The Boys Season 5, Episode 6 Pays Homage To A Modern Horror Classic

Contains spoilers for "The Boys" Season 5, Episode 6 — "Though the Heavens Fall"

Remember how the ending of "The Boys" Season 4 teased that Ashley Barrett (Colby Minifie) was about to change into something truly nasty after taking Compound V, and how "The Boys" Season 5 finally revealed that her mysterious superpower is a psychic tumor face at the back of her head? "Though the Heavens Fall" reveals what happens when said tumor actually takes charge. As a bonus, it also gives us a very cool reference to the modern horror classic "Malignant." 

The episode builds on Ashley's conversation with the super-smart Sister Sage (Susan Heyward) in the latter's segment of Episode 5, "One-Shots." After learning of Sage's plans to let the world die in a brutal war between humans and supes just so she can read in peace, Ashley is understandably apprehensive of working with her to read Soldier Boy's (Jensen Ackles) mind. Unperturbed, Sage chloroforms Ashley unconscious, leaving the psychic tumor face at the back of her head in charge. 

The tumor promptly takes over Ashley's body and collaborates with Sage. In doing so, Ashley's body moves and functions very much like "Malignant" villain Gabriel, who also lives in the back of protagonist Madison Mitchell's (Annabelle Wallis) head and has the ability to control her body when she's not conscious.

As the ending of "Malignant" reveals, Madison has been suffering from murder visions throughout the movie for a reason: She's actually been committing said murders herself. Well, her body has. She has a parasitic twin called Gabriel, born attached to the back of her body as a malformed, twisted thing. Since the two share a brain, not everything about Gabriel could be removed by surgery — and the malignant twin occasionally gains control of Madison's body to commit atrocities.

When Gabriel is in charge, his malformed face emerges from the back of Madison's head, creating an effect not unlike Ashley's psychic tumor. Since he's looking at the world from that particular angle, Gabriel gets around by operating Madison's body in a reverse or back-to-front manner, just like Ashley's tumor does on "The Boys." This gives Gabriel his unnerving horror villain movements. 

In true "The Boys" fashion, "Though the Heavens Fall" both pays tribute to and pokes fun at the "Malignant" villain reveal. While the psychic tumor does control Ashley's body like Gabriel, her movements are considerably more awkward, and she finds it amusingly tricky to control the body. The "Malignant" reference is pretty obvious, and it's fun to see "The Boys" nod at yet another genre work so soon after taking a hilarious shot at HBO's "The Last of Us."

"The Boys" Season 5 is streaming on Prime Video.