Homelander vs Hancock (The Boys vs Hancock): Round 1 Fight Blogs

 

(Round 1 Fight)

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"Heroes and villains always have the same backstory - pain. The difference is what they choose to do about it. The villain says, ‘The world hurt me, so I am going to hurt it back.’ The hero says, ‘The world hurt me, so I am going to make sure it doesn’t hurt anybody else.’”

-Chris Choi

Homelander, the psychotic “superhero” mass murder of The Boys

Hancock, drunken asshole turned heroic defender of New York City

When the world needs a hero and the chips are down, you won't always get a Superman to sweep you off your feet. No, sometimes, the cruel nature of reality leaks into the profession, and that includes the most evil aspect of modern life: social media. It can turn a hopeful child into a psychotic attention-starved murderer, or a depressed immortal to a reformed hero, but now? It puts some of the strongest super-beings on the planet in a Clash of Titans.

Round 1: FIGHT!!!

Before We Start…

Both Homelander and Hancock will receive their standard media. Homelander will be composited between the original comic and the current show of The Boys, given he is pretty much the same in both iterations. That includes spin-offs set in the same universe, like Diabolical and Gen V. For Hancock, he just has the one movie, of which we will include the original and extended cuts. Due to this limited nature, we will also be looking at extended interviews and features found on special versions of the DVD, which explain a little more about Hancock’s powers. We will also look at the script “Tonight, He Comes” which was the original blueprint for Hancock’s story. It features the same premise of the movie (Hancock is basically the same guy, a couple gets introduced to his life, havoc ensues, etc) where it can be generally used as supporting evidence. 

Also, obvious content warning in the case of The Boys, which contains extensive profanity, violence, sexual content, non-stop political allegories for some reason, and the list goes on. If you’d rather not read that (understandable), we recommend you take our word for it and stay away from the links if need be. Enough of that though, let's get into it!

Huge thank you to Flip, French, and Aggravating_Floorgor for visuals/images!

Sources used:

• Omni-Man vs Homelander G1 Blog

• Homelander Respect Thread

• Billy Butcher Respect Thread

• Stormfront Respect Thread

• Soldier Boy Respect Thread

Background

Homelander

“You guys… you are the real heroes.”

In a strange and warped version of the world we know, a company known as Vought International practically monopolized the idea of a superhero. Starting back in World War II through Frederick Vought, this esteemed geneticist created the formula for Compound V; a super-soldier serum that can turn any who take it into a veritable Demigod. After success in projects like Soldier Boy, Vought’s future was set, but all companies need a mascot to frontrun their image. Soldier Boy served his purpose for a few decades, but eventually his fame began to wane, so Vought put all their effort into getting rid of him, or simply, replacing him. After attaining his DNA through tests and such, they made a child destined for greatness horror, and trained him both body and mind to be the strongest man on the planet. He was once known as John, but he’d much prefer you’d call him Homelander or he’ll flay you alive.

Homelander grew up with psychological and physical training to serve Vought’s purposes, and by the time he was 18, he was exactly as they needed; a subservient puppet driven only by emotion and attention that would thrash out should he not get his way. Thanks to manipulation from Madeline Stillwell and Stan Edgar, Homelander spiraled deeper into this hole, becoming all the more a self-absorbed narcissist thanks to it. He began to view humans as beneath him, and akin to a God himself thanks to his Supe-status. Unable to shed that viewpoint, nor his need for affection from the masses, Homelander went about his time in an uncaring fashion for any but himself. He formed the super-team “the Seven” and just did, in his words… “whatever the f*ck he wants.” This included a forced “meeting” with one Rebecca Butcher, the wife of CIA operative Billy Butcher. Said meeting resulted in her getting pregnant and bearing a child she named Ryan, though Homelander never knew that, simply believing he killed her.

Flash-forward a while, and Billy was starved for revenge to the point of organizing his own team of “The Boys” to combat Vought and the Seven in general. This put Homelander in contact with someone who wouldn’t back down to pressure, and for the first time in his adult life, he was challenged. Intrigued, Homelander began a blood-soaked rivalry with Billy, which eventually led the both of them to discover that Rebecca was alive, as was Ryan, and Homelander had a son in the latter. He even found a fellow Supe of similar mind in Stormfront (an actual Nazi btw) and began a… relatively unhealthy lovers engagement with her. Despite finding the closest thing he had to actual happiness, it was soon stripped of him as Ryan was turned against him and subsequently damaged Stormfront beyond repair. 

Now losing what little grasp he had on sanity, which was furthered by the return and reveal of Soldier Boy, his father, Homelander lost virtually everything thanks to an ally turned enemy, Starlight. With her and The Boys working against him, on top of navigating the tenacious at best relationship with the media, Homelander did manage to lure Ryan back to his side and land in the White House, but it will never last. He has only ever experienced pain, and because of that, he will inflict that pain on anybody without quarrel. As he said, he is the Homelander, and he really can do whatever he wants.

Hancock

“Good job!”

Picture this: A highway chase between gun-toting joyriders and San Francisco’s boys in blue. Only one man can save the day! …and he’s currently hungover; passed out on the street. A boy wakes him up, and his reaction causes the boy to cuss him out. He then grabs his booze, tries to grab a leg, and takes off with enough force to destroy the area beneath him. This man nearly crashes into a plane, ACTUALLY crashes into a street sign that causes the police to crash, and proceeds to impale the runaway thugs car on a building spike because they broke his glasses. He doesn’t sound much like a superhero, right? Well, just you wait, because this is the story of how he became a true hero. This is the story of John Hancock.

Hancock woke up 80 years ago in a Miami hospital, with his skull fractured and a heaping helping of amnesia as a result. All he had to his name were his clothes, his bubblegum, a pair of tickets to Boris Karloff’s Frankenstein, and nobody to pick him up. As his hope left him, something else filled that hole, when he mysteriously healed his injuries in an hour, while an IV broke against his skin. With no explanation to that or how he inherited abilities beyond the scope of mankind, Hancock could only latch onto a makeshift name, which he got from the hospital asking him for his “John Hancock.” With growing depression, amnesia, and all sorts of nasty feelings at a world he couldn’t even grow old in, Hancock had nothing but a desire to shed his loneliness. He may have the power to tear your arm off in a friendly arm-wrestling contest, or the ability to release with enough force to make “fun-time” an impossibility, but his powers could do what others couldn’t so he became a superhero, in his own way. 

In current day San Francisco, even that desire to help others, due to a longing for acceptance and love, had all but faded. He didn’t care about the world, and he didn’t care about the damage he caused. Why would he? He’s basically a demigod, and it’s not like anybody on Earth could stop him… but nobody could connect with him either, because he distanced himself from the world. All the drinking and self-loathing in the world couldn’t fix it, but ironically, a regular man could. Ray Embrey was a man who wanted to change the world through spreading acts of good will, like through his idea of the All-Heart logo; a sign that a company or organization was dedicated to being better. Not everybody was as star-eyed as he was, and he had begun to lose hope, until Hancock saved his life from a train. Maybe it was the crowd’s reaction to the damage he caused, maybe it was his relating to Hancock’s situation of the world laughing or yelling at him, but Ray stood up for John. He may not have been able to change the world for the better, but he could change one person, and really, that was enough. 

Ray set his heart on helping Hancock become a better hero, and although John was originally skeptical, both Ray’s wife Mary and Ray’s son Aaron intrigued him for different reasons. Aaron all but idolized him, and Hancock simply felt strange when he was with Mary. More than that, Hancock finally met someone that broke through his cynicism and helped him release that he did care. He did want to help people, and he would be miserable forever, until he accepted that. So, Hancock reduced himself to a mere mortal under the laws of man, and went to prison for the damage he caused. After a bit of therapy and hero lessons from Ray, Hancock was eventually called to help with a hostage situation at the bank, where he returned with a new suit, and a new outlook. For the first time in who knows how long, Hancock was met with applause and appreciation with his actions, or more befittingly, a piece of the love he was searching for since he walked out of the hospital all those years ago. 

That love was no oddity either, as his meeting Ray was more akin to fate than a cosmic accident. Remember his wife, Mary? She was actually the same kind of demigod Hancock was, where they were members of a mythic race created by a higher power. All the members of their race were made in pairs, to eventually lose their god-like power and die after having known love with each other. As the last pair on the planet, Hancock and Mary were frequently chased by humans who thought them monsters, which resulted in more than one scar on John’s body, like the fracture 80 years ago. When she saw that Hancock would not remember her, Mary remembered all the times he had nearly died for her, and left him alone, thinking he would be better off without her. As John became more human from spending time with her and they worked through their issues, the robbers from the bank returned for revenge. Despite his sadness and weakness from becoming mortal, Hancock still managed to save Mary, Ray, and everyone else in that hospital. With tears and blood in his eyes, Hancock flew away, leaving Mary to her family and himself to solitude once more. However, his time as a human genuinely changed him, and he became committed to changing the world, which started with placing Ray’s All-Heart logo on the Moon. After forever reminding the world that they can change, that they can be better, and moving to New York to be a hero once more? What else can we say to you, Mr. Hancock, but “Good Job.”

Experience & Skill

Homelander

From day one of his conception, Homelander was molded to be the perfect “superhero” by Vought, and was put through intensive testing for him to be the best of the best. Practicing his powers even as a child, Homelander was trained in battles against seemingly stronger supes than him, put on multiple military or assassination missions to “clean up” the company’s mess, and he even learned impressive stealth skills. Despite having received basically no fighting nor formal combat training, Homelander is surprisingly not a half bad fighter (at least not as inept as some think). While his combat does show his inexperience with the wide big, dramatic punches and haymakers he throws nevertheless he has enough dexterity to block, dodge, and co9iunter attacks from Queen Maeve who is quite the skilled combatant with extensive combat training.

It's not really out of the ordinary either, as while he can't stack up to their skill, he can still prevail in solo fights against Billy Butcher and Soldier Boy; both of whom having had decades of military experience prior. While he ultimately got killed by his clone in the comics, it’s not to say he didn’t go down without putting up an insane (off screen) fight. For reference Black Noir was mutilated beyond recognition, with an arm barely still attached, an eye missing, guts hanging out, and lower body sections completely charred. Just goes to show how terrifying Homelander is in this department, same as anywhere else really.

Hancock

Despite his more careless beginnings, Hancock became an incredibly skilled hero by the film's end. His own memories start in the 1920’s, where he quickly discovered his powers and became a hero over 80 years due to his immortality. In that time, he’s fought crime naked, put out apartment fires, and jailed most of the current inmates in a prison. He may also seem like a drunken bum most of the time, but he’s pretty smart when the situation calls for it, like when a conniving bank robber threatened dozens of hostages via explosives on a dead man’s switch. Solution? Sharpen a disc-like object and launch it to slice off the man's hand, keeping his finger on the trigger and saving the hostages in one move. Even when nearly human from power loss and suffering from gunshot wounds, he fought and defeated multiple former navy seals while protecting his friends. 

While technically lost memories at this point, Hancock also repeatedly saved his ex-wife Mary across the centuries and even millenia, from 4 B.C to 1850. Mary herself chalks this up to Hancock being literally built to be hero by their creator(s), more so than other members of their species, and Mary is another great example of Hancock’s skill. He did lose thousands of years of experience due to his amnesia, but Mary did not, and has been alive for at least 3,000 years, on top of having more experience using their more esoteric powers. Even so, Hancock matched and defeated her, making him much more than meets the eye.

Arsenal

Homelander

Compound V storage

Vought’s most prized possession, and it's most valuable asset. Compound V is a mysterious chemical substance that was created by a German geneticist during World War II; Frederick Vought. The serum mutates organic compounds by granting them profound and strange characteristics which is the source of all of Homelander’s abilities.

Homelander carries an entire storage of vials of the chemical and in the comics, he has taken it directly to dope himself. As seen with A-Train and Popclaw, the recreational use of Compound V can induce a euphoric high and temporarily enhance a Supe’s abilities. While how much precisely is unknown, a dose of Compound V in the comics can enhance a normal person from fifteen to twenty times their normal physicality, (though it's unlikely to boost a Supe to that degree). However, in the long run it will ironically weaken and harm them, as Compound V acts in a very similar way to steroids when injected into a Supe's bloodstream. A-Train has suffered from testicular atrophy, low bone density, and heart problems as a consequence of his abuse of the drug. In the short run those problems are unlikely to show up.

Supe Suit

Ah, Homelander’s iconic, flamboyant, and patriotic suit (which is definitely not padded whatsoever). Apart from just looking good, the suit is surprisingly resilient, and managed to come out of a factory explosion unharmed. 

Yummers

Creamy delicious milkshake 

Hancock

Supersuit

While initially opposed to this suit, Hancock was talked into it by Ray due to the purpose and commitment it held as a showcase to the world that he was taking things seriously. Despite his qualms, the suit is surprisingly pretty impressive, given it appears unscratched from gunfire or his flight speed, which he has noted is fast enough to tear a normal person’s face off.

Abilities

Homelander

Supes Physiology

Due to having been exposed to high amounts of compound V while still in Utero (and a genetic makeup highly compatible with the chemical agent due to his father’s DNA), it’s no surprise that Homelander is by far the strongest superhero on the planet. Supes are obviously superhumanly strong, fast, and durable; leaps and bounds beyond any mortal human. Even specialized high caliber bullets wouldn't scratch him, and other high tier Supes have internal tissue and organs just as durable as their outer skin. Neurons in Supe’s brains fire at an increased rate, making it so Homelander’s speed also includes increased perception. 

Supes are also far more resilient to injuries than others, and can keep going even when in a, frankly, nightmarish physical state. Homelander himself continued to fight even after having his jaw punched off in the comics by Black Noir, who was a stronger clone of him. As a bonus, due to having so little challenge in his universe, Homelander rarely goes all out whether he realizes it or not. Once the situation and adrenaline really kick in, he gains enough of a boost to break out of the hold that Butcher, Hughie and Soldier Boy had him in, despite him not being able to get out before.

Additional point while not a factor being composited between versions as the Show Homelander does age at a normal rate (Soldier Boy and Stromfront had a different earlier version of V with the anti aging properties) but in the comics, Supe’s age much slower than humans.

Heat Vision

As his deadliest (and most spammed) tool, Homelander can generate and fire raw energy from his eyes capable of slicing humans into paste or destroying entire airplanes instantly. Furthermore, those beams are extremely hot, being stated by Homelander himself to be able to reach 500 Degrees Fahrenheit. His heat vision has been shown to match Butcher's own version, which is impressive, given that it could burn even Soldier Boy's skin. In relation to that, Soldier Boy withstood oxy-acetylene flames during torture/experimentation (despite clear pain), which range from 3,000 to 5,400 degrees Fahrenheit depending on intensity and such, along with what part burns you. 

Flight

In typical superhero fashion, Homelander can fly in the air with perfect control of his direction and control of movement. He has shown the ability to fly at or over supersonic speeds, and has even implied he could go all the way to space (Albeit was done offscreen) 

X-Ray Vision

Homelander wouldn’t be a Superman homage blimey rip-off without his classic X-Ray Vision. He can see through any solid object or surface, with the exception of objects and surfaces that are lined with zinc, implying that he only has low energy photon x-ray vision. He once X-rayed Stan Edgar, stating that he is very close to a coronary because his blood is like engine oil. This can be used to see through people and their insides, allowing him to detect any anomaly or medical issue in a split second or “spy” on others

Enhanced Senses 

Naturally, all Supes have a wider range of hearing than normal humans; being able to hear up to 200.000 Hz. Homelander specifically has great examples of this, which allows him to catch on to barely audible words not meant for him to hear (as seen above) or notice explosions from far away. He can even hear the beat of your heart or the neurons firing in your brain. Furthermore, Homelander possesses an amazing olfactory sense, and is able to locate explosives or identify individuals by scent. For example, he smelled Billy Butcher's scent on Queen Maeve, and identified Hughie by a single drop of sweat instantly like a bloodhound. 

Supersonic Screaming

Like the manchild he is, Homelander can throw a fit and scream his heart out (and yours too). His shouts are loud enough to make the inner ear and cochlea of an entire airplane’s worth of passengers explode and burst in a biology mess, while he himself is unaffected at its epicenter.

Regeneration

Not only has it been stated that Supes in general recover from injuries faster than a normal human, but Homelander himself has regenerated from a pretty mean scar on his face in a short amount of time in the comics. In the show, Homelander received a bleed in his ear after being stabbed with a metal straw by Queen Maeve. However, when he introduces his son Ryan to his and Stormfront's supporters at Vought Tower the next day, the wound in his ear had already disappeared.

Resurrection

On top of the regenerative properties of Compound V, it also is present within Homelander’s brain, and as long as the body is still in enough of a stable state to recover, the regeneration will kick in; bringing him back “from the dead” so to speak however it has a 100% chance of causing permanent brain damage leaving the individual as a vegetable.

Social Influencing/Charisma

Homelander’s stage presence and sheer charisma is frankly so unbelievable that it is basically a separate superpower to name a few; he managed to keep the support of his fans for so many years. He managed to recover his social image even after killing an innocent man, dating an actual 100 year old Nazi and getting exposed for locking Maeve up. His crowd straight up cheered for him when he killed a random person in broad daylight.

Resistances

• Extreme Temperatures: As a child, Homelander was kept in a super-oven for hours on end without his skin being burned, despite the fact that the heat was high enough to kill a normal human in seconds and reduce him to basically ash. He should also be as tough as his father Soldier Boy, who could survive Oxy-Acetylene flames (3,000 to 5,400 Degrees Fahrenheit) without scarring. Although his powers work differently, we could also compare Homelander to Translucent, whose skin was noted as fireproof.

• Acid: Weaker Supes have shown to be unaffected by sulfuric acid, and Soldier boy was experimented on with it as well.

• Poison: Homelander should be comparable to his father Soldier Boy, who is immune to almost every single poison and chemical agent on the planet. Even something as deadly as the Novichok Nerve Agent only amounted to knocking him out for a time.

• Viruses: According to him, Anthrax wouldn't be able to hurt him and Ryan. More notably, according to Sameer (a highly skilled scientist) a virus capable of killing Homelander would need to be so potent that it would lead to a global pandemic and kill all other Supes in the process suggesting that supes with strong enough cellular durability are resistant to its normal version which Butcher backs up being confident that the standard sample is not strong enough.

• Mind Manipulation: Generally speaking, Homelander should compare to Soldier Boy, who could resist Mindstorm’s mind probe.

Hancock

Demigod Physiology

Before he made their idea synonymous with “superhero,” Hancock’s species was called Gods, Angels, and many other mythic forms across the millenia. Even more then others though, Hancock was made to save mankind as a hero and a failsafe policy by whatever legitimate God created him. Thanks to this genetic lottery of legendary traits, Hancock is ludicrously strong, fast, and can fly at supersonic speeds. This extends to making simple physical attributes much more enhanced, like how his nails are sharp enough to slice cleanly through glass, or his hair being only able to be shaved by those nails, or his “releasing” being physically dangerous to mortal women (where have I heard that before… ). It also does wonders for his senses, like letting him see and catch a child he threw out of sight, or easily making a shot from across the court (which would need great accuracy among much more). His nature as a Demigod is directly related to Mary, and the closer they are, the more he loses his powers. This is meant to act as a way for the immortal to become mortal and experience the beauty of it, eventually dying as a result as opposed to their natural immortality. However, if you stayed away from your other half, the opposite would happen. 

As Mary puts it “the further away you get from me, the better you’re gonna feel”, and at the end of the movie, doing so showcased that in rather absurd terms. For context, he was shot multiple times, as was Mary, and due to their nature as beings literally made for each other, their pain was shared. So, every time Hancock got shot, Mary experienced the pain of it, and he in turn experienced that pain, convoluted as it sounds. That is important because Mary was on the verge of death for all of this while Hancock was fighting, as was he the more damage he sustained, but he still managed to leave the building. The moment he did, he gained much more of his powers (he was literally nearly dead on the ground moments ago), to the point that he could fly away and ignore the several fatal wounds he had, while doing so in turn increased Mary’s own powers to bring her in turn back from the brink of death. In layman’s terms, you could take this example to mean the further Hancock resists fate’s pull to be with Mary, the stronger he gets, and the greater his powers work.

Flight

Similar to most superheroes from godly races and beings, Hancock can fly like an eagle to save (or crash into) anything at speeds that would literally tear face off.

Invulnerability

Hancock can get… quite reckless while drunk, so it’s a good thing he’s more than tough enough to tank whatever damage he causes. His skin is pretty much unbreakable, and more than enough to earn the term of invulnerability. He’s been shown and stated to ignore bullets even higher than 50 Caliber without a scratch, which even extends to his eyes. He is also resistant to other methods of piercing his skin, like how an IV would ordinarily break against it. 

Immortality/Healing Factor

Even in the event his invulnerability isn’t enough to stop your assault, good luck actually killing Hancock due to his immortal body. Physically, he’s been the same age for 80 years, but Mary has revealed he’s been around for over 3,000 years, and shown the examples to prove it. Undying isn’t just related to that, as his actual stamina and healing examples are just as busted. He healed a fractured skull in an hour while regaining his powers back when he got amnesia, and he was able to remain conscious after multiple gunshot wounds while also much weaker than he only is.

After that and his already being weakened after his fight with Mary, Hancock still fought like he always did, which included getting stabbed in the back, repeatedly being smashed in the face with an oxygen tank, being caught in an explosion from said oxygen tank, and being choked before killing the man who did all of that. He even managed to push his limits further beyond when he was shot 3 times by Red, yet he still managed to push past that and fly away based on his powers increasing the further he got from Mary. Speaking of, Mary should be comparable to him, and she was shot multiple times by a shotgun before he fought those thugs.

Storm & Tornado Creation

Befitting the mythical connection to legends of old, along with the Grecian and Egyptian parallels, Hancock has created massive storms of mythic proportions when battling Mary. Specifically, both of them are connected to the weather and to each other according to Will Smith, making the storm a direct result of their powers clashing. Featurettes for the movie also clarify that Mary created the lightning present, while Hancock created the massive tornadoes, which does line up with dynamic shots made. The directors have also implied Hancock controls the weather in general, which doesn’t seem too far-fetched when the stormy weather the pair created became a snowstorm, or when bringing up Mary’s electrokinesis seems to extend to raw heat/energy. 

Resistances

• Heat (Limited, see Weaknesses) - Hancock has put out Apartment Fires manually, and exited it without any physical injuries, which is impressive, given house fires can reach 1,500 degrees Fahrenheit. Granted, he was clearly unhappy about it, and noted he was hot while explaining actions in a video he took. That then becomes something he can take more then others, but not to an unlimited degree. On a similar note, he was also noted to fly to the moon at some point over a month and back as well, meaning he dealt with the temperatures in escape velocity and re-entry. Impressive, considering these temperatures can reach 3,000 to 7,000 degrees Fahrenheit.

• Radiation/Extreme Temperatures - It was revealed by Hancock at the end of the film that he spent time off Earth to place the All-Heart logo on the moon, and this would by nature mean he endured the heat of escape velocity/re-entry, as well as the coldness of Outer Space. It was also obviously over multiple hours, meaning he can either hold his breath for that long or he simply can breath in space without issue.

Feats

Homelander

Overall

• Became the most popular superhero on the planet and the leader of the Seven

• Murdered countless people over his life

• Fought on par with Soldier Boy, the previously strongest man on the planet

• Killed the President and took over the White House

• Defeated Professor Banzai, Black Noir (show only), Queen Maeve

• Gets a 1% of merchandise sales

Power

• Can toss an entire fighter jet with one hand

• Quite literally rips WebWeaver apart

• Can bend steel without breaking a sweat

• Reduced an entire platoon into a puddle of blood large enough to cover a hangar

• Lifts up a dude who weighs 800 lbs 

• Stated that he could wipe New York “off the map” along with other cities, where the Artbook also notes he can level a city in a relatively short time frame (1.26 - 6.34 Kilotons for Fragmentation, 4.23 - 21.25 Kilotons for Violent Fragmentation, see before the Verdict)

• With his heat vision he can

• Split an airplane into two  (0.0133 Tons of TNT)

Speed

• Broke the sound barrier as a child (>Mach 1)

• Move at supersonic speeds (Mach 1.5)

• Homelander was able to slow down his perception speed, making bullets move in slow motion and disarming the gunmen before most could react.

• Homelander was able to outspeed a C4 explosion (Mach 18.2) 

• Has flown from New York to Washington D.C and Washington D.C. to Hollywood in short timeframes (Potentially Mach 70.3)

Durability

• Was practically unharmed after being crushed under a train and likely hundreds of tons of rubble

• Completely unfazed by gunfire

• Unbothered and unmoved by Queen Maeve throwing someone at him

• Tanked several blows from Queen Maeve in their fight (shown above)

• When he was a teenager, Homelander survived a chemical plant explosion without much damage (289 - 754 Tons of TNT)

Hancock

Overall

• “Saved” San Francisco and ACTUALLY saved it multiple times

• Became a hero in New York City

• Overcame his depression and alcoholism to become a true hero

• Made the Moon an advertisement

• Saved Mary and her family while his powers were nearly gone

• Defeated Mary in a city-wide battle

• Surprisingly very popular in vs edits

• WE’RE GETTING A SEQUEL BOIS

• This seriously got announced a few days before we finished the blog. What are the odds lol.

(DISCLAIMER: Due to Hancock’s power fluctuating throughout the film, we’ll be listing phases as “states” for the context in which he performed these feats)

Power

Weakened/Injured

• Tossed multiple thugs out of a building

• Threw a wheelchair to seriously damage medical equipment

• Threw a bed through walls to crush some thugs

• Smashed through a wall just by walking backwards

Casual

• When he reaches the moment, he can… “release” with enough force to blast through the top of a trailer

• Literally shoved a man’s head up another man’s ass

• Ripped a prison door off its hinges

• Tore off the back of a car, and has lifted or tossed cars elsewhere multiple times

• Frequently destroyed the ground beneath him from taking off or landing while flying

• Threw a Blue Whale into the distance (Don’t worry, he survived - Ray)

• Deflected a bazooka shot that blew up a car

• Implied by Ray that he can destroy or heavily damage a building

Serious

• Ran and clashed with Mary, with their attacks wrecking and smashing all sorts of objects

• Created a storm over San Francisco while fighting his ex-wife Mary (219.760 Kilotons overall, 109.880 Kilotons for Hancock, See Before the Verdict) 

• Carved the All-Heart symbol on the Moon (105.927 Teratons - 2.834 Petatons of TNT overall, 1.226 - 32.796 Gigatons of TNT realistically, see Before the Verdict)

Speed

Weakened/Injured

• Nothing notable

Casual

• Threw a Zagnut bar with enough velocity to kill a man and bash him through a window

• DVD Featurettes showcasing animated script sections have him directly throw it in tandem with the bullet (Mach 2)

• Threw a french brat into the air and out of sight in an instant (Mach 15.299)

• Made a sonic boom while flying, to the point that the filmmakers have dubbed it “his trademark” (>Mach 1)

• This scene also implies his actions are faster than eyesight, which the filmmakers conversation of the scene gives credence to (Mach 19.55)

• Has noted while flying that an average person would need a helmet so their face “doesn’t tear off” from the speed of it, and that he has seen Earth as a planet from the sky

Serious

• Quickly flew back to San Francisco from his home on the outskirts

• Flew to the Moon in a relatively short timeframe (Mach 311.3, see Before the Verdict)

• At bare minimum this is Mach 33 due to Escape Velocity

Durability

Weakened/Injured

• Nothing notable

Casual

• While flying, he has bashed through highway signs and smashed through multiple buildings without damage

• Was implied by Red able to survive a C4 explosion from several hostages

• There were at least 8 hostages (many more in the Unrated cut) with 8 lbs of C4 strapped to all of them, and Red stated he would “blow up this entire building”, which would leave their blood on Hancock’s hands.

• Unharmed by any of his drunken destruction, like when he completely halted a freight train (at least 15 cars) by standing still

Serious

• Got slammed down by a truck from Mary and was up without much damage a moment later

• Tanked several blows from Mary during their fight

Scaling

Homelander

The Seven

As the leader of the Seven, and the world's strongest superhero team, Homelander should certainly compare and upscale to all members of it, be it the current members or past ones. He’s had his fair share of times showing this (choking out Starlight with one hand, scaring the pants of Deep and A-Train, one-shotting Black Noir, beating Maeve, etc), and we know he is objectively the strongest Supe in the world, so it’s clear where he stands in the series opposed to them.

The Deep has…

• (Comics) Survived a full collision with a plane

• (Show) Could survive being 2 miles underwater (4,699 psi)

Starlight has…

• Lifted the back end of a buick and held it in place with one arm

• Been shot by a sniper rifle

• Tanked blasts from Stormfront

• Stunned Stormfront with her blasts and helped beat her up with Kimiko/Maeve

• Blasted back Soldier Boy with her powers after gaining enough energy (she didn’t do any major damage, but impressive nonetheless)

A-Train has…

• (Comics) Launched a supervillain through a wall

• (Comics) Can run at Mach 3 (Mach 3, lol) 

• (Comics) Moved FTE to Starlight

• (Show) Reduced robin to Gore (437 Kilojoules)

• (Show) Ran at a speed of 371 m/s (Mach 1.0816)

• (Show) Outran bullets as a child (>Mach 2)

• (Show) Can reportedly cover all of Manhattan in 30 minutes

• He also stated he could cover all of New York City in 3 hours

• (Show) Blitzed and beat up The Deep

• (Show) Smashed Kimiko through a wall

• (Show) Vought’s cameras apparently need to be 5,000 fps to catch glimpses of A-Train (See Before the Verdict)

Black Noir has…

• (Comics) No-sold a plane explosion

• (Show) Slammed Starlight through a wall, smashed her through a pillar, and nearly killed her

• (Show) Fought and defeated Kimiko

• (Show) Knocked out and captured Maeve off-screen

• When Maeve saved Starlight from Noir, she resorted to exploiting his allergies instead of a blatant fight. This acts as more support of the threat he poses to her

Queen Maeve has…

• No-sold smashing through a runaway armored truck (6.3 Megajoules)

• Was the main player in jumping Queen Maeve with Kimiko and Starlight, and worked together with them to force her retreat

• Stated in profiles to be the strongest alumni of God U (which includes The Deep and A-Train)

• Was stated by Homelander in a deleted scene to be alongside him as “the two most powerful people on the planet”

• Of note, this scene was before Season 3, where other characters (Temp V Billy and Soldier Boy) showed up, as well as its canonicity being questionable, but it should be fine as supporting evidence for her own standing in the series.

Stormfront has…

• (Comics) Created a Sonic Boom (>Mach 1)

• (Show) Stated she could fly from New York City to the Sage Grove Center and back in 20 minutes (Mach 1.327)

• (Show) Threw a car a large distance with her lightning

• (Show) Blew up part of an Apartment Complex (0.016483355641 Tons of TNT)

• (Show) Bashed Homelander across a room during… fun time

• (Show) Her character bio states that she is capable of "flinging anything lighter than a 747 out of her path".

• (Comics) Stormfront was enlisted by Vought to destroy areas of land in Indonesia that neither hurricane nor tidal wave could do (46.63 Kilotons - 12.66 Megatons of TNT, debatable, see Before the Verdict)

The Boys

Similar to the Seven, Homelander certainly upscales or scales to all the members present. He obviously upscales humans with no V (Frenchie and M.M), but has also proven superior to other characters the likes of Kimiko have scaling to (A-Train & Black Noir). In regards to Billy and Hughie, it took them, as well as Soldier Boy, to overcome him via hax methods, and he was winning that fight before Hughie jumped in. Thus, anything they can do, so too can he.

Billy Butcher…

• (Comics) Billy crushed a gun with his bare hands 

• (Comics) Dodged lightning from Stormfront

• (Show) Lifted and thrown by Stormfront’s lightning

• (Show) Matched Soldier Boy for a time before getting overwhelmed

• (Show) Pushed back and scarred Soldier Boy with his heat vision

Kimiko has…

• (Comics) Beat Tek-Knight, who has ​​a grip strength of 200 kg/cm^2 

• (Show) Been smashed through a wall by A-Train

• (Show) Fought Black Noir for a time

• (Show) Damaged Stormfront with her blows, and helped Starlight/Maeve force her to retreat

• In the comics, she dodged his lightning and damaged him with her strikes

Hughie has…

• (Comics) Outran Shout Out's electricity

• (Comics) Dodged explosions

• (Show) Was sent flying by a punch from Soldier Boy

Soldier Boy

Homelander’s father in surprise, and one of his most challenging foes. As the top dog before Homelander came on the scene, Soldier Boy is by far the strongest supe aside from him, and Homelander has matched him during Herogasm. While the actual disparity between who would win is a bit tenuous (Homelander held the advantage during their first meeting, Soldier Boy in the latter), we do know Homelander is generally stronger based on statements, so he should certainly compare at the least to Soldier Boy.

• Threw a car through an apartment building “like a freight train”

• Both his skin and mouth are bulletproof

• Consistently stated to be the strongest Supe of his time, and nearly as strong as Homelander himself

• Homelander even doubted his ability to defeat him

• Homelander considered him “bigger fish” than Queen Maeve

• Shoved nearly all of Payback off of him, and Beat Black Noir to a pulp 

• Caught and intercepted Kimiko’s attempt to sneak attack him

• His explosions have 

• Blasted Kimiko through a brick wall in his first yield

• Destroyed a building and killed 19 people (aftermath for reference)

• Killed Crimson Countess and destroys her house. It also blasted a shockwave that reached Starlight and Hughie from afar, and made a gate near them collapse

• Destroyed most of the Herogasm building. This killed 7 supes on top of many more. 

• Created a massive explosion that destroyed part of a building, which he also survived

Misc Supes

Like the others, Homelander has been stated as the strongest Supe on the planet, so he would compare to or upscale any value present.

• Tek-Knight has ​​a grip strength of 200 kg/cm^2 and can fly at 253 km/h (70.2778 m/s)

• Naquib destroyed a house. (0.1 tons of TNT)

• A random Supe froze part of a lake (411 Megajoules)

• Crimson Countess I can melt tanks with her power blasts ​​(14.8 - 19.6 tons of TNT)

• Certain Supes are capable of running at the speed of a leopard

• Jack from Jupiter claims his skin can’t be pierced by shots from an Anti-Tank Rifle

• Groundhawk dodged Nubia's lightning (Mach 624 - Mach 637)

• The Great Wide Wonder flew into Orbit in seconds, disbursing a cloud on the way (0.0109551538 tons of TNT and Mach 12.12 - Mach 20.778, see Before the Verdict)

• Billy Butcher claims that some Supes can fly to the moon, outrun tachyons, and swim in the Sun (See Before the Verdict)

Hancock

Mary

As Hancock’s literal soulmate and original wife, Mary shares basically all of the same powers as him, and is the only real comparison to gauge his upper limits. Beyond that, they obviously had a no-holds-barred fight that shredded nearly the entire city, which Hancock seemed victorious in. At the very least, it’s proof they are around equal, despite Mary’s claims that she is stronger, which we will discuss later. 

• Mary’s skin ignored Hancock poking her with a kitchen utensil, and bent it against her skin, while rolling pins swung against her head shattered

• Shoved Hancock back through her house to dent multiple cars

• Lifted a truck and slammed it on Hancock to smash the ground

• Tanked cratering the ground with Hancock

• Obviously fought him on even footing and such

• Created a storm over San Francisco while fighting Hancock (219.760 Kilotons overall, 109.880 Kilotons for Mary’s share, See Before the Verdict) 

Weaknesses

Homelander

As everyone knows, Homelander has a lot, and we do mean a LOT of issues. For starters, due to his childhood trauma and isolation, he developed a lot of mental illnesses, along with a dissociative identity disorder (coupled with an unhealthy dose of PTSD and mental instabilities). All of this filled his psyche with deep rooted insecurities, a need for a family, and acceptance from those around him, which can cause him to enter psychotic blackouts. Furthermore, Homelander has quite the ego and superiority complex, and living in a world where no one can really measure up to him only solidified it. Having had his powers his entire life, he’s had very few actual battles or serious challenges, so his combat experience against people on his own level is very low. On top of it, as he never had any need to push himself past his limits, he doesn’t seem to have any actual combat training or additional skills past his powers. Hell, the whole premise of the series is superpowers in hands of people without the mental restraint nor skill to use them properly, so Homelander clearly isn’t the best example of this.

Hancock

(Credit to ifunny)

Obviously not much can actually stop Hancock in his world, but that doesn’t make him unstoppable. Should he be sufficiently weakened and given more damage than his healing factor can take, it’s likely he would perish, given Red had him about dead to rights before Ray killed him. Even without that weakness of flesh, he was shown an unpleasant reaction to heat after putting out an apartment fire, implying high levels of it could be heavily damaging or even fatal. Of course, his greatest weakness would be his mental state, where his getting drunk causes him to lose most if not all care for the area around him; becoming increasingly reckless as a result. He’s also had his fair share of depression thanks to virtual solitude in several separate avenues, and a more intelligent foe could potentially exploit this. 

Before The Verdict

Nuke-Lander?

One of the most famous arguments across The Boys’ standing in VS would definitely be the statements that indicate Homelander could survive a nuke. Since the top tiers can compare or downscale him, that then leads to nuke scaling to the cast. So, is it legitimate?  Can he do it? Let’s find out.

Comic

Starting with the comic, this all but shouts the exact opposite, and has repeatedly doubled down on this. Homelander was strapped to a Hydrogen Bomb until adulthood and the company was sure they could trust him, as otherwise they would kill him. Vought has, in present terms, been stated capable of killing Homelander if they need to, and Stillwell (a reliable source in this conversation) says a nuke would kill Homelander as a matter of factly. Most of all, Garth Ennis (author of the story) stated that a nuke will kill Homelander in an interview years ago. The link is dead and we can’t find the interview, with that information being found on Screenrant (shocking, we know). Other websites refer to this same interview, and try to link to it but it's also dead so it clearly does exist. Regardless, in said interview, Ennis stated Homelander had to stay in line or Vought would get tired of it and “chuck a nuke at him.” Can’t get much more blatant than the writer saying a nuke would kill him.

Show 

For the show's relation to this, it was what popularized the arguments (and the series really, for some reason). It all comes from Madeline Stillwell (a higher-up in Vought) stating as follows (you can check the episode transcript if you wish).

“There isn't a weapon on Earth that they haven't thrown at him. They've all failed.”

Chaos ensues among VS Brainrot.

Diving into this, her statement is proven false several times over to the point that it is impossible to deny. First, the statement doesn’t even say “he survived all of them.” It says “none of them have worked.” That does not, in any legitimate metric, mean he can take a nuclear bomb by association. “Failed on him” could mean literally anything, and doesn’t necessarily mean tanking it. Homelander could simply avoid it, survive via surface area, or make the nuke explode from far away with his lasers. All of these are options he has that could make it “fail” on him, and you need to make the best possible assumptions to say he scales at all. For reference, this would be the equivalent train of thought.

1. The nuke got close enough to him where surface area wouldn’t be a factor without him destroying it with his heat vision

2. (Assuming the former happened barring heat vision) He wouldn’t simply fly away and escape its effects.

3. (Assuming he couldn’t outright escape it with his flight) He wouldn’t be able to get away to the point of surface area saving him from the full blast.

4. That the nuke in question was something like the Tsar Bomba. Most nukes these days are single digit megatons, and Surface Area applying at all to a bomb like that would screw it all over for him.

Even barring the statement and its flaws, everything else, like the comics, shouts the opposite. All of this is through Soldier Boy, both in scaling and in how his powers work. To be blunt, Billy stated a an H-Bomb would be enough to kill Soldier Boy when discussing the power needed to kill someone like Homelander. Let me say that again. Billy Butcher, the most reliable source on this sort of thing (and in a serious narrative moment that you can’t dismiss like his statements we’ll discuss later), specifically stated a Hydrogen Bomb could kill Soldier Boy and thus Homelander. Even aside from that, Soldier Boy’s explosions are an even bigger flaw here. They are radioactive in nature from official sources, like when Billy noted he had twenty sieverts of radiation injected into his body alongside much more; surmising that’s where his new powers come from, while scientific tools have noted Soldier Boy’s Radiation levels rise when he gets mad. This is clearly intentional, given symbolism with Queen Maeve and Soldier Boy’s general war basis, so he’s basically a mini-nuke.

Why does that matter? Well, the reason these explosions were so dangerous were that they burned the Compound V right out of Supe systems. Even if they survived the blast, they were rendered powerless, and narratively this was a threat to everyone, even Homelander. So, this is a large-scale radioactive blast, and it is directly a hard counter to Compound V. Even if one were to survive it, they would be powerless as a side effect of the radiation. That is exactly what a nuclear bomb is. Those blasts hold incredible amounts of radiation, and that kind would kill or de-power even Homelander. He could not have possibly survived one given the picture the series paints about Supe powers and limits.

Overall

So? No. Homelander can not survive a nuke. Someone he scales to was stated to die if hit with the power of a hydrogen bomb, Madeline’s statement is extremely flimsy, Vought is frequently stated able to kill him with a nuke in the comics, and Soldier Boy’s existence counters any other argument thanks to how his explosions work. In other terms, per Billy’s statement, a Hydrogen Bomb (usually ranges from hundreds of kilotons to 50 megatons) would be enough to kill Homelander.

Stormy Weather

Ah, that one elemental character in “insert street-tier series” who has storm powers and mucks up the scaling. How fun!

Alright, to keep things brief, Stormfront is a character across both versions of the series who has storm powers, and that thus concerns people comparing it to creating storms or dodging light. Starting with the arguments for storm creation, it’s… well, it’s outright wrong, to be blunt. The context for the argument is that Vought enlists Stormfront to “acquire” areas of land in Indonesia where neither hurricane nor tidal wave are likely to do. So, the argument is that he creates storms over the areas. The problem? It didn’t even happen.

Context is key regardless of series, and the wording on this is always the best bet. For starters, the quote doesn’t even state he’s creating storms. It just says that he takes over the areas as a sort of one-man army. Specifically, Frenchie states “There is evidence of Supe involvement in… clearances. In Africa, in Indonesia, closer to home. Anywhere that Vought’s development division sees land the locals will not sell, where neither hurricane nor tidal wave are likely to oblige them.” The problem with this is all that its saying is that Stormfront clears an area that extreme weather does not, which does not mean he’s actually creating a storm that covers the area. For one thing, there’s two ways you could take that statement.

1. This sort of weather simply wouldn’t reach the area

2. The area is protected against storms anyway.

Both of these statements don’t mean Stormfront creates a storm covering the area. The former simply means any kind of weather could be fatal due to lack of protection, and the latter simply means he could concentrate it into something like a lightning blast (as he does) to destroy houses and such. Of course, a simpler answer to both would just be to kill everybody there, which doesn’t require a spread out storm to do. However, let's say you assume he could anyway. The problem? This isn’t supported by anybody else in either the show or the comics. Stormfront’s show counterpart never did ANYTHING like it in terms of weather manipulation, and neither did the Nubians (we’ll talk about them in a second). So, to recap, the entire argument is assuming he created a storm over those areas based on nothing, no actual statement that is how he clears the areas, and several trains of thought/logic proving that the entire argument is a massive assumption with no confirmation or backing. Assuming you did? Creating storms over smaller and larger areas of Indonesia get 46.63 Kilotons - 12.66 Megatons of TNT, but once more, this value shouldn’t really be used.

Moving to the Nubians, this is just as faulty, if not more so. The feat is argued due to clouds forming over the house. The issue is these are just really small and not the actual size of a legitimate storm, meaning they don’t get any serious numbers. From Kaiser (who we enlisted Day 1 to review and revise The Boys calcs if needed), the issues are pretty prevalent. If you use height assumptions to bump the size up, perspective would be all messed up, because if you used angular sizing to get the distance from our P.O.V to the clouds, it would be a larger distance, so they couldn't logically form above the house. It’s simply a matter of perspective and showing meaning the clouds aren’t all that big, and thus it's also not getting anything notable.

Finally, let’s discuss lightning timing arguments, considering characters can react to it across the show/comic. Stormfront’s blasts are referred to as plasma, both by official profiles and Frenchie, who intended to counteract them with an EMP, while the Nubians example is just shooting electricity and such. Since both of them have legitimate storm powers, it should be fine to use lightning speeds anyway (and plasma is what makes up lightning), but it isn’t the most concrete argument ever. Furthermore, nobody ever dodges Stormfront’s lightning in the show (seriously, we checked). As for scaling to this, Billy dodges Stormfront’s lightning in the comics, and Groundhawk dodges Nubian lightning in Diabolical.

Rela/FTL The Boys?

No doubt, plenty of you are curious about Starlight’s “light” and whether it’s usable or not. After all it’s literally in the name, it emits brightness which can blind people, and when fired as a beam travels in a straight line. So, what’s the issue? Well the most obvious problem is that Starlight’s light emits force,enough to send people flying back (which is not a one off). Her powers create a LOT of force, which light, without mass, simply cannot do. Not to mention, she literally uses it to fly in the latest season. Her powers also explicitly drain electricity in electronics rather than the light of it as a source. As she puts it “Electricity goes in, blast comes out”.

Narratively is also where another issue arrives, such as A-Train weaving and seeing them in slow motion. The same A-Train who was explicitly on Screen at just over mach 1 while on enhancing drugs. While there’s always the possibility for characters to improve overtime (heck A-Train got a whole new heart in the meantime since season 1 and has faster feats across the show/comics) the point remains that the beams cannot be lightspeed per the writer’s own in universe logic. Plus if you want to be technical, even Death Battle itself does not think her beams are true light.

How about the comics though? While there are far less Anti-Feats in the comics (simply because Starlight literally never does anything or uses her powers against others) the one time she did… Well, it absolutely blitzed A-Train. So, even if they were legit in this version, there is simply no feat of people reacting to them or moving in tandem.

The second big argument for it would be Homelander's own heat vision. Laser eyes means lasers, right? Well… no. Certainly not here, anyway.

Homelander’s heat vision works similarly to Starlight's, where it moves in a straight line usually, while his burns and heats up objects (he has controlled it to heat up objects without burning them before). Should it not explode or show force, you could argue it… but unfortunately for Homelander, it shows both. There have been several times where Homelander's lasers show blatant force, with the most blatant example being when he shot them at Billy and blasted him back. Heck, Billy's lasers do the exact same thing, so it's pretty consistent. For clarification on why this is such a problem, light does not have mass, meaning there is no inherent force behind its movement despite its speed; only heat. Real lasers can at best only exhibit enough force to push around dust particles, which is obviously league's below smashing grown men into walls. 

Just that by itself would ruin lightspeed arguments, but in the comics, Homelander’s lasers have blatantly made explosions. That's another big no-no for lasers, since light burns and doesn't explode on contact with objects, nor produce them itself. Force and explosions are the two biggest killers of lasers being legitimate, and since both Starlight and Homelander’s have both in varying areas, they can't be lightspeed. Also, food for thought, but Homelander’s lasers in the show are almost always a frame one laser, meaning that it’s basically impossible to have character movement in tandem with it as it’s just instantly there (for example go to 0.25% speed and look at this or even this) at its end location even should you ignore it. Finally, A-Train also has a relativistic argument, when taking Ashley’s statement that Vought’s cameras need to be 5,000 fps to see him. Certain interpretations of this can get relativistic, but overall it’s just not reaching that level. 

For one thing, Ashley could simply be lying, and that is the joke with all of these Vought videos. Even if you were to take it as 100% truth, this doesn’t even mean relativistic speeds anywhere. Her words are, quote, “and our cameras can capture up to 5,000 frames per second, so even speedsters like A-Train are always caught on camera.” This showcases the obvious flaw in the logic, where they are trying to catch visible clips of A-Train, not just his presence at all. If that seemed confusing, it can be simplified as Vought needing to capture clear footage of A-Train, “always caught on camera.” It’s not “he runs so fast they only see one frame of him.” The statement is outright saying he’s caught on camera, meaning the footage is clear and usable in wider products. It can’t possibly be referring to only 1 frame per second. There’s also the fact that, simply, he could just be blurring on regular cameras, while 5,000 fps cameras can actually catch clear footage. Overall, it’s a massive stretch to get this to rela that relies on several bad assumptions.

So, with the lasers and any other arguments dead in the water, rela/FTL The Boys arguments go up in smoke.

Billy Bu(llshi)tcher Statements

As anyone with half a decent understanding of The Boys in the versus scene knows, the series has many statements that can greatly amp the cast, and Billy is without a doubt a more reliable source than a company who’s entire identity is lying to the public. On more than one occasion, he’s spouted off some nonsense about Supe capabilities, so let’s cover the validity of those.

Swimming in the Sun

Billy claimed that Supe’s can swim on the surface of the sun in the Comics. Elsewhere, dozens if not hundreds of them were burned to death by multiple flamethrowers; nowhere near as hot. Even the best heat resistance in the series (Soldier Boy) could handle at absolute best 5,000 degrees, and a continuous laser from Butcher could pierce his skin, so it’s clearly the max limit on that aspect. That is twice as low as the surface of the sun, so it’s clearly false.

Outrunning Tachyons

The more famous one would be Billy saying Supes can outrace Tachyons. Frankly, this is clearly Billy Bullshitting. What he’s saying here in general is throwing out grandiose examples of such godlike powers with a lack of responsibility and consequences to prove a point, and it's not supported by literally anything else in the series. The line of text is outright saying “if you can dodge bullets or outrun Tachyons” which is… um, yeah. The gap between a bullet and the speed of light is (checks calculator) several hundred thousand times over, and it's such a huge leap that it makes no logical sense to be taken seriously. Saying “outlier” is an even easier counter, as the fastest Supes in the series (A-Train, GWW, Homelander, etc) never even come CLOSE to that kind of speed. 

Fly Me to the Moon

(I hope more than four people fully get the joke here -Flip)

Billy Butcher claims that some Supes can fly to the moon. This one is not really a factor. For one thing, his wording it as “some supes” clearly closes off the majority from something like this, so something select is likely needed to do so. Like, for example, breathing in space, which we’ve seen no Supe do aside from implications from Homelander. The Great Wide Wonder nearly froze over/passed out from flying too high, so you’d need someone who can breathe in space/withstand the vacuum to even approach this. This also lacks a timeframe entirely, and no context indicates it would take a short time to do so. So, any reasonable interpretation simply axes any impressive results whatsoever.

Great Fraud Wonder

The Great Wide Wonder is a great big disappointment as far as the show is concerned, and I greatly wonder why people bought into his highballed calcs.

Jesting aside, GWW is a pepped up supe from Diabolical who showcases some impressive-looking speed feats that Homelander could scale to, due to his status in the verse. Let’s dive into those for a bit, shall we?

Starting off with speed and his most obvious potential boon, during the Omni-Lander blog back in 2022, his speed was slotted at around Mach 284 (just under the speed of lightning). Back then it wasn’t really challenged (nor was any of the highballs because of the obvious), but currently? This calc/interpretation of his feat doesn’t really work. The original calculation got him this fast by looking at an image of the planet, scaling how big a country looked in one shot to determine how high he flew, and then worked with other factors like timeframe. For most other types of calculations this could be fine, but context pretty blatantly points out how this can’t be the case. The overlying issue is while this is happening, he is still facing atmospheric resistance, and nearly freezing over right after, while becoming faint of breath to the point of needing to fall back down. As noted while this was happening, the GWW’s other “exploits” were around that high as well, and this should paint a pretty clear picture of what’s happening; he hasn’t gone into space yet or left our atmosphere. If he had, he wouldn’t be facing heat resistance (no atmosphere), and we can support this because the negative side effects of outer space (no air to breath and the temperature to freeze you over) are exactly what we are shown he suffers before falling back down.

In layman’s terms, the scene is outright showing us that he is nearing the boundary between Earth and Space, but not actually reaching the final frontier, as such a thing would be fatal. Why does this matter? The calculation proposed would have him travel 1,252.2 Kilometers high, or about 778 miles, where the edge of the Karman Line (the boundary to space) is only 62 miles high. That is over ten times higher than the boundary of space would actually be, which is a blatant contradiction on what the scene is actually telling us in several separate ways, where he did not leave Earth’s orbit. If he did, he would have suffered the extended effects of dipping temperature and lack of air and caused his own death. Even worse is how we see him be pulled back to Earth via its own gravity, which is still more proof he could not have left our atmosphere or the entire scene would be a redundant mess. It is clearly showing the intent of how high he actually flew, and thus, the maximum length attributable to him is the Karman Line, and 62 miles distance. 

This sort of scaling celestial objects and things on that scale is something people are mixed on, like the many examples of characters in cartoons messing with planets or stars or etc that aren’t sized accurately, which even extends into other more adult series. In my opinion, it’s a simple case where context matters and should be what proves an object is legitimately the size you claim it to be, as otherwise you’d be effectively making an entirely new object to suit the calculation when the real thing is proving otherwise. Here, all context proves that despite the awkwardly drawn shot, he couldn’t possibly have flown that high, and so the real value would land just above hypersonic ranges. To add salt to the wound, Queen Maeve is outright telling us his speed of ranging from Mach 1.5 to Mach 2, and while she is wrong in regards to his space flight, she was referring to his flying around the city, which is pretty evidently correct based on the repeated sonic booms he makes. The clear intention is that his speed is around hypersonic generally, which is noted as rather dangerous in a series like this where its more grounded.

Overall, the feat is shot in the foot by contextual clear showcases and statements, and frankly, its hard to even apply this to Homelander at all. The show implies he’s faster just from wording by Homelander himself (“yes, but there’s fast, and then there’s…”) and a growing sense of insecurity from even Maeve as he sped up. Your only real indication for Homelander outscaling him is leaning on his stance as the strongest supe, which we’ll talk more on later. Regardless, this feat caps at Mach 12 to Mach 20.

Of course, you'd also like to talk about the abysmally low recalc, where it jumped from large town to not even building level. Why's that, you ask? The previous calculation assumed the clouds split at the speed which the Great Wide Wonder was calced flying. That is… ah, quite unfounded, and essentially calc-stacking. Even if it wasn't, we are outright shown the distance the clouds moved and their weight in that original calculation, and editing it like so drastically alters the speed at play. Anybody who knows Kinetic Energy knows this automatically cuts the feat to bits, and drops it down to barely even 0.1 Tons of TNT. 

This feat is even worse off to others, because GWW can't even scale to his own KE, as ramming a physically stronger foe quite literally pasted him. The final nail in the coffin is, even if you tried the same calc stacking method on his new and improved speed (Mach 12-20), it would only land about 238 - 700 Tons of TNT. Again, this method is unusable.

So, in conclusion? The Great Wide Wonder is a literal F-R-A-U-D. 127 Kilotons and Mach 280? That's Vought at work, mate. That idiot caps at 0.1 Tons of TNT and Mach 12-20.

Overall Scaling for The Boys

Here is just a TL;DR of this section in relation to stats of the series

Nuke Scaling: This is based on a statement which has dozens of holes to be poked in. Aside from it, literally every viable source, in and out of story, states a nuke would in fact kill Homelander or people he scales to like Soldier Boy. Unusable.

Storm Scaling (Stormfront/Nubians): Both of these examples can’t seriously be used for storm arguments due to the sizing of the actual storms made, and how Stormfront’s feat in the comics is nonexistent. He never created a storm there, much less something of that size. Unusable without substantial assumptions that don’t change much for the series anyway.

Great Wide Wonder: His feat is fraudulent through context and much less than previously proposed. Unusable.

Rela/FTL Arguments: All of these rely on flimsy highballs for potential feats (accepting either Homelander or Starlight’s blasts as lightspeed) which break dozens of narratives on top of being proven untrue in how lasers work. Unusable.

Billy’s Statements: The context is just him spouting off impressive sounding things to make a point, and swimming in the sun/outrunning Tachyons are wholly unsupported everywhere else. Unusable.

What’s left?

The only feat here that is not fraudulent would be Homelander’s claim that he can level a city. Narratively, this does make sense given the threat of that moment and his ultimatum, and the artbook of the series supports this notion. What does this get? Assuming Fragmentation, 1.26 - 6.34 Kilotons, and if you wanna be really generous, assuming Violent Fragmentation, it gets 4.23 - 21.25 Kilotons. So overall, 1.26 - 21.25 Kilotons is the maximum power the series can access. It is consistent with Homelanders MCB feat he survived without much damage while a teenager, isn’t based on massive assumptions or false information, and is built on narrative intention as well as official information. It should be stressed however that violent fragmentation should not be used, and the 21.25 Kiloton end is a rather large highball for destroying it in only 2 minutes (as opposed to a more reasonable number like 5). For speed, the best you can get is lightning timing like from Groundhawk, which lands just over Mach 600. Of course, if these lightning bolts were fraudulent (which is possible given earlier notes and context) it would fall back to mid-high hypersonic from Homelander’s feats. Anything higher (rela arguments) are all faulty with the same issues as power arguments, and should not be actually argued. 

Final/Updated Stats of the verse and thus Homelander? 1.26 - 21.25 Kilotons, and Mach 624.

Frankly, I blame Omni-Man being Homelander’s opponent for all these highballs to be considered lol.

Hancock & Mary’s Storm

One of the most blatant and argued scenes in the movie, Hancock’s hurricane while fighting Mary is subject to discussion here.

To clarify what exactly the feat is, Hancock and Mary’s powers interacting with each other subsequently cause a storm that covers pretty much all of San Francisco, which lands about 220 Kilotons overall. Why does this work? Featurettes of the movie (which are official and usable for supporting evidence/clarification) state that both the pair and the weather are connected, and that it is directly happening because of them. Mary created the lightning, Hancock created the tornadoes (while also implied his is more weather in general), with the clear and stated intention being that they create an event of mythic proportions. Per laws of energy that plenty of verses abide by for a vs context (IE: Kung Fu Panda using the Wuxi Finger Hold for power despite it not being physical due to it working off internal energies) with plenty of anime examples like blowing up planets with ones one inner life energy and such. 

If you create or destroy something on this scale, without context proving it wouldn’t scale back, then generally speaking you would scale physically. All the energy to do something like this had to come from somewhere (clouds can’t just materialize on a sunny day, which is what happened here), and that somewhere was Hancock/Mary. They directly created them, so, per laws of energy, it is applicable to their physicals. As for dividing it up, it’s about even, realistically speaking. Mary has claimed she’s stronger than Hancock, but nothing really supports this beyond her wording, which itself is outdated. During their fight, neither were holding back, and it was clearly even across the board up until the ending, where Hancock appeared to be the winner. Your only bet on saying she’s stronger is taking her wording at 100% face value (with no support beyond Mary at all) and saying she was holding back during their fight, which… 

Being honest if she was then why did they smash through like 10 buildings. She’s clearly not concerned about collateral or anything like that, so it’s clear she was being serious. Since Hancock directly fought her and was implied the winner, he would certainly scale. Even so, her statement isn’t even the most supportive evidence considering it's been decades since she’s last met Hancock, where he has not been in contact with her. Assuming she was correct and he was in fact weaker would likely only apply to his past self, which he would currently exceed given how their fight went. So, the feat is legit, and both parties should get about half of the required energy; about 110 Kilotons of TNT.

WTF did Hancock do to the Moon?

Welp, it’s about time we stopped putting this off. Here’s how Hancock pulled a Todd Ingram, and what it means.

For context (very important here), the feat is that Hancock carved the All-Heart Symbol onto the moon in an unspecified amount of time. Let’s get cracking. 

First, let’s cover what exactly the feat is. It’s (somehow) creating a red space on a celestial body in a short time, so first up would be discussing what exactly he is doing. Some have contested that he’d be simply painting over the surface, which is outright impossible. To cover half the moon with paint (just about the level Hancock would be doing) you would need… a metric shit-ton of Paint. Assuming an average paint coverage of 400 Square Feet per Gallon of Paint (thank you Google), and taking in the fact that the Moon’s visible hemisphere (the side he covered) has a surface area of 1,500,000,000,000,000,000/1.5 Quintillion Square Feet, one would need about 3.75 Billion gallons of paint overall. For reference, the U.S produces over 1 billion gallons of paint… per year. In current terms. And this is ALL paint, not red specifically, which he would be using. It’s obviously impossible for him to do this given a lack of resources, 

So, how’d he do it? Well, fortunately, there is a scientific explanation for it. There are materials on the moon, the main one being Hematite, that are red in color, meaning Hancock would simply need to use those to make the moon red. That just leaves the question of what exactly he did. In essence, Hematite forms through oxygen and air, so to speak, which the moon doesn’t have. It still gains the material anyway through solar winds and oxygen from Earth, meaning essentially, massive air pressure would be needed to do such a thing. So, he carved the areas in order to make it more evident, and somehow displaced enough pressure to cause country sized dust uproars exactly where he wanted it. So, the calculation we listed (using frag and violent frag values) should be fine, which gets 105.927 Teratons - 2.834 Petatons of TNT overall.

That then leaves the timing of this feat, as it's clear he did not do it all at once. Going bit by bit, his flying away from Mary is implied to be to the moon, and then a 1-month timeskip is noted to have happened. Finally, Hancock calls Ray, who noted he was trying to contact him multiple times, while Hancock wistfully looked at the moon and stated he was out of cell range before showing him what he did. One could try and say it took a month as a lowball, but it statistically could not have due to the reveal at the end of the movie. It was set up as a dramatic surprise, and Hancock called him when he was finally done. It being done any earlier would ruin the point of the scene, and anybody on the face of the Earth would have told Ray if it was done sooner, given it was his idea. So, it was clearly finished that night, and even basic work Hancock could have done on it weeks ago would have been noticed or spoke of, but we have no proof of that. So, it’s clear he did that all in the span of about a day. 

Now, moon rising times vary (both now and in 2008) but he would have to have started after the moon was not visible (sometime after morning) and done around early night time (Ray and Mary were taking their son out for ice cream, and given his age it's unlikely it was very late given how many other people were in the scene. That could push the scene down to something like ten hours, but for sake of the lowball, lets assume this took him a full day, ignoring time spent flying to the moon or back from it. Dividing the values by 86,400 (seconds in a day) leaves him wielding 1.226 - 32.796 Gigatons of TNT per second, which is MAJORLY impressive. So, is this 100% legitimate to use as scaling to him? Well, sort of. 

We know from context and statements throughout the film that Hancock loses his powers and becomes mortal the longer he is around Mary. Conversely, Mary has stated that the further away he gets from her, the better he would feel. For those who can see where I’m going with this, hold your horses, as this concept of him getting “better” the further away he is from Mary is actually pretty well established. When both were on death’s door from injuries and extraordinary pain, Hancock moving further and further away managed to put him back in control of his powers, and save Mary when she had flatlined. Since going near her makes him get weaker, and given context, one could logically assume that in the reverse, going away from her makes Hancock stronger.

When put in comparison to the moon feat, this actually makes a lot of sense. One can easily just label this as a result of his being stronger over there when hundreds of thousands of miles away, or say something like it even stockpiling based on Hancock implying he was out of cell range for several days (IE: on the Moon). Either way, it’s rather easy with this mindset to attribute the feat to a power amp due to how his abilities work. However, this still leaves open the possibility and pure factual nature that a portion of this is still applicable to a “base” Hancock. Under the notion that being further away from Mary boosts his powers, he ended the film on the other side of the continent in New York City, while she was still in San Francisco. Ergo, on that assumption, he would be MUCH stronger than when he was during most of the film. Like, for example, when he created a storm fighting Mary? Under that umbrella, he would vastly upscale the numbers in strength and speed we see him pull off in the film, and frankly, it could grow, assuming he decides to take the battle off-world and fly further away from Mary. 

Or, you could just say this doesn’t boost/subtract his power at all, and he just scales in base.

One last thing. He obviously flew to the moon, and thus, you can get speed from it. The best end is to use one hour, as the scene implies he flew there, and in context he was trying to get as far away as possible for Mary’s sake. Lower or higher ends can be applied, but we think it’s the most logical overall.

In conclusion, the feat is legitimate, and whether he scales in base or needs an amp to do it is up to your perspective on how his powers work.

Art/Support

Trailer Playlist: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL9GDGILAAlA-6_Ls4u0BRPR1MMXe6ADZO&si=EKxG9fZPir222G-U

My own Trailer

Reddit posts

Sprite Art Link

Art Link

Verdict

Read the script here (I think I did really well on it).

Stats

Befitting such demigods among men, both Homelander and Hancock vary extensively in the amount of power they can dish out, or the speed at which they move. Both of them can casually (or scale to people that can) destroy buildings, as well as other massively impressive feats like Homelander shrugging off getting crushed by a train/hundreds of tons of rubble, or Hancock casually stopping a several hundred ton train car without moving or getting hurt. Generally speaking, both are about even in lower feats, but lets dive into higher ones to show their limits. Fortunately, Hancock’s is incredibly blatant, where his fight with Mary caused a storm over San Francisco. Overall, this lands 220 Kilotons, and Hancock should scale to half of it (due to it being essentially a combined effort), which nets him about 110 Kilotons. So, how can Homelander stack up to that? You’d think he could certainly compare with his calcs in the hundreds of kilotons or dozens of megatons across scaling to other characters like the Great Wide Wonder or Nubians, but as we covered, each and every single one of those is fraudulent. 

For a little recap on all of those, both of the storm feats pushed (Comic Stormfront and the Nubians in Diabolical) are simply not impressive. Stormfront’s require major assumptions on a feat that didn’t even happen to land anything impressive, and the Nubian’s cloud isn’t large enough to get even somewhat close numbers. Alright, so Homelander’s storm scaling isn’t quite as impressive as Hancock’s own, but what about the Great Wide Wonder? Well, his own calculation from years back is a ridiculous highball that the series itself proves false, and his own cloud split maxes out at 0.1 tons of TNT. All other calcs proposed or brought up (A Supe freezing a lake, Crimson Countess melting Tanks, any of the explosions Soldier Boy causes, etc) just don’t stack up to Hancock’s storm. Clearly, none of Homelander’s scaling can help him here, so let’s look at his own feats and statements to see if something else can. As a teenager, he survived a chemical plant explosion without much damage that lands an impressive 289 - 754 Tons of TNT, and while it’s likely he got stronger or would upscale to a decent degree, that’s still 145.7 to 380 times weaker than Hancock’s storm (289-754 Tons vs 109,880.1924 Tons).

Still, what about scaling Homelander to a nuclear bomb? Madeline clearly stated no weapon on the planet could kill him, which includes nukes, right? Well, not really. As we noted earlier, the statement itself does not in any sense indicate he can shrug off every weapon on the planet, just that none have worked in killing him. Homelander possesses several options for surviving something like a nuke, and you need to be as lenient as possible in multiple areas to actually say he can tank a nuke based off that. This logic especially falls flat when several sources, in an out of the series, in the comic or the show, outright note that a nuclear bomb would kill Homelander. The comics repeatedly establishes it from people like Stillwill or the literal writer of the series, Garth Ennis, while the show has Billy Butcher state a Hydrogen Bomb would kill Soldier Boy/Homelander. Heck, Soldier Boy’s powers are literally a mini-nuke, and are frequently established as a direct instant-death to all Supes due to their radiation, including Homelander. He could not have possibly survived one, and everything else in the series proves this. 

Homelander’s only option left is his statement that he can level cities, which the artbook backs up in stating he could do so “in minutes.” It’s unclear just how many he would destroy, or how many minutes, but for a median answer, let’s take his claim in relation to New York (which he did say he could do. Fragmenting or even violently fragmenting New York land 761.646 Kilotons and 2.538821 Megatons of TNT, which are impressive… but when you take into account this blatantly taking a few minutes at best, even something like 5 minutes lowers both yields attributable to Homelander down to 2.53 - 8.46 Kilotons per second (how one would handle feats that explicitly take timeframes). Even the most generous assumption (Violent fragmentation and taking only 2 minutes total to destroy it, which is an extreme highball mind you) would only grant Homelander 21.25 Kilotons of TNT. Compared to Hancock? Reasonable assumptions as noted above (2.53 - 8.46 Kilotons) would still result in Hancock being 12.98 - 43.43  times stronger (2.53 - 8.46 Kilotons vs 109.880 Kilotons), while Homelander’s highest possible end (21.25 Kilotons) there still has Hancock over 5 times stronger. 

It should be rather clear that Hancock easily takes strength, which doesn’t change no matter how high you have Homelander. Even taking Stormfront’s proposed storm into account, it is around 46.63 Kilotons, which is still 2.3564270298 times weaker, and again, this feat is entirely unusable. By continuing to throw Homelander a bone and granting him the max of Stormfront’s feat (again, very unusable), he could land up to 12 megatons, or even greater. Matter of fact, let’s throw everything to the wind and assume Homelander could in fact survive a nuclear bomb despite everything proving otherwise, like the 50 Megaton Tsar Bomba. Hancock STILL overwhelms him even at that level, due to his carving the All-Heart symbol onto the moon. Now, this feat is wrapped up in an obvious timeframe and likely relied on Hancock being boosted from being far away from Mary, but when we’re discussing the type of highballs Homelander is allowed for sake of argument, let’s ignore them for its sake. Even a timeframe as long as 24 hours for a feat worth 105.927 Teratons - 2.834 Petatons of TNT would still land Hancock at LEAST 1.226 Gigatons, which is nearly 25 times stronger than surviving the 50-Megaton Tsar Bomba.

Once again, this is the absolute most you can grant Homelander in power through just plain bad arguments, and Hancock’s similar higher ends maintain a sizable AP advantage with much less problems involved. No matter what timeframe you take for the moon feat, it’s still leagues stronger than Homelander’s highballs, and if you were to say he only scales when that far away from Mary? That still wouldn’t matter. Not only did Hancock end his film across the country from Mary (meaning he would realistically upscale everything we see him do and scale to a portion of the moon feat anyway, which itself is another counter for worse higher ends of Stormfront), but this is also under the assumption his powers work that way. If you don’t have him get stronger the further he goes away from Mary, then he just… scales in base, and the conversation is over right then and there. Hancock solidly takes the edge in power, and is more than able to slap Homelander silly with just a few punches.

Speed is much less divisive, and both are similar for the most part. They have their own examples of supersonic or hypersonic flying feats (Homelander outspeeding a C4 Explosion or Hancock flying through a Bank at FTE speeds) as well as higher examples. Hancock’s best feat would be flying to the moon, which, under the umbrella of an hour (makes sense in context) clocks in at Mach 311.3. For Homelander, his best comes from scaling to lightning timers, like The Boys and Groundhawk dodging lightning from Stormfront and the Nubians, respectively. Surprisingly, this actually places Homelander a bit faster in reactionary terms, since Groundhawk’s dodge equals Mach 624, and is just over twice as fast as Hancock. The only problem is that this is exclusively reactionary terms, and Hancock’s own flight and attack speed is MUCH higher than anything we see Homelander do in the series. 

Any and all speed scaling in the series, reactionary or movement based, simply doesn’t compare to Hancock. Butcher’s statements are either hogwash or inapplicable to Homelander, lasers from Homie or Starlight are clearly not lightspeed, and A-Train or Great Wide Wonder’s potential higher feats don’t work due to context. As such, Mach 624 is the best we can grant Homelander (and even that’s debatable considering nobody ever dodges Stormfront’s electricity in the show, which itself is referred to as plasma bolts instead of lightning), and Homelander would be about twice as fast. 

Hancock takes strength in spades, and Homelander slightly takes speed.

Arsenal & Abilities

Now that we’ve decided stats, how does abilities turn out for these two? Both generally have similar physiologies and such (all-around enhanced stats, invulnerability, etc) but it’s clear a few of their abilities don’t compare to each other. Starting, Hancock’s flight examples are clearly much better. Not only did we discuss he is physically (in terms of movement speed) a lot faster, but given the context of the moon carve, he can clearly survive in space much longer (24+ hours depending on how long you have him up there, while Homelander relies solely on him saying he can see an area from space). Should the fight last long enough, Hancock can easily drag Homelander to space, where he is significantly underprepared to undergo extensive battle (we can even compare Homelander to the Great Wide Wonder, who exhibited a lack of ability to endure the extreme temperatures/vacuum of space). 

Generally, Hancock also has the edge in most other subsets of their powers, like stamina and healing. In the comic, Homelander may be able to fight with inhumane amounts of damage, but he’s not actually healing that fast. His actual showcased healing at most heals scars in short times, while Hancock can heal skull fractures in an hour when barely superhuman, as well as survive several gunshot wounds and still fight. His healing examples are clearly much greater on an actual healing standpoint given how fast he recovered the more he flew away from Mary, and while his pain tolerance is inferior in relation to comic Homelander, his own is still more than enough to survive anything Homelander can do to him. Both of them have enhanced senses, but the boons Homelander’s X-Ray Vision and such allow him don’t do much beyond helping discern Hancock’s emotional state. This sounds impressive, but Hancock has always been incredibly blatant and straightforward in his actions, and has very little to analyze in terms of battle strategy due to this.

When comparing their most esoteric powers, both have pretty impressive ranged attacks, and therein lies Homelander’s biggest win-condition. His lasers (and others on the same level) can burn Soldier Boy’s skin, which could survive 3,000 to 5,400 degree flames in torture. In comparison, Hancock has shown discomfort from heat by his own words when saving an apartment building, and this could lead into a potential weakness to it. This matters because the maximum an apartment fire can get to is around 1,500 degrees, and less than half of what Homelander’s lasers are hitting. Since Homelander is a bit faster, and spams these attacks in canon, he should have a solid win-condition and strategy that he is likely to attempt. So, does Hancock have any way around this? In fact, he does, thanks to his own AOE. Once Hancock gets going and makes city wide storms, or tornadoes as large as buildings, there’s no question who has better range. Homelander has never had to deal with AOE/attacks of that scale, and has little means of avoiding both the weather and Hancock at the same time.

Still, Homelander’s method is quicker, so what’s stopping him from slicing Hancock in half right then and there? Well, for one thing, we know Hancock would have to survive re-entry/escape velocity atmosphere resistance, given he flew to and back from the Moon, which itself gets 3,000 to 7,000 degrees; a direct match for Homelander’s own showings. In that vein, it wouldn’t matter much, but assuming you didn’t use this, there’s once more the matter of his own stamina, which has enabled him to shrug off repeated gunfire and fly away. Homelander would need repeated blasts in that stage, and all of this before Hancock hits him once. Having hax is a pretty good win-condition, but not the greatest when you only have a 2 times advantage in reactionary speed and your opponent is much physically faster than you, and ESPECIALLY not when Hancock only needs a few good hits to cave in Homelander’s skull. 

Not even Compound V’s weird resurrection properties would save him from that, as not only do they take time to take effect (by then the fight would be considered over), but they turn the resurrected into a mindless zombie that Hancock would have no trouble splattering as well. Speaking of, Compound V can boost Supe powers, but Homelander has never really taken it before a fight, so it’s unlikely to make a difference here. So, Homelander might have a solid hax option that he could potentially utilize with his superior speed, but Hancock’s superior healing, own pain tolerance, massive AOE advantage, and subtle stat advantages from earlier would be more than enough to survive it, assuming you didn’t take the atmospheric examples and just have Hancock take it without an issue.

Hancock takes the edge in abilities.

Tertiary Factors

Don’t mistake either Homelander or Hancock as unskilled, because now let’s discuss their tertiary factors. Starting with experience, this goes to Hancock without question. Homelander has had over 40 years of experience, with much of that spent trained by Vought and in killing other Supes. Hancock has twice that much with his own 80 years of experience, and that’s just covering what he remembers. He still matched Mary in current terms, who herself does remember the thousands of years she’s been alive, and nobody in The Boys has that kind of experience. This extends to skill as well, where Hancock has defeated several ex-soldiers without much of his powers, just like the masters of fighting Homelander has dueled in Billy, Maeve, or Soldier Boy. 

More than that though, Hancock’s relation to both are greater in his own examples of facing challenges. Homelander has rarely experienced an actual contest of strength in either comic or show, with only a few examples across both of him fighting somewhat at or beyond his level. In comparison, Hancock matched and defeated Mary in their duel over San Francisco despite this being the first time he’s done so, and has endured all sorts of challenges while nearly mortal himself. His own adaptation to crisis and quick thinking are clearly much greater than Homelander’s, and he’s definitely much more put-together mentally. Granted, Homelander has displayed more examples on cunning and manipulation, but Hancock’s own direct attitude leaves little for Homelander to try and analyze. This is especially true when you take into account all the other edges Homelander lacks, which will only serve to further anger him as his chances dim and his options fail.

Hancock takes the edge in Tertiary Factors.

Conclusion

Homelander

“I’m the Homelander… and I can do whatever the f*ck I want.”

Advantages: 

• Generally faster (which can be amped by taking Compound V should he choose to)

• Better consistent and spammable range options with Heat Vision

• Heat Vision’s heat potency is higher than Hancock’s lower end temperature resistances and focusing it could potentially overwhelm him….

• X-Ray Vision and enhanced senses allows greater battlefield awareness and would give him knowledge on Hancock’s emotions or physical state

• Smarter and more cunning 

• Superior endurance and survivability with the comics…

• Series isn't dead (NOTE: Written before the announcement)

• At least he stomps Brandon from Brightburn…

Disadvantages:

• …But unable to do much to Hancock if higher end resistances are used

• …but not so much in the show, where in both cases it's less effective than Hancock's

• Much weaker no matter which end you use

• Less experienced and skilled

• Much more prone to mental problems given his psyche

• Range is inferior to Hancock's massive A.O.E 

• Pretty much screwed if things go to space

• Eric Kripke

• The writing of pretty much the entire franchise

• Forced three members of the blog to read The Boys comics

Hancock

“I can relate to that. You know? You want something, nobody can stop you from taking it; you just take it right? I like that… but can you take it?”

Advantages:

• Much stronger and tougher no matter the end both are placed

• More experienced and skilled

• Is more put together mentally

• Far greater A.O.E with his weather powers

• Superior flight examples and can survive in space for much longer

• Better and faster working regeneration

• Greater creativity and tactical thinking on the fly

• Somehow has a more successful love-life

• Beat Homelander in every vs edit of the match (DAMN)

• Again. We're finally getting a sequel.

Disadvantages:

• Vulnerable to Homelander’s heat vision to a degree

• Slower in most metrics

• Not as cunning

• Doesn’t have as many ranged options without his weather abilities 

• Series is dead (NOTE: This was before the announcement)

• The second half of the movie

• Hey, I liked it (R1F)

At the end of it all, Hancock is the clear winner. His strength and durability advantage leave very little options for Homelander of surviving his attacks or damaging him, while his own heat resistances, AOE, and stamina examples allow him to survive Homlander’s heat vision. While Homelander is a bit faster in reactionary terms, Hancock’s much greater flight speed and advantage in other powers, like regeneration, more than make up for it. Hancock’s options for taking the fight to space, distancing Homelander with tornados, or putting his own skill to the test are much more reliable than spamming one move (which itself is contentious given he doesn’t spam it against Soldier Boy or Billy in their duel once his attempts are blocked), as are his utilizing his greater experience, skill, and more put-together mind in comparison. 

It looks like John’s victory was Han-cocked and loaded, while Homelander’s chances here were Butchered.

The winner…is John Hancock.

Final Tally

Homelander (0) - not yummers…

Hancock (10) - Aggravating_Floorgor, Badtime, Flip, French, Gillian, iceking, kaiser, MomoUra, Round 1 Fight, Sifu

Afterword

Thanks to all those involved for all the work done on the blog, and for the help in cataloging something like The Boys. This has been one of the few times my blogs reanalyzed an entire series to clear up a bunch of misconceptions and such, and I think it turned out quite well. The memes and visual edits we came up with went over hilariously, the debate and conversations around it were fun, and I kept getting reminded why I love the match. Speaking of, allow me to continue a trend I’ve done a few times before, and talk about why I like Homelander vs Hancock.

Why I like it

Homelander vs Hancock is my preferred for Homelander and easily my preferred for Hancock. The connections are as follows.

• Both are demigod superheroes in “realistic” takes on the genre, where their actions and emotions are far more complex than the more campy and played out stories we’ve come to associate with heroes for years. 

• They are members of a Godly race that are frequently compared to mythic beings, both in actions and presence. 

• Despite their power and status, their prior life shaped them into someone who longs for love and support that they never received at a critical moment (Homelander’s entire childhood and Hancock being left alone after getting amnesia). This ensured that their actions are shaped by the media and the masses, where they are constantly plagued by a feeling of loneliness and desire to replace it with the affection of others.

• In a contrast worthy of Cole vs Alex, both are the ultimate antithesis to each other's lifestyle.

• Homelander views humans as meaningless; little more than insects due to his own power, and equates himself to a God. He treats others with contempt and a complete lack of respect, while also caring little if at all for the results of his actions. He takes lives without a care, and believes he truly can do whatever he wants. Hancock once lived like that (albeit not as uncaring and he didn’t kill bystanders or anything like that), and didn’t concern himself with worrying over the damage he caused to the city. Deep down, he hated himself for it, and that was a major angle of his depression. More than anything, it was what drove him to be better, where Ray finally made him realize he was meant to help people, and to do that, he had to judge himself like one. Due to how they grew, both would ultimately despise each other (more on that in a bit)

• That prior relation to mortals and to love is what drove their actions as they progressed, but in opposite ways (Homelander began to view humans as worthless, and this extended to everyone around him really. It turned him into a narcissistic manchild that further pushed everyone away with his actions, where he was exposed, bit by bit, for the monster he was. Hancock’s drive to gain acceptance drove him to subject himself to punishment for his damages, which led to his further becoming human and gaining friends like Ray. He eventually received the love he desired, which continues to drive him to be better, for humanity’s sake.)

• Coincidentally, both have had relationships with other Godly individuals who control and manipulate storms (Stormfront and Mary). Both of their first names are also John, but everybody calls them their more known name.

So, why this one? It’s not as connection heavy as something like Omni-Man vs Homelander, nor is it quite as similar in terms of character archetype. The simple answer is that it goes into both parties' characters like, in my opinion, none of their other matches do. This is pretty much superhero Cole vs Alex for me, where not only are both the ultimate examples of good and evil in their fields, but they would come to hate each other as things progress. 

Homelander is what Hancock once was; a selfish self-absorbed jerk who believes himself above humanity, and John would hate someone like him running around with nobody to stop him. Conversely, Hancock is what Homelander wants to be; a Demigod that humanity loves and supports, and Homelander would despise someone like that. Both would view each other as jokes (Homelander would see him as a boot-licking jokey child, while Hancock would see him as a corporate sellout boy-scout). As time goes by, Homelander would see that Hancock is all that he wants to be, while Hancock would see Homelander as an embodiment of all that he hated about himself, and more. One of his greatest quotes in the movie, which I linked above, perfectly symbolizes what I love about his growth. “You want something, nobody can stop you from taking it; you just take it right? …but can you take it?” He hates that people will just do whatever they want because they can, exactly like Homelander does, and he would despise someone like that.

I love matches where you can really reveal the character of the fighters in their actions, and this doubles in moral clashes or examples where both completely understand the other's scenario. This can lead to heartbreaking and driven endings, or in this case, the ultimate clash between good and evil. Like I put in the script, just picture a Guts vs Dimitri-style shot of both of them, shaking and bloody, but finding the drive to push onward from the media and the world, like they always did. Hancock, to save them all, and Homelander, to destroy them all for not loving him. 

You can do so much with this as a Cole vs Alex-coded idea, like work in gorgeous aerial combat, plenty of destruction on the scale of Hulk vs Doomsday, a 2000’s movie clash where the villain attempts to talk the hero onto his side, and more. More than Omni-Man, this is my preferred for Homelander because it is pitting the exact man he would hate most against him: A being with unmatched power that is loved by all. Conversely, It is my preferred for Hancock because it is doing the exact same; having him fight a narcissistic child who thinks he's above it all, and has killed hundreds because of it. They would HATE each other, which would make the fight and character interactions all the more entertaining while making me fall more and more in love with the fight.

So, that's why I like Homelander vs Hancock. 

Bonus:

Now that The Boys has a new look in vs, I figured I would briefly talk about some ideas I've heard of before.

Billy Butcher vs Punisher: This one is the most likely return of the series on DB. Billy is easily the second most vs applicable character on the show (powers, character, relevance etc) behind Homelander, and Frank is an obvious pairing against him for several reasons. Both are edgy gun-toting mass murdering vigilantes with a grudge against the slime that took their family away (Billy hating Supes for Homelander raping and taking his wife from him, while Frank hates criminals for killing his family just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time). 

It's a simple draw and an equally simple pairing, especially taking into account Garth Ennis making the boys, who obviously based Billy off Punisher because… you know. It's a highly compatible comparison, a popular idea to casuals, and neither has any real competition for matches these days (Billy has a few good ideas here and there, but Punisher's main request from years ago in Judge Dredd just isn't as relevant anymore, nor is it comparable in other factors really. 

Debate: Yeah, Punisher just wins. You could debatably have him stronger based on various calcs in the series, but after our relook into it, he's just even with Frank now. Even if he was weaker, Punisher blitzes ridiculously (FTL vs MHS) and his hax/Tertiary advantages are unquestionably better. 

Ochako Uraraka vs Starlight: I also think this one has a shot. Technically speaking, I did “create” it (unaware if people pushed it before I did) but I was the one who started shilling it in the Official DB Server. I have fallen off it a bit (I really dislike Starlight after Season 3-4) but that's just my opinion, and overall I think it's the best for both. Bright-eyed young women from poor families who rose up the ranks to become heroes while providing for their parents, while training with other heroes to become their best selves and revolutionize heroism in their worlds, is a great connection compared to their other options. My Hero Academia and The Boys is also a heavily interesting series pairing (just look at All Might vs Homelander), which you can do a lot with in here for a more skill and intelligence-based idea compared to raw power. 

You can make an interesting dynamic with their abilities (one is close-range, the other is long-range), where both have their set advantages, but have dipped their toes into their opposite as well. Uraraka can use her smarts to figure out how to get close to Starlight despite her energy blasts, while Starlight can keep trying to keep her distance and evade shields/attacks Uraraka makes with Zero Gravity. Both are also just the sort of grounded opponent that worm best with each other, and the escalation of their powers into final “no more holding back” territory makes great potential for a climactic finisher, or a sad death if necessary (Uraraka's Quirk Awakening against Toga, and Starlight’s true power against Soldier Boy). Simple but pleasant idea, great potential, obvious pairing, popular series and characters etc. I like it. 

Debate: Also pretty clear-cut victory for Uraraka. Even bare-bones scaling for Uraraka makes her stronger than any end of Starlight comparing to Homelander (Todoroki's Ice Wall is double digit Megatons) which Uraraka would largely upscale by now to maintain a large power advantage. Her speed is also much better (high rela at least vs MHS) and her powers are much more versatile, as is her skillet/training. 

Tenya Iida vs A-Train: Here's the other major MHA vs The Boys idea besides MightLander. It's a simple pairing: Super-Speedster blue bois with impactful relationships with their brothers. Personally, I don't really like the idea. A-Train is one of the few characters in the show I whole-heartedly like currently, primarily because of his redemption and the quality of it. I also am a big fan of Iida, and pitting him against A-Train reduces both of their characters in my eyes. You need to shove A-Train back to when he was a dick to have the fight make sense dynamically, and have Iida act OOC to have him be fine with murdering some random guy (the fight cannot work in a vacuum if A-Train isn't the villain). 

There also a more obvious dynamic issue where Iida just styles on everything A-Train does visually. His super-speed and applications of it are much more flashy and grandiose, while A-Train is much more grounded as a fighter. It's just hard for me to see a very interesting fight when it's entirely there for Iida and you can't really do anything interesting on A-Train's side because he's a Quicksilver and Tenya is a Flash, relatively speaking. 

Debate: Iida is a top-tier of 1A. A-Train is dying. 

Soldier Boy vs Peacemaker: One of the more all-around solid matches thought up. The character interactions and ability clashes are interesting, it's a really funny banter-fest, the connections are good, and other more solid ideas. Not the most diehard fan of it, but it's objectively one of the best fights the series has. 

Debate: Pretty much Billy vs Punisher again. Strength is generally even, one could push Soldier Boy harder, but he's still getting blitzed and outhaxed, so Peacemaker wins. 

Nezuko vs Kimiko: This one is an alright idea I've tossed around here and there. I say alright because I like the connections, but the dynamic is pretty uninteresting (Kimiko really can't match Nezuko in terms of anything, and the comparison is like Invincible to Gohan for fight progression). I would prefer a more anime-based/flashy opponent who can push her to her best, like my personal favorite in Power from Chainsaw Man (good connections, great dynamic/power interactions, closer debate, etc). 

Debate: Nezuko kinda just beats out every end you give Kimiko and clears in powers. 

Other Homelander matches: Obviously, a lot more options exist for Homelander besides Hancock, which I don't fault you for preferring. A lot of them are kind of boring, but his other two biggest as of right now are Red Keeper (Ranger Reject) and Albert Wesker (Resident Evil). Barring spoilers, I can certainly understand why both are requested (RK is a match of superhero parodies in similar series’, while Albert is just the same kind of egotistical douche Homelander is, but also the same kind of scientist who experimented on him as a child). Of the two, I do like Wesker more as an option due to the power and character interactions, and I do quite like it overall. Actually, a friend of mine (Fenic) is doing a blog on Homelander vs Wesker on her own blogs, and I'm sure she'd love the help if anybody is interested. 

Closing: So, yeah, this has been my first (and last) blog on The Boys (seriously). I actually put this very match against Uraraka vs Starlight in a poll several months ago for those who remember on which one I would make a blog, and I'm happy this turned out as well as it did. I expect Uraraka vs Starlight to happen eventually and will aim to join the eventual G1 to help MHA's best girl win, hence why I'm not too bothered about leaving it off my blogs. Apologies to my blog members for reading/watching the series (y'all some soldiers lol) and thanks for helping me land CockLander.

Still the funniest match-up name ever.

Next Time…

DM if interested in joining.