The sad thing is, I don't think the depersonalisation stuff in Homelander's childhood was an accident, or 'just how labs look'. I think it was probably very deliberate, especially if they had world-class psychologists to consult. They didn't want him to be a person. They didn't want him to develop a personality. They wanted him to say baseball was his favourite sport - a sport he'd almost certainly never played, and probably only seen in indoctrination videos. They didn't want him to get angry and hurt people or get upset and lose control and hurt people, because they didn't really want him to have emotions. They just wanted him to perform.
If they knew existing like that was torture - I would guess they either didn't care, or they were satisfied with it, as long as it produced results.
