After missing the two-episode premiere, Ryan Butcher returns in The Boys Season 5, Episode 3. The son of Homelander was conspicuous by his absence, but “Every One of You Sons of B*tches” makes up for it by giving him a very sizable role, with a couple of major developments that could prove crucial as the Prime Video series flies towards its endgame. Warning: MAJOR spoilers follow for the episode from this point on.
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Ryan’s return brings him into contact with Billy Butcher, who wants to use him to lure Homelander out so they can hit him with the Supe-killing virus before the villain can get his hands on V1. It would also mean the deaths of both Butchers, but Billy sells him on this as they “loved the same woman, and hate the same c**t,” so Ryan reluctantly agrees. However, things go awry when Dr. Sameer Shah destroys the virus, after learning that his daughter, Zoe, is alive and that Butcher killed her mother, Victoria Neuman, in The Boys Season 4 finale.
Not to be deterred, Ryan takes matters into his own hands, going face-to-face with his father. He initially gets a couple of good shots in, before Homelander loses his cool and completely overpowers his son. He beats him into oblivion, leaving him to be found motionless by Butcher at the very end of the episode.
Did Homelander Kill Ryan In The Boys Season 5, Episode 3?
The good news is that Ryan is not dead. It’s a subtle, one-second moment, but you can just about make out that he’s still breathing as Butcher checks on him at the very end of the episode, so if nothing else, he’s still alive… just. What remains unclear in this is whether Homelander deliberately left him this way, or if he departed the scene thinking he had killed his own son. I assume we’ll get more on that in Episode 4, but the former seems more likely.
While he’s set on a path of destruction by the angelic vision of Madelyn Stillwell (the returning Elisabeth Shue), the show is also exploring his desire for love and family connections. Before Ryan starts attacking him, he thinks he’s there to reconcile, and welcomes that opportunity. At the same time, he did send his own father, Soldier Boy, to potentially die just last week, and, well, he’s Homelander, so nothing is really off the table in terms of just how far he’ll go.
Homelander May Regret Not Killing His Son
Whether Homelander meant to kill him or not, what’s impressive is that Ryan survived the barrage of punches thrown by his father. It certainly didn’t appear as though Antony Starr’s villain was holding back, which means that while Ryan wasn’t able to overpower him, he was able to withstand some of his most powerful blows. It’s also worth noting that, before this, he was also able to make Homelander bleed, something that we’ve only seen Queen Maeve do before now.
So, for all he suffered an almighty beatdown, this actually highlighted just how powerful Ryan is in The Boys. Because he has the same powers as Homelander, it’s long been theorized that he’ll be the one to kill him. It’d be a change from the comics, but it would feel fitting with the show: him defeating his own father and getting revenge for his own mother feels like the kind of thing the series would do. He’ll now have an even greater desire to hone his powers and come back stronger against Homelander in the future, and it’s kind of classic superhero (or just hero) storytelling to suffer the first defeat before emerging victorious.
On the flip side, that could be an argument against Ryan doing it. He is, after all, a child, and one who has already experienced far too much pain and too much of the world’s evil, rather than simply being allowed to be a kid. Now, he’s being used as a pawn in Butcher’s war against Homelander, and while that’s a noble cause, him being the one to kill his own father would mean robbing him of his innocence and irrevocably changing his future. Because of that, it’s also easy to see a world where Ryan isn’t the one who kills him, or even decides to spare him (especially with theories of Homelander losing his powers).
Whichever way it goes, the one thing that does seem certain is we’ll be getting another showdown between Ryan and Homelander. And even if they both come out of that alive, Homelander might regret not killing his son when he had the chance.
New episodes of The Boys release on Wednesdays on Prime Video.
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