"I bet you never danced a day in your life..."
The Boys has never been a particularly ruthless show when it comes to its main characters (we're a long way from Game of Thrones here), but the current fifth and final season has featured quite a few deaths, and Wednesday's penultimate episode concluded with the most heartbreaking yet.
Major spoilers follow.
So far, we've bid farewell to two members of The Seven (Firecraker and Black Noir) and one reformed villain (A-Train), but in "The Frenchman, The Female and the Man Called Mother's Milk," we lost one of The Boys themselves when Frenchie sacrificed himself to save Kimiko.
After Homelander took the V-One last week, Billy Butcher devised a new plan to expose Kimiko to enough radiation to replicate Soldier Boy's powers in the hope that she could blast Homelander and fry the V out of his system. A crazy idea, but it might have just worked with Sister Sage's help.
Unfortunately, "God" is made aware of their scheme when a psychic Supe reads a captive Butcher's mind.
Frenchie manages to hide Kimiko and Sage in a zinc-protected crawlspace before Homelander confronts him. Frenchie tells his enemy that they have already succeeded in recreating Soldier Boy's abilities and that the others are on their way. He then exposes Homelander - and himself - to the uranium.
It's not made clear whether Homelander actually attacked Frenchie before he flew off or if he simply succumbed to the radiation (his injuries suggest the former), but Kimiko finds her lover in a bad way with a trail of blood behind him. Serge dies in her arms as Butcher and Hughie arrive on the scene.
So, where does this leave our heroes as we approach next week's series finale? Has Kimiko actually acquired similar powers to Soldier Boy (who is now back on ice), or will Sage - who seemed genuinely upset by Frenchie's death - help them to come up with a new plan to take down Homelander?
In the fifth and final season of The Boys, it's Homelander’s world, completely subject to his erratic, egomaniacal whims. Hughie, Mother's Milk, and Frenchie are imprisoned in a "Freedom Camp." Annie struggles to mount a resistance against the overwhelming Supe force. Kimiko is nowhere to be found. But when Butcher reappears, ready and willing to use a virus that will wipe all Supes off the map, he sets in motion a chain of events that will forever change the world and everyone in it. It's the climax, people. Big stuff's gonna happen.
The Boys stars Karl Urban, Jack Quaid, Antony Starr, Erin Moriarty, Jessie T. Usher, Laz Alonso, Chace Crawford, Tomer Capone, Karen Fukuhara, Nathan Mitchell, Colby Minifie, Cameron Crovetti, Susan Heyward, Valorie Curry, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Jensen Ackles, and Daveed Diggs.
Seth Rogen, Evan Goldberg, James Weaver, Neal H. Moritz, Pavun Shetty, Phil Sgriccia, Michaela Starr, Paul Grellong, David Reed, Judalina Neira, Jessica Chou, Gabriel Garcia, Ori Marmur, Ken F. Levin and Jason Netter serve as executive producers.