The finale of season 3 of The Boys allowed us to see how important Ryan is to Homelander because he had to go looking for him over at Grace Mallory’s place. Of course, he also used Ryan as a way to make Soldier Boy stop his mission of killing him as the boy ended up being the grandson of the legendary supe. But how exactly does Homelander feel about his son? Does Homelander actually love Ryan?
Homelander loves Ryan but in his own twisted and selfish way. This is not the same kind of love that most parents have for their children because Homelander wants Ryan around him so that he would have someone that could share the same kind of twisted view that he has about the world.
In a way, the way that Homelander loves Ryan is somewhat a reflection of how twisted and morally corrupt he is as a supe and as a person. He is someone who craves the love that he never had, and that is why he wants to have Ryan around him because he feels like his son is the only one that could understand what he has been through as a person. With that said, let’s look at whether or not Homelander really does love Ryan.
Does Homelander Really Love Ryan?
Season 2 of The Boys allowed us to meet Ryan Butcher, who is the son of Homelander and Becca Butcher after they had sex before Billy Butcher assumed that his wife was raped and murdered by Homelander. The fact that Becca had an affair with Homelander did indeed bother Butcher, but he was more than willing to accept Ryan as his own son as he even gave him a few pointers in life and started hanging out with him.
Nevertheless, Ryan is still Homelander’s son, and that was something he was more than willing to assert in season 2 when he tried to parent Ryan and force him to be able to do what he could do as a supe. He knows that Ryan is a supe by birth, and that was what made him special as he inherited all of Homelander’s powers without the need for him to get injected by Compound V or get genetic enhancements.
That said, while Ryan spent a good part of season 3 away from his biological father, Homelander eventually found out where his son was hiding all this time after Victoria Neuman gave him the boy’s whereabouts. Ryan was hiding with Grace Mallory the entire time as Homelander was now able to reunite with his son during the events of the season 3 finale. But while we do know that Homelander wants his son to be with him, does that actually mean that he loves Ryan?
In a way, Homelander does love Ryan but in a manner that’s a lot different from the way we often look at parental love. Most parents would want their children to be able to live safely and comfortably regardless of whether or not they are together. But that isn’t the kind of love that Homelander has for Ryan.
Homelander’s love for Ryan is the same as the kind of love that he had for both Maeve and Stormfront when they were together. It’s the kind of love that suits his selfish agenda all too well as he tends to view himself and the world differently from how the common person sees themselves and the world.
He loves his son in a manner that’s twisted and selfish because he doesn’t want what’s best for him. Instead, Homelander just simply wants to be the one to raise Ryan, regardless of whether or not he may be the best person for the job. And that perfectly suits his character as someone who is selfish, twisted, and morally corrupt.
How Does Homelander Feel About Ryan?
The way that Homelander feels for Ryan is somewhat a reflection of the kind of life he has lived and the things he experienced when he was younger. And knowing what made Homelander into what and who he is will allow us to better understand how exactly he feels for Ryan.
Homelander Craves For Love
Homelander never received the kind of love that most people were able to get when they were still children because he was raised in a lab and was forced to be the weapon that he is today. Most of the interactions that Homelander had when he was younger were related to experiments that Vogelbaum conducted on him so that he could learn how to use his powers and develop them properly.
As such, when Homelander became the leader of The Seven, the one thing that he craved the most from people was love because he never understood what love was. He made sure to do all that he could to make the people love him in their own way. And when people didn’t love him, he made sure that they feared him, as was the case for almost all of the members of The Seven, who didn’t want to do anything out of line out of fear of what Homelander could do to them and their loved ones.
That is why Homelander wants Ryan to be around him because he wants the boy to love him just like how a son should love his father. But the thing about Homelander is that he also wants Ryan to be someone who understood him because he never had a person that allowed him to feel understood.
Homelander always felt alone in the world because of the fact that no one was remotely close to his strength and power. Queen Maeve may be strong, but she didn’t share the same kind of twisted view of the world that Homelander had. Homelander wants the world to not only love him but worship him as a god, and that was something that he wanted Ryan to also experience because the boy is the only other supe that has the same strength and powers that he has.
So, by raising Ryan and by allowing him to be as sick and as twisted as he is, Homelander could have someone who shares the same way he sees the world. And that would make him feel more understood because he now has someone who carries the same burden of power and has experienced the same things that he has experienced in his life.
Homelander Has A Deep Need To Have A Family
Homelander grew up not having a family because he was grown as a test tube baby and was raised in a laboratory. He is not like the other supes that were able to grow up with families, even though they may not have experienced normal childhood lives. Still, they had families, which was something that Homelander never had.
In that regard, ever since season 1, Homelander had a deep need for a parental figure that could remind him of what it was like to be in a family. Madelyn Stillwell was that person at one point in time, but he also ended up seeking parental guidance from Vogelbaum, who was the scientist that created him and raised him in a laboratory.
Season 3 shed some light on Homelander’s deep need for a family when he told Maeve that he wanted to harvest her eggs so that he could have powerful children with her. Then there was a scene wherein he told A-Train, the Deep, and Ashley that he thought that The Seven was going to be his family, but, instead, he was disappointed to learn that he was stuck with incompetent people.
Going back to Ryan, Homelander wants to be the one to raise him because he wants some semblance of normalcy in his life. He didn’t even care whether or not Ryan was safe as long as he could form a family. This was seen from the fact that he brought Ryan to Vought Tower, knowing well enough that Soldier Boy was going to attack. Homelander wanted to use Ryan as a way to convince Soldier Boy, who was revealed to be his biological father, that they could be a family.
So, in a way, he loved Ryan in the wrong way because he focused more on his desire for a family than on making sure that his son was safe and raised properly. And that is why his love for Ryan is as twisted as the way he views the world.