Peacemaker (season 2)

In Season 2 of Peacemaker, Christopher Smith, the vigilante anti-hero, navigates a new mission in the rebooted DC Universe following the events of Superman (2025). Tasked with confronting a vengeful adversary and exploring an alternate dimension, Peacemaker grapples with his past while working alongside his A.R.G.U.S. team, including familiar faces like Leota Adebayo and Emilia Harcourt. The season blends high-stakes action, multiversal twists, and personal growth across eight episodes.

Peacemaker Review (S1:E1)

This initial episode introduces a Peacemaker with a new perspective and a very new, very surprising John Cena, one whose performance will have you looking at the WWE superstar in an entirely different way. It’s a good thing, too, because much of the B and C plotlines bracketing his story are weak and stupid.

                   

No one cares that Agent Unlikable Girl Boss feels useless and is filling the void in her soul with MMA-style bar brawls, and even fewer care that pre-Ozempic Lizzo broke up with her girlfriend. However, neither subplot gets much screentime, so any damage is somewhat mitigated. Whether that remains true for the rest of the season is anyone’s guess.

The core story, that of Peacemaker’s longing for the unconditional love of a family, is rather touching and emotional. Regrettably, most of the episode’s potential poignancy is leached away by James Gunn’s pathological need to out Joss-Whedon Joss Whedon at nearly every turn. Gags and jokes punctuate most serious moments, and they’re usually as sophisticated as… well, as a massive orgy filled more swinging schwansons than season 1 of Game of Thrones.

I’ll say this: the previews for episode 2 look promising, and Cena was impressive enough in this one to justify giving Round 2 a go.

WOKE REPORT

Between Two Men

• Once the prologue ends, the show opens with a drug-fueled orgy at Peacemaker’s place. Situated somewhere firmly between soft and hardcore porn, it features some fairly vile imagery best skipped because it has absolutely nothing to do with the story.
  • Numerous fully naked men simulate masturbation in the background while men and women engage in Caligula-shaming acts.
  • For a brief second, a fully clothed and very high Peacemaker stumbles to his knees and finds himself sandwiched between a naked and writhing man and woman.
    • He doesn’t engage with them.
  • As Peacemaker stumbles through his house, we get a blink-and-you-miss-it glimpse of two naked men walking in the background, holding hands, and leaning in for a kiss before the camera shifts and they’re out of sight.

She’s Got Two Pair

• Agent Harcourt was meant to be tough in the last season. Now, she can practically stand toe to toe with Peacemaker. In one scene, she goes to a biker bar to pick a fight, and she absolutely destroys a man who must outweigh her by a hundred pounds. She then lays into two or three other large guys.
  • Ultimately, she gets obliterated, which is why I didn’t mark the Woke-O-Meter down too much for this.
• During a meeting with an NSA employee, he tells Harcourt that she suffers from “toxic masculinity.” On the one hand, it’s a joke, but it’s not making fun of toxic masculinity (which it should, since there is no such thing).
  • Then again, in the same meeting, the NSA employee says to her, “I find the insinuation that only men can suffer from toxic masculinity a little sexist.” It’s a joke at the expense of wokeness, even if it doesn’t land particularly well in the scene.

Did You Forget She Was a Lesbian?

• The prologue reintroduces the heavy black actress and gives us a silly and poorly written exposition dump to remind us that she’s a lesbian.

Peacemaker Review (S1:E2)

Peacemaker Review (S1:E3)

Peacemaker Review (S1:E4-5)

Peacemaker Review (S1:E6)

Peacemaker Review (S1:E7-8)