The Boys is a streaming series developed on Amazon prime and written by Eric Kripke. It is an adaptation of the comics written by Garth Ennis and Darick Robertson. The series follows a group of superheroes known as ‘The Seven,’ and vigilante heroes. In this dark and twisted universe, the superheroes are megalomaniac, narcissistic, and well downright terrible people. The vigilantes who battle against the superheroes are simply put people who do wrong things but for the right reasons, driven by a personal vendetta. This recap contains spoilers ahead read at your personal discretion.
This recap is meant for people starting season 3 of The Boys who have forgotten what took place in the previous season apart from the awesome action sequences and gruesome deaths. This recap explains the plot for season 1 and season 2 respectively.
The Boys Season 1 Recap
The Seven, that is, Homelander, Queen Maeve, A-Train, The Deep, Black Noir, Translucent, and Starlight comprise the world’s most powerful and famous superheroes. The show starts with them at the pinnacle of fame and shows the glittery illusion of pious perfection that is displayed through them. They are the protectors, saviors, and the most perfect people in all of America. Part-time they foil bank robberies, and evil people inside the borders of America. The rest of the time they make brand deals pose for social media, and parties. The Seven is a subsidiary of Vought a pharmaceutical business giant. Vought creates and maintains the images of the heroes and also gets them the brand deals. The Boys is a vigilante group consisting of Hughie, Billy Butcher, Mother’s Milk, and Frenchie. All are attempting to destroy the supes driven by personal vendettas of their own.
Hughie & His Girlfriend’s short-lived romance
Hughie loses his girlfriend when A-Train runs through her and completely obliterates her. He makes a standardized public apology as directed by lawyers and Hughie is offered compensation and an NDA for his loss. The next day Billy Butcher states that the Supes are not who they say they are and there is more behind the death of his girlfriend. He claims to work for a special task force in the FBI to take down superheroes. On the other side, we see Madelyn Stillwell (Senior VP of Vought) trying to get supes into the army. These are the two overarching plot points for this season. The supes are evil and somebody needs to expose them, and Vought attempting to get military-grade contracts for the supes. This show displays the existence of superbeings under a capitalist setup and what would happen.
The Deep Harasses Starlight
Hughie learns there is more to Supes when he sees them behind the scenes at a seedy club. Starlight also sees the disgusting underbelly of being a superhero after joining The Seven post the retirement of Lamplighter. The Deep sexually harasses her and says that if she were to join The Seven she has to sleep with him. It hurts to see Chace Crawford playing this terrible person but hey that’s what The Boys do. You see these beautiful people doing revolting things. Now Hughie attempts to plant a bug in the Vought building under the pretence of meeting A-train. But, holy shit, translucent sees him when he drops the bug in the bathroom because face it Hughie is no spy.
Killing Translucent
Translucent then follows Hughie to the tech shop he works at and tries to kill him. Billy Butcher shows up to help take down the invisible c**t or so he says. The two of them attempt to destroy him together. Hughie asks him to call for backup from the FBI and Butcher reveals that there is no special unit and he basically lies to Hughie. Both of them take translucent to another location after electrocuting him. There we meet Frenchie who is hands down my favorite. Frenchie is an off-the-books weapons expert whose specialization is in killing supes. They trap translucent in an electrified cage and figure out a way to torture, extract information, and then kill him.
Homelander has a Mommy Fetish
Starlight further realizes how much of a sham superherodom is, as everything is staged for the gram. The disillusionment makes her question if she should be there at all. Meanwhile, we see a politician attempting to make a deal with Madelyn Stillwell for a hero for their state, and negotiates a lower price using something called compound V. He essentially blackmails her into accepting a lower price. Homelander overhears this and essentially lazers him out of the sky as to how dare someone hurt his mommy/lover. Yes, Homelander has some weird mommy fetish because his All-American backstory is a lie and he grew up in a lab surrounded by scientists. In a not-so-surprising turn of events, he hates Stillwell’s baby.
Cherry Bomb
They are trying to kill translucent but he is invincible due to his diamond skin that makes him impenetrable. Then Frenchie comes up with an absurd idea to put a bomb up Translucent’s butt and that get’s him talking. We learn about Popclaw, A-Train’s supe girlfriend whose a d-list superhero who’s known for her films. A-train and Popclaw fight about compound V which is a supe drug that A-train takes to make sure that he’s the fastest. That is also how he killed Hughie’s girlfriend as he cannot control his speed on the drug. After this Translucent is going to be killed but he manages to escape but Hughie gets pissed and blows him up through the butt bomb.
The Female
They then try to get their hands on some compound V so that they can go to the CIA with some proof and finally bring the supes to justice. After meeting Popclaw they learn about the compound V warehouse and try to raid it and there they meet The Female. A young girl is locked in a dungeon and Frenchie opens it only to realize that it was for good reason as she tries to kill all of them. Mother’s Milk gets angry as Frenchie never follows the plan.
Crashing the plane
In other news, The Deep is now a crazy comic character who is obsessed with saving the fish population and in a misfortune turn of events while trying to save a dolphin ends up killing it. Yeowch. Homelander and Queen Maeve also have some saving of their own to do. They attempt to save a hijacked plane but Homelander whose addicted to killing gets excited and lazers the control panel causing the plane to now crash. Also, he explains that he cannot superman it buying holding the plane as physics just doesn’t work that way. They let the plane crash and save no one. Leaving even a small child to die as her parents beg them to save her.
Hughie & Starlight’s romance
Meanwhile, Hughie and Starlight start dating on the side. From a cute meet-cute on a park bench to a classic bowling alley date. He then uses starlight to get into the Christian superhero fest led by Ezekiel. Starlight exposes Th Deep and he gets kicked out of The Seven.
Supe-Terrorists
The Boys learn more about Compound V from Ezekiel and realize no superheroes are born and all of them are injected with compound V as babies. They were created by Vought to make more money. Superheroes are essentially a Vought manufactured commodity. They still don’t know anything about The Female and take her to Mesmer a mind-reading supe. They find out through The Female that Vought is creating supe-terrorists so they would have to let superheroes into the army. They take this information to the CIA and before they can do anything another supe-terrorist emerges. Destroying any chance of exposing and stopping Vought as now they need superheroes in the army. Homelander was behind the entire thing and used A-train to run the Compound V across the world. Ooh, also A-Train kills Popclaw in the middle of all this because she’s a liability. Homelander figures out all the members of The Boys and relays the information to The Seven. Starlight is hurt that Hughie used her but he says he loves her also. She also confronts her mother about being created into a superhero and not born one.
Becca is alive
Through all this, we also find out about Butcher’s and Homelander’s rivalry. Butcher’s girlfriend Becca was raped and murdered by Homelander and now he spends his time avenging her. Homelander learns that Becca was pregnant and was told that she died delivering the baby. Butcher now captures Stillwell to kill her to hurt Homelander. Surprise, Homelander kills Madelyn himself by lasering her and blowing up her house. Why? Because she lied about Becca’s death and Homelander’s child is alive. He takes Butcher along with him and we see him look at Becca and that’s where season 1 ends.
The Boys Season 2 Recap
Well now for Season 2, if you haven’t watched after season 1. I would advise you to stop here. Okay, let’s go. Becca’s alive, Stillwell’s dead, The Boys are outlaws and Vought is still a big corporation that practically owns America. Billy Butcher is being blamed for Stillwell’s death and is missing. The Boys and The Female/ Kimiko are living in an underground bunker as they are criminals. They talk to Billy’s CIA contact to expose Vought but her head literally explodes as she’s talking to them. YES, let me say that again, her HEAD EXPLODES.
Homelander & his son
The Homelander’s plan worked and now the supes are allowed into the military. The Vought corporation didn’t know about the plan so the CEO puts Homelander back in his place. He says, that Compound V is their real product and the superheroes are actually dispensable. Homelander now tries to play house with Becca and his son Ryan. Becca hates having him around but Vought is of no help. (Also the Butcher’s now back. He wasn’t killed by Homelander.) Butcher wants Becca back real bad and finds the compound where she lives. He tries to get her to run away with him but realizes that she won’t leave Ryan behind. Also. Vought won’t let Ryan go and now they’re at an impasse.
Stormfront’s arrival
Homelander’s convoluted relationship with Stillwell is further highlighted when he asks Doppelganger to shapeshift into her. He spends the night with Doppelganger Madelyn Stillwell because he misses her. They also admit translucent’s dead and bring into the fold a new member of The Seven, Stormfront. A new-age superhero who does and says what she wants with a huge Instagram following.
Starlight helped The Boys last season and is still trying to expose them from the inside. She tries to get her hands on some Compound V to expose Vought. Well. A-Train catches onto her plan and also knows she helped The Boys. But she silences him with her knowledge of Popclaw’s death. She leaked Compound V’s information V to the press and now everyone knows superheroes are manufactured.
Kimiko’s long-lost brother
The Boys realize that a super terrorist has been smuggled into the country. Billy goes to the original CIA contact who initially formed the team, Grace Mallory. Yes, the same Grace Mallory whose grandchildren were murdered by Lamplighter. She tells him to bring in the super terrorist to clear their name. Surprise surprise, he’s Kimiko’s long-lost brother. Kimiko helps The Boys capture him as he was trained to be a terrorist and keeps blowing things up. They take him to a boat to exchange him in turn for their innocence. But local law enforcement spots The Boys and Kimiko’s brother escapes.
Stormfront vs Kimiko
The Deep in the meanwhile has joined a church, started going to therapy, and rectified his image. He even got married to keep up the ruse after a depressing few months and a lot of sea animal deaths. The Deep coming riding in on a whale to help The Seven capture The Boys. But The Boys’ boat crashes into the whale causing another sea death. A gory fight sequence ensues in fish guts. Stormfront locates Kimiko’s brother- the superterrorist and kills him off. Causing a lot of civilian deaths in the process. This switches the narrative on superheroes as they killed a superterrorist and everybody forgets about the whole babies being injected with Compound V thing.
Homelander & Stormfront’s Romance
This is not Homelander’s season as he first discovered he had a child. He killed Stillwell and got threatened by the Vought CEO. Now Stormfront has gotten all the glory and fame. Someone leaks a video of him killing a civilian in Africa that causes protests as the rise of a political leader Victoria Neuman. She rallies liberal protestors against the superheroes and Vought. Homelander at first starts hating on Stormfront but then develops a relationship with her that is conveyed through a very violent sex life.
Stormfront is a Nazi
Now everybody tries to figure out who Stormfront is. Turns out she’s really old and went by the name liberty earlier. She is also racist and killed a black man for nothing. She is gaining popularity and importance because of which Vought kicks A-Train out. They also learn that she’s in charge of a facility that’s trying to inject Compound V into adults but stabilizes it which is run by Lamplighter. There they run into lamplighter who now vows to make everything right as he didn’t know it was Mallory’s grandchildren. Lamplighter promises to testify at the upcoming congressional hearing against Vought. But starlight gets captured and Hugie takes lamplighter’s help to break into Vought. There lamplighter immolates himself but starlight manages to escape as the emergency protocol releases energy. Butcher now intimidates the scientist into testifying against Vought but his head explodes at the congressional hearing.
Becca Dies
But on further inspection, she isn’t just racist but a Nazi. She was the wife of the OG founder of Vought and wants to create a Nazi army to obliterate all other races. They expose her on live television with the help of A-Train. Everybody is disgusted and she is thrown out of The Seven. Homelander in the meanwhile kidnaps his son from Becca and Becca takes Billy’s help to get him back. Billy cuts a deal with the CEO of Vought saying that he gets Becca and they can take Ryan. Billy tries to get back Ryan and now a superhero fight ensues when Homelander figures out what Vought has done. Queen Maeve, starlight, and Kimiko fight against Stormfront and she flies out. She tries to get Ryan back by killing Becca. Ryan finally uses his superpowers to kill Stormfront but Becca also dies. Billy arrives to find Becca dying and as she dies in his arms she asks him to take care of her. Homelander tries to take Ryan with him but Ryan wants to stay with Billy. Uh-oh. Homelander then tries to kill both of them but Queen Maeve arrives with blackmail. Remember the plane crash? She has video evidence that Homelander let everyone on that plane die. Queen Maeve also had a lot going on this season. By being the first lesbian superhero and having to deal with the fall out of her relationship, oh, and also a film. Homelander backs away, and mass production of Compound V is put on hold.
Another head explodes
Remember The Deep joined a cult to rectify his image. Well. The cult leader is friends with congresswoman Neuman. Also, while he’s on the phone with her his head explodes. We see her outside his window and learn that she’s the supe that explodes heads. What? The anti-supe politician is a supe, holy sh*t. Also since Hughie makes the best decisions, he joins Neuman’s campaign, to do good, you know? Neuman also starts a unit to keep tabs on the superheroes which The Boys are recruited for. Well, that’s where season 2 ends.
The Movie Culture Synopsis
Wow okay, that was long. But hey, The Boys has a lot going on, okay sue me. This is as brief as I could be. Didn’t even really talk about Queen Maeve, The Deep, or Starlight and Hugie’s romance because there’s so much to cover. I probably still missed something. But I covered the broad storylines and deaths, alright? Alright.
