boys embark on a journey to Fort Harmony. When they reach its outskirts, they find rotting corpses lying around, and when they get to the parking lot of Fort Harmony, they not only notice a lot of dead Supe-animals, but they also feel oddly agitated. After getting their hands on the blueprints to the place, they start discussing next steps, and that’s when everyone’s cortisol levels really start spiking. Well, everyone, except for Frenchie.

The Rage Virus Affects The Boys

As per Frenchie, the V-One has spilled into the environment around Fort Harmony, causing the plants to mutate. The spores coming out of those plants have made the air toxic, and since they are breathing that air, they are being affected by it, and that’s causing them to become little rage monsters. All the dead bodies in and around Fort Harmony are those of unsuspecting people who were affected by this rage virus, and they ended up killing each other. Theoretically speaking, Frenchie is unaffected because all the drugs in his system are somehow counteracting the effects of the rage virus. Butcher interrupts this brainstorming session by pointing out the fact that Homelander and Soldier Boy have reached the parking lot of the facility; which means that they really need to hurry up and get the V-One. They do some digging and theorize that Bombsight (everyone thinks he is dead but the packet of heroin on the floor says otherwise) is still alive, and he’s the one who has stolen whatever V-One was stored in Fort Harmony. Hughie shoots down that theory, because Bombsight must have V-One in his veins; so why would he need more? Before they can get an answer, Milk notifies everyone that Homelander and Soldier Boy are drawing closer; so, they need to leave. 

Hughie realizes that, for Butcher and Milk, getting the V-One never ranked that high on their list of priorities. They were always planning to use the Supe-killing virus and end it all. This causes the rage virus in them to truly spike their anger and have a go at each other’s jugulars. For some reason, Homelander and Soldier Boy hear none of this; I guess the effectiveness of their superpowers depends on the plot. Do you remember the lengths the Boys had to go, in Season 1, to prevent Homelander from detecting Translucent? Now, he’s one floor away from the Boys, who are screaming and fighting, and he can’t tell where they are? Maybe their superpowers have been affected by the rage virus that’s in the air. Speaking of the rage virus, while running away from his friends (who have lost their minds), Frenchie finds the mutated roots of the plant that’s supposedly releasing the spores that are creating all these issues and starts following them until he reaches the “tree.” Meanwhile, Kimiko takes on Milk and Hughie, and although Milk manages to get away from Kimiko, Hughie gets trapped in an incinerator, with Kimiko trying to break into it and kill him. Again, how Hughie manages to hold his own against Kimiko (even though Hughie doesn’t have superpowers) is a mystery.

Vought’s New Marketing Gimmick

Homelander calls Firecracker up to his room to give her the order to organize an event where it’ll be announced that he’s the God-sent messiah that’ll rid the world of all evil and naysayers. Their conversation is briefly derailed by the revelation that Firecracker and Soldier Boy had a sexual encounter. But since Homelander is so narcissistic, he forgets all about it and goes back to the topic of his “Christening.” Sage meets up with Soldier Boy and informs him about Homelander’s plans to go to Fort Harmony. Homelander has learned about that location from Stan, of course; as for whether or not Stan is still alive, that’s a big fat question mark. Sage suggests that Soldier Boy go with Homelander, because he has an in-depth understanding of the facility as that’s where Ben became Soldier Boy. Soldier Boy accepts the assignment, with the intention of stopping Homelander from getting the V-One. As Soldier Boy goes on a little father-son trip with Homelander, we get a brief glimpse at Noir and Deep fighting over the fact that the latter knocked him out and took all the credit for apprehending Stan Edgar; a fight that spills onto their podcast; a podcast that’s actually watched by Mason (yeah, the manosphere parallel is obvious and sad). 

By the way, those who were speculating that Black Noir II doesn’t speak because he’s Homelander’s clone, or that Homelander has cut off his tongue to get him to commit to the act, I hope seeing Nathan Mitchell’s face has convinced you to cool down on the fan-theories. Anyway, Firecracker carries out Homelander’s orders and meets up with Ashley and Oh Father (after they are done getting freaky with each other and arguing about the dwindling finances of Oh Father’s megachurch) to talk about how they are going to present Homelander as the new Jesus. They then brainstorm the topic with the marketing team, and even though the statistics show that presenting Homelander as God or Jesus is going to be detrimental to his popularity, they soldier on. 

Soldier Boy Traps Homelander

Soldier Boy and Homelander reach the outskirts of Fort Harmony, and spot the rotting corpses too. While marching towards the main building, Soldier Boy confesses that he did have an intimate relationship with Liberty/Stormfront. I saw some fans theorizing that Stormfront could be Homelander’s biological mother, to which other fans said they can’t be the case, because Vought said that his mother died while giving birth to him. Now, my question to the incest-naysayers is, why are you believing Vought’s narrative? Isn’t the whole point of this show that you shouldn’t blindly believe anything until you get ample evidence? I mean, just look at the face that Soldier Boy makes when Homelander tells him that Stormfront died by suicide. They clearly loved each other and hence, it’s totally possible that she gave birth to his child (and then fornicated with him for some reason). 

As the father-son duo venture deeper and deeper into the facility, their personal jibes about their respective pasts get more and more intense (turns out TV Soldier Boy’s past is quite similar to his comic book counterpart’s backstory, and we’ll probably get to see it in Vought Rising). That prompts Soldier Boy to trap Homelander in an anti-Supe chamber and leave him to die of radiation poisoning (there’s enriched uranium in the chamber which looks exactly like kryptonite, thereby furthering the evil Superman parallels). Butcher finds Homelander in that prison and begins monologuing, which allows Homelander to figure out that Butcher doesn’t have the Supe-killing virus; because if he had it, he would have taken advantage of Homelander’s weakened state and finished him off. So, Homelander promises that when he gets out of this jail, he’ll kill him. Butcher responds to that threat by stating that no matter how powerful Homelander becomes after acquiring the V-One, he won’t die until Homelander is dead; On that note, Butcher takes off.

Soldier Boy Presumably Parts Ways With Homelander

Frenchie baits Soldier Boy into entering the room with the “tree” from which all those rageful roots have formed; well, it’s not a tree, but a person who has turned into a tree (if you have watched Annihilation, this’ll look familiar). Who’s this person? Based on Frenchie’s interpretation of Soldier Boy’s reaction to the toxic tree guy, he’s Quinn, one of the subjects (soldiers) who applied for Dr. Frederick Vought’s V-One trials. Why is he in this state? Taking the V-One clearly backfired and Quinn ended up becoming this supervillain who thrives on hatred (kind of like the Sith). Now, while Frenchie wants Soldier Boy to kill this hub of rage, Soldier Boy wants Quinn to be in this state and suffer in solitude for passing comments about his affluent background back in the day. Frenchie figures out that if Quinn doesn’t die, then none of his friends will be free of the rage virus. Hence, he goads Soldier Boy into killing Quinn, and it works. And then the Boys just leave. They don’t rope in Soldier Boy, they don’t wait to watch Homelander die of radiation poisoning; they just leave and we get to watch a scene where Kimiko wants to change herself so that she can be a better partner for Frenchie? Huh?! What kinda contrived writing is this? 

Because of this nonsense, in the ending of episode 4, Homelander exits the anti-Supe chamber and encounters Soldier Boy, but he passes up on the opportunity to kill him. Why? Because earlier on, Butcher told Homelander that he has proven himself to be a weakling by beating up his own son; and he advised Homelander to not do something equally or more disrespectful. Killing his father, as he is begging to be finished off, would have been disrespectful for someone who was about to be presented to the world as the new God. Hence, he pardons Soldier Boy like a benevolent deity and takes off to attend Vought’s ceremony. The episode ends on a cliffhanger where we don’t learn what Homelander is about to say, or how the people react to it. But if you need to get an idea of what happens when you mix religion with politics, and then replace the god that people believe in with their favorite politician, you just need to look outside. It’s happening everywhere around you. You don’t need to watch a satirical show like this one (which kinda has lost its edge because it can’t be edgier than reality) to learn about religious-political deification. Hope that helps. By the way, if you’re wondering what Soldier Boy is going to do next, my guess is that he’s either going to retire or he’s going to join the Boys to kill Homelander. He clearly doesn’t return to Vought, and he has nothing to do in Fort Harmony (unless there’s some secret chamber full of V-One that only Soldier Boy knows about). So, yeah, it’s either retirement or redemption on the cards for him. What are your expectations from Soldier Boy? Let me know in the comments section below.