The Boys Just Shut the Door on Homelander’s Comic-Accurate Death for Good

Well, that escalated quickly. The Boys Season 5 just made one of the comics' biggest twists basically impossible on the show, and it did it with a death I did not have on my bingo card this week.

Spoilers for The Boys Season 5, Episode 6 ahead.

Quick recap: Homelander gets an upgrade, Butcher gets a headache

Episode 6, 'Though the Heavens Fall,' brings in Mason Dye as Bombsight and ends with Homelander snagging the last vial of V1. That is bad news for literally everyone, especially Butcher, whose plan to level the playing field just took a swan dive off Vought Tower. With V1 in his system, Homelander is now about as beatable as a Final Boss with cheat codes.

The show has also been quietly clearing the board. A-Train bowed out earlier this season in what might be its saddest send-off so far, Firecracker followed, and now another member of The Seven is gone. And this one has ripple effects that reach all the way back to the comics.

Black Noir II is dead, and with him goes the comic-accurate Homelander ending

The tension between The Deep and Black Noir II hits a boiling point right out of the gate, all because The Deep killed director Adam Bourke last week. Bourke was a mentor to Black Noir II, who, yes, secretly wanted to act and almost made a legit run at Broadway with him. When The Deep torpedoed that by murdering Bourke, there was only one way this was going to go.

In Episode 6, Black Noir II retaliates by wrecking the shiny new pipeline The Deep is hawking, which also kills 1.4 billion fish. The Deep snaps, strangles and stabs Black Noir II, and just like that, The Seven has another vacancy.

That single move knocks out a couple of dominoes. First, it sinks Oh Father’s plan to roll Black Noir II out as a miraculous healing case to sell the whole 'Homelander is literally God' crusade. Second, and bigger picture, it closes the door on a TV version of Homelander’s comic-book death.

In the source material, Homelander dies at the hands of Black Noir, who turns out to be a Homelander clone created by Vought as a kill switch. The show has basically made that reveal impossible: we’ve already seen who both Black Noirs are under the mask, and TV Homelander doesn’t need a clone to do evil things—he’s doing them just fine on his own. Still, with that Oval Office tease in the Season 5 trailer and Black Noir’s sketchy behavior earlier, there was a world where the show did a partial nod to the comics. Not anymore.

Could they still force it? Technically. Would it be ridiculous? Absolutely.

Sure, Vought (and Homelander) would replace Black Noir again in a heartbeat if it helped the optics. But introducing a third Black Noir in the last two episodes just to off Homelander? That would be the limpest possible way to end TV’s biggest supervillain. Also, the series has already swapped in a new Noir once—how many times can they pull that trick and keep a straight face? And with Homelander juiced on V1, there isn’t even a practical reason to set up another doppelganger.

Even if the show hangs onto fragments of the comic ending—say, the location teased in the marketing—it’s pretty clear Black Noir is out of the picture.

So who actually has a shot at taking down Homelander?

The good news: the TV version has baked in better options than a last-minute clone reveal. Any of these would be more satisfying than a rushed Black Noir III twist:

• Ryan: He doesn’t exist in the comics, and his arc flat-out needs resolution. As a naturally born supe, he’s the biggest wild card in the room.
• Soldier Boy: He’s not Homelander’s biological father in the books, but he is here, and his blasts clearly mess up V1 users. That matters now.
• Butcher: A straight 1:1 fight is a fantasy, but this rivalry is the spine of the show. Their showdown can—and probably should—land harder than the comics.
• Marie Moreau: Pulling in Gen V at the eleventh hour can feel like a cheat, but at least Marie is set up within this universe. That’s miles better than conjuring another Black Noir out of thin air.

The bottom line

With Black Noir II gone, the comic-accurate Homelander death is off the table. The show’s changes—Ryan, Soldier Boy’s paternity twist, Butcher’s scorched-earth vendetta, even the Gen V backdoor—give it richer, messier options anyway. And after Homelander’s latest power-up, a clone under a mask would feel like a joke. If The Boys sticks the landing, it won’t be by copying the panels—it’ll be by weaponizing the relationships it built for TV and paying them off where it hurts.