Madelyn Stillwell is one of the two secondary antagonists (alongside A-Train) of Season 1 of the Amazon series The Boys and a minor character in its spin-off series, The Boys Presents: Diabolical and Gen V.
She was one of the top-ranking executives within Vought International, a media conglomerate that owns The Seven. As a result, she worked closely with the Seven frequently.
As Vought's Senior Vice President of Hero Management, it was Madelyn Stillwell's job to manage Vought's vast assortment of individual superheroes and their respective teams, including principally the world's foremost, best and greatest superhero team, The Seven. It was also her job to ensure maximum power and profitability for the company – and that was a job she executed with ruthless efficiency. But her ambitions went beyond merely having superheroes fighting crime on America's streets; she desired to put them in the military, through a multi-billion-dollar government contract.
The Boys Series[]
Background[]
Stillwell gains the position of Senior Vice President of Hero Management after "backstabbing" The Legend with the help of Stan Edgar.
In 2015, Stillwell is seen on TV proudly introducing A-Train as the newly drafted member of The Seven, as well as the first black superhero who joined the team.
The Boys Presents: Diabolical[]
One Plus One Equals Two[]
Stillwell convinces Homelander that he should not let Black Noir upstage him while handling a hostage crisis at a chemical plant and says that Black Noir is not there to teach him. She advises him to drop the word "The" from his title. She interacts in a sexually suggestive way with Homelander.
Homelander fails to save anyone from the chemical plant disaster, which Stillwell says was not how she planned for him to be introduced to the public. However, she remarks that his ratings have still increased.
Season One[]
Stillwell manages Homelander's public persona for him, telling him where and when to go to events and what scripts he should follow in his speeches, sometimes going against his wishes. Over time, Homelander becomes increasingly resentful of how she tells him what to do. He also resents the time she spends taking care of her own child instead of being around him.
More to be Added
Season Two[]
To be Added
Personality[]
As one of the most important members of Vought International, Stillwell works closely with all of its Supes; most particularly, The Seven. Stillwell seemed to have a particular closeness with Homelander, being one of the only people at Vought capable of keeping him under control while acting as a maternal figure towards him, via letting him suckle on her large and heavy, milk-lactating breasts. She is a very manipulative and somewhat dishonest to both him and other people who work with or under her and is even implied to have sexually abused him when he was still a relatively young adolescent.
The relationship between the two developed further at the end of season one, with Homelander questioning Vought and its use of Compound V. He is angry to find out that Stillwell lied to him about the whereabouts of Becca Butcher and her child. In You Found Me, she is held hostage by Butcher in hopes of angering Homelander. He is undeterred, however, and tries to force her to stop lying about everything and answer his questions honestly. After she finally tells him the truth and admits to being afraid of him, Homelander smiles and gently holds Stillwell's face, before his gentleness turns to rage and he directs his heat vision into her eyes, burning through her face and killing her.
At Homelander's insistence, Doppelganger impersonates Madelyn Stillwell following her death to satisfy Homelander's perverse urges. Then Homelander spontaneously snaps Doppelganger's neck, insisting that he needs no one.
Abilities[]
- Manipulation: She was exceptionally skilled at manipulating and influencing other people including Homelander, being only one of few people who were actually able to control him through exploiting his need for familial love and personal affection by acting like a caring parental figure towards him. However, this approach had its limits and only worked up until the point that Homelander learnt that Stillwell had been lying to him about the fate of Becca Butcher and their unborn child and when found out the truth behind the events, he finally stopped listening her all together and killed her in his rage-induced state at the sense of her betrayal.
- Business: She was quite talented in her corporate leadership acumen and other business management skills that helped to make Vought's various business ventures and other endeavors not only just remain profitable but continue to grow and thrive exponentially despite some Supe-related controversies and setbacks over the years in the ever-changing corporate environment of the state of the global economy. She was even chosen by Stan Edgar to be his potential successor after he retired before her death put a dent into the works of that plan.
Relationships[]
Family[]
Allies[]
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Enemies[]
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Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- Madelyn Stillwell is loosely based on the character James Stillwell from the comics, who also seems to have heavily inspired the character of her superior Stan Edgar.
- It is heavily implied that Madelyn had molested Homelander at a young age due to him seeing her as a motherly figure. This is likely true from the Diabolical episode "One Plus One Equals Two".
- Madelyn Stillwell marks the first character in The Boys to lose an eye (or both, in her case), as Homelander lasers through them in the S1 finale, killing her.