The Guy From Vought
), a company which publicly owns the Seven, several smaller superhero teams, and their related franchises, and privately is responsible for the creation and distribution of the superpower-inducing Compound V. The most prominent normal human antagonist in the series, whom Homelander often unsuccessfully seeks to impress/cause to fear him, the Guy From Vought is an apparent high-functioning sociopath and practical embodiment of VA (his legal name, James Stillwell, only revealed at the conclusion of The Bloody Doors Off), working only in the corporate interest, including orchestrating/ordering: the near-coup of the Russian government, the massacre of the G-Men teams, Payback's ambush of the Boys, and the takeover of the White House via idiotic puppet ruler U.S. Vice President Vic the Veep.
His real name, James Stillwell, while first mentioned in #29, is not explicitly confirmed to refer to him until #63, until which point he is presented solely as the embodiment of the company, also known as the Vought Guy, first introduced in #4.
Two major developments occur by sheer accident: the death of VA's CEO by a heart attack in #34, and the President being killed by a rabid animal in #60.
His calm exterior is in contrast to the superhero teams he oversees: he never shows any concern in the Seven's meetings or around the Homelander, despite their powers, nor around Russian mob boss Little Nina.
Jack from Jupiter considers the Guy From Vought to be worse than the Seven, and has said he used to have nightmares about the sort of things the executive might have had done; Homelander has shown signs of wanting to kill him, but always stops himself and seemed genuinely scared of him (or the true power he wields) in Herogasm #5.
[4] During Homelander's attempted coup d'etat against the United States government in Over the Hill with the Swords of a Thousand Men, the Guy From Vought becomes aware that the Boys and VA had been tricked into a conflict by a third party, ultimately revealed as Black Noir.
However, he knew they could not survive the revelation that they had tried to kill the President, and so when the Boys released everything they had on VA and the superheroes, the Guy From Vought used Jess Bradley as a scapegoat; his plan all along was to blame everything on her.
The Guy From Vought then meets with his subordinates before seeing the newest superhero team, wearing all-white costumes and going by the name of TRUE, and noting the redressed nature of it, scraps it.
[5] In the epilogue Dear Becky, set twelve years later, the Guy From Vought is revealed to have become a bearded hermit following his breakdown, wandering around a pineapple plantation while quoting Milton Friedman and repeatedly muttering about good products and bad products, and is quickly dismissed by Wee Hughie as a suspect for being the individual who sent him Butcher's old diary.
[13][14][15] In the third season, a now toddler-aged Theodore "Teddy" Stillwell is revealed to be one of the Supe children held in Red River,[16] with Madelyn having been feeding him Compound V prior to her death, leading to him developing teleportation, allowing him to escape from Butcher's bomb, while Edgar is revealed to be Black Noir's brother and Victoria Neuman's adoptive father,[17][18][19][20] and to be looking for a way for Vought to get out of the superhero industry in favor of solely focusing on their pharmaceutical/military clientele.
[22][23] However, secretly guiding Noir's actions,[24] Edgar arranges for him to cover up Homelander's accidental massacre of both a group of eco-terrorists and their hostages, claiming them to have had a bomb.
