Season 3 of The Boys is building up to the show's biggest confrontation yet. Now, Homelander's actor Antony Starr cannot wait for the fanbase to see what's to come when the two meet.
Throughout its three seasons, The Boys' main antagonist Homelander has not once had anyone who's come close to matching the immense and exponential power he has. Now that Vought's original icon Soldier Boy is back in the picture, he may have just met his match.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Starr recently talked about Homelander's upcoming confrontation with Soldier Boy in the near future. Starr compared his fight with Soldier Boy to two sharks duking it out in an area that's only big enough to have one of them. Knowing how powerful the two supes are, Starr's excitement is justified. "It's definitely a real problem when two great whites are swimming in a very small sea together," Starr, who plays Homelander, tells EW. "It was so much fun just playing around with that." Showrunner Eric Kripke added that because Soldier's Boy's personality traits are so similar to Homelander's, fans should expect to see a fiery dynamic between the two. "His alpha instincts and Homelander's alpha instincts definitely lead to some fireworks... When you have two alpha males who both consider themselves the most powerful, most famous person on the planet, that gets to conflict pretty quickly."
While The Boys has made it a point from pretty much the beginning that Homelander was the real antagonist as Evil Superman, the third season has also established that his predecessor, Soldier Boy, who is basically Evil Captain America, was in the same boat as Homelander back when he was running the show. He was the all-powerful leader of Payback who was internally disliked by most of his crew. Worse yet, their contempt for him was so strong that the first chance they had to have him out of their lives, they took it and were more than happy to let it all happen for free.
So, with him being aware of what they did, that brings into question if Soldier Boy truly is the better alternative to Homelander in this world. Throughout the show, Homelander has clearly established himself as the show's big baddie because while he doesn't go searching for blood, he uses his unrivaled power to control everything by any means, even if it means killing the people he once trusted. Soldier Boy is on the rampage now that he knows that both Vought and his original team, who he cared about, staged a coup to get him out of the picture. There's no telling where that rampage will end, especially since he's been regarded as "Homelander before Homelander." Even though Homelander is clearly losing his composure, Soldier Boy may potentially be a much worse option knowing what he's already been through.
It also adds to the show's overall conflict of even though you may have the chance to get rid of the one person who exemplified the problem the most, it does not mean the problem itself has been solved with him gone. This goes beyond the notion that Soldier Boy may potentially be a worse alpha than Homelander too. Now, our protagonists have gotten their very first taste of power. Hughie clearly enjoys that he can fight back when he's been powerless all his life while Butcher primarily wants Homelander gone once and for all. There's no telling how corrupted they too may become because of their newfound abilities. All of this has made for an excellent season thus far.
The Boys season 3 can currently be streamed on Amazon Prime.
Source: Entertainment Weekly