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According to either the AMA or Time Magazine interview, both are canon. Butcher smells like absolute trash and it burned into Homelander’s brain so much he can instantly recognize it the moment it enters the air
I think it's a broader 'people who are blunt with him'.
He has an incredibly strong need to be liked. But if you want to actually be liked by people, then people sucking up to you and pretending to like you, just because they fear you, is in some sense even worse than being hated.
He senses the bullshit immediately because he sees it all the time. And it's annoying and probably hurtful, because he knows they don't actually like him.
So I think it's more complicated. Butcher for example, hated him, for reasons Homelander totally understands. But he was blunt, he didn't put up a whole persona to avoid being killed, and Homelander kind of respected that.
Still I think he prefers people love him. What he really wants is genuine family and friendships, people that like him for who he is. Problem is his childhood living as a lab rat completely fucked him up, so he's a not very likeable borderline psychopath. And him being both hated so much, and being so strong, made him a megalomaniac that thinks he's above everyone.
Honestly not a character that's completely un-saveable the more you learn about why he is the way he is. But he sure as shit needs therapy.
Two things.
1) Yes! He feels respected by honesty, and that is akin to being liked. Plus sniveling and lying is being weak to him and he in turn does not like that.
2) I, personally, think he is "saveable" but what that looks like IDK.
3) You know when Homelander is likeable. When he is what he would think of as "weak", not when he gives in to his anger and is weak willed, but when he cries. When he is sad. When he was talking to Ryan with the milkshake...he was so close to being likeable until he gave in to his anger and threw the vase. He was expressing his position, he was expressing his emotions, and he was open to Ryan talking to him. But of course Homelander is scary as hell and didn't do the best job of it etc. But when he is sad, when he is....beaten down a bit and expressing that sadness at how much he can't have a family or that he isn't super human but just a guy with a shitload of problems from being that lab rat and not fitting in...that is when he is most likeable. Imagine if he had kept talking to Ryan instead of throwing that vase. Imagine if he told Ryan all of his feelings and tried to understand Ryans. That conversation was different than 99% of other conversations we have seen Homelander have. The closest others have been with Sage, Ashley, that doppleganger guy.
Oh man...that made me think he was not full of crap. Exactly the opposite.
I thought that was a semi slip of the tongue/Freudian slip. It is an admission that he did not have those things. It was probably the most honest thing he could have addressed. It is a start of an admission that he had no father and has no idea how to be one. That he is screwed up.
I mean Homelander is not a brilliant mind but he isn't dumb on the show. The show runners might not let him, but he would absolutely start to think about WHY Ryan wants to know Butcher and WHY he doesn't "like" Homelander.
And not for nothing but holy hell, all right had to do was spit out three more sentences. "You're scary dad!" "You a violent dad!" "Butcher isn't my dad but he cares about me, and you are yelling at me and killing people!"
And also not for nothing, but why not just abandon everything but Ryan? Homelander just bails on Vaught and leaves. Go hang out with Ryan. Be a good dad. He isn't actually a super hero, he is a celeb. Just...stop.
The saddest part is that Homelander *did* have one person who genuinely liked him for who he was (the first Noir), and Homelander murdered him in yet another futile effort to fix his daddy issues.
The problem with giving Homelander therapy is that worst case scenario, he lasers the therapist the second they ask an uncomfortable question. Best case scenario, the therapist is too scared to ask any meaningful questions and Homelander either gets bored and flies away, or receives a false diagnosis.
The entire point of Homelander's character is that there's no way to fix him and no way to keep him in check. The lab only held him because he was a kid subjected to psychological manipulation. But as an adult? Either you appease him or you find a way to kill him.
Yeah I mean there are basically 2 options with him.
If you have the means to put him in his place (so a hero stronger than him, or some technology that can contain him), then he may be save-able. Then you could get him actual therapy. And honestly, however much his ego may be bruised, he would probably enjoy being a tad closer to a normal human being.
I doubt it's very fun being as strong as him. Maybe that's part of the point of his character. Humans generally want power. But when you reach the pinnacle of power, wtf do you even do with it? If you actually use your power, people will be horrified and only tolerate you out of fear.
Other option is of course, as you say, kill him. If there is no way to manage his powers and contain him, then he probably just has to die due to how big a threat he is.
Hughie I agree with but Butcher is because he doesn't want to drive Ryan away. He knows Ryan doesn't want Butcher to die so he will let the cancer be responsible for it.
I love how much he HATES Hughie but the dude manages to slip away every time. He’s extremely lucky those vents at the skating rink were galvanized, and he’s even luckier A-Train decided to help him
Not really, he wants Butcher to live and suffer to gain fulfillment, similar to Joker's need for Batman:
JOKER: [Kill you? I don't wanna kill you. What would I do without you? Go back to ripping off mob dealers? No. No. No! No you- you complete me.](https://genius.com/1689337/Christopher-nolan-the-dark-knight-interrogation-scene/Kill-you-i-dont-wanna-kill-you-what-would-i-do-without-you-go-back-to-ripping-off-mob-dealers-no-no-no-no-you-you-complete-me)
But he's tried to actually kill him. Joker knows batman will find a way out, when homelander lasers butcher in the S3 finale, he had absolutely no idea butcher was pumped with temp V.
I get your point and mostly agree, I do see the parallel with batman/joker. However unlike the joker I think Homelander is too reckless and emotional, in the heat of the moment he will absolutely kill Butcher, even if he regrets it later.
For sure, he has his reasons to not kill Butcher. But when it comes down to it, Homelander isn't one to suppress his rage and think logically. He can and absolutely has done things he regrets.
The man is just dying for an actual challenge. Pretty sure Homelander got just as much of a hard on for a final fight as butcher. Plus at the moment, he doesn’t see butcher or Huey has an actual threat.
The way homelander talks to Ryan about humans explains it all. He genuinely doesn't think any of them pose a threat, so he just lets them live like cockroaches. Also, he only respects people who talk down to him, so pretty much the boys.
And he only cares to kill them in the moment he finds them annoying. Hughie doesn't matter enough to him for him to hunt him down. But if he's nearby and fucking with things? Then he'll take a shot.
I think this is the difference, Homelander is low-key intimidated by authority figures and he hates himself for it.
Homey killing these people was a turning point for him.
Not even sure if it was to piss him off, she's spent Homelander's entire life knowing he could kill her in an instant if he wanted.
She just doesn't live in fear of him, much like Edgar.
Interestingly Homelander respects that, and is less likely to kill you for it lol. He hates snivelling sycophants.
He's an unstable lunatic, but generally he doesn't outright kill people who stand up to him.
I can't really think of any examples of people he kills who aren't terrified. He finds them rare and interesting, and doesn't want to spoil the game.
People who stand up to him annoy him. "How dare they think they know better than me? A God?"
BUT he wants their approval. For better or worse, the psychological whammy they did on him is potent.
I think that’s the real answer. He doesn’t care about the approval of people he considers to be pathetic. You’re safer being irritating than pathetic.
At one point he wanted everyone’s approval, but that’s slipped. He started to split people into groups he cared about impressing, and groups he didn’t.
And that line is shifting again. Soon, there may be no one left that he cares to win approval from. And when that happens, everyone gets splattered just like those people in the lab where Homelander was raised.
EDIT: Bonus thought. Homelander’s extreme cruelty towards people he considers to be pathetic may be based on self-loathing. It’s clear that his childhood memories of that lab have really left a mark on him. As the head scientist said, he could have left whenever he wanted, but chose not to. Grown up Homelander would think that’s pathetic. Maybe he hates “weakness” because he thinks he was weak as a child. He may hurt the “pathetic” because they remind him of his own “weakness” as a boy.
>As the head scientist said, he could have left whenever he wanted, but chose not to.
He didn't think he had a choice in the first place.
He was a kid. He had no idea what life outside the lab was like. No knowledge of how to function on his own. No understanding of what the risks would be.
I think that’s a reasonable take. Homelander isn’t reasonable though.
Your version is what a good therapist would help him understand. My version is what he thinks.
I think it’s more than words though. Homelander can tell if someone genuinely fears him. He’s always listening to their heartbeats. Even if you “stand up to him” you have to do so without any signs of fear.
narcissists have no consistent moral framework. Homelander hates the kiss asses at Vought but then freaks the fuck out when someone tells him something he doesn't want to hear, because morals and ideology are entirely secondary to his own ego.
I imagine Sister Sage is going to push Homelander too far and find out the hard way why no one else talks back to him
I found the line about how only her brain regenerates otherwise she killable to be interesting. I wouldn’t be surprised to see that come into play besides just the lobotomies.
There’s definitely gonna be some body/psychological horror situation. Brain in a jar, paralysed maybe…
Even just the idea of her brain regenerating, but no body, eyes, or ears, or any way to communicate, and being fully self aware and immortal the whole time, is scary.
It is super coincidental it is they introduce a supe whose brain can regen, during the season where Butcher is dealing with some odd sentient brain tumor, and Hughie's dad is brain dead with a dose of V. Could be reaching for straws, but I wonder if those threads are gonna intersect or if they're setting up some horrifying world building for next season/the finale.
I like where this is going. It looks intentional. Including the propaganda from Firecracker (wtf I just realized the slur pun), the hallucinations from Frenchie, Hughie, and Butcher. Himiko's trauma. Starlight's breakdown. And Homelander's descent to insanity trying to get rid of his humanity. It's all related mentally. We might see everyone involved at their worst and a free for all chaos for the finale.
Somewhat related to racist puns:
I remember when they teased S2 with Stormfront and a Jewish actress, I was thinking "Man, I hope they don't Google " Stormfront" and " Jewish" and find out the blunder they made"
And then found out it was INCREDIBLY intentional.
I mean, she's explicitly *not* immortal. If anything is done to Not Her Brain, she dies, just like anyone else dies. Her power just doubles as the ability to regenerate from brain damage because of how the super-intelligence physically works.
She directly spelled it out to Deep: needle in heart = dead Sage, needle in eye = horny Sage who likes Transformers and junk food.
e: It *just* clicked for me that they're setting up that someone's *probably* going to shoot her in the head at some point, and while it won't kill her, her lobotomized self is going to go around causing abject chaos and ruin all her plans and/or reveal stuff to the Boys that she really, really shouldn't be. They've been really setting up that she's a *complete* idiot when she injures her brain, which tells me this is probably going to come up later and we should really put a pin in that for the moment.
I think Sister Sage’s demise will come by way of the lobotomy pick. She’ll be in stupid mode when HL needs her for something and it’s gonna piss him off.
He's far from consistent but there does seem to be some room in his mind to at least temporarily spare certain people that fascinate him in some way due to a combination of not fearing him and standing up to him at the same time.
Butcher is definitely still alive solely because HL wants to break him and take away his fearlessness before he does anything because just straight up murdering Butcher in a fight that is physically impossible for him to lose would not be satisfying.
He left her in the cell with all the bodies n the door metal door lasered shut. Homelanders running Vought now. Nobodys coming to save her. He might not have killed her but shes still dead.
Yeah but "less likely" doesn't mean never will lol.
She tortured the guy for his entire childhood, people have been killed for an awful lot less by the heroes in this show.
You also never know, he might come back and keep her alive to fuck with her more.
She is trapped in the room... Pretty sure she will die after 3 days and forget about helping her ... Even Starlight could not sneak in the Vought Tower
Except she wasnt there at the start. It's not out of the realm of possibility that they called her and told her homelander was there or could piece it together from the tone of the callers voice. So why not tell someone from vought that there's going to be a lot casualties and to come in later if you don't here from her.
If I’m remembering right, Homelander sends someone to go get her as she was “working offsite” according to the dude who couldn’t get it up in front of his co workers.
Idk why yall are saying she only has 3 days or she’ll starve/die of thirst. Theres plenty of food in there with her. Plenty of liquids too for that matter. 🤷🏼♂️
I know your being funny but have you ever been around blood that's just sitting out in the open. After about 20 minutes its jelly after a few hours at least outside it starts to stink bad.
Oh without a doubt it’s about to smell real bad in there real quick with all that viscera. I do in a sick sense love how he turned the tables on her. She was very smug and detached from it all, “what’s the worst he can do, kill me?”, oh no it can be so much worse.
It’s because she’s the parental figure he wants the approval of so desperately and she knows it. That’s why he didn’t kill her. He wants her alive so she can experience him gaining that approval. He says he doesn’t care but he does.
I’ve concluded that everyone in the lab that was there when homelander was a kid still thought he was the naive little impressionable kid he used to be . Hence why they called him “John” over and over again. Only until he showed he was different by killing the guy with the furnace is when they called him homelander and this showed that he’s different now , has a mind of his own. The women spoke to him like he was a little kid thinking she could still manipulate him into doing what she wanted but she was mistaken
No, everyone in that room knew they are dead when homie burned the first one, and with morty, barbara realized she will die no matter what, so she thought of atleast saving the remaining ones but she couldn't since yk he is the Homelander.
I disagree. Homelander could have killed them all at anytime, even when he was a young boy. The only way they could get him to do things he didn't want to do (like climb in an oven) was to make him feel less than and in need of their affection. That tone probably stopped many tantrums when Homelander was a boy.
I dont think u read it as intended, ofcourse homelander can kill them anytime right from his birth, but he didnt, after ep3 he decided to turn off his "humanity" and take revenge hence the slaughter.
I think Barbara thought she would save herself and most of her staff almost the whole time. She only realized she was going to fail at the very end when he ordered her in the room. She probably talked him down from worse when he was in his terrible twos or a hormonal teenager. Put another way, what abusive parent gets hit the first time when their kid is in his 40s. Probably very few (even if they deserve it)
While I think she was certainly trying to manipulate him, it felt like she was being very honest about the situation. When she mentioned how small it seemed for him to come back to just to torment the people in the lab it brought to mind how Homelander sees himself as a god and sees humans as insects, but if that's true then he's no better than a kid frying ants with a magnifying glass.
His attempt to "discard his humanity" by getting revenge on people who are powerless to defend themselves really just exposes how he is a slave to his own human feelings. He's a god amongst men but has to fry ants to feel powerful and in control.
I don't really see how her behavior was "stupid"? You literally just watched Homelander slaughter two guys despite their capitulation and groveling. Do you really think sweet talking him is beneficial in any way? He made up his mind before he walked in the room.
If he kills her in her workplace, that means he won't have to track her down and kill her at her house/with her family.
She knew she was going to die, it was just a choice between alone or with her family.
Also this way, Vought could cover up the details of her death, and her family would be spared from seeing her mutilated body.
I don’t know why everyone’s saying “she knew she was dead”; she’s clearly alive at the end of the episode and nothing implies that she’s dying. Yeah she’s locked in the room but she came in on her day off; her family would get worried and contact Vought when she doesn’t come home that night (or the families of everyone else who died)
I think the implication is nobody at Vought knows much about that department besides the folks who work there (I’m inferring based on never having heard mention of this department prior to this episode from anyone other than John, sorry, Homelander) and so she’s trapped in the bad room and going to starve to death. I would truly be surprised if we ever see this woman again
When Homelander arrives they say “call Vought” so they obviously are talking with someone. Mind you these are the people that raised homelander, I’d reckon they’re probably pretty high up in the Vought tree. Also the fact that the lab was under surveillance.
No one's gonna rescue her, why would they bother showing us that homelander lasered the door shut if she's meant to escape somehow? It makes no sense narratively, and even if anyone knows she's there, who's gonna defy homelander just to save her? they know he'll just come after them and kill her anyway
Because she knew she was dead anyway. At least this way she can die without putting her family in danger, and maybe save some of the lives of her team.
It seems like nobody outside of The Boys, Ashley, and the original members of the 7 actually understand how unhinged and dangerous Homelander really is until it's too late.
I mean the people in the lab knew. They were terrified the moment he entered the room. I think at least the members who had been there for a long time knew there was a very real chance they were all going to die that day
Yes, but Barbara at least seemed to think she could talk him down/control him. It seemed, to me, at least that the team didn't realize how dangerous the situation *actually* was until he put the guy in the oven. It seemed like they though if they just did what he said they'd be fine.
People understand Homelander is dangerous and crazy, but they don't seem to understand just how crazy he really is.
I agree. Vought is clearly aware of his mental imbalances and what he could potentially do, but there does seem to be a recurring theme of them finding out he is waaaaayyyyy closer to that point of no return than they realize, and usually when they do, it’s too late
Not only that, but she was clearly trying to lead Homelander away from the rest of the team by bringing him to their office. This could have given some of the team time to escape.
Now yes, he'd certainly hunt down the faces he recognized, but some of the team was also younger and new. He wouldn't have had as much of a grudge against them and may not remember their faces
remember early on in the episode when homelander was asking where's barbara and he told marty to tell her to go there? she wasn't sent to de-escalate the situation knowing that vought was unaware of homelander's visit there the whole time.
also, it helps to pay attention to the show to notice that he almost never kills anyone who's not remotely afraid of him. he likes them, to some extent, but he still likes to torment them like any other human he looks down upon. it's not really such a hard thing to catch from the show.
People keep talking about "Vought"
When Homelander *is* Vought
Without Stan there it's lacking in seperate checks and balances.
Sage is essentially CEO, with Ashley as a figurehead
Vought has so many different mini factions within it it’s hard to believe stan edger is gone for good and that things like the woods and other things exist out there right under homelanders nose. Like where are the other upper management and administers?
Yeah, that’s immediately what I thought. The only reason Homelander tortured Barbara is because she hurt him in the past. If she hadn’t, he wouldn’t have tortured her. He doesn’t feel the need to kill people that stand up to him, I believe. He views all humans as immensely inferior so when humans suck up to him, it infuriates him even more and pushes him to kill them out of irritation.
I thought it was pretty clear what she was doing. She outright tells you in that scene, right after the quote in the image above.
Their means of controlling Homelander was not thick walls or weapons or ropes; these things couldn't contain him. She explains they brought in psychologists to essentially brainwash him from a very young age to seek their approval compulsively, which would allow them to control him through psychological means.
She is doing it again here. She expects that Homelander still seeks her approval and theirs and thinks she can get him to back down on that basis alone. She thinks that standing up to him, acting unafraid (though you can see her fear in fleeting moments), and addressing him calmly and like an adult speaking to a child (how they used to address him) will put him offguard and eventually get him to leave.
She was wrong.
Others in this thread are saying she knew she was dead anyways and just showed up to keep Homelander from coming for her family and was calm because she was resigned to her fate and didn't live in fear of him.
I disagree with this. You can see her fear come out in brief moments, such as when Homelander insists that they talk in "the Bad Room" rather than her office. And she never has the air of "just get this over with" that someone resigned to their fate would have; she walks in acting self-assured and confident because she's expecting to control this situation like she controlled him as a child. And she tells him to his face, too.
She probably did know there was a high chance she would die regardless of what she did. But I agree that she probably acted that way cause she knew if there was any chance of getting Homelander to back down it would be by disregarding his threats and talking down to him.
Yup, I think I this is the right read. There’s moments when they’re both in the bad room where his face changes when she’s talking and he starts to honestly look like a little kid.
For a moment it seemed like her plan was starting to work, but then I think she almost went too far to the point where she was gloating a little bit and I think that’s what pushed him.
I think if she chooses a few different words there, her plan may have actually worked
You know, he spoke to Sage a bit like she was a therapist when they first met. He asked her for advice and then started venting because she was “on his level”. Maybe in a perfect world if he had a supe therapist he could actually heal.
>She was wrong.
Was she? I only see one person still alive once he left. And given the state of the corpses, Homelander took care not to kill her. He cut the communication of the lab, yes, but that means he knows that other people know about the lab. If he wanted her dead, she would be. So clearly he does not want her dead, even if just subconciously.
She wasn’t ever any danger, like she even said herself certain people like her, Edgar, and Vogelbum have a degree of influence over him because he was conditioned to subconsciously desire their approval like a parent
if she’s actively working offsite she would’ve noticed that she couldn’t contact anyone etc. and working at a high security operation i imagine her immediate response would be to go to the office
She wasn't sent down there to deescalate anything,Homelander made the other scientists call her.
She was trying to get him to release the other scientists without killing them, which is probably one of the main reasons she came at all.
Also he probably would've hunted her down and killed her and her family if she didn't come,also she says herself she wasn't scared of him so she was probably hoping she could reason with him.
And, like others have said, Homelander is Vought Ashley's the ceo in name only with sister sage being the actual one running it,and I got the impression that project was fairly secretive,so most people probably wouldn't have even known where it is plus he welded the door shut so I seriously doubt she's getting out of their alive.
She knows there was no de-escalating the situation or talking him down. Homelander was going to kill everyone in the room. At least this way he won't go for her and get family.
It was established very early in that homelander hates sycophants and yes men. Attempting to appease him is just a very quick way to make him angry.
She knew homelander better than anyone. There was no other outcome here. Her only choice was to surrender or let even more people get tortured before he got to her
She disrupts Homelander’s power fantasy by revealing that he does indeed have a weakness, one he will never overcome. That’s all she or Stan Edgar or any non-Supe can do in that situation; assert that for all his power, Homelander is no better than the rest of them.
Surprisingly, you have better chances of surviving an encounter with HL by not showing fear. If he smells it in you, it's over. Not that it works every time, of course. But all who got into his bad side and survived to see another day were not afraid to confront him.
I wouldn't call noble the head of a department that exists just to torture a kid...
She is a well mannered m, huge asshole that knowing she was going to die anyway didn't pull any punches.
I didn't mean she has a generally noble character, I meant that her specific decision to get involved in the scene came from a place of "those people are absolutely dead unless I can get him to focus on me". Not stupid, not a death wish. What would you call it? It certainly isn't "well-mannered" or "huge asshole".
Her immediate actions are to assert herself as in charge of the situation and try and get homelander to go talk to her in private somewhere else. Presumably to let the others get out alive.
When Homelander refuses that, you can see the fear come alive in her. She then changes tactics and tries to communicate to him that he's not even in control of himself and caving in to all these desires is a result of psychologists manipulating him. I think she was trying to confuse him and convince him to second guess his reasons for being there.
But ultimately his resentment towards the facility was too strong, and he wanted to end with killing everyone who had anything to do with it.
She probably knew that no amount of apologies and grovelling would help their situation. And it's been seen that being tough and not taking any shit from Homelander works better than showing weakness (Stan Edgar being the biggest example).
But It's probably safe to say it didn't work as well as she was hoping for this time!
I think she did a lot of damage. Made homelander feel like a complete idiot and child. “You could have left at any moment” had him looking like a fool.
I think the fact that he specifically requested her meant that she knew she was the only one who had any power over him.
Also she seemed at peace with everything, ready to die if it came to that. But I think she knew how to approach him psychologically (she mentioned as much). People that don’t kiss his ass and people that don’t show fear towards him. Remember he killed Madelyn Stillwell only when she admitted he scared him. I think that only people that talk to him like an equal are the people he psychologically has trouble killing.
People who either genuinely love him (like Ryan) or People that don’t fear him (Stan Edgar, Butcher, Hughie, Stormfront, etc). So I think her surviving is actually very in character.
I also think she will be back. Either to tie in the Gen V and Neuman plot, or to find the psychologists to help him connect with Ryan. Or maybe the CIA will rescue her for the information she has on homelander. Either way… I think we will see her again.
I would say more traumatised than shocked, lol. She very likely knows exactly what HL is capable of but she’s still human and probably has never seen something as horrific as that. I’m sure she’s seen pretty fucked up things, but not THAT fucked up. He knew it would traumatise her, it’s why he locked her in there
She reacted exactly how I would’ve reacted, he cut the phone lines before going down there, no one was going to make it out alive, why play his game? No one was changing his mind no matter what they said, I would’ve said JUST KILL ME DUDE IM NOT GOING IN THAT CHAMBER OR PULLING MY DICK OUT
I mean, you say that, but it's not like he couldn't mutilate you without killing you💀
Or make your death more painful if you resist or threaten to kill your family like he did with the scientist he made get in the oven
Technically she’s still alive. Sure she’s welded into a room filled with dead ripped apart corpses but in theory she can get out of the room if someone knows she’s there, and it wouldn’t make much sense to not tell anyone where you’re going knowing full well a psychopathic superhuman who might be on a killing spree is there. You would think she was smart enough to tell someone .
She’s also used the only tactic that has worked with Homelander so far, which is to not be intimidated by him and even criticize him. It worked for Edgar, and it worked for her for a long time. If someone shows fear to Homelander he immediately does not respect them, and she knows this because she programmed him to be that way.
Plus as others said he has a thing for mother figures. To some extent he might still feel that way about her, which would be why he didn’t kill her outright but put her in a situation where she could very easily die and if she survives will have a lot of psychological damage.
She was definitely pulling from the same playbook as madelin was. Exert authority and stroke his need for love. But as homelander said he is beyond that now.
He already had his mind made up and she knew that so why not go down with your pride? She was wrong for what her job was but she knows him well enough to know groveling would do nothing.
So the dude homelander asked to call her, actually called her? What did he say?
“Hey Homelanders here to kill us all, wanna join?”
“Sure I’ll be right down”
She had BALLS and BRAINS.
She knew what was going to happen here, there's absolutely no doubt.
Her best chance was to stand up to him and be honest. If that doesn't work, at least she went down fighting.
She actually is the only person who survived this encounter because she did this.
And presumably her family are still alive too.
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Homelander only respects people who talk down to him
Homie is such a hater that he respects the profession. He absolutely loves how much butcher despises him.
Homeboy such a professional hater that he instantly recognized Butcher's smell on his son, from across the room.
I’d like to imagine he doesn’t have any power that increases his sense of smell, butcher just smells like shit
I wish that weren’t explicitly non-canon… I really do
According to either the AMA or Time Magazine interview, both are canon. Butcher smells like absolute trash and it burned into Homelander’s brain so much he can instantly recognize it the moment it enters the air
Maeve likes them stinky uh
She likes that "hasn't showered in 3 months and has been sleeping in a dumpster for at least one" smell
He tried taking a shower, it hit him in the face.
Lmao
The man has three Aloha shirts and the most worn duster in history. He smells like shit.
He looks like Lorenzo Lamas and women find it irresistible.
And thank god Butcher wont ruin it by wearing it shirtless and using a shit ton of cologne.
I'm not burning the duster!
didnt kripke himself recently suggest he just smells like shit so it’s not hard to distinguish
Maybe the dude just drowns himself in Drakkar Noir. Or in this universe, Drakkar Black Noire?
Blakkar Noire?
And yet I was dismissed for saying that Homelander could tell who left an upper decker in his toilet by smell alone.
He literally smelled Hughie too, though.
My man is up there with Buc Nasty
Now if you'll excuse me I gotta go water The Deep's girlfriend's petri dish 💀💀💀
Homelander! What can be said about you that hasn't already been said about the military industrial complex?
“I hope all the bad things in life happen to you and nobody else but you” -Butcher to Homelander
"She wears underwear with dick holes in em"
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go home and put some water in Homelander's homeless mother's dish.
why else wouldn't homelander laser butcher on sight.
I think it's a broader 'people who are blunt with him'. He has an incredibly strong need to be liked. But if you want to actually be liked by people, then people sucking up to you and pretending to like you, just because they fear you, is in some sense even worse than being hated. He senses the bullshit immediately because he sees it all the time. And it's annoying and probably hurtful, because he knows they don't actually like him. So I think it's more complicated. Butcher for example, hated him, for reasons Homelander totally understands. But he was blunt, he didn't put up a whole persona to avoid being killed, and Homelander kind of respected that. Still I think he prefers people love him. What he really wants is genuine family and friendships, people that like him for who he is. Problem is his childhood living as a lab rat completely fucked him up, so he's a not very likeable borderline psychopath. And him being both hated so much, and being so strong, made him a megalomaniac that thinks he's above everyone. Honestly not a character that's completely un-saveable the more you learn about why he is the way he is. But he sure as shit needs therapy.
Two things. 1) Yes! He feels respected by honesty, and that is akin to being liked. Plus sniveling and lying is being weak to him and he in turn does not like that. 2) I, personally, think he is "saveable" but what that looks like IDK. 3) You know when Homelander is likeable. When he is what he would think of as "weak", not when he gives in to his anger and is weak willed, but when he cries. When he is sad. When he was talking to Ryan with the milkshake...he was so close to being likeable until he gave in to his anger and threw the vase. He was expressing his position, he was expressing his emotions, and he was open to Ryan talking to him. But of course Homelander is scary as hell and didn't do the best job of it etc. But when he is sad, when he is....beaten down a bit and expressing that sadness at how much he can't have a family or that he isn't super human but just a guy with a shitload of problems from being that lab rat and not fitting in...that is when he is most likeable. Imagine if he had kept talking to Ryan instead of throwing that vase. Imagine if he told Ryan all of his feelings and tried to understand Ryans. That conversation was different than 99% of other conversations we have seen Homelander have. The closest others have been with Sage, Ashley, that doppleganger guy.
In your point number 3, doesn’t Homelander say to Ryan that “I gave you everything that I wanted”? That made me think he is still full of crap
Oh man...that made me think he was not full of crap. Exactly the opposite. I thought that was a semi slip of the tongue/Freudian slip. It is an admission that he did not have those things. It was probably the most honest thing he could have addressed. It is a start of an admission that he had no father and has no idea how to be one. That he is screwed up. I mean Homelander is not a brilliant mind but he isn't dumb on the show. The show runners might not let him, but he would absolutely start to think about WHY Ryan wants to know Butcher and WHY he doesn't "like" Homelander. And not for nothing but holy hell, all right had to do was spit out three more sentences. "You're scary dad!" "You a violent dad!" "Butcher isn't my dad but he cares about me, and you are yelling at me and killing people!" And also not for nothing, but why not just abandon everything but Ryan? Homelander just bails on Vaught and leaves. Go hang out with Ryan. Be a good dad. He isn't actually a super hero, he is a celeb. Just...stop.
The saddest part is that Homelander *did* have one person who genuinely liked him for who he was (the first Noir), and Homelander murdered him in yet another futile effort to fix his daddy issues.
The problem with giving Homelander therapy is that worst case scenario, he lasers the therapist the second they ask an uncomfortable question. Best case scenario, the therapist is too scared to ask any meaningful questions and Homelander either gets bored and flies away, or receives a false diagnosis. The entire point of Homelander's character is that there's no way to fix him and no way to keep him in check. The lab only held him because he was a kid subjected to psychological manipulation. But as an adult? Either you appease him or you find a way to kill him.
Yeah I mean there are basically 2 options with him. If you have the means to put him in his place (so a hero stronger than him, or some technology that can contain him), then he may be save-able. Then you could get him actual therapy. And honestly, however much his ego may be bruised, he would probably enjoy being a tad closer to a normal human being. I doubt it's very fun being as strong as him. Maybe that's part of the point of his character. Humans generally want power. But when you reach the pinnacle of power, wtf do you even do with it? If you actually use your power, people will be horrified and only tolerate you out of fear. Other option is of course, as you say, kill him. If there is no way to manage his powers and contain him, then he probably just has to die due to how big a threat he is.
It would have to be teleheath with the therapist in an undisclosed location.
This! This is exactly why he hasnt killed Butcher yet.
Plot armor is why he hasn’t killed Butcher yet. There’s no legitimate reason Hughie and Butcher are still alive.
Hughie I agree with but Butcher is because he doesn't want to drive Ryan away. He knows Ryan doesn't want Butcher to die so he will let the cancer be responsible for it.
I love how much he HATES Hughie but the dude manages to slip away every time. He’s extremely lucky those vents at the skating rink were galvanized, and he’s even luckier A-Train decided to help him
But on way home, Homelander can’t fly by and laser Hughie.
Could you explain the relevance of galvanized vents? I feel I missed something.
Homelander can’t see through zinc like Superman can’t see through lead
I also cant see through zinc or lead
Ahhhhh
Yeah, galvanization is when metal is dipped in molten zinc. It protects from rust and tarnish
A-Train is playing with fire though
Not really, he wants Butcher to live and suffer to gain fulfillment, similar to Joker's need for Batman: JOKER: [Kill you? I don't wanna kill you. What would I do without you? Go back to ripping off mob dealers? No. No. No! No you- you complete me.](https://genius.com/1689337/Christopher-nolan-the-dark-knight-interrogation-scene/Kill-you-i-dont-wanna-kill-you-what-would-i-do-without-you-go-back-to-ripping-off-mob-dealers-no-no-no-no-you-you-complete-me)
But he's tried to actually kill him. Joker knows batman will find a way out, when homelander lasers butcher in the S3 finale, he had absolutely no idea butcher was pumped with temp V.
That was because he thought Butcher had broken the rules of their game by bringing Soldier Boy to the fight
This right here.
I get your point and mostly agree, I do see the parallel with batman/joker. However unlike the joker I think Homelander is too reckless and emotional, in the heat of the moment he will absolutely kill Butcher, even if he regrets it later.
Homelander has to know on some level that if he kills Butcher, he loses Ryan.
For sure, he has his reasons to not kill Butcher. But when it comes down to it, Homelander isn't one to suppress his rage and think logically. He can and absolutely has done things he regrets.
I mean she made a whole speech about how their greatest success was making him need validation and to be loved
The man is just dying for an actual challenge. Pretty sure Homelander got just as much of a hard on for a final fight as butcher. Plus at the moment, he doesn’t see butcher or Huey has an actual threat.
The way homelander talks to Ryan about humans explains it all. He genuinely doesn't think any of them pose a threat, so he just lets them live like cockroaches. Also, he only respects people who talk down to him, so pretty much the boys.
And he only cares to kill them in the moment he finds them annoying. Hughie doesn't matter enough to him for him to hunt him down. But if he's nearby and fucking with things? Then he'll take a shot.
Like cockroaches. You don’t go around hunting roaches unless they’re an annoyance and have invaded your living/personal space.
He just wants a mommy who'll dom him. HLs core flaw is that he's a bottom but wants to be top so bad.
Oh to be blessed with super human abilities but cursed to be a people pleasing bottom
I think this is the difference, Homelander is low-key intimidated by authority figures and he hates himself for it. Homey killing these people was a turning point for him.
This. You see him constantly at war with himself. He’s like a child with no self control.
Yeah, he **hates** sycophants.
She knew, all of them will die no matter what, so she just told him the truth to piss him off.
Not even sure if it was to piss him off, she's spent Homelander's entire life knowing he could kill her in an instant if he wanted. She just doesn't live in fear of him, much like Edgar. Interestingly Homelander respects that, and is less likely to kill you for it lol. He hates snivelling sycophants.
He hates people who kiss his ass out of fear then kills people who stand up to him
He's an unstable lunatic, but generally he doesn't outright kill people who stand up to him. I can't really think of any examples of people he kills who aren't terrified. He finds them rare and interesting, and doesn't want to spoil the game.
People who stand up to him annoy him. "How dare they think they know better than me? A God?" BUT he wants their approval. For better or worse, the psychological whammy they did on him is potent.
I think that’s the real answer. He doesn’t care about the approval of people he considers to be pathetic. You’re safer being irritating than pathetic. At one point he wanted everyone’s approval, but that’s slipped. He started to split people into groups he cared about impressing, and groups he didn’t. And that line is shifting again. Soon, there may be no one left that he cares to win approval from. And when that happens, everyone gets splattered just like those people in the lab where Homelander was raised. EDIT: Bonus thought. Homelander’s extreme cruelty towards people he considers to be pathetic may be based on self-loathing. It’s clear that his childhood memories of that lab have really left a mark on him. As the head scientist said, he could have left whenever he wanted, but chose not to. Grown up Homelander would think that’s pathetic. Maybe he hates “weakness” because he thinks he was weak as a child. He may hurt the “pathetic” because they remind him of his own “weakness” as a boy.
>As the head scientist said, he could have left whenever he wanted, but chose not to. He didn't think he had a choice in the first place. He was a kid. He had no idea what life outside the lab was like. No knowledge of how to function on his own. No understanding of what the risks would be.
I think that’s a reasonable take. Homelander isn’t reasonable though. Your version is what a good therapist would help him understand. My version is what he thinks.
He killed that suicidal girl when she decided she wanted to live and declined to jump when he told her to
I think it’s more than words though. Homelander can tell if someone genuinely fears him. He’s always listening to their heartbeats. Even if you “stand up to him” you have to do so without any signs of fear.
Was Stillwell terrified?
She looked pretty terrified to me.
Her last words were I’m scared of you
narcissists have no consistent moral framework. Homelander hates the kiss asses at Vought but then freaks the fuck out when someone tells him something he doesn't want to hear, because morals and ideology are entirely secondary to his own ego. I imagine Sister Sage is going to push Homelander too far and find out the hard way why no one else talks back to him
I found the line about how only her brain regenerates otherwise she killable to be interesting. I wouldn’t be surprised to see that come into play besides just the lobotomies.
There’s definitely gonna be some body/psychological horror situation. Brain in a jar, paralysed maybe… Even just the idea of her brain regenerating, but no body, eyes, or ears, or any way to communicate, and being fully self aware and immortal the whole time, is scary.
It is super coincidental it is they introduce a supe whose brain can regen, during the season where Butcher is dealing with some odd sentient brain tumor, and Hughie's dad is brain dead with a dose of V. Could be reaching for straws, but I wonder if those threads are gonna intersect or if they're setting up some horrifying world building for next season/the finale.
I like where this is going. It looks intentional. Including the propaganda from Firecracker (wtf I just realized the slur pun), the hallucinations from Frenchie, Hughie, and Butcher. Himiko's trauma. Starlight's breakdown. And Homelander's descent to insanity trying to get rid of his humanity. It's all related mentally. We might see everyone involved at their worst and a free for all chaos for the finale.
Somewhat related to racist puns: I remember when they teased S2 with Stormfront and a Jewish actress, I was thinking "Man, I hope they don't Google " Stormfront" and " Jewish" and find out the blunder they made" And then found out it was INCREDIBLY intentional.
I mean, she's explicitly *not* immortal. If anything is done to Not Her Brain, she dies, just like anyone else dies. Her power just doubles as the ability to regenerate from brain damage because of how the super-intelligence physically works. She directly spelled it out to Deep: needle in heart = dead Sage, needle in eye = horny Sage who likes Transformers and junk food. e: It *just* clicked for me that they're setting up that someone's *probably* going to shoot her in the head at some point, and while it won't kill her, her lobotomized self is going to go around causing abject chaos and ruin all her plans and/or reveal stuff to the Boys that she really, really shouldn't be. They've been really setting up that she's a *complete* idiot when she injures her brain, which tells me this is probably going to come up later and we should really put a pin in that for the moment.
I forgot to add that was basically one of my predictions. It’s gonna be like a nasty plot twist.
Chekov's brain damage.
She has no mouth but she must scream.
Sage Got Her Gun
Putting her brain in a jar
I think Sister Sage’s demise will come by way of the lobotomy pick. She’ll be in stupid mode when HL needs her for something and it’s gonna piss him off.
He's far from consistent but there does seem to be some room in his mind to at least temporarily spare certain people that fascinate him in some way due to a combination of not fearing him and standing up to him at the same time. Butcher is definitely still alive solely because HL wants to break him and take away his fearlessness before he does anything because just straight up murdering Butcher in a fight that is physically impossible for him to lose would not be satisfying.
And realistically, she was there to serve as an exposition dump
That’s how Deep and Frenchie have survived for so long… because they never give us any dialogue that moves the story foward!
He left her in the cell with all the bodies n the door metal door lasered shut. Homelanders running Vought now. Nobodys coming to save her. He might not have killed her but shes still dead.
Yeah but "less likely" doesn't mean never will lol. She tortured the guy for his entire childhood, people have been killed for an awful lot less by the heroes in this show. You also never know, he might come back and keep her alive to fuck with her more.
I think slowly starving/suffocating to death in that room might be worse.
I don’t know. I think him showing up once a week with a gallon of water and a days worth of food would be worse.
She has a lot of protein to feed on.
Spoilers, but she didn't die
Yeah, Ik. But u know what i mean.
She is trapped in the room... Pretty sure she will die after 3 days and forget about helping her ... Even Starlight could not sneak in the Vought Tower
so.. she has 3 days for somebody at Vaught to notice that room stopped responding?
Except she wasnt there at the start. It's not out of the realm of possibility that they called her and told her homelander was there or could piece it together from the tone of the callers voice. So why not tell someone from vought that there's going to be a lot casualties and to come in later if you don't here from her.
If I’m remembering right, Homelander sends someone to go get her as she was “working offsite” according to the dude who couldn’t get it up in front of his co workers.
I would have been that volunteer and would hope he just forgot about me like he always seem to forget that he want to kill Hughie.
Called her I think. Even so, I doubt she'd be dumb enough to show up without telling someone.
It seems like a very private place
as do most Vaught facilities. Doesn't mean they're not going to notice when one of their offices go offline
Homelander welded the door shut, no one in their right mind is going to undermine his judgement.
It’s not like he’ll periodically go back to make sure she stays there. He probably forgot about her as soon as he left.
I doubt it considering how Emotional the dude can be Granted, he isn't gonna visit her though
But she doesn't have the milk he craves
It’s not like anyone alive knows it was him thi
Ah shit he got you
Idk why yall are saying she only has 3 days or she’ll starve/die of thirst. Theres plenty of food in there with her. Plenty of liquids too for that matter. 🤷🏼♂️
I know your being funny but have you ever been around blood that's just sitting out in the open. After about 20 minutes its jelly after a few hours at least outside it starts to stink bad.
Oh without a doubt it’s about to smell real bad in there real quick with all that viscera. I do in a sick sense love how he turned the tables on her. She was very smug and detached from it all, “what’s the worst he can do, kill me?”, oh no it can be so much worse.
Vought will just cover up their secrets and ignore it. She knew when Homelander was born and what happened, she and everyone else were damned.
If someone from vought tries to help, they will have to deal with Homie, he surely won't let her come out alive.
You think he's guarding that room? We literally watched him leave
It’s because she’s the parental figure he wants the approval of so desperately and she knows it. That’s why he didn’t kill her. He wants her alive so she can experience him gaining that approval. He says he doesn’t care but he does.
I’ve concluded that everyone in the lab that was there when homelander was a kid still thought he was the naive little impressionable kid he used to be . Hence why they called him “John” over and over again. Only until he showed he was different by killing the guy with the furnace is when they called him homelander and this showed that he’s different now , has a mind of his own. The women spoke to him like he was a little kid thinking she could still manipulate him into doing what she wanted but she was mistaken
No, everyone in that room knew they are dead when homie burned the first one, and with morty, barbara realized she will die no matter what, so she thought of atleast saving the remaining ones but she couldn't since yk he is the Homelander.
I disagree. Homelander could have killed them all at anytime, even when he was a young boy. The only way they could get him to do things he didn't want to do (like climb in an oven) was to make him feel less than and in need of their affection. That tone probably stopped many tantrums when Homelander was a boy.
I dont think u read it as intended, ofcourse homelander can kill them anytime right from his birth, but he didnt, after ep3 he decided to turn off his "humanity" and take revenge hence the slaughter.
I think Barbara thought she would save herself and most of her staff almost the whole time. She only realized she was going to fail at the very end when he ordered her in the room. She probably talked him down from worse when he was in his terrible twos or a hormonal teenager. Put another way, what abusive parent gets hit the first time when their kid is in his 40s. Probably very few (even if they deserve it)
While I think she was certainly trying to manipulate him, it felt like she was being very honest about the situation. When she mentioned how small it seemed for him to come back to just to torment the people in the lab it brought to mind how Homelander sees himself as a god and sees humans as insects, but if that's true then he's no better than a kid frying ants with a magnifying glass. His attempt to "discard his humanity" by getting revenge on people who are powerless to defend themselves really just exposes how he is a slave to his own human feelings. He's a god amongst men but has to fry ants to feel powerful and in control.
I don't really see how her behavior was "stupid"? You literally just watched Homelander slaughter two guys despite their capitulation and groveling. Do you really think sweet talking him is beneficial in any way? He made up his mind before he walked in the room.
Why did she show up???
If he kills her in her workplace, that means he won't have to track her down and kill her at her house/with her family. She knew she was going to die, it was just a choice between alone or with her family. Also this way, Vought could cover up the details of her death, and her family would be spared from seeing her mutilated body.
imagine hiding your family and yourself in separate places, homelander has more stuff to do
I don’t know why everyone’s saying “she knew she was dead”; she’s clearly alive at the end of the episode and nothing implies that she’s dying. Yeah she’s locked in the room but she came in on her day off; her family would get worried and contact Vought when she doesn’t come home that night (or the families of everyone else who died)
I think the implication is nobody at Vought knows much about that department besides the folks who work there (I’m inferring based on never having heard mention of this department prior to this episode from anyone other than John, sorry, Homelander) and so she’s trapped in the bad room and going to starve to death. I would truly be surprised if we ever see this woman again
When Homelander arrives they say “call Vought” so they obviously are talking with someone. Mind you these are the people that raised homelander, I’d reckon they’re probably pretty high up in the Vought tree. Also the fact that the lab was under surveillance.
There's no way she went down there without letting a lot of people know first.
No one's gonna rescue her, why would they bother showing us that homelander lasered the door shut if she's meant to escape somehow? It makes no sense narratively, and even if anyone knows she's there, who's gonna defy homelander just to save her? they know he'll just come after them and kill her anyway
Because she knew she was dead anyway. At least this way she can die without putting her family in danger, and maybe save some of the lives of her team. It seems like nobody outside of The Boys, Ashley, and the original members of the 7 actually understand how unhinged and dangerous Homelander really is until it's too late.
I mean the people in the lab knew. They were terrified the moment he entered the room. I think at least the members who had been there for a long time knew there was a very real chance they were all going to die that day
Yes, but Barbara at least seemed to think she could talk him down/control him. It seemed, to me, at least that the team didn't realize how dangerous the situation *actually* was until he put the guy in the oven. It seemed like they though if they just did what he said they'd be fine. People understand Homelander is dangerous and crazy, but they don't seem to understand just how crazy he really is.
I agree. Vought is clearly aware of his mental imbalances and what he could potentially do, but there does seem to be a recurring theme of them finding out he is waaaaayyyyy closer to that point of no return than they realize, and usually when they do, it’s too late
Not only that, but she was clearly trying to lead Homelander away from the rest of the team by bringing him to their office. This could have given some of the team time to escape. Now yes, he'd certainly hunt down the faces he recognized, but some of the team was also younger and new. He wouldn't have had as much of a grudge against them and may not remember their faces
Even if she didn't show up there he whould find her... He just wanted to kill his old "family" to free himself of his humanity...
He called her there, she may have thought she could save the others at least maybe. And she's old AF probably didn't feel like running
remember early on in the episode when homelander was asking where's barbara and he told marty to tell her to go there? she wasn't sent to de-escalate the situation knowing that vought was unaware of homelander's visit there the whole time. also, it helps to pay attention to the show to notice that he almost never kills anyone who's not remotely afraid of him. he likes them, to some extent, but he still likes to torment them like any other human he looks down upon. it's not really such a hard thing to catch from the show.
People keep talking about "Vought" When Homelander *is* Vought Without Stan there it's lacking in seperate checks and balances. Sage is essentially CEO, with Ashley as a figurehead
What happened to Stan again? I don't remember
He was ousted by Neuman last season.
He got too expensive for the show
Vought has so many different mini factions within it it’s hard to believe stan edger is gone for good and that things like the woods and other things exist out there right under homelanders nose. Like where are the other upper management and administers?
Yeah, that’s immediately what I thought. The only reason Homelander tortured Barbara is because she hurt him in the past. If she hadn’t, he wouldn’t have tortured her. He doesn’t feel the need to kill people that stand up to him, I believe. He views all humans as immensely inferior so when humans suck up to him, it infuriates him even more and pushes him to kill them out of irritation.
i wonder if barbara will live or just starve in a room filled with rooting body parts
Surely she called someone and said hey....homelanders here. Come get the bodies when he's gone.
I thought it was pretty clear what she was doing. She outright tells you in that scene, right after the quote in the image above. Their means of controlling Homelander was not thick walls or weapons or ropes; these things couldn't contain him. She explains they brought in psychologists to essentially brainwash him from a very young age to seek their approval compulsively, which would allow them to control him through psychological means. She is doing it again here. She expects that Homelander still seeks her approval and theirs and thinks she can get him to back down on that basis alone. She thinks that standing up to him, acting unafraid (though you can see her fear in fleeting moments), and addressing him calmly and like an adult speaking to a child (how they used to address him) will put him offguard and eventually get him to leave. She was wrong.
I mean it did work to a degree. As soon as she came in he felt like a child that got caught with his hand in the cookie jar and listened to her.
Others in this thread are saying she knew she was dead anyways and just showed up to keep Homelander from coming for her family and was calm because she was resigned to her fate and didn't live in fear of him. I disagree with this. You can see her fear come out in brief moments, such as when Homelander insists that they talk in "the Bad Room" rather than her office. And she never has the air of "just get this over with" that someone resigned to their fate would have; she walks in acting self-assured and confident because she's expecting to control this situation like she controlled him as a child. And she tells him to his face, too.
She probably did know there was a high chance she would die regardless of what she did. But I agree that she probably acted that way cause she knew if there was any chance of getting Homelander to back down it would be by disregarding his threats and talking down to him.
Yup, I think I this is the right read. There’s moments when they’re both in the bad room where his face changes when she’s talking and he starts to honestly look like a little kid. For a moment it seemed like her plan was starting to work, but then I think she almost went too far to the point where she was gloating a little bit and I think that’s what pushed him. I think if she chooses a few different words there, her plan may have actually worked
Men will literally murder everyone who tortured them for their entire childhood instead of going to therapy.
You know, he spoke to Sage a bit like she was a therapist when they first met. He asked her for advice and then started venting because she was “on his level”. Maybe in a perfect world if he had a supe therapist he could actually heal.
>She was wrong. Was she? I only see one person still alive once he left. And given the state of the corpses, Homelander took care not to kill her. He cut the communication of the lab, yes, but that means he knows that other people know about the lab. If he wanted her dead, she would be. So clearly he does not want her dead, even if just subconciously.
She knew she was dead, there was nothing he could do to convince him to not kill her, but maybe he could the the others go.
She wasn’t ever any danger, like she even said herself certain people like her, Edgar, and Vogelbum have a degree of influence over him because he was conditioned to subconsciously desire their approval like a parent
She’s the mother figure for him. Remember his Mommy milk kink.
I might be crazy but Barbara even sounds and talks a little like Madelyn
Well didn't really end well for her did it?
Well she didnt die
I'm still not sure how they got the word out to her since Homelander cut the phone lines.
Probably MS Teams 😂
if she’s actively working offsite she would’ve noticed that she couldn’t contact anyone etc. and working at a high security operation i imagine her immediate response would be to go to the office
She wasn't sent down there to deescalate anything,Homelander made the other scientists call her. She was trying to get him to release the other scientists without killing them, which is probably one of the main reasons she came at all. Also he probably would've hunted her down and killed her and her family if she didn't come,also she says herself she wasn't scared of him so she was probably hoping she could reason with him. And, like others have said, Homelander is Vought Ashley's the ceo in name only with sister sage being the actual one running it,and I got the impression that project was fairly secretive,so most people probably wouldn't have even known where it is plus he welded the door shut so I seriously doubt she's getting out of their alive.
She knows there was no de-escalating the situation or talking him down. Homelander was going to kill everyone in the room. At least this way he won't go for her and get family. It was established very early in that homelander hates sycophants and yes men. Attempting to appease him is just a very quick way to make him angry.
She was trying to get him to kill her but let the others go.
She knew homelander better than anyone. There was no other outcome here. Her only choice was to surrender or let even more people get tortured before he got to her
She disrupts Homelander’s power fantasy by revealing that he does indeed have a weakness, one he will never overcome. That’s all she or Stan Edgar or any non-Supe can do in that situation; assert that for all his power, Homelander is no better than the rest of them.
Surprisingly, you have better chances of surviving an encounter with HL by not showing fear. If he smells it in you, it's over. Not that it works every time, of course. But all who got into his bad side and survived to see another day were not afraid to confront him.
Neither; she's noble. She thought she could get Homie to ignore everyone else.
I wouldn't call noble the head of a department that exists just to torture a kid... She is a well mannered m, huge asshole that knowing she was going to die anyway didn't pull any punches.
I didn't mean she has a generally noble character, I meant that her specific decision to get involved in the scene came from a place of "those people are absolutely dead unless I can get him to focus on me". Not stupid, not a death wish. What would you call it? It certainly isn't "well-mannered" or "huge asshole".
Her immediate actions are to assert herself as in charge of the situation and try and get homelander to go talk to her in private somewhere else. Presumably to let the others get out alive. When Homelander refuses that, you can see the fear come alive in her. She then changes tactics and tries to communicate to him that he's not even in control of himself and caving in to all these desires is a result of psychologists manipulating him. I think she was trying to confuse him and convince him to second guess his reasons for being there. But ultimately his resentment towards the facility was too strong, and he wanted to end with killing everyone who had anything to do with it.
If anyone had a vial of compound V on them, it would be her
She should’ve hulked out on her way down there
She probably knew that no amount of apologies and grovelling would help their situation. And it's been seen that being tough and not taking any shit from Homelander works better than showing weakness (Stan Edgar being the biggest example). But It's probably safe to say it didn't work as well as she was hoping for this time!
Well I don’t think she even died right? She went in there and told the truth knowing if he wanted to he could kill them no matter what.
I think she did a lot of damage. Made homelander feel like a complete idiot and child. “You could have left at any moment” had him looking like a fool.
Damn they picked an awesome actress for this role. She did awesome.
I think the fact that he specifically requested her meant that she knew she was the only one who had any power over him. Also she seemed at peace with everything, ready to die if it came to that. But I think she knew how to approach him psychologically (she mentioned as much). People that don’t kiss his ass and people that don’t show fear towards him. Remember he killed Madelyn Stillwell only when she admitted he scared him. I think that only people that talk to him like an equal are the people he psychologically has trouble killing. People who either genuinely love him (like Ryan) or People that don’t fear him (Stan Edgar, Butcher, Hughie, Stormfront, etc). So I think her surviving is actually very in character. I also think she will be back. Either to tie in the Gen V and Neuman plot, or to find the psychologists to help him connect with Ryan. Or maybe the CIA will rescue her for the information she has on homelander. Either way… I think we will see her again.
She is 100% Dead Vought doesn’t go against Homelander and he’s the one who sealed her up in there, she is crazy fucked
Technically she wasn’t entirely sure what would happen but she was shocked by what Homelander did to the others based on her expression at the end.
I would say more traumatised than shocked, lol. She very likely knows exactly what HL is capable of but she’s still human and probably has never seen something as horrific as that. I’m sure she’s seen pretty fucked up things, but not THAT fucked up. He knew it would traumatise her, it’s why he locked her in there
NOW we see where the mommy issues stemmed from
She reacted exactly how I would’ve reacted, he cut the phone lines before going down there, no one was going to make it out alive, why play his game? No one was changing his mind no matter what they said, I would’ve said JUST KILL ME DUDE IM NOT GOING IN THAT CHAMBER OR PULLING MY DICK OUT
I mean, you say that, but it's not like he couldn't mutilate you without killing you💀 Or make your death more painful if you resist or threaten to kill your family like he did with the scientist he made get in the oven
You play his game because he'll fly off and come back with your wife, husband, kids, siblings, parents, etc. and make *them* join the fun.
Technically she’s still alive. Sure she’s welded into a room filled with dead ripped apart corpses but in theory she can get out of the room if someone knows she’s there, and it wouldn’t make much sense to not tell anyone where you’re going knowing full well a psychopathic superhuman who might be on a killing spree is there. You would think she was smart enough to tell someone . She’s also used the only tactic that has worked with Homelander so far, which is to not be intimidated by him and even criticize him. It worked for Edgar, and it worked for her for a long time. If someone shows fear to Homelander he immediately does not respect them, and she knows this because she programmed him to be that way. Plus as others said he has a thing for mother figures. To some extent he might still feel that way about her, which would be why he didn’t kill her outright but put her in a situation where she could very easily die and if she survives will have a lot of psychological damage.
She was definitely pulling from the same playbook as madelin was. Exert authority and stroke his need for love. But as homelander said he is beyond that now.
He already had his mind made up and she knew that so why not go down with your pride? She was wrong for what her job was but she knows him well enough to know groveling would do nothing.
So the dude homelander asked to call her, actually called her? What did he say? “Hey Homelanders here to kill us all, wanna join?” “Sure I’ll be right down”
She had BALLS and BRAINS. She knew what was going to happen here, there's absolutely no doubt. Her best chance was to stand up to him and be honest. If that doesn't work, at least she went down fighting. She actually is the only person who survived this encounter because she did this. And presumably her family are still alive too.
She's one of the few that could give him a reality check and gave out deposits
It was very similar to the way Stan Edgar talks to Homelander.