How Kimiko Speaking In The Boys Season 5 Changed Karen Fukuhara’s Character

Kimiko doesn’t talk in The Boys due to her past trauma. This made it shocking in the season 4 finale when she shouts, “No!” after Frenchie (Tomer Capone) is taken from her by Cate Dunlap (Maddie Phillips). A season 5 trailer then showed that Kimiko will continue to talk moving forward as she casually says to Annie January (Erin Moriarty) and A-Train (Jessie T. Usher) after seeing them hug, “You guys are friends?”

In an interview with ScreenRant‘s Liam Crowley, Fukuhara discussed how it is initially always challenging for an actor “when something new comes into play” for their character. She teases that a lot of Kimiko’s dialogue is humorous, which is a shift after previously sharing many of her scenes with Frenchie, who is one of the funniest characters. Check out Fukuhara’s comments below:

I think it’s always a challenge when something new comes into play. And especially with her lines this season, there’s a lot of humorous ones. I feel lucky in that she was given these lines because she’s always been with the funniest character, in my opinion, on the show. And Frenchie has always had those jokes in our scenes and I would always be the one that’s breaking. And so it was really fun to tackle that new side of her this season.

While Fukuhara does sing in The Boys season 3’s premiere, this is a sequence that Kimiko is imagining in her head. The season 4 finale is the first time the audience sees Kimiko speaking in reality, which paves the way for her to have her own lines and be making jokes in season 5 as seen in the trailer and as Fukuhara describes. Her remarks also confirm that humor will continue to be an important part of the series, even with the story at its darkest point yet as Homelander (Antony Starr) controls the U.S. government and rounds up his enemies into camps.

When shouting “No!” as Frenchie is abducted, it proves how deeply Kimiko cares for him, but it is still another traumatic moment in her life. In The Boys season 5, Kimiko won’t only be speaking during particularly distressing moments, but seemingly on a frequent basis and even casually among friends. This is a massive change for the character and a sign of how much she has changed since first being introduced in season 1 and because of the Boys becoming her found family.

Even though Kimiko will be more vocal than ever before this season, another one of the season 5 trailers does show her using her sign language when Billy Butcher (Karl Urban) asks if the Boys will come together one last time. Since he doesn’t know what the sign language means, he says, “I’ll take that as a yes?” This interaction indicates that she will not be completely abandoning her sign language this season, the reason for which has not been made clear yet.

As for whether Kimiko will survive the final season, there is no guarantee. Showrunner Eric Kripke and members of the cast have emphasized on multiple occasions that major characters will die and that the stakes are higher than ever as the story comes to a conclusion. Kimiko’s powers in The Boys have allowed her to previously heal from injuries that would have been lethal for a regular individual, but all bets are off on what could happen in the final episodes.

The Boys season 5 begins with a two-episode premiere on April 8 on Prime Video.