The following is a spoiler-free review of the full first season of Peacemaker. For spoiler-filled breakdowns, see our episodic reviews below:
Peacemaker Premiere Review: First 3 Episodes
Peacemaker Episode 4 Review - "The Choad Less Traveled"
Peacemaker Episode 5 Review - "Monkey Dory"
Peacemaker Episode 6 Review - "Murn After Reading"
Peacemaker Episode 7 Review - "Stop Dragon My Heart Around"
Peacemaker Season 1 Finale Review
Peacemaker doesn’t seem like a show that should work. James Gunn took one of the true villains of The Suicide Squad – an abrasive jerk willing to betray his teammates to cover up the horrific sins of the U.S. government – and asks us to care about his motivations and even view him as a hero.
None of that would have worked if Gunn gave Peacemaker aka Chris Smith an easy time of things. But in many ways, Peacemaker is the crystallization of the themes that Gunn has been exploring since 2014’s Guardians of the Galaxy. It ends up being a story about the redemptive power of friendship and how hard it is to change, particularly when that means cutting ties with toxic parents or forgiving yourself for past trauma.
Picking up soon after The Suicide Squad, Peacemaker has the title character once again coerced into working with Amanda Waller’s A.R.G.U.S. black ops squad. But instead of working with other supervillains, he’s partnered with the agents that operated behind the scenes during The Suicide Squad and assigned to be the muscle for Project Butterfly, a mission he’s told precious little about. The stakes and the nature of the threat are revealed slowly yet there’s so much humor and action that it never feels like Gunn is stalling for time or trying too hard at misdirection. Plot points that seem like they’ve been left hanging eventually return to contribute to a powerful conclusion.
Peacemaker follows the example of Amazon’s The Boys by serving its heavy topics with heaping portions of over-the-top violence and juvenile humor. Tonal whiplash is the unapologetic norm here, where heartfelt conversations happen while riding in a stolen veterinary van plastered with cute pictures of “star patients” and a huge character moment culminates in a ludicrous burst of gore and guts.
Yet the pieces all manage to fit together remarkably well. Even a running joke about how A.R.G.U.S. agent John Economos dyes his beard that might seem repetitive eventually leads to remarkable emotional payoff. Characters that could easily be one-note villains or comic relief are given surprising depth over the course of the eight-episode season. Superheroes are often relatively static, since they can’t change too much if they want to show up for the next sequel, but freed from franchise constraints, Gunn has been able to focus on the ways his ensemble and even their antagonists grow together.
Every part of that ensemble works remarkably well. John Cena shows off not just his biting humor but impressive emotional depth and vulnerability as he grapples with his relationship with his abusive, white supremacist father Auggie, played fearsomely by Robert Patrick. While there are hints at a budding romance between Chris and A.R.G.U.S. agent Emilia Harcourt, the show’s most important relationship is the purely platonic bond Chris forms with new recruit Leota Adebayo. Adebayo is dealing with her own familial baggage, struggling to figure out what she’s really capable of and the degree to which she wants to be part of her family’s morally questionable business.
The series’ fight scenes look great, largely avoiding CGI and instead finding novelty and humor in both giant brawls and one vs. one martial arts battles. There’s plenty of banter between punches and kicks and the low power level and high emotional vulnerability of Peacemaker’s misfit heroes mean that every blow they receive is keenly felt.
Gunn masterfully weaves in both science fiction and superhero tropes, mocking and embracing them in equal measure. Peacemaker seemingly has a filthy story about every DC hero and derides Batman for not being tough enough to kill his villains, yet he desperately clings to his own purpose and moral code motivated by his own tragic backstory. The show examines the power of symbols and ideology in justifying murder, explaining the oddly understandible reason behind Peacemaker’s ludicrous pledge to kill as many men, women, and children as it takes in the name of peace, but also fully examining its montrous potential by pushing it to its logical conclusion.
Gunn pays homage to classic alien infiltration films like Invasion of the Body Snatchers and They Live, pulling no punches in his critique of humanity while also rejecting the premise that freedom of choice is inherently sacred. Instead, Gunn again returns to his core premise of the healing power of love. If a jerk like Peacemaker can change for the better, maybe there’s hope for the species after all.
from IGN Reviews https://ift.tt/0qQD3Ts
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