The Boys: What is Every Supe’s Power?

This article contains spoilers for The Boys seasons 1-3.

In the world of Prime Video’s The Boys, superheroes – or supes as they’re not-so-affectionately called – are a part of normal, everyday life. But these supes aren’t naturally born, they’re created by Vought Industry’s Compound V serum. Even though Vought does their best to control who does and does not become a supe, they don’t have control over how abilities manifest in people who take Compound V.

This leads to a wide variety of powers among the supes on the show, including those in the prestigious superhero group known as The Seven. With so many superpowered characters appearing in both large and small roles throughout the series, it can be hard to keep track of what exactly everyone can do. Here is a handy guide breaking down the powers of The Seven, as well as a few other notable supes in The Boys. Meanwhile, a full list of every supe in The Boys can be found over here.

Annie January a.k.a Starlight

In Season 1, Starlight (Erin Moriarty) becomes the newest member of The Seven. She has super strength – in the first episode we see her lift a car and punch holes through a brick wall. However, her truly unique powers come from her ability to control and channel electricity. Starlight can use electric currents to produce blasts of light and sparks that can incapacitate certain opponents, she can destroy anything that uses electricity with pinpoint accuracy, and, as we learn in the season 3 finale, she can briefly levitate if she absorbs enough energy. Her eyes and hands glow as her powers activate. Starlight also has fairly durable skin. While not as impenetrable as Homelander’s, she can take bullets without them leaving much more than a scratch and it takes a crystal saw to cut through her skin enough to remove her Vought tracking device.

Maggie Shaw a.k.a Queen Maeve

Queen Maeve (Dominique McElligott) is one of the original members of The Seven, and the only woman on the team until Starlight joins in season 1. While unable to fly, Maeve’s enhanced agility allows her to run up the side of buildings at above average speed. She has super strength that rivals Homelander’s and is a highly skilled fighter, although she does have limits –  she broke her right arm stopping a bus from falling off a bridge in her early days as a supe. Her skin is durable – she can withstand being carried by Homelander at high speeds and altitudes and punches from other supes with enhanced strength. She even survives a blast from Soldier Boy’s explosive powers and a fall from Vought tower at the end of season 3, although not without injury. Queen Maeve also has heightened senses, she could sense invisible supe Translucent’s presence in a Vought tower bathroom even though he was invisible and unmoving. 

Homelander

The leader of The Seven, Homelander (Antony Starr) has almost all of the powers of Superman, but none of his compassion or heart. Homelander can fly and run with superspeed. He has enhanced senses – he has x-ray vision that he can control the distance and depth of (unless the object is coated in zinc), he can smell increases in adrenaline and pheromones in others, he can shoot laser beams from his eyes at varying levels of intensity, and he has super hearing that allows him to hear things imperceptible to the the average person. Homelander is virtually indestructible, with no weapon so far being able to take him down. Soldier Boy and Queen Maeve are the only supes who have been able to go head-to-head against him for any extended period of time.

Black Noir

Black Noir (Nathan Mitchell) is an original member of The Seven and the superhero group Payback, and serves Vought as an assassin. Noir has enhanced agility, stealth, and strength. He can move without making a sound, he can rip a person’s jaw apart or slice them with his sword before they even realize he’s there. He seems to have an incredibly high pain tolerance – Black Noir can withstand explosive blasts with only a few burns and can jump from the roof of certain buildings unscathed. However, he did withstand brain damage during Payback’s military operation/plan to make Soldier Boy disappear in Nicaragua that he hasn’t totally healed from. He is also easily killed by Homelander.

Kevin Moscowitz a.k.a. The Deep

The Deep (Chace Crawford) can breathe underwater thanks to gills on his abdomen. He can also swim at great speeds and can communicate telepathically with aquatic wildlife. The Deep was kicked out of The Seven in season 1 after assaulting Starlight, but then, after a stint in the cult-like Church of The Collective, rejoins the superhero group in season 3.

Reggie Franklin a.k.a A-Train

A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) has superspeed and enhanced strength. Until he abuses Compound V to enhance his abilities and has a heart attack in season 1, he is The Seven’s resident speedster. But A-Train is more than Vought’s fastest man alive. He has an incredibly fast metabolism that requires him to eat more than the average person in order to sustain his body and abilities. This enhanced metabolism helps him heal rapidly, especially when he is on extra doses of Compound V – in season 1 his leg fracture heals within a few days and is able to heal from his heart attack. However, his abuse of Compound V leaves him slower than he once was, and eventually he becomes unable to run without jeopardizing his heart health. A-Train also has increased perception, meaning that his brain can process information as quickly as he moves, allowing him to dodge projectiles before they hit him.

Stormfront

Before replacing Translucent in The Seven at the beginning of season 2, Stormfront was known as the supe Liberty, who was active in the 1970s. She is also the widowed Nazi wife of Vought founder Frederick Vought and the recipient of his first successful Compound V injection. Stormfront ages incredibly slowly, still appearing as a thirty-something year-old woman even though she is over a hundred years old. She can fly, shoot lightning from her hands with varying intensity, and according to her profile on The Boys’ Prime Video home page, “fling anything lighter than a 747 out of her path.” Stormfront can withstand tremendous physical damage – such as flying through buildings and being punched by other supes with enhanced strength – and has the ability to heal, although this ability does have its limits. After Becca and Homelander’s son, Ryan, loses control of his heat vision at the end of season 2, Stormfront is left with severe burns and is unable to regenerate her lost limbs.

Translucent

One of the original members of The Seven, Translucent (Alex Hassell) has the ability to appear invisible thanks to his skin, which is made out of a carbon meta material, like a diamond, that bends the light around him. He has to be completely naked in order for him to be perceived as totally invisible. As shown in Season 1, Translucent can stay invisible even when knocked unconscious by electric shock. Even though he can be knocked unconscious, his skin is bulletproof and virtually indestructible from the outside. However, as Frenchie (Tomer Capone), a member of The Boys, discovers, Translucent’s insides are just as “soft” as everyone else’s. This means that some strategically placed explosives in certain body cavities can take Translucent out despite his invulnerable skin.

Kimiko

Injected with Compound V as an adult, Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara) is an unwilling participant in Homelander’s plan to create super terrorists and expedite Vought’s partnership with the military. The Shining Light Liberation Army smuggled her into the U.S. and injected her with Compound V against her will. She joins The Boys after they free her and Frenchie gains her trust. Her powers include enhanced agility and super strength. She can snap someone’s neck or rip out their throat in seconds. Her body has incredible healing capabilities that allow her to quickly bounce back from any injury, including fatal ones. The only thing that has truly injured her thus far is Soldier Boy’s explosive powers, which take away her abilities temporarily until she reinjects herself with Compound V in season 3.

Soldier Boy

Soldier Boy (Jensen Ackles) is widely known as America’s first supe. He was given Compound V during WWII and became the face of America’s war efforts. He later became the leader of the superhero group Payback, until they turned him over to the Russians in 1984. Soldier Boy ages slowly, looking the same in 2022 as he did in the 1980s and during WWII. He has super strength, rivaling Homelander’s. He can lift a car and throw it through a building like it’s nothing, which is unfortunately how Mother’s Milk (Laz Alonso) lost many members of his family. He can withstand intense physical and chemical damage – he can take heat vision blasts, assault rifle bullets, and toxins that would decimate a mere mortal. After being experimented on by the Russians, Soldier Boy can emit an explosive blast that can take out buildings and take away the powers of any supe that can survive it.

Lamplighter

A former member of The Seven, Lamplighter (Shawn Ashmore) was sent to work at the Sage Grove Center, a psychiatric hospital that Vought uses for Compound V testing, after killing Colonel Mallorey’s (Laila Robins) grandchildren instead of her as he intended. Lamplighter has the ability to manipulate fire, primarily using a lighter as his flame-source when we meet him at Sage Grove, although he does have a torch staff that has greater fire-power (pun intended) during a season 2 flashback that shows The Boys and Mallory blackmailing Lamplighter into helping them. Unfortunately, he can’t create flames on his own and he is still susceptible to fire. Lamplighter dies after lighting himself on fire while helping Hughie (Jack Quaid) sneak into Vought tower.

Victoria Neuman

When we first meet U.S. Congresswoman Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit) in season 2, she is vocally anti-Vought and calls for hearings to hold them accountable. She works with The Boys and Mallory to find witnesses and later spearheads the Federal Bureau of Superhuman Affairs in season 3. However, it turns out that Neuman is a supe, and the adopted daughter of Vought CEO Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito). She has the ability to make another person’s body explode, although she seems to favor the head.

Ryan Butcher

The son of Becca Butcher (Shantel VanSanten) and Homelander, Ryan Butcher (Cameron Crovetti) has many of the same powers as his father, although he doesn’t quite know how to control them yet. His first attempts at flying aren’t very successful (Homelander basically throws him off the roof of his house), but by the end of season 3, Ryan is able to join his father in the air. Ryan also has super strength, durability, and enhanced senses – so far only smell and hearing that we know of. Unfortunately he discovers that he can shoot lasers from his eye after accidentally killing Becca while trying to save her from Stormfront. Ryan is the first supe to be born naturally and not created by Compound V. Once he gains control of his powers, he will likely be even more powerful than Homelander.

Supersonic

Supersonic (Miles Gaston Villanueva) briefly joins The Seven in season 3 after winning the Vought reality competition “American Hero.” He becomes an ally to Starlight thanks to their past as friends and romantic partners during their days in the teen hero circuit. He has super strength and the ability to create sonic waves by clapping his hands together. Supersonic is also a talented singer, and is a former member of the boyband Super-Sweet.

Blue Hawk

Blue Hawk (Nick Wechsler) is a local supe who is called out by A-Train for over-policing Black neighborhoods. His powers include super strength, durability, and stamina – he is able to throw people across the room without issue and survived the explosion caused by Solider Boy during Herogasm. However, none of these abilities kept him from dying when A-Train dragged Blue Hawk’s body behind him at super speeds as revenge for paralyzing his brother.

Payback

Before The Seven, the supe team Payback were Vought’s chosen heroes. Aside from their leader Soldier Boy and eventual member of The Seven, Black Noir, members of the team include Crimson Countess (Laurie Holden), Gunpowder (Sean Patrick Flannery and Gattlin Griffith), Swatto (Joel Labelle), Mindstorm (Ryan Blakely), and the TNT Twins.

Crimson Countess has slightly enhanced strength, but her primary power is generating balls of fire that she can throw at her opponents. However, her hands have to be in a specific position in order for her to use this power, if her hands are tied up separately she’s effectively powerless.

Gunpowder can shoot a firearm with enhanced accuracy – he can even bounce bullets off of other objects in order to hit his intended target. While not directly mentioned, he likely also has enhanced regeneration or healing abilities, seeing as Soldier Boy beat him frequently without killing him or leaving any lasting visible damage.

As his name suggests, Swatto has insect-like abilities. He has retractable wings similar to those of a dragonfly that allow him to fly through the air and, unfortunately for him, straight into Russian missiles in Nicaragua when Payback tries to help the CIA in 1984.

Mindstorm has telepathic abilities that allows him to see into the minds of others. He is most known for using this ability to control the actions of others and trapping his enemies within a never-ending nightmare, as he does to Billy Butcher in season 3.

The TNT Twins, Tommy (Jack Doolan) and Tessa (Kristen Booth), have the ability to produce explosive bolts of energy, but only when they’re holding hands with each other. Their abilities also weaken after years of not using them.

All three seasons of The Boys are available to stream on Prime Video now. Season 4 has been confirmed and has started filming.