Pitch black superhero satire The Boys will be concluding with its fifth season, which is set to debut on April 8.

The show has carved out its own story and identity. While it uses the same characters as the original comics, it gives many of them greater depth and/or takes their stories in different directions.

The previous fourth season drew some divided responses. There was criticism about slow pacing and whether the always offensive show finally went too far. However, the Season 4 finale was truly explosive and set up a climactic reckoning.

Homelander (Antony Starr) has finally taken over America itself via a puppet government, and the season ended with his forces capturing all of “The Boys,” barring Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) and Annie January/Starlight (Erin Moriarty).

It’s hard to forget that ending, but if you need a whole season refresher, we’ve got you.

Here’s everything you need to remember about The Boys Season 4:

Homelander

The Boys Season 3 ended with Homelander finally having custody of his son, Ryan (Cameron Crovetti), and debuting him to the public. When a protestor threw a bottle at Ryan, Homelander lasered him. On The Boys Season 4 premiere “Department of Dirty Tricks,” Homelander stood trial for murder but was found not guilty.

Ryan was born when Homelander assaulted Becca Butcher (Shantel VanSanten), which is why Billy is so obsessed with taking down Homelander. Homelander didn’t have a proper childhood. He was raised in a lab, conditioned and tortured by scientists to be the world’s strongest superhero.

That means Homelander is dedicated to giving Ryan what he didn’t have. But he has no clue how to give it to him. Of course, his perception of good parenting is warped, too.

On The Boys Season 4 Episode 2, “Life Among the Septics,” Homelander tried to set up Ryan as a public superhero, then had no clue why his son was traumatized from killing one of the actors in the staged robbery. That means Ryan spent the season torn between Homelander and Butcher as his father figure.

On the Season 4 finale, when he finally learned Homelander raped his mother, he seemed to choose neither of them. 

Homelander himself also went back to his childhood. His subplot in The Boys Season 4 Episode 4, “Wisdom of the Ages,” saw him return to the lab where he was raised, torturing and killing all of the staff. But that didn’t make him happy, nor has controlling Vought International.

While Homelander demands obedience and adoration, he’s also started to get annoyed by the fact that no one will give him honest feedback. So, he recruits Sister Sage (Susan Heyward) — the smartest person in the world — as his advisor to do just that, and help him plot the ultimately successful takeover of America.

Billy Butcher

Back on The Boys Season 3, Billy Butcher took temporary Compound V to gain powers similar to Homelander. However, multiple doses turned out to be fatal. On The Boys Season 3 Episode 8 “The Instant White Hot Wild,” Butcher blinked at a chance to kill Homelander to save Ryan.

Butcher now has fatal brain cancer, with only weeks to live when The Boys Season 4 begins. Of course, that means he’s intent on finishing the job of taking down Homelander and supes like him while he’s still here — egged on by his old CIA pal, Joe Kessler (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). 

Spin-off series Gen V season 1 focused on the creation of a supe-killing virus. Butcher cameoed on Gen V season 1 finale “Guardians of Godolkin,” learning about the virus. He spends The Boys Season 4 trying to acquire it. 

On The Boys Season 4 Episode 5, “Beware of the Jabberwock, My Son,” Butcher captured scientist Sameer Shah (Omid Abtahi) and put him to work making the virus. Butcher wants to kill Homelander, but if the virus causes supe genocide, all the better.

But Butcher himself is a supe. Between Seasons 3 and 4, he took a dose of Compound V in hopes it would give him permanent powers and defuse his cancer. It didn’t take — or did it?

It slowly revealed the Compound V mutated Butcher’s tumor, giving it sentience. Kessler is a hallucination and a manifestation of the tumor. Once Butcher accepts the tumor’s influence on him, his cancer symptoms subside. Then he gains the ability to launch grotesque, super-strong tentacles from his body.

The Boys Season 4 concluded with Butcher driving down a literal dark road, the last sample of the virus in his possession. It’s a chilling ending, indicating he could be as much of a threat to the Boys as any supe this season.

Starlight

Annie January/Starlight (Erin Moriarty) is much more of an active hero than in The Boys comics. The Boys Season 3 featured her becoming a progressive political icon, and she finally ditched the Seven to join the Boys full-time.

When The Boys Season 4 begins, Annie has largely ditched her superhero self. She’s running the non-profit “Starlight House,” but she’s also become the symbol of hatred for Homelander supporters. Annie and her “Starlighter” supporters are smeared as Anti-American, human traffickers, etc. 

New Seven member and reactionary TV host Firecracker (Valorie Curry) has a particular grudge against Starlight from their childhood pageant days. On “Wisdom of the Ages,” Firecracker revealed publicly that — between seasons — Annie had an abortion.

Neither Annie nor Hughie (Jack Quaid) felt ready to be parents. But Annie is a Christian, which made the decision especially difficult.

So, Annie attacked Firecracker on live TV. Deserved, sure, but it also led to much bad publicity for Starlight. She sinks into depression and loses control of her power, but the worst is yet to come.

On The Boys Season 4 Episode 7, “The Insider,” Annie is abducted and impersonated by a shapeshifter, who spends 10 days shacking up with Hughie and even proposes to him. After Annie escapes, she stops the shapeshifter from killing Singer.

After some initial anger with Hughie, he and Annie patch things up. They’re last seen ambushed by Homelander’s police force;  Hughie is captured, while Annie flies off. Gen V Season 2 showed she’s been on the run and working against Homelander/Vought from the shadows.

Hughie

Aside from his storylines with Annie, Wee Hughie had a tough go of it on The Boys Season 4. His dad, Hugh Campbell Sr. (Simon Pegg), had a stroke that left him in a coma. 

Then, Hughie’s absentee mom, Daphne (Rosemarie DeWitt), came back into his life. Daphne left when Hughie was about six years old, which he finds out this season is because she was suffering from postpartum depression and needed treatment. While Daphne reconnected with Hugh, she was still reluctant to talk to her son.

Hughie, unwilling to say goodbye to his dad, procures Compound V. While he has second thoughts, Daphne gives Hugh Sr. the drug. It gives him the ability to phase through solid objects, but he also can’t control his powers or his own mind.

On “Beware of the Jabberwock, My Son,” Hugh flails about through the hospital, accidentally killing some people and threatening Daphne. With no other option, Hughie euthanizes his dad and shares a sad goodbye with him.

A-Train

The speedster A-Train/Reggie Franklin (Jessie T. Usher) had the most transformative and satisfying character arc on The Boys Season 4.

A-Train is the one who kicked all this off back on The Boys Season 1 Episode 1, “The Name of the Game,” when he accidentally killed Hughie’s girlfriend Robin (Jess Salgueiro) by running through her. He spent Season 1 as a prominent villain, but Season 2 and 3 brought him down a peg.

Despite almost being ousted from the Seven and his poor treatment of Homelander, fear and self-interest kept A-Train from changing. An attempt at speaking out against Supe brutality against the Black community also went poorly.

On The Boys Season 3 Episode 6 “Herogasm,” A-Train finally apologized to Hughie (and got punched in the face). He then murdered racist superhero Blue Hawk (Nick Wechsler) and had a heart attack, mandating a transplant operation.

Come The Boys Season 4, A-Train’s change of heart takes hold now that he’s been estranged from his brother Nathan (Christian Keyes). The Boys play on his feelings of wanting to be a real hero for his nephews to cultivate him into an asset.

Over the season, he feeds the Boys info, saves Hughie and MM (Laz Alonso) at different points, and helps Annie fight the Deep (Chace Crawford) and Black Noir (Nathan Mitchell). A-Train was last seen fleeing the country, but Gen V Season 2 revealed he’s been helping Annie’s underground resistance.

Victoria Neuman

The Boys Season 2 Episode 8, “What I Know,” ended by revealing that seemingly friendly Congresswoman Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit) was actually the mysterious head-popping supe.

Season 3, in turn, revealed she’s the adopted daughter of now former Vought CEO Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito), and ended with Vice President “Dakota” Bob Singer (Jim Beaver) picking her as his running mate for the upcoming Presidential election.

The Season 4 premiere reveals that the Singer-Neuman ticket won. Victoria is in bed with Homelander, and the plan is for her to kill Singer and become president herself. The Boys want to stop that, and they’ve roped Singer in; he obviously isn’t keen to have his head blown off.

The season also builds on Neuman’s guest appearance on Gen V Season 1, wherein she got the last sample of the virus. Neuman may be working with Homelander, but she doesn’t trust him.

On the Season 4 finale, Homelander publicly outs Neuman as a supe — using his laser vision, which bounces right off of her. Between that and Neuman’s genuine friendship with Hughie, she tries to defect. But Butcher says no deal and uses his cancer powers to rip her in half.

Singer is framed for Neuman’s murder, setting up Homelander to take control of America, while Neuman’s daughter Zoe (Olivia Morandin) was sent to the Red River supe orphanage.

Other notable Season 4 events:

• With Butcher’s cancer and his reckless actions in Season 3, MM took over as the new leader of The Boys.
• Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) and Frenchie (Tomer Capon) finally threw caution to the wind and admitted their love to each other. When Frenchie was taken away by Homelander’s forces on the Season 4 finale, Kimiko overcame her muteness to shout several tearful “no’s.”
• Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles) remained on ice throughout the season, but the finale had a post-credits scene of Homelander discovering him in cryogenic sleep in a CIA bunker.
• After Homelander ordered all non-Supe employees of Vought murdered, Ashley (Colby Minifie) dosed herself with Compound V. Her powers haven’t been revealed yet.
• While Homelander murdered Black Noir (Nathan Mitchell) on the Season 3 finale, Vought hired a supe actor (Mitchell again) to replace Noir, who always stays silent and fully masked.
• The Deep (Chace Crawford) formed a slight relationship with Sister Sage, who relaxes by lobotomizing herself to enjoy a few hours of no super-intelligence. Of course, Sage was just using him.
• Stan Edgar was last seen being escorted back to prison when Victoria killed his escort. The episode left his fate ambiguous until he guest-starred in Gen V Season 2, which confirmed he’s hiding out in a custom-made bunker and planning to retake control of Vought. 

Follow us on X and on Instagram!

Want more from Tell-Tale TV? Subscribe to our newsletter here!