Hi folks! Welcome back to our weekly recap of The Boys. This week’s episode is named “Nothing Like It in the World” and it almost feels like it should be the Valentine’s special, because the main theme for every plotline was love. Let’s dive right in.
1. What is love?
This episode includes interviews with women talking about love interspersed throughout the episode à la When Harry Met Sally, they were funny and weird moments that were aptly fitted with the episode and at the end it was revealed that those girls were being interviewed to possibly be The Deep’s wife.
Of course he chose the “sexy, obliging” woman, but his “mentor” chose the weird one talking about dead people, you know, the one most willing to be, first the image of Deep’s change, and second a person being loved.
2. The magic of the first kiss
After days being “high as a kite”, Frenchie tries to kiss Kimiko and she responded violently, you know, as expected after your brother died and you are mourning. Then Frenchie goes to his old girlfriend and seeks advice.
The truth is, he didn’t kiss Kimiko for her, he kissed her because he is in love and he thought that they could focus on themselves instead of the chaotic world they are living. Later, we see Kimiko at Stormfront’s rally (where she was spouting racist talking points by the way) about to fight with the person that killed his brother, only to be stopped by Frenchie.
To me, this feels like the most honest relationship between any characters in the show, Frenchie doesn’t hide his feelings to her although she doesn’t seem to think of him that way, but they clearly have confidence in each other, there’s something real between them.
3. Warpath
When Butcher meets Mallory, she revealed to him that Becca lives in some kind of complex owned by Vought and he goes to save her, they finally meet after years of being apart and they talk and have sex.
Butcher asks her to escape with him, seemingly willing to adopt Ryan, but at the last moment she tells him that she is not going with him, she knows that Butcher is on a constant Warpath, and he is definitely going to kill the result of his wife’s raping sooner of later, but despite being born from a rape, Becca loves her son, and she is not going to let anything happen to him, not even her husband can do something about it.
4. $2000
Meanwhile, after almost being killed by Homelander, Starlight goes on a road trip with Mother’s Milk and Hughie, for the first time in a while, they are together, they are happy and most importantly they feel safe.
In North Carolina they meet a woman that tells them the story of how she saw the super hero Liberty kill her brother and her family was paid merely two grand for their silence, and that Liberty is current superstar Stormfront, but of course, a white hero killing a black person is like every story we hear in real life of black folks being killed by unpunished white police.
Later, when they are back in the city, Annie breaks up with Hughie, but that is understandable, she fears for her life, and being near Hughie puts both of them at risk of being killed by either A-Train or Homelander.
5. Madelyn
Finally, the last relationship we see explored is the one between Homelander and the late Madelyn Stillwell. He goes to a cabin and meets her, she greets him in lingerie and offers him milk; it is revealed that the dead woman really is Doppelgänger, and, if their relationship seemed nasty earlier, now that we know the truth, it ends up being disgusting.
At the end of the episode, and after a discussion with Stormfront, Homelander returns to the cabin, and after rejecting Doppelgänger as Stillwell arguing that he only needs himself, the shapeshifter transforms into Homelander and proposes an oral, sex with yourself. Homelander stops him and says “you are pathetic” and breaks Doppelgänger’s neck.
But I wonder, who was Homelander referring to? The shapeshifter of himself? What I do know is that killing your own images does wonders to your psyche, am I right? Just kidding of course, it means a schism in Homelander’s mind, and if everybody is afraid of him, now they must tread very lightly, because we have an even more unstable super.
Oof, that was grim… but for the meantime that’s it for this episode, overall, it was full of heartbreaks and it was a wonderful character study, insightful is the word I’m thinking of.
What did you think of this episode? Leave your comments below and join us next week for our take on episode 205, “We Gotta Go Now”.
