Sister Sage’s Ice Pick Romance Makes For The Boys Season 4’s Gnarliest Scene
According to Sister Sage actress Susan Heyward, playing dumb on The Boys season 4 is a big relief.
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This article contains spoilers for The Boys season 2 episode 4.
The boys are back in town (quite literally) as the selfish supes of The Seven suit up for another season of Prime Video’s hit series. The Boys heads into its penultimate season with some fresh blood bolstering the ranks of The Seven and familiar faces causing trouble once again.
With some notable gaps on Vought’s top team of supes, newcomers include Nathan Mitchell as a chattier Black Noir, Valorie Curry’s Firecracker, and Susan Heyward as Sister Sage. The latter is the smartest person in the world, and with some of The Seven not exactly known for their shining intellect, they’re already giving Sister Sage a headache – in more ways than one. Episode 4 “Wisdom of the Ages” features Sister Sage inviting The Deep (Chace Crawford) to perform a lobotomy on her.
Although The Deep was originally pissed that Sister Sage took the Crime Analytics job away from him, the pair got it on at the end of episode 3. Continuing their unlikely tryst in episode 4, Sister Sage originally seems disgusted with The Deep, even going as far as saying, “I find you repulsive in a way that’s difficult to quantify, and I’m fucking amazing at quantifying.” Giving in to her urges, she later gets him some fried pickles as a way of an apology and shares her own dirty little secret.
Sister Sage explains most people’s brains will grow until the age of 25, but her power means that her’s will grow indefinitely, leading to her astronomical IQ. As such, Sage occassionally performs her own ice pick lobotomies to “dumb” herself down and escape the pressure of being so smart. Asking The Deep to “put this inside of me” (there’s the typical sex toy joke), he obliges by jabbing it in her eye and scraping part of her brain out for an at-home transorbital lobotomy.
Invented by Dr. Walter Freeman in 1948, the orbitoclast is associated with the “ice pick lobotomy” due to its resemblance to the bar tool. We’ve seen lobotomies in everything from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest to Sucker Punch, but in typical fashion, The Boys’ is one of the most graphic to be shown on screen. Den of Geek and other outlets spoke to Heyward about that big twist and what was going through Sister Sage’s mind at that moment.
“[Playing dumb] was a relief,” Heyward says. “Living up to the idea of the world’s smartest person comes with some kind of pressure. Susan felt as much relief as Sage did when it came time to play dumb.”
As for what it was like to play around with an outdated medical tool on set, Heyward adds, “The stunt team took great care of us with the ice pick towards my eye. I’m also very experienced with contacts – have worn them all my life. It was fun, honestly, I felt like I had been taken such good care of, and I got to relax and enjoy the psychologically brutal and strange moment.”
Fans had already clocked that something was up with Sister Sage in episode 3. Here, The Deep walked in on an uncharacteristically chill Sister Sage, vegging out to Say Yes to the Dress and eating a Bloomin’ Onion. As the two got down to business, eagle-eyed viewers noticed what looked like a bloody orbitoclast on the table. Don’t worry, though, Sister Sage will soon be back to reminding us she’s the smartest person (not just woman) in the world. Many theorists correctly guessed that Sister Sage would be just fine, as when Ashley (Colby Minifie) pulled up potential new recruits for The Seven, “moderate healing” was listed as one of Sister Sage’s powers.
While we’re glad that Sister Sage still has her smarts, it would’ve been arguably more shocking if Homelander’s atrocities and the idiocy of the others had pushed her to permanently give up on her gift. It’s unclear what Sister Sage’s modus operandi is right now, but if anyone can outsmart Homelander, it’s her. We all need time to kick back, and let’s be honest, it can’t be easy dealing with the bumbling supes of The Seven while massaging their egos. The question is, will Sister Sage’s DIY lobotomies eventually take their toll? It would be typically poignant for The Boys to end the season with a dark twist where Sister Sage loses her status as the series’ very own Lex Luthor.
The first four episodes of The Boys season 4 are available to stream on Prime Video now. New episodes premiere, culminating with the finale on July 18.