Stormfront’s identity is revealed while a former member of the Supe returns. As Butcher and Starlight bond over a love for Hughie, Frenchie’s past is explored. The Deep has dinner with A-Train and Goran Višnjić’s Alistair Adana, and MM has an unfortunate encounter with a love sausage…
“The Bloody Doors Off” offers some long-awaited answers we’ve been asking about the newest member of the Seven, Stormfront. Born in Berlin in 1919 (looking good for 100 years old), she married and had a daughter with Frederick Vought, the man that started it all. This makes Stormfront the first-ever living being to be injected with Compound-V, and as a result, the world’s first superhero.
She proudly proclaims that Homelander is the man to lead an army of superheroes toward Vought’s true destiny. It’s a scary prospect to imagine Homelander leading an army of supes against the rest of the world, considering the power he and Stormfront possess between the two of them alone.
On the subject of supes, the Sage Grove Center mystery has been uncovered. The center is a psychiatric compound facilitating a secret ambition to stabilize Compound-V within people, but there’s far more going on within the facility’s walls than we first realized. Shawn Ashmore made a brief appearance in Episode 5, but in a smartly executed twist, Ashmore is revealed as none other than Lamplighter.
Notorious by reputation alone, the former member of the Seven is responsible for the deaths of Mallory’s grandchildren. Despite his despicable actions, one man and a lighter makes for one awesome villain. The pyro supe burns a test subject within Sage Grove, and later reveals he’s responsible for burning the evidence of the failed subjects.
MM, Frenchie and Kimiko infiltrate the Center, but all hell breaks loose. Once again, it’s all because Frenchie is spotted by Lamplighter. Much like Episode 3’s boat dilemma, it all escalated due to Frenchie’s mistakes. In a supe breakout reminiscent of the monster’s rampage from The Cabin In The Woods, the supes slaughter the staff in a smattering of bloody and awful ways. Our group eventually escapes, leaving the future uncertain for Frenchie and Kimiko. Mallory comes close to killing Lamplighter for her grandchildren’s deaths, and MM coming to terms with an encounter with a supe’s elongated sexual organ. Not even kidding.
Meanwhile, outside the compound, Butcher, Hughie and Starlight encounter one of the subjects with some visually, but narratively boring telekinetic powers (Sorry, it’s been done before with the short-lived Kenji).
This leads to some very sweet moments of bonding between our usually cold Butcher and Starlight as Hughie recovers in hospital.
“The Bloody Doors Off” is a deliciously dark and violently rampant episode, which delves into the past of some of the key characters. It also pushes the story into new places for the final two episodes of Season 2. While The Deep’s Church Collective story seems to dawdle on and leave me rather uninterested, Stormfront’s ambitions for a superhero army makes me anxious for what’s to come from the rest of the season and beyond.
