The Curious Case of Queen Maeve

The Seven’s female powerhouse is also the team’s most complex character.

In the DC Universe, there is a Trinity of heroes that the rest of the Justice League always look to. Superman, Batman, and Wonder Woman are seen as the three that lead by example and inspire the rest of the heroes in the DCU. In the world of The Boys, while the Batman of the group isn’t as clear, Homelander obviously takes the Superman role, and Queen Maeve is the Wonder Woman of the team.

The Seven are no Justice League though and even though she shares very little with Diana of Themyscria in terms of her character, besides Starlight, Queen Maeve might be the closest thing The Seven has to a hero, and it makes her one of the most complex, and human, characters on The Boys.

Maggie Shaw is no Amazonian princess and like every other member of The Seven, she’s just a regular person who’s been injected with Compound V which gifted her with superhuman strength, stamina, speed, and durability. A feminist and humanitarian, Maeve is also the second most powerful member of the team and, as Vought promotes her, a role model for all young girls around the world. During the first season of The Boys, it’s revealed that she and Homelander were once in a relationship and that there still may be something between the two, coming more from him than her. When the two board a hijacked passenger plane, she tries her best to save everyone but Homelander, who is unable to fly the plane, decides to just walk away. She begs with him to try anything and with his powerset, he should be able to do something, but he shrugs it off. She pleads with him to at least save two kids, but he refuses to leave any witnesses. They leave the plane and watch as it crashes, killing everyone on board, and proceed to lie to the world about the situation. For Queen Maeve, this is a huge turning point and the moment that changes everything for her. Up until the incident on the plane, she’s mostly turned a blind eye to what Homelander and the rest of The Seven have been doing, including The Deep’s sexual assault of Starlight. After the plane, however, she becomes mentally damaged and starts to drink (more) to forget the incident. This leads her back to her ex, Elena, which would put her straight in the line of Homelander’s fire.

At the start of the second season, her relationship with Elena seems like it’s on better terms until Homelander threatens to kill her if Maeve does anything to upset him after outing her to the public. This leads Vought to push Maeve’s sexuality and her relationship with Elena to the forefront of their “Girls Get It Done” campaign, promoting strong female heroes. As the season progresses, Maeve starts to become more of the hero she wants to be, saving Starlight from a brutal attack from Black Noir by exploiting his peanut allergy, coming to help the girls beat down Stormfront, and eventually helping Butcher and Ryan escape from Homelander by showing him that he has footage of the plane incident and threatening to upload it. While her conscience might be a bit clearer at the end of the season, she still has a lot to get through but her victory over Homelander, no matter how temporary it might be, is a step in the right direction for Maeve, as her character continues to develop in a righteous direction.

In the comics, it’s The Seven’s botched prevention of 9/11 that completely disillusions her. As the team deflects planes from the World Trade Center, they can’t stop the destruction of the Brooklyn Bridge or save the lives of those who were on it at the time, an incident with leads Mother’s Milk to The Boys. After that moment, she becomes a drunk who uses men purely for physical gratification and feels dead on the inside. Her relationship with Homelander on the show is taken right from the comic, as the two are together for a time. However, she has two children in the comic, one with Stormfront, who is male in Ennis and Robertson’s book. And like on the show, she takes a liking to Starlight and comes to her aid several times, eventually dying when saving Annie from an attack by Homelander and Black Noir.

Even with all of that, Maeve doesn’t have much of a character in the source material, which is why the direction the character takes on the show is such a welcome change. Her bisexuality is an important aspect of her character, as it shows that behind the damaged veneer, she has a love for everyone. Her relationship with Elena is a tragic one and after leaving her for Homelander, it’s obvious that she still has feelings for her, feelings that are used against her when Homelander callously outs her on live television. Butcher once threatened Homelander by holding Madelyn Stillwell hostage in hopes that she is his weakness. It obviously doesn’t work when it comes to Homealder but it would work on Maeve, as caring for others is one of the only weaknesses she has. She’s a character like no other on The Boys, one that has grown more than most since the start of the show. At first, she’s generally apathetic to everything that’s going on, complicit even to everything The Seven has done, and has been doing up until the start of the series. However, it’s obvious that at one point she wanted to be an actual hero, and she can’t fight that desire (as evidenced on the plane with Homelander) no matter how much she tries to kill it with alcohol. Early on in the series, she tells Starlight that people are a weakness and the only true way to be invincible is to cut them out. Even with this knowledge, she goes to Elena during her lowest point, showing that she too needs love. She’s the most human, and humane, member of The Seven and while she’s only second to Homelander when it comes to power, her love for Elena, and humanity in general, makes her the most vulnerable member of the team.

Queen Maeve might not be Wonder Woman but she’s more of a hero than most of The Seven. Starlight’s arrival on the team looks to be a turning point for her, as having another strong female on The Seven has given her a teammate, and more importantly a friend, she can relate to.

Arguably no other character on The Boys has gone through more character development than Queen Maeve and as the series progresses, and she continues to grow, Maeve has already become much more interesting than the character she’s modeled after. When it comes to The Boys, there’s only one queen and no room for a princess.