Warning: Contains SPOILERS for The Boys season 4, episode 7!

The Boys season 4, episode 7 introduces a brand new villain, one that is a blatant copycat from the show Supernatural. The Boys is known for taking superhero tropes and putting an interesting spin on them. The Boys season 4 attempted to do this again with a common power from superhero comics, but it turned out not to be all that original, as this take on The Boys season 4’s new villain has already been pulled off in a similar fashion in Supernatural.

Almost every major superpower that can be thought of has some kind of presence in Amazon Prime Video’s acclaimed superhero series, with each new season of The Boys introducing new supes with new powers. However, these powers almost always have a terrifying, gory, or sexual twist, and the same can be said for a new supe that has been introduced in The Boys season 4, episode 7.

The Boys’ Shapeshifter Sheds Their Skin, Just Like Supernatural’s Shapeshifters

The Boys Didn’t Beat Supernatural To The Punch

The Boys season 4, episode 7 introduces a new shapeshifter villain, one that acts very similarly to the shapeshifters from Supernatural. In The Boys, the shapeshifter first has to make physical contact with its target, gaining the ability to transform into the character. Then, the shapeshifter has to choose to take this new form and subsequently rip the old skin off, with the new form being revealed as the old skin is shredded. This gory method of shapeshifting fits in with the tone of The Boys, but it actually may have been lifted from Supernatural.

Supernatural also features a race of shapeshifters who, rather than simply morphing into their new forms, also have to shed their old skins in order to show off their new ones. While this could just be a coincidence, it is important to note that Eric Kripke created both Supernatural and The Boys, meaning that these similarities were probably known when creating the new season 4 villain. The Boys and Supernatural have had a lot of overlapping elements, and the rules of each show’s shapeshifting characters is just another example of this.

The Eyes Give Away The Shapeshifters In Both The Boys & Supernatural

They Share The Same Visual Weakness

The method of shapeshifting isn’t the only thing that The Boys‘ and Supernatural‘s shapeshifters have in common, as their tells are also very similar. In The Boys, shapeshifters look almost identical to the original people they are copying. However, there is a way to tell that they are shapeshifters, with that being the weird eyelids. The shapeshifter has grey eyelids that blink in a strange way, with this being what gives away the fact that Starlight is a shapeshifter in The Boys season 4, episode 7.

Meanwhile, the powerful shapeshifter creatures from Supernatural work in a similar fashion. When appearing on camera or in videos, Supernatural‘s shapeshifters feature eyes that have a golden appearance, making them stand apart from normal humans. This is how the characters and audience are able to tell who a shapeshifter is in Supernatural, with these uncanny eyes being another similar element across both Eric Kripke TV show shapeshifters.

The Boys Also Copies Supernatural’s Shapeshifter Memory Rules

They Have An Even More Important Similarity

The eyes still aren’t the end of the similarities between the shapeshifters in The Boys and Supernatural, as one important rule is also carried over. Looking like the person that the shapeshifters are copying isn’t the extent of the shapeshifters’ transformations, as both shows also allow their shapeshifters to take on the memories of the person that they are transforming into. Supernatural‘s shapeshifters obtain the thoughts and memories of the people that they are kidnapping, allowing them to blend in with their original lives even more seamlessly.

While The Boys hasn’t explicitly confirmed that its shapeshifting villain has the memories of Starlight, it is heavily implied. The Boys season 4’s new shapeshifting supe uses the term dumpster fire when it is disguised as Starlight, a term that she used earlier in the episode. This implies that the shapeshifter is calling back to something that it knows Starlight previously said, or at the very least it has the verbal tics of the supe that it transformed into. It is possible that future episodes of The Boys will reveal more about how the shapeshifter works, possibly creating more Supernatural parallels.