The Boys Season 4 Episode 1, ‘Department of Dirty Tricks’, sees Homelander unraveling before enacting a new plan, and the same goes for Butcher and Co. Let the chaos commence.
While The Boys Season 3 ended with a bang (literally, thanks to Soldier Boy), Gen V also slots nicely into the timeline, taking place after the third chapter and before The Boys Season 4.
In terms of what you need to remember, consider this your mini-recap: Butcher’s got months to live after his affair with Temp V; Hughie and Annie are back together and back in The Boys after she left The Seven; and Victoria Neuman is Robert Singer’s running mate (and she’s also got hold of Gen V’s supe virus).
Let’s not forget Homelander — his murder trial is pending, but his fanbase is stronger than ever thanks to the rise of supe supremacy. He has reunited with Ryan, formed an alliance with Neuman, and his ego shows no signs of slowing. So, with that said, let’s recap what happens in The Boys Season 4 Episode 1. Warning: Major spoilers ahead!
God save the queen
Confirming that Neuman (Claudia Doumit) will play a significant role in The Boys Season 4, the opening scene shows her taking to the stage to applause from the crowds and cameras flashing, as Sex Pistols’ ‘God Save the Queen’ ironically plays in the background.
The campaign is clearly going well. Neuman confirms Colorado and Nevada just went to Singer (Jim Beaver), with the VP-to-be standing confidently in front of their presidential tagline: A Stronger America.
While it’s all smiles, little does she realize that the event has been infiltrated by The Boys. As the crowd erupts once more, Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) walks across the screen dressed as a waiter. She heads to the back of the building, pushing her food trolley past a series of Homelander posters that say, “Saving America.”
Kimiko arrives at a van where Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso) leads their latest plan, and Frenchie’s (Tomer Capone) putting together what looks like a deadly concoction. Hughie (Jack Quaid) and Annie (Erin Moriarty) manage to infiltrate the building’s CCTV so the gang can keep tabs on what’s heppning inside.
And Butcher… well, he’s outside throwing up, a downside of his Temp V illness. “Oh, don’t you f*cking start,” he says. “I’m fine.” Which would be perfectly normal if it weren’t for the fact that there’s no one else there.
Kimiko and Frenchie turn up and ask him who he’s talking to, but Butcher (Karl Urban) denies saying anything. He pulls himself together (by necking some booze) and the trio heads to the fire exit, where two security guards escort them in. But Butcher’s not allowed any further, instead being made to man the exit while Kimiko and Frenchie head up.
Homelander and Neuman unite
Meanwhile, Homelander (Antony Starr) tries to bring Ryan (Cameron Crovetti) into the main event room where the election results are being read out. Homelander looks set to indoctrinate his son throughout Season 4, telling Ryan, “Come on, we’ve talked about this. They’re only humans, and,” the pair say in unison, “toys for our amusement.”
Homelander heads straight for Neuman, Ryan in toe, which throws a spanner in the works for our Boys. MM gives the gang a heads-up, telling all of them — especially Butcher — not to engage.
Neuman’s there with her daughter Zoe (Olivia Morandin), who if you remember from Season 3 is now a supe after her mom gave her Compound V. After a ridiculously inappropriate joke from Homelander (who tells Ryan and Zoe not to get pregnant), the young ones head off, leaving the adults alone.
The long and short of it is, Neuman is reluctant to join forces with Homelander due to the fact he’s on trial for murder and it didn’t go down well with his shareholders. “Any transaction that you and I may or may not have had is ancient history,” she tells him.
But Homelander laughs in his trademark maniacal way, before saying, “Let’s make some new history.” He grabs the attention of the crowd, letting his allegiance with Neuman be known. “Girls get it done in the White House,” he announces, urging people to clap for his new partner in crime.
Let’s make a truce
Butcher finds Zoe and Ryan in the kitchen, asking the former for some alone time with his surrogate son. He tries to urge Ryan to come with The Boys, saying it’s what his mom Becca would’ve wanted. But before he can convince him otherwise, Homelander rocks up.
“No means no, William,” he says. “This isn’t the Neverland Ranch.” Which is pretty rich given the way Ryan was conceived. Homelander’s X-ray vision means he immediately spots the “black mass” in Butcher’s brain, knowing he’s going to die soon. After some back-and-forth, Ryan ultimately chooses to go with Homelander.
Elsewhere, Kimiko and Frenchie make it into Neuman’s room, swapping out her eye drops with the mixture made by Frenchie. But they’re interrupted when Zoe walks into the room. The security men try to get her to leave, but instead, she transforms into her supe self, with four fanged tentacles emerging from her mouth and mauling the guards to death.
After a brief fight (Kimiko loses an arm and a face, but of course, they regenerate), they get away from Zoe. Neuman hears about what’s happened and heads to the truck where she finds Hughie alone.
He questions why she gave Compound V to her daughter, and the pair end up having a heart-to-heart. Hughie says they were like family, wanting to know if any of it was real. “I always cared about you, Hughie,” she says. “That part was real.”
Using this moment to his advantage, Hughie opens the other canister of Frenchie’s concoction, throwing it at Neuman. But it’s the ultimate womp, womp moment, doing little more than burning a hole in her jacket. Hughie threatens to out her and tell the press she blew up Congress.
Neuman’s in a forgiving mood, recommending that they make a truce. Out of the blue, Butcher enacts “Plan B” and shoots her in the head, although again it does little to no damage. “How is it you’re getting worse at your jobs?” she says, before returning to the election event. Cut to Neuman and Singer, who stand triumphantly on the stage as red, white, and blue balloons tumble through the air.
Robert Singer’s not happy
Following this rather embarrassing exchange, MM and Butcher visit Grace Mallory (Laila Robins). She’s pissed at Butcher for failing to get Ryan back. But that’s not the only reason the CIA is angry — those “security guards” were actually agents and their concoction (revealed to be acid) didn’t work.
What’s most surprising of all is Robert Singer’s there. Turns out, he’s working with the CIA, who are bankrolling the Boys to take out Neuman. “Congress certifies the election January 6,” Singer tells MM. “After that, a supe is one heartbeat away from the presidency. My f*cking heartbeat. Now I can only keep my distance from her for so long. Eliminating her is top priority.”
As Butcher waits outside, Joe Kessler (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) debuts in The Boys Season 4. The pair go way back, catching up with coffee and filling each other in on what’s been going on. Kessler clearly has an agenda: he reckons Butcher should walk away from the Boys and join him in taking down the supes before they start “rounding them up and dumping them off in camps.”
MM gets a visit from Monique (Frances Turner), who’s concerned about their daughter Janine after Todd was made to leave. Janine still loves him, despite his foray into the super right-wing movement, and Monique wants MM’s help to track him down.
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Homelander is unraveling
We cut to a montage of disturbing Homelander moments, from his childhood to more recent events such as him drinking Madelyn Stillwell’s breastmilk, killing Black Noir, and countless laser deaths. He wakes up from this nightmare, only to live it, with a montage of him in a tiresome Vought PR meeting, watching Annie on the news, and seeing Deep addressing his octopus controversy.
Clearly, he’s bored, as he expresses in a meeting with the Seven. The only ones left aside from Homelander are A-Train (Jessie T. Usher), Deep (Chace Crawford), and Black Noir 2.0 (Nathan Mitchell), and so Ashley (or the board, at least) thinks it’s time for some new supes. We meet a few colorful characters, including Sister Sage (Susan Heyward), the world’s smartest person.
Homelander shows interest in a guy called Wrangler, and everyone’s quick to agree. But this doesn’t make him happy; quite the opposite. He’s sick of being surrounded by yes men. To make a point, he tells Deep to “blow A-Train.” Though they’re reluctant, they go to do it, with Homelander pulling the plug before the pants are off. Point made.
Meanwhile, the Vought PR machine is in full force. A series of snippets show a fundraiser for Homelander’s legal fund, Cameron Coleman (Matthew Edison) claiming the man Homelander killed attacked Ryan, an ad for Vought on Ice, and footage of tensions rising between the public outside the courthouse.
We’re also introduced to Firecracker (Valorie Curry), the host of a right-wing conspiracy podcast called ‘The Truthbomb with Firecracker’. She goes one step further than Coleman, alleging that Homelander’s victim was a child abuser. Shortly after this, she targets Starlight House, alleging that the home for at-risk teens is actually an “LGBTerror dungeon.”
Butcher and Homelander have new plans
At the Boys’ HQ, Starlight is working on her flying skills, Butcher’s not in a great mood, and Frenchie’s had it after his acid trick didn’t work. When Butcher leaves, they try to convince Hughie to drop him, saying he nearly got them killed.
Butcher heads to a rundown old Vought Video (a clear parody of Blockbuster) where he has a secret meeting with Neuman. They strike up a deal: if she can get Ryan back for him, he’ll give Neuman all the info Hughie has on her from the Red River group home.
This won’t be too difficult for Butcher if he decides to go through with it, as Hughie gets the call no one wants: his dad Hugh is in hospital. Before hearing the news, Annie heads to Starlight House HQ where she sings the praises of Colin, who Frenchie put her in contact with. Frenchie and Colin head to the bathroom where their hands touch one another; clearly there’s something between them, and Kimiko notices when she sees them talking in the stairway.
Homelander continues unraveling, as we discover he’s found several gray hairs in his nether regions. Rather than brushing it off, he keeps them all in a jar, locked away with an empty breast milk bottle and the old picture of his former Nazi flame, Stormfront. As you do.
He decides to pay Sister Sage a visit, asking her to prove herself to him. She doesn’t hold back, breaking down his state and telling him, “Any mouth breather could see you’re going through some existential midlife whatever.” Ouch.
Homelander admits that even though he’s reached the summit at Vought, he’s still unhappy. He saves people, they cheer; he kills people, they cheer. “Humans are less than nothing,” he admits. “They are just toys for my amusement, and yet they control everything. It’s unnatural.”
Sage has some bitterness of her own. Despite being the smartest woman on the planet, no one listens to her. So, she decides to help Homelander hatch a plan, not too dissimilar from the fall of ancient Greece. “People will tear it apart themselves,” she says. “Just got to nudge them a little. Then you get to swoop in, be the one saving it.” Hearing her plan, Homelander asks her to join The Seven.
Let the chaos commence
A dismayed Hughie returns to the Boys HQ and tells Butcher his dad’s had a stroke. Butcher comforts his friend, telling him not to feel guilty for not answering his last call. Annie turns up and does the same. When they leave, it’s revealed that Butcher secretly swiped Hughie’s USB — the one containing Neuman’s files.
Elsewhere, MM, Frenchie, and Kimiko are on the hunt for Todd. When they find him, he’s meeting up with a few other men and Sage. They head inside a building, which we find out is for a meet-and-greet event with Homelander and the rest of the supes.
After a brief introduction, Homelander chillingly tells Todd and co. that they’re unwilling “martyrs,” demanding that Deep, A-Train, and Black Noir 2.0 beat the men to death with baseball bats as a show of loyalty to the cause. Sage watches from the sidelines as they turn the men into human slushies (although it’s clear at this point that A-Train is having doubts).
MM, Frenchie, and Kimiko see Homelander walk out before flying back to his trial. We cut to outside the courthouse, where Starlighters vs Homelanders wait for the verdict. The result? Not guilty. Sage takes her opportunity to enact phase one: chaos. Dressed as a Starlighter, she throws her coffee cup at a Homelander, saying, “F*ck you fascist.”
The opposing sides erupt into a massive brawl, with Kimiko, MM, and Frenchie trying to help the beaten Starlighters and stop Homelanders with guns. Frenchie sees Colin being beaten by a gang of Homelanders and jumps in to save him. As they run to the sidelines for safety, they share a passionate kiss, with Kimiko having earlier urged him to go for it if it makes him happy.
Homelander is unsurprisingly enjoying the conflict, half-heartedly telling people to stop. Annie shows up and gives a more earnest attempt, helping her campaign manager after she’s brutally beaten.
As all this is going on, A-Train reluctantly does what he’s told: he takes the bodies of Todd and the other men and dumps them in the crowd, making it appear as if Starlighters killed them. Sure enough, Coleman reports that the Starlight supporters left “three innocent patriots dead.”
In the aftermath, Homelander and Ryan watch the news. Ryan’s not happy, telling his dad that he doesn’t want Butcher to die. Meanwhile, Deep’s at home scrubbing his gloves and venting to his octopus lover (they never actually broke up, he just keeps her hidden in a tank at his home).
Frenchie wakes up next to Colin. While he’s sleeping, Frenchie spots a family photo, placing it down with a concerned look on his face. As for Hughie, he sits patiently by his dad’s bed when all of a sudden his long-lost mom shows up.
In the final scene, Butcher is looking at Neuman’s files. We finally find out who he’s been talking to this whole time: it’s a vision of Becca, who tells him that while she wants him to save Ryan, she doesn’t think he should jeopardize his relationship with Hughie.
We then see Neuman receiving a text from Butcher that reads, “Got Hughie’s files on you right here.” But when she opens it, it’s nothing more than a close-up picture of his literal a**hole. Well, that’s one way to finish an episode.
The Boys Season 4 Episodes 1-3 are available to stream on Prime Video now. Check out the how the Gen V timeline ties in and theYou can find more TV shows streaming this month, as well as the best TV shows of 2024 so far.
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