Karen Fukuhara on giving Kimiko her voice in the final season of ‘The Boys’
The actress discusses her character finally speaking in the show's final season, and balancing her old and new identities
Karen Fukuhara as Kimiko
Prime Video
Words by Andy Crump
Auditory communication is the social default, so when a character like Kimiko, from Amazon Prime’s superhero satire The Boys, goes from using sign language to spoken language, the effect is mildly discombobulating. All of a sudden she can speak, though of course she’s always been able to express herself; it’s just that until now, she used her hands instead of her words. For The Boys’ fifth and final season, the shift in Kimiko’s mode of communication is the capstone for her arc and a tricky balancing act for Karen Fukuhara, who’s played the nigh-unkillable supe throughout the series’ seven-year run.
The Boys, based on Garth Ennis’ mid-2000s comic book series, follows a group of covert government operatives who monitor superhero activity and intervene when their behavior grows too extreme. Ennis presupposes that if superheroes existed, they’d be heavily corporatized and largely amoral. The show, developed by Eric Kripke, takes its share of liberties with the source material and improves on it in the process, notably in the writing and casting departments. Fukuhara’s work as Kimiko, who is referred to in the comics as “The Female of the Species” or “The Female,” is routinely cited as a bright spot in a production loaded with them. She is, by turns, savage and feral, delicate and gentle, no-nonsense and slapstick hilarious. What she’s never been, however, is vocal.
All that’s changed in season five, which marks a clear departure for the character as well as for Fukuhara, who has not so much “more” to do as The Boys reaches its conclusion, but “different” things to do: less ripping off thugs’ faces, more stringing together run-on foul mouthed insults. Speaking with Fukuhara recently, we dug into the ways in which Kimiko stays the same and also turns into a different person this season, and finding the “old” Kimiko while breathing life into the “new” one.
This interview has been edited for clarity and length.
Andy Crump: For (Kimiko), this season of The Boys is about speaking her mind and saying things that she hasn't been able to say previously, and I wonder how that lands for you as her performer?
Karen Fukuhara: Over the years, Kimiko has had a lot to say, and people forget that sign language has always been a language, so I won't say that just because she's speaking audibly doesn't mean that she wasn't speaking volumes before. Sometimes the quietest people in the room say the heaviest sh*t, right? I’ve always viewed her as an emotionally intelligent character, and that didn't come easy either. She has had to do a lot of work to get there—working through her trauma, self-reflection, and all of that. So I found it metaphorically beautiful that she has come full circle and gotten her voice back, both in the audible sense and emotionally. It’s a metaphor for her evolution.
AC: It's definitely a marker of growth for her. She's been able to communicate with Frenchie the entire time, and yet it strikes me that the moment where they consummate their romantic relationship is at the point where she's able to literally voice her desires in a way she hasn't been able to before. There’s power in that. It also represents a whole new head space for her, and I wonder how you adjusted to that for this season.
KF: I mean, it's definitely a different version of the character, right? Exploring that was a challenge as an actor. You spoke to it when asking the question, but it's always jarring when someone goes through such a drastic change, and I think there are moments with Frenchie where we see him struggling with the new version of Kimiko. She's making new friends, and there’s a little bit of possessiveness that comes through. We all kind of have it growing up: you have a best friend and then someone else comes along and you think, “Wait, but that's my best friend.” I think Frenchie has a bit of that when Kimiko’s making new friendships, new relationships with other members of the Boys.
The thing is, she's always had that freedom. We tried to show that as much as possible in previous seasons, like when she would teach Huey (Jack Quaid) how to fight or bring M.M. (Laz Alonso) food because she was worried about his health. Those were all things that we intentionally asked for. I remember Jack and I pitching it hardcore throughout that season: “We need a Huey and Kimiko scene! It's weird that they're not friends at this point!”
I think she's always had that freedom, and she's always had friendships, but now it can be deepened because she has the ability to communicate. And now that I'm answering this question, I think it's so interesting because language is really important. My mom is from Japan, and Japanese is her first language, and even after years of being here in America, English is still not her native language. I know my mom to be really, really funny. She's assertive, she's funny, she's always lighting up the room. I imagine her to have been the class clown. But my American friends that come over to my house, I think in their mind she's dainty, and she’s fiery, fun, the life of the party to me. So language is really interesting because it can change someone's personality and how they present themselves. It’s all a social experiment.
AC: That's a great detail, and it makes total sense. Even though Kimiko’s the same now as she was before—she can just speak—do you miss old Kimiko versus new Kimiko? There’s a definite difference in what this season requires of the character versus past seasons. Do you have a preference in terms of what each season has required you to play?
KF: Definitely. What I struggled with this season was to keep that old Kimiko in there, because it's a whole different personality that came out when she started speaking. I love her brooding aspect. She was a silent character, but it's not like she wasn't thinking. There was always a thought going through her head. She had opinions about things; even though she wasn't voicing them out loud, there was always something cooking. I really loved that about her, and I was trying to keep that within season five as well. I think the writing is so different this season for her dialogue. That was where the challenge came in. How can we still be Kimiko while saying these lines?
This season, I made it a point to watch it when everyone else in the world is going to watch it. I wanted to experience the watch party aspect of it. So I just watched episode five. Val (Curry) was amazing in it, P.J. (Byrne) was amazing in it, Daveed (Diggs) was amazing in it. It’s fun to see them showcase their talents. But I’m excited and nervous to see the upcoming episodes for Kimiko.
Published on May 15, 2026
Words by Andy Crump
Bostonian culture journalist Andy Crump covers movies, beer, music, fatherhood, and way too many other subjects for way too many outlets, perhaps even yours: Paste Magazine, Inverse, The New York Times, Hop Culture, Polygon, and Men's Health, plus more. You can follow him on Bluesky and find his collected work at his personal blog. He’s composed of roughly 65 percent craft beer.