Sister Sage fully survives a bullet to the head in The Boys season 4, here’s why:

Spoilers follow for The Boys season 4. It’s no surprise to fans of The Boys when a major character meets an early and gruesome end. Even during season 4 of the series alone there have been characters that have been thrown against the side of buildings or heat-visioned in the crotch. For a brief moment in the latest episode of The Boys it seemed like the most surprising death of the season had happened as MM shot Sister Sage in the head to prevent her from alerting Homelander to their presence. The real twist of course wasn’t Sister Sage’s surprise death, it’s that she survived.

The genius aspect about this moment from The Boys season 4 is that the death is handled pretty matter-of-fact. MM and Sister Sage are locked in a standoff. Sage is taunting him with information about his daughter while MM is trying very hard to make sure his team isn’t compromised, leading to the moment where Sage tries to sound the alarm and promptly takes a bullet to the head from MM’s gun. Not only that but MM passes out from the panic attack that has been induced by the sudden killing of another person (who was taunting him with details of his private life).

Of note is that in this exact moment, immediately after being shot in the head, The Boys wastes no time confirming that Sister Sage isn’t dead. As previously revealed in The Boys (just two episodes ago!), Sister Sage’s super-power isn’t JUST that she’s the smartest person in the world, it’s that her brain is regenerative. Sister Sage will routinely give herself lobotomies to make her briefly dumber, and to ease her own anxieties about being the smartest person in the world. MM shooting Sister Sage in the head is only a more extreme version of the supe lobotomizing herself in her bedroom.

As the episode continues, we see that this is absolutely the case, because not only is Sister Sage stuck in her “dumb” persona while recovering, it seems to be an even more extreme version of that too. Rather than answer any of Homelander’s questions, she goes on about eating candy corn, making him realize that she’s had some…brain damage. We don’t see Sister Sage fully recovered by the end of the episode, but based on what we know about her recovery time we’ll assume she’ll be back to “normal” in next week’s episode.

In The Boys season 4, Karl Urban stars once again as Billy Butcher, leader of The Boys, which also includes Jack Quaid as Hughie Campbell, Laz Alonso as M.M., Tomer Capone as Frenchie, and Karen Fukuhara as Kimiko Miyashiro. Some of the “supes” featured in the series include Antony Starr as Homelander, Jessie T. Usher as A-Train, and Chace Crawford as The Deep. Other stars of The Boys include Colby Minifie as Ashley Barrett, CEO of Vought International, and Claudia Doumit as Victoria Neuman.

The world is on the brink. Victoria Neuman is closer than ever to the Oval Office and under the muscly thumb of Homelander, who is consolidating his power. Butcher, with only months to live, has lost Becca’s son as well as his job as The Boys’ leader. The rest of the team are fed up with his lies. With the stakes higher than ever, they have to find a way to work together and save the world before it’s too late.