The Boys Season 5 Could Be Quietly Setting Up a Comic Accurate Ending for Homelander

Given the differences between The Boys comics and the Prime Video adaptation, there’s a good chance that Homelander’s ending will play out differently than it does in the source material. However, one detail from The Boys Season 5 suggests a comic-accurate conclusion is still possible for Antony Starr’s supe. And if the series is quietly laying the groundwork for that, it’ll offer a new spin on what happens in the original story. SPOILERS ahead for The Boys Season 5, Episodes 1 & 2 and the comic.

Heading into The Boys‘ fifth and final season, one of the biggest mysteries involves who will defeat Homelander. Although The Seven’s leader could potentially survive the final episodes, it seems more likely he’ll perish. The risk of him returning from a cryo chamber or losing his powers is just far too great. And several characters are poised to kill him, including Soldier Boy, Marie Moreau, Ryan, and Butcher. However, there’s a chance that the same person who takes his life in the comic series could do so in the show: Black Noir.

Black Noir’s Silence in The Boys Season 5 Is Suspicious

Black Noir is the one who kills Homelander in the comics, as he’s secretly a Homelander clone who is tasked with eliminating him and taking his place if he steps out of line — and he desperately wants to fulfill that role, so he sets out to make it happen. This is obviously quite different from the TV series, which shows us two separate characters wearing Black Noir’s suit. Neither is a Homelander clone, and the stories of both Black Noirs and Homelander are too drastically different for the show to pull off this exact twist. However, there’s something up with Black Noir in The Boys‘ latest episodes, and it suggests the series could put a spin on the source material’s ending.

In the show, the original Black Noir doesn’t speak, the result of the damage Soldier Boy does to him in the ’80s. However, after Homelander kills Black Noir at the end of The Boys Season 3, Vought replaces him with someone who can and does talk. He’s not supposed to — the public can’t know what happened to the original — but he does it anyway. And that makes it all the more suspicious that he’s suddenly silent again in The Boys Season 5.

Black Noir is back to never uttering a word, and it’s something the other characters pick up on. The Deep even wonders if he’s going “full method” by copying the first Noir, and it seems unlikely the series is drawing attention to this detail for no reason. While the circumstances surrounding Black Noir killing Homelander would need to be different, The Boys may be quietly setting up a new version of the comic ending. And fans have theories about what the motive for such an incident could be.

The Boys Could Be Setting up a Black Noir Twist That Leans Into Homelander’s Comic Ending

We’ve yet to uncover why Black Noir is so quiet in The Boys Season 5, but there are theories floating around online — and they could set up a partially comic-accurate ending, even if it can never be wholly true to the original. On Reddit, one theory is that Homelander has done something to render Black Noir incapable of speech. The Seven’s leader is no stranger to cruelty, so it’s not unthinkable that he’d threaten Noir, or even go so far as to remove his tongue or stich his mouth shut. It’s a gruesome thought, but it would give this version of Black Noir a motive to kill Homelander at the end of the series.

Another common suggestion is that Black Noir has been replaced again. This would explain the unwillingness to speak, and it would make sense of him losing to Starlight in the premiere. If whoever’s in the suit is part of the resistance, they would want Starlight to win that fight. And even if they aren’t working with Starlight directly, they could answer to Stan Edgar or another one of Homelander’s enemies. In that case, they’d still want Starlight to succeed over Homelander.

The wilder Reddit theories suggest the original Noir could still be alive and back in the suit. This would certainly offer a good reason for Noir to go after Homelander, even if his survival is a bit far-fetched. Fortunately, “far-fetched” is what The Boys is known for, and the first Noir did already survive one injury that should have killed him. Some have even suggested that Stan Edgar or another one of the show’s major players could have revived him. That would bring Noir killing Homelander the closest to the comics’ clone twist without copying it 1:1.

The Boys Season 5’s Oval Office Tease Fits With Homelander’s Comic Ending

Black Noir’s suspicious behavior is enough to fuel theories about him killing Homelander, but The Boys Season 5 trailer also fits with this speculation. The end of it shows Homelander gleefully sitting in the Oval Office, which is where Noir kills him in the original story. It’s no accident the writers included this scene; they’re certainly hinting at Homelander’s death, even if someone else lands the killing blow. But with Black Noir’s suspicious behavior, that demise could look far more similar to the source material than anyone expected. And after all the turns the show took to get there, it’d still manage to be surprising, even for longtime fans.

What do you think is going on with Black Noir in Season 5? Leave a comment and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!

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