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The Church Of The Collective Detail That Should Have The Boys Fans Concerned

Amazon's adaptation of the Garth Ennis comic book series The Boys is not exactly stocked up on virtuous figures. The superheroes are malignant narcissists at best, the people charged with watching over the superheroes are seen by many as violent terrorists, and Hughie Campbell (Jack Quaid), one of the closest characters we have to an "innocent," just unwittingly signed up to work for a lady who secretly exploded a lot of heads! In essence — there's danger on all sides. Even the "good guys" are often bad. So it's not without a little reservation that we can still peg one most dangerous things on the show as a "religion" of sorts — The Church of the Collective.

Audiences were first introduced to The Church of the Collective in season 2 of The Boys as a kind of parody of modern fad religions. The Church of the Collective doesn't seem evil so much as opportunistic — at least, at first blush. We first meet them when The Deep (Chace Crawford) is at his lowest, living in squalor and excommunicated from Vought superhero group The Seven. Eagle the Archer (Langston Kerman) ushers Deep into the new-agey, Fresca-drinking cult to find redemption — or maybe just so The Collective can find Deep's money.

But the Church goes much deeper than that kind of low-stakes theft. Historically speaking, this religion is yet another front for the Nazis.

The Church of the Collective's connection to Stormfront

The Church of the Collective's origins are far more disturbing than even its members questionable soft drink choices. In addition to The Church, season 2 of The Boys also introduces a very scary character in the form of Stormfront (Aya Cash). At first, Stormfront seems like some kind of social media guru, someone who can inspire others, and who might even be good for The Seven. We learn pretty quickly that Stormfront is a lot more than she seems, and part of that stems from her connection with The Church of the Collective.

While Stormfront (whose real name is Klara Risinger) seems like she is in her 30s, she was actually born in Berlin, Germany in 1919 and went on to become a member of the Nazi party. And how did Stormfront become a seemingly ageless, white supremacist super villain? She married scientist Frederick Vought (the patriarch of the Vought corporation) and became the first to be injected with Compound V, the drug responsible for manifesting superpowers.

According to both Stormfront and Vought head honcho Stan Edgar (Giancarlo Esposito), the Church was cool with Nazis like Stormfront. In fact, it might even have been exclusive to Whites only. And while Stormfront may have abandoned the Church after it became more inclusive of other races, there's every possibility that the organization could become just as sinister now as it was when Stormfront was a member.

The future of The Church of the Collective

At the end of The Boys' second season, there's a major change to The Church of the Collective: It's then-leader Alastair Adana (Goran Visnjic) gets his head exploded by congresswoman and secret Supe Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit). What that means for the world of The Boys is that there is a power vacuum at the Church, and no one immediately present to fill it. As we look toward the third season of The Boys, we have to ask ourselves: Who will wrest control of the Church next?

Before Stormfront found herself limbless at the wrong end of some eye blasts, she had a belief that Homelander (Antony Starr) could become the next Great White Hope. "We are in a war for the culture," she told him. "The other races are grinding us down and taking what is rightfully ours, but we can fight back. With an army of supermen, millions strong. Because that is Vought's true destiny, and you will be the man who will lead us."

Homelander didn't seem too keen on being the leader of that type of master race, but his son (whose laser blasts took a chunk out of Stormfront) isn't speaking to him — so who knows what dangerous form Homelander's narcissism might take next? Maybe he'll be looking for a little godly redemption. And we can't discount the possibility that Victoria Neuman could take over the Church as part of her political movement. We have no idea what her superpowered endgame is, just that she's willing to explode a bunch of heads to get there. Maybe she'll use the Church to raise an army of disaffected Supes who feel ignored by Vought?

We don't know what will happen next with The Church of the Collective on The Boys; we just know that they're still a threat — and likely a major one.