Recaps

Over two months, Solomon’s Vought empire expanded rapidly, signing up thousands of mutant superheroes and turning Magneto into a commercial superstar. Solomon approved a Hollywood film that dramatized Magneto’s past, then learned that Dr. Trask’s laboratory had completed the first-generation combat suppression collar.

• Vought’s superhero roster passed five figures, while Erik Lehnsherr became its most popular star and reluctantly accepted endorsements in exchange for wealth and support for mutants.
• Vought Studios began preparing “The Rise of Vought,” a film that recast the Cuban Missile Crisis as a victory for Vought’s heroes.
• A screenwriter pitched a melodramatic showdown between Magneto and Sebastian Shaw, and Solomon approved the script without changes.
• Solomon ordered the Public Relations Department to have Erik attend the film’s launch press conference and warned the screenwriter to remove metal objects before meeting him.
• Roland reported that Dr. Trask’s X-Gene energy suppression project had produced the First-Generation Combat Suppression Collar, and Solomon went to inspect it.

Solomon witnessed Trask test a collar that suppressed a mutant’s powers and learned that mutant assaults were becoming frequent. He left Charles and Erik to handle the growing problem, insisting only that Vought’s reputation and business remain untouched.

• Trask showed Solomon the first-generation Suppression Collar and demonstrated it on Mad Rhino, whose powers vanished when the collar activated and who broke his ribs against the test wall.
• Solomon learned that Mad Rhino had tortured a civilian family to death after losing his temper during a rescue mission.
• Roland reported that dozens of similar assaults had occurred that month as mutants’ newfound status and past grievances fueled their brutality.
• Roland explained that Charles and Erik had disagreed over Mad Rhino’s fate until Raven proposed sending him to Trask’s laboratory.
• Solomon refused to intervene in the mutants’ affairs and ordered that Vought’s share price and reputation be protected.

Solomon told Trask that his work on the suppression collar could earn him a place on the Compound V research team, then informed Charles, Erik, Raven, and Emma Frost that he would leave Earth. He assigned them control of Vought and warned that he would destroy them and reset the world if they let the company fall into infighting.

• Solomon praised Trask’s work on the suppression collar and promised him a place on the Compound V research team after he completed recessive X-Gene detection technology.
• At a meeting in Vought Tower, Solomon told Charles, Erik, Raven, and Emma Frost that he would leave Earth and claimed The Seven were fighting threats capable of destroying the planet.
• Solomon assigned Charles and Erik to oversee superhero management and global security, with Raven mediating disputes between them.
• Solomon put Emma Frost in charge of Vought’s business, capital, and secret research, and ordered her to prioritize Compound V and continue improving Cerebro.
• Solomon warned the four leaders to keep Vought as Earth’s undisputed overlord or he would crush them and reset the world.

Solomon tested the first-generation X-Gene suppression collar and concluded he needed stronger mutant subjects to learn whether it could weaken Apocalypse. He summoned Magneto, Charles, and Emma Frost to Trask's laboratory and began testing the collar on Emma.

• After the others left, Solomon considered using the collar against Apocalypse but decided to determine its suppression limit first.
• Solomon fastened the collar around a clone that lacked an X-Gene, and the device failed to suppress it.
• The clone removed and broke the collar despite its anti-tampering electric shock, and Solomon discarded the damaged device.
• Solomon summoned Magneto, Charles, and Emma Frost to Trask's laboratory to test new collars on their different peak attributes.
• Emma Frost volunteered first, and Trask activated a collar around her neck at Solomon's command.

Solomon tested Trask’s Mutant Inhibitor collars on Emma Frost, Charles, and Erik, but all three overwhelmed the restraints with their level 5 powers. He reviewed his own attributes afterward and concluded that reaching level 6 would require finding powerful people in other worlds.

• Emma Frost overloaded her collar with her X-Gene energy and regained her diamond transformation.
• Charles burned out his collar’s chips with a surge of psychic power.
• Erik overloaded his collar with genetic energy, then crushed it into an iron ball with magnetic force.
• Solomon reassured Trask that the test had gone as expected and told him to keep improving the collar.
• Solomon checked his superpower panel and saw that all his attributes had reached level 5, but the mutants he had recruited had not raised any to level 6.

Compound V became publicly available as Victoria Neuman was elected vice president, and Homelander presented himself as America’s savior while brutally killing a newly empowered bank robber. Solomon watched the incident, leaving the wider changes in the world unfolding around him.

• Vought advertised Compound V as a product for anyone seeking to become a Supe, while news reported Victoria Neuman’s election as vice president.
• Solomon watched as a rock-skinned Supe held up Chase Bank and shrugged off police gunfire.
• Homelander arrived, reassured the officers, and confronted the robber inside the bank.
• The robber attacked Homelander, who broke his limbs and crushed his head despite his pleas for mercy.
• Homelander wiped blood from his boot, then took flight and assured the crowd that everyone was safe.

Homelander mistook a shadowy onlooker for Solomon and fled to Vought Tower, where he searched the building in fear. He recalled secretly injecting the last dose of original Compound V and becoming ten times stronger, leaving him convinced he had surpassed Solomon.

• Homelander basked in the crowd’s adoration after rescuing people, then spotted a black-clad figure who reminded him of Solomon.
• Homelander searched the street with his enhanced vision but found only bystanders, then rushed back to Vought Tower in panic.
• Homelander used his senses to search the tower repeatedly and found no sign of Solomon.
• Homelander remembered finding Bombsight and secretly injecting the last dose of original Compound V instead of giving it to the Research Department.
• Homelander recalled losing most of his strength during a two-month genetic rejection before the compound fused with his genes and increased his abilities tenfold.
• Homelander remembered defeating Soldier Boy and concluded that he had become as strong as, or stronger than, Solomon.

Homelander enjoyed his new family but feared Solomon’s return after using up the last vial of First-generation Compound. Meanwhile, Mother's Milk reunited Frenchie, Kimiko, and Hughie to plan an attack on Soldier Boy, ending with Frenchie revealing a nerve gas designed to incapacitate Supes.

• Homelander beat Soldier Boy into accepting him as his son and brought Ryan to his side, but he worried that Solomon would learn he had used up the last First-generation Compound.
• Hughie teleported naked into the apartment where Mother's Milk, Frenchie, and Kimiko were waiting for him.
• Hughie learned that Mother's Milk had called him back to help deal with Soldier Boy, despite Hughie's reluctance to risk his peaceful life at Vought.
• Frenchie revealed ten vials of Novichok nerve gas that he and Kimiko had modified to paralyze Soldier Boy.

Mother's Milk planned to kill Soldier Boy with Hughie's help, but Solomon unexpectedly appeared in the safe house and warned that their plan was unrealistic. The chapter ended with the group facing Vought's hidden ruler, unsure of his intentions.

• Hughie questioned how the group could kill Soldier Boy, and Frenchie explained his plan to inject acid and explosives into Soldier Boy's brain.
• Mother's Milk demanded that Hughie use his Vought access to obtain Soldier Boy's route map and poison the ventilation ducts, then revealed that his wife and daughter had left him.
• Hughie reluctantly considered helping Mother's Milk, but Solomon appeared in the safe house and said their plan would not work.
• Hughie recognized Solomon, while Mother's Milk and Frenchie realized that Vought's hidden ruler had overheard their plot.
• Frenchie reminded Kimiko that Solomon had saved his life, and Kimiko stepped back while continuing to watch him.

Solomon warned Mother's Milk that revenge on Soldier Boy would endanger his family and offered to erase his painful memories instead. After Solomon left, the others debated whether to ask Butcher for help, despite Hughie's objections.

• Mother's Milk accused Solomon of serving Vought, but Solomon said he would not stop him from seeking revenge on Soldier Boy.
• Solomon warned that Mother's Milk could not defeat Soldier Boy and that Homelander would retaliate against his family, then offered to erase his memories of Soldier Boy.
• Solomon told Hughie to claim their friendship if Homelander ever tried to kill him, then vanished from the safe house.
• Hughie suggested Mother's Milk accept Solomon's offer, while Frenchie proposed asking Butcher before they decided.
• Hughie objected that Butcher had settled down with Becca, but Frenchie insisted Butcher still wanted Homelander dead.

Mother's Milk went to Butcher seeking a decision about revenge, and Butcher revealed that he had permanently gained Compound V powers and intended to fight Vought once Becca and their unborn child were safe. Solomon secretly used his psychic power to control the group, then returned to Vought Tower without confronting them.

• Mother's Milk, Hughie, and Frenchie visited Butcher and told him about Soldier Boy, Frenchie's poison gas plan, and Solomon's proposal.
• Butcher rejected giving up and revealed golden Laser Eyes after surviving Compound V, declaring that he would turn himself and his allies into gods.
• Butcher said he would delay attacking Vought until he could ensure Becca and their unborn child were safe, then promised to lead the others against Vought.
• Solomon listened from above the villa and used psychic force to control Butcher, Hughie, Frenchie, Mother's Milk, and Kimiko for three seconds.
• Solomon left the group unaware of his interference and returned to Vought Tower.

Homelander returned to Solomon’s apartment and was caught lying on Solomon’s bed, then bragged that Original Compound V had made him far stronger. Solomon pierced Homelander’s shoulder with a violet lightning attack, leaving him bleeding and stunned.

• Homelander entered Solomon’s bedroom and curled up on his bed, recalling when he had thought Solomon was dead.
• Solomon returned, found Homelander on the bed, and demanded to know what he was doing.
• Homelander claimed he had only come to take a nap, then boasted that Original Compound V had increased his power tenfold.
• Solomon used Energy Vision to inspect Homelander’s enhanced attributes as Homelander assumed Solomon was intimidated.
• Homelander offered to spare Solomon and ordered him to keep working for him.
• Solomon fired violet lightning through Homelander’s right shoulder, piercing his defense and making him bleed.

Solomon learned Homelander had destroyed nearly all of the original Compound V and forced him to reveal that he had saved a drop. After taking control of Homelander and hearing about the drug’s rollout, Solomon ordered him to make injections of a new Compound V mandatory for newborns worldwide.

• Solomon subdued Homelander with purple lightning and psychic power, then demanded to know whether he had used the original Compound V.
• Homelander admitted he had saved one drop of the original solution in his safe, and Solomon ordered him to surrender it and cooperate with the Research Department.
• Solomon spared Homelander, intending to use him as a controllable public figure and living research subject.
• Homelander reported that Compound V had reached more than ten thousand registered Supes in six months, though adult injections still had a high fatal rejection rate.
• Solomon presented a reformulated Compound V with a much higher success rate and ordered Homelander to arrange mandatory injections for newborns across America and the world.

Solomon ordered Homelander to force through mandatory Compound V injections for every newborn and made him arrange a meeting of the Seven. The next morning, Solomon arrived at the meeting, leaving Homelander and the other members subdued by his presence.

• Solomon ordered Homelander to have Ashley push a bill for mandatory injections for every newborn through Congress, and Homelander reluctantly agreed.
• Solomon threatened Homelander for sneaking into his room and lying in his bed, then sent him away.
• Solomon burned the bed and ordered Ashley to provide a new penthouse and summon the surviving members of the Seven for a meeting.
• The Seven assembled the next morning, where Homelander stood quietly beside the head of the table and Soldier Boy complained about being summoned.
• Solomon entered the conference room, and the Seven straightened as Soldier Boy remembered how easily Solomon had subdued him before.

Solomon ordered Vought to make New Compound V mandatory for newborns worldwide, dismissing objections and placing Homelander in charge of implementation. The Supe Cultivation Act was quickly enacted, and Homelander used force to ensure governments carried it out as public outrage spread.

• Solomon announced New Compound V as Vought’s core strategy and ordered the company to push for injections for every newborn.
• Starlight and Queen Maeve objected to the plan’s dangers and its threat to Vought’s business, but Solomon rejected their concerns and assigned Homelander to oversee implementation.
• Solomon left the meeting and considered researching Original Compound V, copying ten thousand Supes’ abilities, and eventually leaving the world to visit others.
• After an overnight review, the United States government enacted the Supe Cultivation Act, triggering worldwide controversy and resistance.
• Vought and governments began building Supe schools and facilities and granting Supes preferential treatment, while Homelander forcibly subdued officials who obstructed the plan.

Solomon recreated the original Compound V and tested it on ten Supes, all of whom died despite one nearing level 3. He concluded that surviving the formula likely required at least one level 3 core attribute and considered testing it on a genuine level 3 Supe.

• Solomon reverse-engineered the original Compound V and reproduced its exact formula in one week.
• Solomon had Homelander bring ten condemned Supes into the laboratory as test subjects.
• Solomon injected the first nine Supes with the original formula, and each died from catastrophic bodily reactions.
• Solomon injected the tenth subject, a level 2 Supe whose strength and defense briefly seemed to approach level 3, but his organs failed and he died.
• Solomon concluded that a Supe likely needed at least one level 3 core attribute to survive the formula and considered testing it on a genuine level 3 Supe.

Solomon tested the newly completed Cerebro beneath Vought Tower and discovered that it let him detect supes across the world and control them from a distance. He confirmed the device’s power but learned that controlling many distant targets at once still strained his mind.

• Solomon ordered Homelander to find a powerful supe with exhausted potential for his experiment and rejected Homelander’s suggestion to use Golden Boy.
• Homelander told Solomon that the Research Department had completed Cerebro using the materials and blueprints he had provided.
• Solomon put on Cerebro’s helmet in a secret chamber beneath Vought Tower and expanded his psychic awareness across the Earth.
• Solomon distinguished supes from ordinary humans by detecting the mental distortion left by compound V and located more than ten thousand supes, including Butcher and Hughie.
• Solomon remotely took control of several supes in Africa and Europe, then noted that controlling numerous targets over great distances could overload his mind.

Solomon used Cerebro to prepare for harvesting the abilities and attributes of the world’s Supes, while tests confirmed that even a powerful Supe could not survive an injection of original Compound V. After harvesting ten thousand assembled Supes, he discovered three hidden individuals with the distinctive psychic frequency of original Compound V.

• Solomon ordered Homelander to gather every registered Supe at the nearest Vought branch and warned him that Cerebro would kill anyone else who used it.
• Homelander found a Supe with a Strength Attribute of level 3 to test original Compound V, but the subject’s body burst apart after the injection.
• Solomon abandoned further tests in The Boys world and decided to seek suitable test subjects in a world such as the X-Men world.
• Solomon used Cerebro to control and harvest the attributes and abilities of ten thousand Supes gathered at Vought branches worldwide.
• During the harvest, Solomon detected three concealed Supes whose psychic frequencies matched original Compound V.

Solomon copied the abilities and attributes of Bombsight, Torpedo, and Private Angel through Cerebro, then reviewed the gains from harvesting thousands of Supes. His new cellular rebirth ability gave him three revival tokens, while his expanded storage space reached 17.28 million cubic meters.

• Solomon used Cerebro to find Bombsight, Torpedo, and Private Angel, then copied their abilities and attributes from afar.
• Solomon reviewed his attribute panel and found that harvesting ten thousand people had yielded only modest attribute gains but many new abilities.
• Solomon gained Precognition +3, which let him passively see future fragments at important causal junctures.
• Solomon's Biological Immortality +7 gained cellular rebirth, allowing him three resets that restored him to his past peak condition.
• Solomon's Storage Space +5 fused his storage spaces and expanded their combined capacity to 17.28 million cubic meters.

Solomon arrived in Gotham in 2012, where Batman intervened when three thugs tried to rob him. After learning that Clark Kent had not yet become Superman, Solomon made finding him his main objective.

• Solomon arrived in a dark Gotham alley and was surrounded by three armed thugs.
• Batman swooped in, disarmed the gunman, and swiftly incapacitated all three thugs before warning Solomon to leave Gotham at night.
• Solomon recognized Batman and decided that Superman’s powers were far more valuable to him than Batman’s skills or equipment.
• Solomon used psychic power to search the thugs’ memories and learned that it was June 2012, with Metropolis across the bay from Gotham.
• Solomon concluded that Clark Kent had not yet become Superman and set out to find him.

Solomon traveled to Smallville, Kansas, hoping to find Clark Kent by locating his adoptive mother, Martha Kent. He reached Kent Farm and met Martha at her door, while Batman remained in Gotham trying to understand Solomon’s disappearance and the mysterious paralysis of the thugs.

• Solomon chose to search for Clark at Kent Farm rather than hunt for him across the world or search the Arctic for the Kryptonian Scout Ship.
• Batman returned to the alley after Solomon vanished and wondered whether Solomon had noticed him watching.
• Batman found the three thugs unconscious with their central nervous systems paralyzed and identified Solomon as a serious threat.
• Solomon used Teleportation to reach Smallville and walked to the Kent farmhouse late at night.
• Martha Kent opened the door, and Solomon politely greeted her.

Solomon stayed overnight at Martha's farmhouse, then discovered the spaceship hidden in the barn, where Martha caught him examining it. He pretended he had only entered the barn to find tools and acted surprised by the alien craft.

• Martha welcomed Solomon into her farmhouse after he claimed his car had broken down and he needed a place to stay.
• Solomon spoke with Martha about her son Clark and spent the evening chatting with her by the fireplace.
• Martha found Solomon gone in the morning and discovered that the normally locked barn door stood ajar.
• Martha rushed into the barn and found Solomon touching the spaceship that had carried Clark to Earth.
• Solomon apologized and claimed he had come to find tools, then pretended to mistake the spaceship for a model Jonathan had collected.

Solomon convinced Martha that he had seen a spaceship like the one hidden in her barn, prompting her to call Clark with the news. Clark raced from a logging camp in Canada toward Smallville, thrilled by the possibility of learning about his origins.

• Martha tried to drive Solomon away after he saw the spaceship in the barn.
• Solomon claimed he had seen a similar spaceship elsewhere, and Martha asked him to wait while she called for a tow truck.
• Martha locked the barn and phoned Clark, telling him Solomon had seen another spaceship like his.
• Clark reacted with shock and joy, then used his super speed to race toward Smallville.

Solomon stayed at Kent Farm and helped Martha while Clark hurried back from Canada. After Clark arrived and met Solomon, Solomon claimed he might remember a clue about the model in the barn and led Clark into the cornfield to talk.

• Solomon returned to Kent Farm in a borrowed Ford and agreed to stay when Martha asked him to help with farm work.
• Solomon helped Martha repair the sheep pen fence, chop firewood, and fix the harvester as they waited for Clark.
• Clark reached the farm after a carefully concealed journey and used his Super Hearing to confirm Martha was safe.
• Clark met Solomon, whose Energy Vision revealed that every one of Clark's attributes was level 5.9.
• Clark asked Solomon about the place resembling the model in the barn, and Solomon suggested a walk to help him remember.
• Solomon and Clark walked together into the cornfield behind the farm.

Solomon ambushed Clark in the cornfield and overwhelmed him with precise, experienced attacks, but Clark’s Kryptonian body resisted both his physical and psychic assaults. Solomon’s attempt to control Clark instead began awakening his suppressed powers, leaving Solomon in danger of being outmatched.

• Solomon suddenly punched Clark and sent him crashing into a crater, shocking Clark with the discovery that someone could hurt him.
• Solomon attacked Clark with rapid strikes, exploiting his inexperience and repeatedly knocking him down.
• Solomon struck Clark’s neck, but Clark remained conscious because Kryptonians did not need oxygen.
• Solomon invaded Clark’s mind with psychic power, but Clark’s subconscious fiercely resisted his attempt to control him.
• Clark’s resistance began releasing his suppressed Kryptonian abilities, and Solomon realized he had to end the fight before Clark fully awakened.