Could Homelander From The Boys Beat Superman In A Fight?
Amazon Prime's The Boys is going from strength to strength, and no one on the show is stronger than Homelander (Antony Starr). Unfortunately for the rest of the world, Vought International's most powerful creation is also a sadistic and narcissistic character with a vast array of issues that he only barely manages to keep in check — most of the time. As such, the people who are aware of his true nature see him as a dangerous and massively intimidating presence, and it's not rare for him to use extremely violent methods that have been known to leave him covered in blood. Since the Homelander is both the unstoppable force and the immovable object, we've yet to see him meet his match. In fact, it's possible that he doesn't even have one.
... that is, unless you look into a very different superhero universe. Like many other super-strong, flying characters with invulnerability and heat vision, Homelander bears a similarity to the ultimate superhero archetype, DC's Superman himself. But is he as powerful? There's only one way to find out.
On one corner, you have Homelander, the fearsome uber-Supe of The Boys universe. On the other, there's the DCEU's Superman (Henry Cavill), the last survivor of planet Krypton and a solar-powered strongman whom all other superheroes are compared to. Which one of them would win? Could Homelander from The Boys beat Superman in a fight?
Who's stronger, Homelander or Superman?
The Boys hasn't explored Homelander's full might quite yet, but the show has made abundantly clear that as far as we know, there are no real challengers to his sheer power and invulnerability. Even the secondary powerhouse of season 2, Stormfront (Aya Cash), not only submitted to Homelander's superiority — but also got thoroughly and quickly defeated by his young, presumably less powerful son, Ryan (Cameron Crovetti). The same Stormfront who fought and survived the extremely deadly trio of Queen Maeve (Dominique McElligott), Kimiko (Karen Fukuhara), and Starlight (Erin Moriarty), was quickly burned to a limbless crisp by a pint-sized kid with Homelander's powers. How strong do you think that makes the adult, fully-powered Homelander?
Meanwhile, Henry Cavill's DCEU Superman is formidable enough to battle the entire Justice League, as well as Kryptonian elite soldiers who have the same power set as he does. However, unlike Homelander, he has a major physical weakness — kryptonite. He's also had his superpowered rear handed to him more than once. In Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice alone, he has trouble with both Batman (Ben Affleck) and Doomsday, who actually technically killed him, even if it didn't exactly stick.
While we haven't really seen Homelander perform feats of strength comparable to DCEU Superman, the Vought hard-hitter himself states in the ending of The Boys season 2 that he's fully capable of ending "everyone and everything." Maeve — who's presumably perfectly aware of what he can do — doesn't call this out as hyperbole, either.
Knowing this, Homelander is a truly apocalyptic threat, and may very well be at least as powerful as the DCEU version of Superman.
Who's a better fighter, Homelander or Superman?
Unfortunately for Homelander, if two people of similar size and power fight, it all comes down to skill and experience. Superman has plenty of both, while the leader of the Seven has very little of either.
The fact that Superman has fought tough battles might mean that he occasionally gets knocked down, but it also means that he's used to getting up again. More importantly, he knows how to power through difficult fights in the first place. In his various appearances, Cavill's Superman has shown that he can counter everything from super-strength and super-speed to even heat vision, as General Zod (Michael Shannon) and his neck found to their mortal disadvantage in Man of Steel.
This bodes extremely badly for Homelander, who's been the undisputed king of Supe Hill all his life. As a result, his main combat tactics appear to be "turn up," "be invulnerable," and "have enough eye lasers for everyone." When faced with an opponent who can match his powers and knows how to counter his eye-beam attack — again, see General Zod and the old neck-snapping trick — things aren't looking great for everyone's favorite mentally unbalanced supe.
All in all, while Homelander possibly does have the raw power to take Superman to the ropes and beyond, he'll need to flex his non-eye-related powers every once in a while, and maybe take some MMA lessons while he's at it. Otherwise, Superman might make quick work of him.