Peacemaker: Season 1 - Review 

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

JAMES Gunn and John Cena pulled off a neat trick in the first season of Peacemaker, by taking a character that was largely pathetic (or, as Rick Flag Jr referred to him, “Peacemaker, what a joke”) and hard to like by the end of The Suicide Squad and really pulling him apart to expose the wounded, complex individual underneath the helmet.

At the same time, they maintained the tone and style of Gunn’s best work (from Guardians of the Galaxy through to The Suicide Squad), by successfully combining loud, shouty and sometimes crass humour with outlandish violence and emotionally involving character building.

John Cena excelled in the title role, bringing surprising nuance as well as plenty of self-deprecating humour. He quite literally through himself into everything Gunn asked of him, however absurd - whether being beaten up by a woman while only on his tiny whities in episode 1 to continually being splattered with blood and other bodily secretions throughout.

But as juvenile as some of the antics seemed, there was genuine drama underpinning the journey as he learnt to deal with the repercussion and trauma that have informed his life, courtesy of an abusive, racist and extremist father (Robert Patrick’s superbly grotesque Auggie Smith), which in turn led to the accidental killing of his own brother by Peacemaker (during a brawl orchestrated for financial gain by their white trash father).

Trauma played a huge part in the show as a whole, mirroring the kind of trauma informed back stories Gunn told in movies like Guardians of the Galaxy: Volume 2 (in which Star-Lord had to come to terms with his own relationship with his father) and Volume 3 (which placed a broken Rocket front and centre).

It also informed the journeys of several of the supporting cast, no matter how comic some of their endeavours, whether it was Jennifer Holland’s tough but bruised Emilia Harcourt, or Steve Agee’s continually put upon John Economus. All had their moments to unpack their emotions.

But then Gunn has continually proved himself to be a past master at combining genre requirements of big spectacle and action with something more intimate and meaningful, even in the most outlandish of stories.

Peacemaker was no exception. Here, the titular anti-hero and company had to stave off a threat posed by a secret alien species known as The Butterflies - so named because of the way they hide out in the brains of their human hosts.

This, in turn, also enabled Gunn to indulge in some of his apparent love for gore, as there was plenty to rival the likes of Slither and the worst excesses of The Suicide Squad.

If there were criticisms, there were indeed times when some of the profanity, violence and name calling became excessive… as if Gunn were deliberately pushing the envelope but becoming tiring as a result (much in the same way that Deadpool does eventually become so).

While the overall series lacked a genuinely standout episode, slow building upon its successes to deliver an overall sense of satisfaction.

But while the alien invasion story itself was probably the weakest element, and didn’t really seem to serve the wider DCU (which was still being established under Gunn’s stewardship), it was the characters and their individual stories, as well as their slow-building camaraderie, that really left the biggest impression.

Aside from the likes of Cena and Holland, there were also notable turns from Chukwudi Iwuji as unit head Clemson Murn (whose character boasted one of the biggest mid-season twists), Danielle Brooks as Leota Adebayo (another character struggling to fit in and find her own identity), and Freddie Stroma as Adrian Chase, aka Vigilante, who brought a different style of self-deprecating, juvenile humour yet managed to keep his character interested and even loveable.

Hence, Peacemaker’s debut season won you over in spite of its flaws. It was funny, occasionally moving, sometimes surprising and always excessive - but in exactly the way that James Gunn fans have come to expect and love.