The episode follows Billy Butcher reuniting with the Boys to capture a Supe terrorist that has recently arrived in the city, having made a deal with his former mentor Grace Mallory in exchange for reuniting with his wife Becca shortly after discovering that she was still alive, initially unaware that the terrorist they are dealing with is Kimiko's younger brother Kenji.
Meanwhile, Homelander attempts to meet and connect with his son, whose name is revealed to be Ryan, with the former having fathered the latter with Becca eight years ago and whose existence he was unaware of.
Meanwhile, the Deep is drugged and locked in a room by Carol and Eagle the Archer, who hope to put him on a "journey" of self-confidence and convince him to join the Church of the Collective.
The Deep has a hallucination of his gills speaking to him and has a "heart-to-heart" conversation with them where he confesses his insecurities, revealing that he abuses women as a defense mechanism.
[1][2] The series showrunner and head writer Eric Kripke had already begun writing the scripts for the season, having started to work on them during the 2018 United States elections in order to capture the topics and themes that would be explored in the season accurately, including white nationalism, white supremacy, systemic racism, and xenophobia.
[8][9] The storyline also introduces a running gag related to the Church of the Collective's favored drink Fresca, that would be used frequently for the rest of the second season, to which Kripke and the writers admitted that it was a joke with no meaning that they kept purely for its humor.
[10][11] The episode main cast includes Karl Urban as Billy Butcher, Jack Quaid as Hughie Campbell, Antony Starr as John Gillman / Homelander, Erin Moriarty as Annie January / Starlight, Dominique McElligott as Maggie Shaw / Queen Maeve, Jessie T. Usher as Reggie Franklin / A-Train, Laz Alonso as Marvin T. Milk / Mother's Milk (M.M.
), Chace Crawford as Kevin Moskowitz / The Deep, Tomer Capone as Serge / Frenchie, Karen Fukuhara as Kimiko Miyashiro / The Female, Nathan Mitchell as Earving / Black Noir, Colby Minifie as Ashley Barrett, and Aya Cash as Klara Risinger / Stormfront.
[12] Also starring are Shantel VanSanten as Becca Butcher, Langston Kerman as Eagle the Archer, Jessica Hecht as Carol Manheim, Abraham Lim as Kenji Miyashiro, Nicola Correia-Damude as Elena, Cameron Crovetti as Ryan Butcher, David W. Thompson as Gecko, Adrian Holmes as Dr. Park, and Laila Robins as Grace Mallory.
[27] David Griffin from IGN rated the first three episodes with 9 out of 10 and gave particular praise to Fukuhara's performance as Kimiko and deemed that her "motive expressions and body language effectively communicate the nuanced emotions she's feeling throughout."
[28] Brian Tallerico from Vulture rated the episode with 4 stars out of 5, giving praise for the focus on the relationships between the main characters and the portrayal of toxic masculinity in the series.
[29] The recap from Richard Edwards at TechRadar which received 4 out of 5 stars, stated that the Seven best moments, particularly the Deep's speaking with the gills, are found in this episode and considered the latter's storyline to be actually kind of funny and heart-breaking, showing how the series has managed to accomplish its success.
[30] Liz Shannon Miller, who wrote a review for Collider lauded the performance of Urban as Butcher while also praising the episode's first scene, which managed to solve the question about the character's fate at the end of the previous season.