Summary

Ryan Butcher’s promotion to series regular in
The Boys
hints at his potential to surpass Homelander’s powers with the right training.
The possibility of Homelander having more offspring, like young Teddy Stillwell, adds a mysterious and intriguing twist to the storyline.
The theory surrounding Teddy’s true identity as either Homelander’s son or a carefully crafted plant by Vought sets the stage for a dramatic showdown.

In the fourth season of The Boys, which turns out to be the penultimate season, Ryan Butcher (Cameron Crovetti) has been promoted to a series regular. As Homelander’s (Antony Starr) biological son, he possesses superpowers similar to his father’s. In fact, it’s suspected that his powers could supersede those of his dad with the right training. The situation can be likened to when Homelander was trained to become as powerful, if not more powerful, than his biological father, Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles), so many years ago.

It’s no surprise that Homelander has been grooming Ryan to succeed him. But there’s another young boy in the mix that fans are curious about when it comes to lineage. Is it possible that Homelander has more offspring? Some signs suggest that he might.

The Boys Release Date July 26, 2019 Seasons 4

Homelander and Madelyn Stillwell in The Boys

In Season 1, Homelander is under the spell of Madelyn Stillwell (Elisabeth Shue), a top executive at Vought and the one person who knows exactly how to manipulate him. He respected, even loved, Madelyn. It’s implied that they had a romantic relationship, though it may have been less sexual and more awkwardly motherly.

It’s confirmed that he suckled on her breasts while she was nursing her baby and producing milk, but whether or not they actually had intercourse is never confirmed. There are suggestions, however, that Madelyn may have molested Homelander as a child, which could explain his attachment to her in a weird Oedipus Complex type of way. He was always deeply jealous when she spent more time with her baby than with him.

Madelyn meets her end when Homelander learns that she knew about Becca (Shantel VanSanten) and Ryan being in hiding. Butcher (Karl Urban) tries to use Madelyn as protection when he confronts Homelander about the heinous things he did to Becca. But to his surprise, Homelander viciously lasers her to death, leaving her baby an orphan.

The baby, who was named Teddy, is never discussed beyond being the reason that Madelyn produces breast milk, satisfying Homelander’s obsession with drinking it. After Madelyn’s death, it was assumed that Teddy was gone, taken away by Homelander. But it’s eventually revealed that he was sent to live at Red River Institute, an adoption center for orphaned Supes.

Related Why Homelander Always Ends Up on Top in The Boys Each season of The Boys brings Homelander closer to his potential end, yet he continually survives. Will Season 4 finally be his downfall?

Teddy isn’t seen again until Season 3, when Hughie (Jack Quaid) visits Red River to dig up dirt on Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit). Hughie comes across a young boy named Teddy Stillwell. The boy has the power of teleportation and keeps appearing where Hughie is, showing others who he is and drawing attention to him being there when he isn’t supposed to be. Unlike Hughie, who winds up naked after teleporting (the few times he did after taking Temp-V), Teddy can keep his clothes on while going from one place to another.

It’s entirely possible that Teddy was injected with Compound V as a child and not born a Supe. However, the reason he has powers could also be that he is Homelander’s biological son. The identity of Teddy’s father is never discussed. Given that Teddy is sent to an orphanage following Madelyn’s death, it’s clear his biological father is not in the picture.

Madelyn alludes to having gone through IVF to get pregnant, so it’s possible she doesn’t know who the father is if it was an anonymous donor. But knowing the way Vought works and how the company exerts control over its employees, Homelander’s sperm could have been used as part of an experiment for Vought’s research, whether knowingly or unknowingly, by Madelyn.

If the baby were biologically Homelander’s, it would stand to reason that Homelander would be able to sense this. But he went out of his way to avoid the baby, often looking at the child with disgust and jealousy. So, he may never have gotten close enough or bothered to use his senses to sus out any potential connection. Those unexplainable things aside, signs point to a possibility that Teddy is the second offspring of the leader of The Seven.

What the Internet Thinks About This Theory for The Boys

This theory has been posited for years, but it is gaining renewed interest now that all hope of taking down Homelander resides in Ryan. He’s arguably the only person alive who is strong enough to defeat Homelander, but he is also the last person who would want to do so. He’s finally developing a relationship with his father and refuses to believe that he’s anything but a hero. He has to believe this, even if every fiber of his being tells him not to, because Homelander is all he has left.

In a Reddit discussion on the topic, beretbabe88 thinks that Ryan might be a plant. Some Supes can age slowly, so they believe Teddy is Becca’s son, who was given to Madelyn to raise, and Ryan is another child dosed with Compound V and given to Becca, posing as her son. This would also require that Grace Mallory (Laila Robins) was part of keeping up the ruse all this time and hiding the identity of Homelander’s actual son.

Beretbabe88 also guesses that Teddy’s true identity was kept secret from Homelander, so his real son could be right under his nose the entire time, and he’d have no idea or any interest in getting close to him. Vought could have guessed that Homelander would eventually discover the truth about Becca and Ryan, so using a “fake son” plant would prepare for this moment.

Related The Boys Season 4 Finally Solved the Biggest Problem With the Series Season after season, The Boys has been about the battle between Billy Butcher and Homelander. But the focus is finally shifting in Season 4.

On a completely different track, it wouldn’t be out of the realm of possibility to consider that Madelyn may have injected her otherwise non-Supe baby with Compound V as a means of protecting him once she realized that Homelander was becoming more unhinged and dangerous. Some even believe Madelyn was never actually pregnant but that Teddy teleported to her as a baby, and she raised him as her own, unaware of his true origins. That theory might be a bit too far-fetched.

Whether Teddy Stillwell is Homelander’s son or just a random Supe baby who does or does not share DNA with Madelyn, it’s strange that he would be brought back in Season 3 in a seemingly insignificant appearance without a reason. This could, of course, be a red herring, a cute Easter Egg that leads nowhere. Or it could be that by the sure-to-be explosive fifth and final season, we see Teddy resurface to fight his half-brother (or fake brother) Ryan and/or his father, Homelander.

Second son or not, the internal battle Ryan goes through between his desire to have a father and honor his mother and everything she stood for makes for an exciting season. Whatever way the story goes for Teddy if it goes anywhere at all, Homelander may eventually find himself going head-to-head with a Supe he doesn’t have the physical nor mental strength to defeat: his son. The question is whether that son will be Ryan or Teddy might emerge from the shadows to reveal himself as more than just Madelyn’s long-forgotten orphaned boy. Stream episodes of The Boys on Prime Video.