Erin Moriarty on Graves’ Challenges and Heartbreaking Finale

(This story contains spoilers from The Boys season five, episode four, “King of Hell.”)

Erin Moriarty can’t bring herself to watch The Boys’ final season. Of course, she loves the show and her signature role of Annie “Starlight” January, but she isn’t ready to revisit such a debilitating time in her life. 

In June of 2025, Moriarty went public with her then-recent Graves’ disease diagnosis. At that point, she was six months into filming The Boys season five, and her doctor’s conclusion immediately explained why she hadn’t been feeling like herself throughout production. Her various symptoms, including chronic fatigue and nausea, soon fell by the wayside thanks to immediate treatment, and she finally felt human again in time for the series finale.

“It did lead to me not being as present for Annie during this final season as I would’ve hoped, and that was super painful for me. I thought, Oh my God, I’m failing Annie and I’m failing our audience,” Moriarty tells The Hollywood Reporter. “It was like I was offline for the first six to seven episodes, and then I came back online. I finally felt present at the very end of season five.”

Moriarty is also offering her thoughts on season five’s fourth episode, “King of Hell.” 

Rattled by Hughie’s (Jack Quaid) latest brush with death, Annie decides to leave her boyfriend and allies behind to track down her estranged father, Rick (Tim Daly). Annie’s mother, Donna (Ann Cusack), originally claimed that Rick walked out on them due to shoddy investments. But in the season one finale, Annie exposed that lie after confronting her mother about her superpowers being created in a lab, not by God, as she had led her to believe. Donna still didn’t come completely clean, insisting that Rick left after regretting their decision to inject Annie with the superhero serum known as Compound V. Annie then speculated at the time that her father probably didn’t want to lie about the nature of her powers.

Annie’s theory proved to be correct when Rick confirms that Donna’s pious fraud caused him to leave. He also reveals that he proudly tracked Annie/Starlight’s accomplishments from afar and urged her not to turn her back on the people she loves like he did.

“He really galvanizes her and catalyzes her to find herself and her heroism for the remainder of the season. If she had previously gone to her father for this information, it would’ve fueled further resentment toward her mother,” Moriarty tells The Hollywood Reporter. “That would’ve negated her ability to move forward in her story. But right now, she’s like, ‘You know what? Mom did the best she could.’ It’s a testament to Annie’s emotional maturation at this point.”

As for the upcoming May 20 series finale of showrunner Eric Kripke’s superhero satire, Moriarty believes it will leave the audience both satisfied and heartbroken. 

“It’s a heartbreaking episode. It’s not overtly cynical. When I read the finale as a script, it was my favorite episode this season, as it should be,” Moriarty shares. “I think the audience is going to be so immensely satisfied by the finale. I never like to give a resolute prediction like that, and I never have, but I’m saying it now because I have so much excitement and confidence in it.”

Below, during a conversation with THR, Moriarty also discusses Annie’s new bad habit she recommended in between seasons, before revisiting the show’s collective anxiety surrounding season four’s finale. 

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You probably shed most of your tears during production, but now that we’re halfway through The Boys’ final season, what are your emotions at the moment?

It’s very bittersweet. I sound like a broken record, because that’s the term we all keep coming back to, but there aren’t words to suffice this moment in time. The mourning and goodbye to my character happened when season five wrapped. But now that the world is watching our final season, I’m experiencing a very, very sharp sense of extreme gratitude. Sincere gratitude gets me emotional, it all still feels so surreal to me. I still feel like it was yesterday that I was auditioning for the role.

When we were filming season five, I was very much in a pre-mourning phase about the show coming to an end. It was such an emotionally pregnant period of time that I tried to balance my feeling of pre-mourning with a level of presence that hadn’t existed in previous seasons.

Annie is battle weary this season. She even has a vaping habit now. She was worried about what Hughie might think of her actions during their year apart. How much detail did (showrunner) Eric Kripke offer you about that missing time period between seasons four and five? 

I’m very fortunate that Eric Kripke gave me a lot. Between seasons, we would always sit down and discuss what has transpired. It was really important because no season has started right after the previous season concluded. A significant amount of time passed between seasons, so meeting with Eric became a really integral part of my preparation process each season.

The cool thing about Eric is that he informs us circumstantially about what has happened, but he also allows collaboration at that point. I said to him, “I want Annnie to pick up a nervous habit that allows her to have micro-escapist moments as scenes are transpiring.” She’s still metabolizing the trauma that has happened in earlier seasons, but what has happened in between seasons four and five has been the hardest for her to swallow. There have been so many casualties as a result of this Starlighter Movement that she’s at the head of, and she’s at her most stressful breaking point.

I even deem her as being suicidal. She sees that the only redemptive way for her to become a hero is to sacrifice herself in honor of the casualties that resulted from the Starlighter Movement. So I wanted there to be this new flavor of Annie, and I wanted her to pick up a mannerism that reflected the stress of what she’s going through right now. I’ve always tried to make sure that Annie, although she’s a superhero, remains human forward. And those moments of stress represented through vaping and other things felt very human to me. 

I watched your interview with David Dastmalchian, and it sounds like you were going through a lot during the final season, health-wise. I don’t mean to trivialize Graves’ disease, but did it end up serving the character’s weariness at all? 

I wish I could say that it did. I’ve been open about this, and I will continue to be open about this. I’ve got no hesitation around it. It’s important for me to be vocal about autoimmune diseases. I was starting to feel so ill, and even though I come from a family of doctors, no one thought to say, “Go get your levels tested.” So it did lead to me not being as present for Annie during this final season as I would’ve hoped, and that was super painful for me. It was like I was offline for the first six to seven episodes, and then I came back online. I finally felt present at the very end of season five.

I wish I could have used it to enhance or to relate to her weariness, but to be honest, I was on set every day just really, really, really struggling to get through it all. I was very fortunate to be surrounded by a really supportive cast and crew, but it was really scary at times. For example, I’ve watched every season of The Boys. I love this show so much. But I’m not watching the final season simply because it’s really important for me at this moment in time to put my psychological health above all other things. 

I wasn’t able to transcend the physical and mental toll that this disease took on me until episode seven. It’s a testament to how profoundly impactful these autoimmune diseases can be, and I don’t think that people are aware to the degree that they can be. So I wish I was able to say it served the character, but unfortunately, it was a matter of getting through every day. The psychological toll that it took on me, I’ll be able to use it in the future, but I couldn’t while it was going on simultaneously. Sadly not. 

Thank you for your candor. Hughie’s (Jack Quaid) near-death in the third episode traumatized Annie to the point where she finally tracks down her estranged father (Tim Dalys’ Rick) after all these years. Her mom (Ann Cusack’s Donna) originally told her that her father left them over bad investments, but then she later divulged that he regretted their decision to inject Annie with Compound V. He then clarified in the fourth episode that he actually left in protest of her mom’s dogma that Annie was a Chosen One. How do you think this revelation affects her relationship with her mom, if at all?

That’s an interesting question. Annie’s relationship with her mother is very much one that many people can relate to. Every parent is a flawed parent. But at this point in time, Annie is able to look at things with nuance. She’s had an immense amount of distance from Donna, and I think she’s reached an emotionally mature enough point where it’s not going to fuel more resentment toward her. This episode was really about her relationship with her father. It was about what she needed from her father and not about feeling more resentment toward her mother. 

Annie’s dad gave her exactly what she needed in this episode to keep going without it fueling more toxicity with her mother. He really galvanizes her and catalyzes her to find herself and her heroism for the remainder of the season. There’s this kismet alignment with these characters at this moment in time. If she had previously gone to her father for this information, it would’ve fueled further resentment toward her mother, and that would’ve eaten away at her and negated her ability to move forward in her story. She would’ve confronted her mother about how she lied to her. But right now, she’s like, “You know what? Mom did the best she could. ” It’s a testament to Anne’s emotional maturation at this point.

The series finale is still under lock and key. Have you let yourself wonder how the audience might receive it? 

I have because I’m excited for the audience to see the finale. When I read the finale script, it was my favorite episode this season, as it should be. Our showrunner and our writers are so cognizant of the fact that the finale is such an integral part of this entire story. They have worked so relentlessly hard to ultimately honor what they believe our audience will want. That’s what we’ve all been working for, and that’s why we were able to end the show with integrity. I really believe the writers did that. I’m just excited for fans to see it. I think the audience is going to be so immensely satisfied by the finale. I never like to give a resolute prediction like that, and I never have, but I’m saying it now because I have so much excitement and confidence in it.

Is it shocking in The Boys’ patented fashion?

Shocking? Yes, but by the time that episode eight airs, so many shocking moments will have happened that I think it will be more satisfying and heartbreaking. Heartbreaking would be the word that I would use. At that point, the audience will have been heartbroken by many characters that are lost along the way. Our showrunner has said that will happen, so it’s not a spoiler. 

It’s a heartbreaking episode. It’s not overtly cynical. But it’s still an episode that really drives home the finality of the show and the characters that we’ve all become emotionally invested in, whether they’re good or bad. The point of the show is that these characters are nuanced. They aren’t black and white. So the losses of characters that you thought you weren’t rooting for can all of a sudden be emotional because no one is all bad and no one is all good on this show.

Have actors from the more conventional superhero projects ever expressed to you in private how they wish their show or movie could do the risqué things that The Boys does every episode?

They have. (Laughs.) They’ve also come up to me and said that they want the catharsis that us Boys actors are lucky to be a part of when it comes to taking on topical issues. There’s so much, pardon my language, shit going on in the world, and whether it’s social or political commentary, I know that a lot of us have benefited from the cathartic element of being a part of a show that doesn’t ignore those things. So other actors will primarily come up to me and say, “I wish I was on a show that wasn’t just specifically catered toward the genre, but also deals with the things that we’re all observing and feeling uneasy about.”

Sometimes, the show responds to events that have already happened, and other times, it foretells what is about to happen. Is there an example of real-world relevance that stands out above the rest?  

Yes, there was something in the season four finale that eerily paralleled the real world and was very much connected to myself. I played two characters in that episode: Annie and a shapeshifter. And my shapeshifter character attempts to assassinate the President-elect (Jim Beaver’s Robert Singer). The episode title was originally called “Assassination Run,” but we had to rename the episode because it was set to air five days after the (July 13, 2024) assassination attempt against Trump. We shot the episode a year before it was released (on July 18, 2024).

We contemplated not airing that episode for my own safety. We didn’t know if I would get death threats. I had to do media training for that episode. But that eerie alignment and close proximity of time was insane. Of course, no one could have predicted that. I remember sitting at my friend’s house and being a little bit scared in anticipation of the episode airing. 

That being said, Amazon and my showrunner were so respectful. We all got on the phone to speak about it, and I was all for the episode airing. But in terms of paralleling the outside world, I never could have imagined something more eerily aligned than that.

Annie’s overall arc is still unfolding, but how would you summarize your own arc from when you first stepped onto the set of the pilot? Have you been able to wrap your head around your entire experience in that way yet? 

First and foremost, I’m just so grateful. That is the predominating feeling. I know I’ve grown and evolved with this show. I’ve learned so much, personally and professionally, that I’ll take with me forever. But it’s going to take a few years to truly absorb the entire experience in my mind and figure out how much the show has affected me and how much I’ve grown from it. 

There’s this very meta element to Starlight. When she joined the Seven, people on the street suddenly called out her name. Simultaneously, I was starting to be known as Starlight too. A lot of what Annie has gone through has weirdly paralleled my own life. This character is known for her purity, and as I’ve gotten older and grown with the character, people have also expected me to retain that initial pure element to Annie. So we have both matured over time.

I’ve learned a lot from how she’s constantly questioning whether or not she’s doing good. I’ve learned that as long as you’re questioning yourself and trying to do good, it means you’re a good person. As a Type A or Type A-minus person, I would constantly question whether I was doing enough for this character and the audience. When I got sick during the final season, I thought, Oh my God, I’m failing Annie and I’m failing our audience.

So playing Annie as she’s questioning whether or not she’s doing good is a testament to the fact that she is doing good, and it was healing for me and my own questions. If I was able to say that Annie is good merely by trying to do good in every situation that she enters, then that meant that I’d done my best by constantly trying to do my best for the character and the audience. So I no longer question whether I’ve done right by Annie and the audience, and that’s been my ultimate goal.

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The Boys season five is currently streaming new episodes every Wednesday on Amazon Prime Video.