The Boys' Antony Starr Is Partially To Blame For Homelander's Bizarre Milk Motif
As gory as "The Boys" has been over the years, the most haunting moment in the series is not a moment of violence. As bad as Robin's death was, or as gross as it was to see poor Deep eat his octopus friend, the most disturbing moment might actually be the early season 2 episode where Homelander (Antony Starr) drinks a bottle of milk. It's not just any milk, mind you: It's the recently-thawed breast milk of his recently-deceased (well, recently-murdered) lover, Miss Madelyn Stillwell.
But that's still not enough context. To understand the full depravity of this scene, you must also know that Stillwell and Homelander had a bizarre mother/son sexual dynamic throughout season 1, and Homelander spent several episodes jealous of Stillwell's baby, who she was breastfeeding regularly. It's only armed with that information that we can understand just how weird it is to see a horny Homelander warm up Stillwell's weeks-old frozen breastmilk and drink it when no one's watching. And of course, he doesn't just drink the milk; first he smells it, inhaling its aroma. Then he sticks his tongue in, licking the milk almost like a cat. It's only then that he fully gives into his desires, chugging the rest of the milk like his life depends on it. Ashley walks in on him at the end and he immediately stops, embarrassed.
"Yeah, the milk thing has really taken on a life of its own," Starr explained in a 2022 GQ interview. Describing that first scene where he drinks Stillwell's breastmilk, Starr said, "It was one of those moments where I was like, 'Oh, we just gotta go for it.' ... So I email [showrunner Eric Kripke]: 'Buddy, that was so much fun. It was so funny. I think we gotta do more.'"
Got milk?
Kripke, who wrote the initial milk scene, is no stranger to exploring the weird fetishes of these otherworldly Supes, so Starr's enthusiasm was all he needed to hear. "And he was like, 'I'm way ahead of you, man,'" Starr said. "'I've seen the dailies and you get ready to drink milk.'" Since then, milk has become an inseparable part of Homelander's character: It's a perfect, deranged metaphor for his longing for a genuine mother figure, a desire that is disturbingly wrapped-up in his desire for a lover. It's also very funny.
"It just became this little motif," Starr said. "And it's really demented, which actually in a weird way opened a lot of doors into the character and into how weird we could go. And then we've really exploited that entirely in season 3. Season 3, it doesn't not factor in." Sure enough, the milk motif keeps growing: Soon he's drinking it with the doppelganger Supe who's pretending to be Stillwell, then he's drinking it while hanging out with his son, then he's milking a cow in season 3 ... Homelander just loves his milk, and who are we to judge him for it?
This all, of course, raises the question of what season 4 will bring us. Just as The Deep's octopus fetish escalated over the first few seasons, there's no doubt that Homelander's obsession with milk will reach new heights the next time around. In season 2, he's chugging a small bottle of milk. In season 3, he's chugging an entire pail. How much is he gonna drink in season 4? We're not sure if we want to find out.