This text comprises spoilers for Gen V Season 2 by Episode 4, “Baggage.”
One of many greatest mysteries of Gen V Season 2 on Prime Video isn’t a factor, it’s an individual. Who’s Cipher, the brand new Dean of Godolkin College, performed by Hamish Linklater? Heck, “thriller” is nearly actually his identify, as a cipher is outlined as “a message in code.” As of the season’s fourth episode, we now have some solutions, no less than by way of one facet of that individual thriller: Cipher’s powers. However there’s extra to return, so let’s get into it.
Within the episode, whereas Marie Moreau (Jaz Sinclair) and Jordan Li (London Thor/Derek Luh) are pressured right into a blended martial arts-style cage match, the remainder of the gang – now reunited with earlier “villain” Cate Dunlap (Maddie Phillips) – investigates Cipher with the intention to shut the battle down. One key ingredient to the plan? Marie, who has blood-based powers, is ready to inform that Cipher doesn’t have any Compound V in his system. Which means, in accordance with our scrappy Guardians of Godolkin, that he’s not a Supe, so what is an everyday ol’ human doing operating a Supe supremacist college like God U?
Complicating plans a bit is that they volunteer Cate to make use of her “push” powers to drive Cipher to admit his humanity. The one downside with that is that Cate’s powers are tousled since Marie, Jordan, and Emma (Lizze Broadway) cracked her head open within the season premiere. So with out truly having the ability to do what she’s being requested to do, Cate is shipped to push Cipher into confessing he has no powers on a digicam that Emma sneaks in by way of her shrinking powers by the bathroom in a personal suite over the “Hostility on the College” battle evening between Marie and Jordan. Observe all that?
With this specific comedy of errors already flawed at the beginning, issues solely worsen as soon as Cipher reveals he is aware of each facet of their plan and appears fully tickled by the gang’s fumbling in the dead of night.
“Okay, you figured it out,” Cipher says. “I’m human. And I wager you’re questioning how I bought away with it for therefore lengthy.”
He then reveals he is aware of in regards to the digicam and that Cate can’t use her push powers correctly, and when Cate blurts out that there’s no V in his blood, he figures out that Marie supplied that information as nicely.
“Right here, watch this,” Cipher says, and that’s once we get the large reveal.
What Are Cipher’s Powers On Gen V? Meat Puppet Powers, Child!
Whereas Cate watches, and Marie tries to close down the battle by kissing Jordan, Cipher basically takes over Jordan’s physique. Cipher makes them wave to the Dean’s field, talks by Jordan’s mouth, and customarily controls Jordan “like a meat puppet, with no strings.”
Whereas Jordan beats the crap out of her, Cipher is clearly utilizing the chance to teach Marie. He pushes her till Marie makes use of her blood powers to make Jordan float within the air, however a facet impact is that Marie manages to push Cipher’s management out of Jordan’s physique as nicely, one thing he appears stunned about.
Marie additionally virtually makes Jordan pop just like the little blood bag they’re; that’s Marie although. Let’s discuss Cipher.
To place it extra plainly, he can puppet individuals and perhaps animals as nicely (alhough TBD on that final level). That’s fairly non-specific, and clearly extra must be explored right here, however it appears completely attainable primarily based on a cautious examine of the supply materials (which means: watching each episode of Gen V) that his powers are blood-based identical to Marie’s. The reasoning there’s that within the first season, we found that Victoria Neuman (Claudia Doumit) wasn’t a mere “head popper” as seen on The Boys, however she had powers primarily based in blood manipulation, giving her a bonding level with Marie.
If Cipher additionally has blood-based powers, that will go an extended approach to explaining a variety of his normal curiosity in Marie, in addition to how he coaches her on this very episode. The title “Baggage” takes its identify from a sequence the place Cipher lays just a few blood luggage on a desk and asks Marie to maneuver them from one desk to a different. After a false begin, she does transfer them, so that they improve the train to a goat named Elon Musk, with Cipher explaining that dwelling beings aren’t a lot totally different than skinny plastic luggage holding blood. “What if I kill Elon?” Marie asks, with Cipher answering, “That’s why we named them for assholes.” Whereas it’s extra difficult than merely making Jordan (or Elon Musk the goat) float within the air, that certain appears to be what Cipher is ready to do as nicely – manipulate a human physique to do no matter he needs, together with talking the phrases he needs it to talk.
Is that this, maybe, the last word evolution of Marie’s powers? Is that this what Cipher has been teaching her in direction of all alongside? There’s a good quantity of paternality within the relationship, and we’ve already seen that – as Dr. Gold – Cipher wasn’t simply within the Elmira jail that held Marie and pals between seasons of Gen V, however was additionally there at Challenge Odessa, which helped create her. Perhaps Cipher seems at Marie as his inheritor, or – whereas he’s known as “Yoda” on this episode – maybe a extra correct comparability level is Darth Vader. In spite of everything, due to genetically creating her by Challenge Odessa, Cipher is one step away from telling Marie, “No, I am your father.”
There’s one itty-bitty little complication right here, although…
What About The Lack Of Compound V In Cipher’s Blood?
The actual fact of the matter is that Marie nonetheless didn’t detect any Compound V in Cipher’s blood, which throws a giant wrench into this entire energy reveal. Every little thing on the planet of The Boys and Gen V is predicated on Compound V being the supply of superpowers – not getting bitten by a radioactive spider, coming to Earth from an alien planet, or some other comedian book-style origin.
There are variations on Compound V, together with V24 (also called Temp V), however there haven’t been any naturally occurring powers within the franchise as of but. Perhaps Cipher is the primary, however that isn’t notably seemingly, primarily as a result of we’re heading in direction of the ultimate season of The Boys; to instantly introduce naturally occurring superpowers midway by a derivative could be a bizarre swerve that will change the sport in unpredictable methods.
We’ve bought a giant clue, although, in that regardless of being enigmatic – as soon as once more, it’s proper within the identify – Cipher hasn’t lied about something all season lengthy so far as we all know. Have a look once more on the quote above, wherein he tells Cate that he’s human; he doesn’t deny it, or say Cate doesn’t know what she’s speaking about.
To crib a line from I Assume You Ought to Depart: Oh my god, he admit it! What that admission means is an efficient query. Let’s say Cipher is as soon as once more telling the reality, and he is human. How does he even have powers? There’s a giant clue to this thriller, however for that we have to discuss one other thriller on this episode.
What About Cipher’s “Dad,” aka The Burnt Man In The Hyperbaric Chamber?
Beforehand, we had been teased a few unusual locked room in Cipher’s home. Due to intrepid investigators Cate and Jordan, we discovered what was behind Door #1: Cipher’s father, horribly burnt, in a hyperbaric chamber…or no less than, we’re instructed that’s Cipher’s father.
Placing collectively some items that Jordan and Cate wouldn’t have, again at the start of the season premiere, we met Thomas Godolkin, performed by Depraved star Ethan Slater. Godolkin was engaged on Challenge Odessa, which appeared to be creating some unstable serum – probably a variant of Compound V – which didn’t work. It killed a lot of the scientists who used it in horrible methods, and the final we noticed of Tommy, he was being burned to loss of life in an out-of-control lab hearth.
It’s not an excessive amount of of a stretch to suppose the horribly burned man we see in Episode 4 is, certainly, Thomas Godolkin, versus a completely totally different, unrelated horribly burned man. How he survived, if that is him, is an open-ended query, however Godolkin being Cipher’s father will surely clarify how Cipher got here to be Dean of the varsity. It might additionally clarify why Cipher instantly introduced again Thomas Godolkin Day within the earlier episode.
And…it additionally would possibly maybe clarify how Marie can’t detect the V in Cipher’s blood. Maybe no matter Challenge Odessa was creating was not precisely Compound V, however one thing else. If Cipher will get his powers from that, it may not be detectable by Marie, no less than not in the identical means.
There’s one other risk, although, which is strongly recommended by the entire “meat puppet” factor, however we don’t wish to get too forward of our skis on that one.
As of the top of Episode 4, Cipher’s powers are bodily and thoughts manipulation, basically marionetting different dwelling beings. As to the opposite elements of the thriller? Nicely, that’s one cipher we’ll be unraveling over the remainder of Season 2.
