The Suicide Squad is my favorite DCEU movie to date, probably even one of my favorite superhero movies of all time. While I didn't love Peacemaker as a character, I was more than excited to see James Gunn's wacky vision of DC expanded into a full series. And it was excellent!
Peacemaker is a show about the titular character (Christopher Smith) being dragged out of prison to stop a bunch of alien zombie butterflies trying to take over the world. He joins a team with two minor characters from The Suicide Squad, Vigilante, and Amanda Waller's daughter Adebayo, who's mostly just in it to make money. To be perfectly honest, I felt the show got to a bit of a slow start, as the "butterfly" threat wasn't made all that clear and the humor was a bit more hit-or-miss. Once the team actually starts trying to fight the alien butterflies, however, Peacemaker becomes a ton of fun, mostly because of how incompetent much of the cast is. Part of the charm of Peacemaker is seeing the team fail at pretty much everything they try to do, and then get mad at each other for screwing up. It simultaneously makes for great comedy and heightens the stakes by making things worse for the protagonists.
Despite the bizarre premise, however, Peacemaker is actually a bit of a character study. When the show started, I was still pissed at Smith for killing off Rick Flag in the movie he was introduced in, but the script does a great job of making you understand why Smith does the things he does and even feel for him a bit. His relationship with his horrendously bigoted father makes for some of the most emotional moments in the show. The whole cast is great, though. Adebayo, Harcourt, and Murn are all complex and likable figures, but the big highlight aside from Peacemaker himself is definitely the straight-up sociopathic Vigilante. And while the humor is a bit spotty at first, it does get a lot better. I'm a big fan of those Seinfeld-ian conversations between the team that feel aimless to the point of doubling back over to being hilarious. Peacemaker is also willing to cross the line in some truly great ways. Like yeah, the "Aquaman fucks fish" joke is pretty overdone. But bringing in the entire Justice League just for The Flash to corroborate it was just simply genius. Similarly, the action is incredibly brutal but in a stylish way, not unlike The Suicide Squad or something like Kingsman.
Once Peacemaker gets good, it gets really good. Here are its highlights:
The Title Sequence: So I know this is a bit unconventional, but I had to bring it up somewhere. Peacemaker has the greatest title sequence of any TV show ever (not including anime OPs, those are on another level). Having the entire cast perform a musical number with stone-faced expressions is pure James Gunn and suits the show's tone oddly perfectly. It helps that the song is catchy, the choreography is legitimately impressive, and the opening is shot with so much energy. I usually skip title sequences but I just can't bring myself to do it for this one, it's just too mesmerizing.
Murn After Reading: Through much of the last few episodes, the characters have been keeping secrets from each other, some of which the audience knows and some of which the audience doesn't. Murn After Reading has pretty much all of those secrets revealed leading to the twist-iest episode of the show. Murn is a Butterfly but he's also good, Adebayo's diary is used to frame Peacemaker, and biggest of all, Peacemaker has been keeping Goff alive the whole time and accidentally causes him to hijack Song's body and turn the entire police station into butterflies.
Stop Dragon My Heart Around: I think the moment I realized this show was amazing was when the last episode (Episode 6 out of 8) wasn't the climax of the series like much of MCU's television output. Murn After Reading was massive and James Gunn still wanted to heighten the stakes, so we get the most emotional episode of the show. Between Murn dying and Smith facing off against and killing his father, Stop Dragon My Heart Around was dark and made for a fantastic set-up for the finale.
It's Cow Or Never: I really don't want to keep trashing on Marvel like this but this is how you nail a finale to a superhero show. It's Cow Or Never pulls out all the stops, from the best action scene in the show (with a badass long take to boot), to some of the best jokes in the series, to surprise appearances from the Justice League and Amanda Waller, to some pretty massive status quo shifts (Harcourt's injury, Adebayo's public statement), to satisfying resolutions for pretty much all of the character arcs.
Overall, Peacemaker was a ton of fun. After a bit of a rough start, the show quickly evolved into a fantastic series with compelling drama, great character work, fun action, and excellent James Gunn humor. And the fact that it actually feels thought-out, cohesive, and has a genuinely satisfying finale makes this pretty much better than every MCU show we had last year.
4/5 Stars
No comments:
Post a Comment