After eight weekly episodes, Peacemaker season two has finally come to an end. James Gunn’s sophomore effort with the John Cena-led show, which exists in canon limbo between the DCUs of old and new, had a lot of hype around it. That hype became even more fever-pitched as the show was positioned as a direct follow-up to Superman. So without further ado, here are all the peaks and valleys from Peacemaker season two.
Liked: Eagly being badass
We here at io9 have made it our top priority to glaze Eagly, the best Peacemaker character (edging out Adrian by the narrowest of margins), at every given opportunity. He’s simply a delight. There’s just something about the Muppet kayfabe of its cast of actors having to pantomime (or better yet, act with a mocapped actor like in Superman) for all of Eagly’s silly little moments.
Whether it was Eagly indignantly ignoring the team to chase down some baloney or soaring into the fray for his big hero moment, the fact that CGI and motion capture turned a damn bird into a cherished character—and made viewers search “does the bird die” every week—is proof of how good Gunn is at weaponizing cute animals to pull at our heartstrings. Thankfully, the bird survived this season. Big shout-out to Dee Bradley Baker, whose wild career arc led to voicing the show’s undisputed best boy.
Liked: Red St. Wild’s Looney Tunes side quest
Peacemaker‘s second season felt distinctly sillier than its first. Maybe something was in the water with the show sharing a streaming service with Looney Tunes (before Warner Bros., in its infinite wisdom, got rid of the show) because this season had big Looney Tunes energy. No element emphasized that more than Michael Rooker’s Elmer Fudd-ass subplot as Red St. Wild, who hunted Eagly while toting a comedically oversized rifle. It’s always a good sign when a comic book show isn’t afraid of being goofy, and this whole bit was peak. No notes.
Liked: That big (albeit predictable) Earth X twist
Although viewers predicted that Peacemaker‘s alternate dimension was Earth X weeks in advance of when Gunn thought they would catch on, the punch of the reveal wasn’t any less effective as a huge “uh-oh” moment of the season. Kudos to Gunn for deliberately choosing background characters in Earth X to be of the mayonnaise complexion variety, while rapidly cutting back to our world—set in Atlanta, mind you—with very visible and, dare we say, drop-dead gorgeous extras turning the heads of the main cast. It was a clever twist made all the more poignant for fans sitting in anticipation for how that shoe would drop, and it dropped in the most hilarious way possible.
What’s more, it managed to make its entire Nazi world ride the line between being outwardly comedic and deeply upsetting, highlighting the danger Judomaster and Adebayo were in. We know Gunn tries not to make his works analogues for real life events (cough cough Superman), but letting Adebayo say the quiet part out loud about our current political climate not being so different from Earth X was some good shit. Robert Patrick’s character can keep his fence-sitting centrist hero speech, though.
Liked: The Superman cameos
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