Peacemaker Season 2 Review

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This is a DynaMic Network Podcast. 

Hi and welcome to the DynaMic Duel Podcast, a weekly show where we review superhero films and debate the superiority between Marvel and DC by comparing their characters in stat-based battle simulations. I'm Marvelist Joe. 

And I'm his twin brother, Johnny DC. And in this episode we're getting back to the reviews. It's been a while since we've done a review. We're trying to hammer out a lot of Duel episodes and lead up to the show's finale. But I know a lot of people have been waiting for this peacemaker season two review, so we're definitely going to talk about that. Yeah, I've been dying to talk about this show for weeks now. We pushed it off in order to get a lot of spooky Halloween-esque duels in the month of October. But now we're finally reviewing it and I have a lot to say later on in this episode. Before that, we're going to break down the comic quick and movie news from the past week, of which we have just one news item and that is the talks about the upcoming potential acquisition of Warner Brothers and DC Studios by another studio. 

As always, we list our segment times in our episode description, so feel free to check out the show notes if you want to skip ahead to a particular topic. Guys, our artificially intelligent Duel Simulator, AJ9K, has a quick message for our listeners, so listen up. 

Why hello there. Do you want even more from this podcast? Then become a part of the dynamic duel community on Patreon, where you can choose from three tiers. The Dynamic 2.0 tier gives you access to our Discord chat server. 

The Fantastic Four tier gives you two bonus episodes each month and the X-Force tier makes you an executive producer of this show. Lastly, the Diner Mike podcast network tier lets you create your own podcast using this Monte Carlo simulator. Johnny and Joe will help you develop your show, provide graphic support and consultation, and get you simulation results. Pitch the twins your ideas via email at Dynamic Duel Podcast at gmail.com. Check it out at patreon.com slash dynamic duel. Pip pip cheerio. 

Thanks AJ9K and thanks to everyone who supports the podcast. Be sure to tune into the other shows in the Diner Mike podcast network this week, including the console combat podcast, where hosts John and Dean simulate battles between popular video game characters. In yesterday's episode, they reviewed the Super Mario Brothers movie. Over on the Max Destruction podcast, hosts Scotty and Gilly pet your favorite action heroes from film and television against each other. The Macho Twins are taking a quick break for the month of November, but they'll be back in December with some Christmas season duels. On the Central World podcast, host Zachary Hepburn speculates on fights between fan favorite anime and manga characters. 

In his next episode, Zach is revealing who would win between Shigyo Kageyama, aka Mob from Mob Psycho 100, and Tatsumaki the tornado of terror from One Punch Man. But with that out of the way, quick to the no prize. A no prize is an award that Marvel used to give out to fans. 

Our version, the Dynamic Duel No Prize, is a digital award that we post on Instagram for the person we feel gave the best answer to our question of the week. Last week we asked you guys, what scary story this episode was your favorite and why? And of course in our last episode, we told you guys six short scary stories as narrated by Nightmare from Marvel and the Phantom Stranger from DC. 

They were original stories written by Jonathan and myself and we hope you guys enjoyed them, but which one did you guys find the scariest? Let's find out by going through our honorable mentions and our no prize winner. Yeah, we got two honorable mentions. The first one goes to Alex Albro who 

said, Hey guys, my favorite story was definitely the story of Greyhaven with the breathless boy and the silent citizens and everything that the ghost trend was there the whole time. And to be honest, I never saw it. It was pretty cool surprise. Also, you just you don't know who lays down the fog and it just felt real. 

It's really good story. Honestly, the scariest thing though is this win streak that DC's on feels like Marvel's just a step behind in the race to January. Maybe next month we can be thankful for the comeback. 

I fully expect this Thanksgiving holiday to be sitting at my dinner table and saying I am thankful for Marvel making a comeback in the month of November. Yes, it's going to happen. 

I mean, it's going to be a lie, but you could say it. Yeah, and the Greyhaven story that Alex referred to was the veil of fog, a story about the hero Nightshade. It was a pretty good story. It had an interesting twist where everyone in the town of Greyhaven, including this little boy that she befriends is actually a ghost, which gets revealed when she fixes this lighthouse that burns through the fog. 

And it turns out the entire populace is made out of fog, basically. So the way Joseph and I approached both of our stories were a little bit different. In the Phantom Stranger Horror Anthology series, there is always a lesson or a morality tale to be told. So I wanted each of my stories to sort of have that lesson since Phantom Stranger was my narrator. And I thought something along the lines of the road to hell is paved with good intentions would be a good moral lesson. So that's what inspired the veil of fog. 

Yeah, with my stories, I was just going for good like campfire-esque tales in the vein of scary stories to tell in the dark or tales from the crypt. Great answer, Alex. Our next honorable mention goes to Nate, who said, Hey, it's Nate here. 

And I just want to thank House of Mystery for giving me those amazing bedtime story for my nieces. And I even found myself falling asleep to those. So thank you for that. The one, though, that really kept me up was Crypt of Shadows. So I think the wind goes to Marvel for giving me nightmares. 

I totally agree, man. Yeah, the House of Mystery tales were boring, and they put you right to sleep. The Crypt of Shadows stories, on the other hand, were dread-inducing and hopefully kept a lot of people awake at night. 

Yeah, I won't deny it. I thought they were actually really scary. I mean, maybe not the Ghost Rider one. That one was more exciting, maybe. But the other two, yeah, they had some really good imagery associated with them. Yeah, I said they were scary, not as scary as the House of Mystery stories, but scary. Sure. Yeah, I thought they were more scary, too. Great answer, Nate. But the winner of this week's No Prize is Noah Terry, who said, 

My favorite scary story would have to be the Manitou, because it's just super creepy in the moral dilemma. And also, your guys' storytelling is just top notch. And just a great story, spine-chilling, amazing Halloween tale. Just loved it. Thanks. 

Thanks, Noah. I had a lot of fun writing that one as well. That one was actually inspired by my favorite horror film, The Cabin in the Woods. That film deals with the sacrifice of five archetypal youths, and I kind of ran with that for my Manitou Raven story. That story wasn't like Cabin in the Woods at all. It was more like Evil Dead. Manitou is very Evil Dead-esque. That's definitely not what inspired it, though. Like, if you notice, the characters were the archetypes of the soldier, the virgin, the harlot, the scholar, and the jester, essentially. And they were each killed by the four Hellenistic elements of earth, fire, water, and wind, plus shadow. That essentially was the framework for my story. 

I knew I wanted to get those elements specifically in there. Well, the Ghost Rider one was based off of a popular, scary story where a woman thinks a guy is chasing her in his car, but really, he's trying to warn her about the killer in the back seat. That's a pretty common one, actually. 

I just spun it with Ghost Rider. And then the many angled ones is actually a riff on my favorite short horror story, The Bookie Man, written by Stephen King. And then the Crimson Lands one was just a zombie tale, because I wanted to write a Jennifer Kale story. I thought it'd be cool to set it in the swamp, and it was kind of reverse engineered from wanting to have zombies in the swamp, but not have them be traditional zombies in the sense that they were controlled by necromancy, but instead by Black Tom Cassidy, who could control plants. Yeah, having Black Tom Cassidy be the villain who just destroys man thing, I thought was a stroke of genius. Yeah, I wanted to get in a lot of villains that we haven't used yet in Duel's, including Black Heart, Black Tom Cassidy, and Shumagorath. And that was really cool, too. That's actually something I wish I would have thought to do with my stories. Yeah, mine were better. 

I mean, we're giving the no prize to Noa Terry, who said that my story was better, which means that I not only won the team duel, I won the story contest. So there in your face. What are you trying to prove, man? What are you trying to prove? 

I'm better than you, bro. Great answer, Noa Terry. You and this week's no prize. 

If you, the listener, want a shot at winning your own no prize, stay tuned to later on this episode when we'll be asking another question of the week. And now that that's done, on to the news. Okay, years ago, as everyone may remember, AT &T sold Warner Brothers to the head of Discovery, David Zaslov, who merged the two companies together with the intention of flipping the studio, as it were. Many of us who followed the story, including myself, were kind of hoping he would sell to Comcast Universal to make them more competitive against Disney and their theme parks. But it looks like Paramount has emerged recently as the studio most interested in acquiring Warner Brothers Discovery. Warner Brothers Discovery has a lot of debt. So what David Zaslov has done is talk about splitting the companies in two, just to make it more attractive to buyers. But it looks like Paramount wants the whole enchilada, and they offered an initial bid of $57 billion, which David Zaslov rejected, because you always reject the first offer. It's about $24 a share. 

Warner Brothers Discovery is currently trading at about $22 a share. So I think it was a smart move. I think they could get more. So while Paramount is working on a follow up bid, Netflix has also entered the arena, actively exploring a bid and even hiring a bank to put together an offer. And with Warner Brothers Discovery, suddenly the bell of the ball, even Comcast owners who own Universal have talked about potentially putting in a bid. 

Now that's less likely to happen, even though I would love for it to happen. Forbes recently came out with an article saying that there's less than a 10% chance of approval of Comcast acquiring Warner Brothers because of the potential antitrust issues that would come with Comcast getting more of a monopoly on internet services. The Paramount deal, Forbes is giving a 30 to 40% chance of approval for the acquisition. It's just that Paramount as a studio is smaller than Warner Brothers, so they would need to acquire a lot more money to buy it. Interestingly enough, Forbes is giving Netflix the highest likelihood of approval between 50 and 60%, although Netflix is not interested in acquiring all of Warner Brothers, just the parts that they can use essentially. 

Like I'm not even sure Netflix would want something like DC Comics the comic company. No one does. I mean, I would. We'll put together a bid. 

I'm poor. But it's really interesting to see all of these players suddenly come out of the woodwork for an opportunity to get a hold of Warner Brothers content library, which is massive, and again includes DC Comics and DC Studios. There's been a lot of rumors as to whether or not James Gunn would stay on board if Warner Brothers were to be acquired. But it looks like at least if Paramount makes the acquisition, they're very much interested in James Gunn staying on board. 

Yeah, it would suck for DC Studios to just undergo this reboot only to have to do it again almost immediately. Actually, that would make me laugh. I would be very upset. I would be very upset. I don't know which of these three would probably upset me more. 

I don't love really any of them. They all have their potential pros and cons. I think what DC Studios has going now is good. 

I mean, Warner Brothers is having a fantastic year at the theaters. So I would say don't change anything right now, but we'll see how things go. Do we know when we're expected to hear something? I think we'll hear something before the end of the year for sure. 

And then it'll take a year or two to get everything sorted out with the government potentially. But considering the three suitors interested in Warner Brothers, that brings us to our question of the week. Which company would you most want to acquire Warner Brothers and DC Studios? 

And why? Yeah, I don't know how business savvy a lot of you guys are, but basically I think a good way to approach this question is to look at the existing buyers, see what existing libraries they have in terms of content, and then think about which of those libraries would incorporate DC Studios most easily. I think that's how I would approach it at least. Record your answer at dynamicdool.com by clicking on the red microphone button in the bottom right hand corner of the screen, which will prompt you to leave us a voicemail. Your message could be up to 30 seconds long. And don't forget to leave your name in case we include you on the podcast. We'll pick our favorite answer and award that person a dynamic duel note prize that we'll post to Instagram. 

Be sure to answer before November 8th. But that does it for all of the news for this episode, so let's go ahead and move into our main event where we review the HBO Max DC television series, Peacemaker Season 2. Okay, Peacemaker Season 2, written by DC Studios head James Gunn, is the third entry in DC's new cinematic universe, following creature commandos and Superman, also written by Gunn. Season 1 was a spin-off of James Gunn's film The Suicide Squad, in which Peacemaker betrayed the Squad and later dealt with the ramifications of his actions in Season 1 of his HBO series, while also saving the world from a secret alien invasion. I loved The Suicide Squad and Season 1 of Peacemaker, both had a terrific blend of action, comedy, and heartfelt themes, as did creature commandos. With the success of Superman, I had fairly high expectations for Peacemaker Season 2, especially when James Gunn revealed that this season would be setting up the story for the Superman sequel, Man of Tomorrow. So did Peacemaker Season 2 meet those expectations? 

Sadly, no. Not even close for me personally, for reasons I will get into in this spoiler review. If you haven't seen Peacemaker Season 2 yet, but want to and lead up to Man of Tomorrow, stop listening now to avoid spoilers. 

Now, as I mentioned, because of James Gunn's creative momentum with creature commandos and Superman, my expectations for Peacemaker's sophomore season were sky-high, and maybe that's my fault for not checking my expectations. I will admit that. I keep telling you. You do. You do. 

You think I would have learned 10 years into this. But with creature commandos and Superman, Gunn had set a newish tonal standard for the DCU, a reverent yet respectful to the source material, heartfelt yet humorous and fully character-driven. So my anticipation centered on how he would evolve Chris Smith's story within the DCU's refreshed continuity. The promise of exploring new dimensions this season, both literal and thematic, had to be convinced that it was going to top its predecessor, Season 1. 

Now, at its core, Peacemaker Season 2 aimed to tackle identity, guilt, and redemption, which are fitting themes for a hero defined by contradiction, like Peacemaker, who's willing to kill for peace. The interdimensional realm known in the show as the Quantum Unfolding Chamber opens this gateway not only to alternate realities, but also really into the fractured psyche of Chris Smith himself, because he's forced to confront ghosts from his past, the Earth-X version of his father, brother, and even himself. So the show initially plays like this surreal therapy session, which is interesting, but these rich themes of duality and self-confrontation, I think lose focus amid the uneven pacing and just narrative clutter. What could have been a poignant reflection on accountability just gets buried beneath all of the season's truly unnecessary subplots and tonal detours. 

I totally agree. I actually thought we were going to spend much more time in Earth-X and kind of explore that where there was going to be a lot more consequences, I think for all the Nazis that lived there. There wasn't nearly enough action in this season overall. 

No, no. That being said, I don't think I went in with any expectations regarding this particular season, and so I think I liked it a little bit more than you did save for the final episode, which I thought was totally and utterly pointless. They should have ended the series on episode seven, which I thought was a much more fitting cliffhanger. 

They should have ended it on episode 10, where they had a few more episodes to flesh everything out. Oh. I agree. The last episode is bad. 

We'll get to that. But my personal biggest gripe is that the show, like you mentioned, completely dropped the ball in exploring Earth-X, which I thought presented a politically timely setup that the show, frustratingly, never explored beyond short-lived surface-level irony. Even in the comics, Earth-X is a world where Nazis won World War II, which I think as a concept could have and probably should have encompassed the entire season. Like, I would have loved to have seen Gunn introduce the freedom fighters, characters like Uncle Sam, Phantom Lady, Black Condor, Ray, and Human Bomb. 

That would have been a huge surprise, but instead I found myself more surprised that that didn't happen. Yeah, Earth-X was almost treated as an afterthought secondary to Chris's personal dilemma, which was interesting, but also somewhat of a retread. From season one? Yeah, it was. 

They didn't need to do that. It made me feel like James Gunn really didn't know what else to do with the character, when really, like the Earth-X storyline, exploring fascism and things like that would have been perfect for the character of Peacemaker, who is a fascist. Yeah, he'd have to weigh his own personal ideals around fascism with the world of Earth-X. Which would have been really interesting. As I was watching this season, I just recognized so much like that that it should have either been expanded upon or cut entirely to make room for what should have been expanded upon, like Earth-X. Things like the Justice Gang's sudden early cameo felt arbitrary, serving very little narrative purpose, and I thought it teased a larger DCU integration that never materialized. There were so many superfluous jokes and characters, like Red St. Wild, and indulgent moments like Foxy Shazam's musical number undercut the narrative tension instead of reinforcing it. And if not more Justice Gang or the introduction of the Freedom Fighters, or heck, even the Suicide Squad, I figured we'd at least get live-action cameos from the creature commandos. Like, what's the point of having a shared cinematic universe if outside characters can't make significant contributions to the story? Instead of getting characters we as DCU fans really want to see, James Gunn leans into characters he's invented, like, Audubio. 

Who might love, don't get me wrong. But I don't love characters like Langston Flurry, or especially Red St. Wild. I get wanting to work with Tim Meadows or Michael Rooker, but you shouldn't write dumb parts just to include them, because that time we should be better spent. I don't know, I liked Tim Meadows. 

I think I could watch a whole series just based on that character. What? Bird blindness? Yeah, his bird blindness is hilarious. 

It is hilarious, but it's also unnecessary. Like, if you're going to have jokes, have them serve the story, I would say, you don't need to start inventing characters. There's already a huge stable of DC characters to use, and I really loved that Hughes to Sasha Bordeaux. I forgot that she was going to be in this season. 

She wasn't probably maximized as well as she could have been, but, you know, it's characters like that that I would love to see more of. What really turned me against the show, however, was the finale's cliffhanger, like you mentioned, in which Chris was trapped in the dimension of salvation, leaving the season feeling incomplete rather than open-ended. It felt lazy, and with no plans for a season three that possibly means that the salvation storyline from the comics will be picked up in Man of Tomorrow, as James Gunn has teased, but I don't know how you could do both salvation and Brainiac. If you're not familiar with the storyline of salvation from the comics, basically, Amanda Waller finds this planet, and she sends all of the supervillains from Earth there. And basically, the supervillains have to find a way back to Earth. It's a great storyline. It sounds like Lord of the Flies meets DC supervillains. It was like that exactly. It was that awesome. 

And we didn't get any of that. That's why I wanted like three more episodes of this season. I just feel like James Gunn is juggling too much as a studio head. 

He's a writer, and maybe he shouldn't be an executive, because as he's juggling so much, he's dropping balls, which is not great this early into a cinematic universe. Luckily, for everything wrong with the season narratively, Peacemaker's cast of characters still makes the show worth watching. Let's talk more about them in our character breakdown. Starting with Christopher Smith, aka Peacemaker, played by John Cena. Now, before I saw Peacemaker on screen, I never really wanted to. 

Like, there's a long list of characters that I would have rather seen adapted to live action. But since the Suicide Squad and these Peacemaker seasons, I've become a real fan of the character, and especially of John Cena's portrayal. He has made Peacemaker way more relatable than I would have thought, and I hope John Cena never stops playing him. 

No, John Cena is to Peacemaker as Ryan Reynolds is to Deadpool. I agree. They're just so endearing and really fill shoes that no one else can fill. And I'm not a big wrestling guy. Like, I didn't really follow John Cena's career prior to him being cast as Peacemaker. I'm still surprised about how much he nails the role. He is a really good actor. I would argue probably even better than The Rock or Dave Batista. 

I would agree with that, yeah, for sure. Probably the best wrestling actor ever. Although I haven't seen that new movie with The Rock playing the MMA fighter guy. Oh, that's fair. Yeah, I haven't seen that either. Apparently he's pretty good in it. So maybe we spoke too soon. 

Yeah, I heard he was good. Now we're season one of Peacemaker forced Chris to reckon with guilt and morality. Season two pushes him into self confrontation, literally, through the quantum unfolding chamber, Chris faces alternate versions of his family and himself, forcing him to question whether redemption is possible, or just another delusion. The death of his counterpart shakes him, but also tempts him with the idea that maybe another reality, one where he's not the screw up, is the only place he belongs. His arc becomes about learning that peace isn't something he can find by escaping his past or reality. It's something he has to make within himself, even when surrounded by ghosts of who he could have been. 

The tragedy in this season is that by the time he realizes that he's once again trapped, this time not by guilt, but by the consequences of his past actions, because he killed Ric Flagg Jr. and his dad has access to the salvation dimension. Moving on to Amelia Harcourt, she was played by Jennifer Holland, who is James Gunn's wife. She's a fantastic Harcourt. She pulls off the badassery, the sexiness and the chemistry with John Cena very well. 

Like honestly, I'm not sure why as an actress Jennifer Holland doesn't get more work outside of this role, because she should. Yeah, in real life, she seems very much like a non-Harcourt type person, so it kind of speaks, I think, to her range and skill as an actor that she pulls off this gruff badass so well. Now, Harcourt's story this season is about divided loyalties and buried affection. After season one, she's disillusioned with Argus and unsure of her place post-government work, intentionally getting into bar fights just to hit and feel something. She resists her feelings for Chris, seeing them as a liability, but his disappearance forces her to confront the truth that her cynicism is really just armor. Her reluctant alliance with Ric Flagg Sr. shows how easily she slips back into the system she despises, but her ultimate decision to defy it and risk everything to bring Chris home shows real growth this season. 

Harcourt begins as someone who believes connection makes you weak and ends as someone who realizes it's the only thing that gives strength, her strength specifically, meaning. Yeah, I was really impressed with her character growth this season. Like when she made that call, just a matter of factly, that they were going to go get Chris from the other dimension, I was like, okay, so she is in love with him and she is willing to make these sacrifices for him and she's not a total ice queen. Yeah, when Audubio got that huge smile on her face, so did I. Yeah, I thought it was a really interesting surprise when it was revealed. That whole moment kind of brushed past me when I first saw it, but right after that I started thinking about the implications of what that actually meant and how she would hold a grudge against Peacemaker for killing one of her best friends slash lovers. Yeah, that was a great retcon that I thought added a great bit of conflict to her character. Yeah, and context. 

For sure. Moving on to Leota, Adubio, she was played by Daniel Brooks. She delivers probably the strongest performance of the show. She works so well with both the comedy and drama throughout the series. 

Next to Peacemaker, she's probably my favorite character within the 11th Street Kids. I agree, except again in that final episode where everything was just way too fucking dramatic and simultaneously boring. The rest of the episodes, I thought Adubio was great. 

I felt truly horrified for her on Earth X when she was being chased. Daniel Brooks just gave a great performance. For sure. Now Adubio starts this season still weighed down by the moral compromises she made for her mother, Amanda Waller. This season reframed her as the conscience of the group, the one who tries to anchor Chris as he unravels. When she follows him across realities, it's not just loyalty. 

It's sort of almost penance. And her experiences on Earth X, where minorities are hunted, push her from passive guilt into active conviction. She finds her voice again, not as an agent executing orders, but as a friend willing to defy authority for what's right. She reclaims her integrity after her betrayal, and she learns that redemption isn't just about saying sorry, it's about what you stand for when no one's watching. Yeah, I thought it was a great continuation of her arc from the first season where she kind of started out as this kind of bumbling idiot and grew into this super badass who was made for this shit and decided that's where her calling was. Right, exactly. 

She started off not wanting to be a spy and to realizing that's exactly what she was born to do, although struggling at it. To end, creating Checkmate, where they all could work together. Now, explain Checkmate. Checkmate is sort of like it's like shield in DC Comics. It's a clandestine organization, the structure of which is ranked like pieces of a chess board. Oh, kind of like the Hellfire Club. Exactly. 

But what a rip-off. Better. I will say that Checkmate is a better name than Hellfire Club, though. Yeah, for a chess themed organization, absolutely. 

Yeah. Moving on to John Economos. He's played by Steve Aggy, who is perfect as economists. I love seeing how he handles conflict as a character. It feels very true to the actor. I don't know if that's an insult, but he does it really well. 

It's just comedic gold. Yeah, the fact that he's a coward. Yeah, it was funny to see him get stabbed in the hand and be like, holy shit. 

And then just totally unravel with all their secrets. As much as you want to hate him for that, it's understandable and at least consistent for who he is. Right. 

Yeah. Now, Economos continues as the team's reluctant straight man. But this time, his arc turns inward, continuously lying as a double agent of sort within Argus while remaining loyal to the 11th Street Kids. When he's literally stabbed by Aggy on Earth X, it's almost like a metaphor for the truth cutting through a self-deception. By the end, his loyalty to Chris and the team isn't about job security or fear anymore. 

It's about choosing family. Economos starts the season trying to justify his usefulness to Argus and ends up realizing his worth has nothing to do with the bureaucracy that exploited him. Moving on to Adrian Chase, a.k .a. Vigilante. 

He's played by Freddie Strowma, who's kind of like the DCU's answer to Ryan Reynolds, though he wasn't as funny this season as he was in the last, I thought. I did not get all of the animal trivia obsession. Just served as an example of all the useless filler jokes that I thought permeated this season. 

I agree. Yeah, the animal trivia thing got old pretty quickly, although I really did like the joke when Steve Aggy was like, how many eyes does a spider have? And he was like, too. 

He was like, you said that so confidently, I actually had to look at my phone. Now, Adrian's relationship with Chris has always been rooted in hero worship. But this season, Adrian's loyalty becomes less about blindly following Chris and more about protecting him from himself. Though in the end, killing Aggy probably put a wedge between him and peacemaker, more so than what we saw, though, who knows if that will ever be explored further. 

I don't think it'll affect their relationship too bad. I mean, Vigilante was just doing basically what he thought he had to. I did love that it was revealed that he was like secretly a millionaire with all this drug money hidden in his basement. He just refused to do anything with it. 

Spending blood money will curse you for generations. The last character on this list is Ric Flag Sr., who is played by Frank Grillo. He plays a great tough guy who appears in control, but he's teetering on the edge. I didn't know he was going to end up as like the main antagonist of the season. 

But I thought he did a good job with the role. Yeah, it makes sense. So I mean, it covers up a plot thread that has been existing since the Suicide Squad in having that whole retribution for the murder of Ric Flag Jr. I really don't like what they did with his character in the last few episodes, though, where he really became a stooge to Lex Luthor, which seems out of character. I know that his motivation was to get back at peacemaker at any cost. But he also seemed to be enjoying himself with the Lex Luthor part. 

But that kind of makes sense to me. Like, it makes sense that Lex Luthor would turn someone like Ric Flag Sr. into his stooge. It's in character for Lex Luthor, if not Ric Flag Sr. I guess it makes me respect Lex Luthor more as a formidable villain, but it makes me respect Ric Flag Sr. less and he's the antagonist of this show. 

That's fair. He ends up not being the strongest villain. And maybe that's another reason why he felt so disappointed by the final episode. And plus, he seemed terribly inconsistent with his appearance in the Creature Commando show. Oh, and that he didn't have white hair. Well, not just an appearance, just in terms of how he acted. Like, I couldn't imagine the animated version of Ric Flag Sr. like, laughing and drinking with his buddies while people were getting killed. Maybe? Maybe you're right. But let's go ahead and move into our story highlights. 

The Dynamite Podcast Network presents Console Combat, where video game legends brawl every Monday. Dynamic Duel, where comic book titans smash every Tuesday. Max Destruction, where TV and action heroes battle every Wednesday. And Cendro World, where anime champions clash every Thursday. Join us as we speculate on the matches and armed with the power of mathematical simulations, discover who will emerge victorious. Visit dynamicpodcast.com, where we settle the debate and settle the score. 

Episode one was titled The Ties That Grime. Well, using his quantum unfolding chamber, also known as the QC as storage, Chris Smith, the peacemaker, discovers a doorway to an alternate reality, Earth X, where his father, Augie Smith, is alive and a superhero. Six months later, Chris struggles with not being taken seriously as a hero and being rejected by the Justice Gang. 

Hardcore remains unemployed due to Amanda Waller's influence, while Argus director Ric Flagg Sr. distrusts John Economos' reports on Peacemaker. Chris revisits Earth X and learns that his brother Keith is also alive there. After meeting his alternate self, the two fight in the QC, ending with the Earth X peacemaker, mortally wounded and dying in Chris's arms. Great setup to the show. I thought the final scene where the Earth X peacemaker dies, just seeing John Cena's acting performance on that was definitely harrowing. It was just like a, oh, shit, moment. Yeah, this was the episode with the Augie scene. 

Yes. Yeah, which is a hell of a way to kick off the first episode of season two. I gotta say, I didn't think that was necessary at all. I did think that parts of it were hilarious. And also I was really put off by some parts of it. Like there was a lot more dudes jorkin' their dork than I would have liked in a streaming TV series. Can you imagine being a fan of Superman and being so excited about this universe and wanting to watch more, only to see that in episode one? 

There was a hilarious part, though, where as peacemaker was going through the kitchen on his way to the portal, there were a bunch of people having sex in his kitchen, but there was one guy in the background who was just eating a sandwich watching everybody. You know, James Gunn has talked about his creative process before, where he says basically as a writer, you just need to write and not really have an emotional reaction to what you're writing because it just needs to get done as the head of DC studios. It sounds like he really has no one there to say, hey, James, this might not be a good idea. 

And I kind of wish he did. Like where was Peter Saffron to be like, maybe don't do an orgy in episode one. Fun fact, actually, I had to pause it a few times during that scene because my wife was convinced that she went to college with one of the actresses in the scene. And I was like, whatever, no, it's just someone who looks like somebody you went to college with. And no, it turns out because she looked it up in the end credits that, yeah, the one who like took a dump and then didn't wash her hands in the second episode is an acquaintance of my wife's. 

They hung out a few times during college, but she was like telling me this and I'm like, what the fuck am I supposed to do? Should I avert my gaze now? Or like, what's happening? I'm just going to keep watching the show. That is a profound moral conundrum that I never would have expected you to be in. 

For sure. Moving on to episode two, it was titled, a man is only as good as his bird. Argus agent Langstrom Flurry is assigned as a condom as handler, as flag senior grows suspicious out of by a warrants Chris that he's being monitored and urges him to surrender the QC. Adrian Chase Vigilante helps Chris dispose of his counterparts corpse during a rooftop party with Chris, Adabayo, Harcourt, Adrian and Economos, the 11th Street kids. 

Flurry leads a raid on Chris's home, but is attacked by his bald eagle, Eagle Lee, later a drunk Chris reenters Earth X and messages that universe is Harcourt, who was the former lover of the Earth X peacemaker. I have to say that so far, these two episodes, I thought were great. And I was totally on board with the show. I liked the direction it was going. I was really interested in seeing where the story was going to go. But then again, I also thought like a majority of the remaining episodes were going to take place in Earth X. 

Well, how did you know that? Was the season spoiled for you? No, I didn't know it was Earth X at the time. I just thought it would take place in the other dimension. Oh, I'm calling it Earth X now because I know that in hindsight. 

Gotcha. Now, as much as I don't like the inclusion of the character of Langstrom Flurry, I do have to say him and Steve Aggy do need their own show together. Yes, maybe not San the DC universe, but their comedic riffing off of each other was pure gold. 

It was so good. The show could be called Ginger Cool. Ginger Cool and Bird Blindness Guy. Episode three was titled Another Rick Up My Sleeve. Chris meets Earth X Harcourt at Argus headquarters, learning that universe's Rick Flag, Jr. is alive and dating her. 

Harcourt X reveals she broke up with peacemaker X for being unfaithful and unwilling to commit. Their talk is cut short when the Sons of Liberty threatened to blow up a building. Chris kills the terrorists and diffuses the bomb. After an emotional talk with his brother, Keith, Chris returns home unaware that Argus agent Sasha Bordeaux has assembled a team, including economists Flurry, Judo Master and the Eagle Hunter Red Saint Wilde to raid his house. This is actually my favorite episode. 

I just feel like a lot happened in terms of like action and building up the intrigue of what was going to happen in the later episodes that just never really came to fruition. Seeing peacemaker take on a whole squad of terrorists is just so damn cool. I feel like that's probably the best action scene that peacemaker has on screen out of all of his appearances. Even in the Suicide Squad? I can't think of one better. What about the scene when he was competing with Bloodsport? I liked this more. 

OK. Less dick, you know. What did you think of Red Saint Wilde? He was just a strange character. I think his inclusion was to set up this whole eagerly being like the prime eagle sort of thing. 

But that didn't really go anywhere. And I don't really know what that means, actually. Like, what does it mean to be the prime eagle? That means you could control other eagles, apparently. 

I guess. I mean, the only purpose that served was to kill Red Saint Wilde later on. So he was completely unnecessary, in my opinion. There were some parts that made me laugh out loud, though, like when John Economist pushed the character over and like he hit his head on the rock. It was just so slapstick and stupid. I did laugh out loud. 

And then when he tasted the eagle poop, he was like, he's been eating Cheetos and ribeye steaks. And John Economist was like, there's no way you could possibly know that. I will say that it's a character that no one else could play, I think, other than Michael Rooker. It does pose a continuity issue where Michael Rooker is playing two characters in the DCU, if the Suicide Squad is considered continuity and that he played Savant and Red Saint Wilde. Well, I think they established in the previously in the DCU tag at the beginning of this season that any continuity errors, you just have to kind of retcon mentally. So like in Peacemaker Season One, it was Aquaman and the Flash and, you know, the Standard Justice League that showed up. Whereas the retcon showed that it was like Green Lantern and Hawk Girl and the Justice Gang that showed up at the end of that adventure. So you'd have to think that the retcon with Michael Rooker would be that it was just a different actor playing Savant within that universe's story regarding the Suicide Squad. 

Fine by me. I never liked him as Savant anyway. Episode four was titled Need I Say Door. Economist warns Chris about the Argus raid, prompting him to flee with the Eagle Lee and the QUC Gateway device. 

Economists incapacitate Savant Wilde to save Eagle Lee while Chris defeats Judo Master in the woods. Chris and Adubio regroup at a cabin in Subdler's Hill, where he transfers the QUC portal to a new location. Meanwhile, Flag Senior temps Harcourt with reinstatement if she helps capture Peacemaker. 

Chris tells Adubio he plans to move permanently to the alternate reality and later texts Harcourt to meet him. Unaware, she's accepted Flag Senior's offer. St. Wilde performs a ritual that reveals Eagle Lee's location at the cabin. Can you remind me why at this point that Peacemaker was on the run? 

Why they didn't access his location via the chip in his head like they did later on in the season? OK, bad writing is the answer. Really? 

OK. I thought maybe it was a plot hole, but also I thought maybe I missed something. No, I don't think you missed anything. There is something about security clearance. But I don't think there was an issue for Flag Senior because he was the head of Argus. Right. 

Like I said, James Gunn, he's juggling too many balls. Episode five was titled Back to the Suture. At their meeting, Harcourt insists there's no future between her and Chris, the Noxum and Conscious to prevent Bordeaux from killing him. At Argus headquarters, she convinces economists to book Chris in jail to save him from Flag Senior's brutality. Adubio later bails Chris out and drives him to the cabin, trailed by Judo Master, feeling he doesn't belong in this universe. Chris decides to cross over permanently with Eagle Lee, who summons a flock of eagles to kill Saint Wilde. 

Judo Master sneaks into the queue you see before it closes and after reading Chris's farewell letter, Harcourt vows to bring him home. It was cool to see Sasha Bordeaux actually be a cyborg in this series because she is in the comics. She used to be Bruce Wayne's bodyguard until she was in a terrible accident and that she was kind of rebuilt by the government. She probably doesn't have that history with Bruce Wayne in this universe. 

I'm guessing it could be wrong. But I just like her as a character and I definitely like that she was included in the creation of Checkmate because she is the Black Queen. I'm wondering why they chose to include that romance between her and Ric Flagg Senior. It really didn't go anywhere. And it was vague as to what was happening to begin with. That's a good question. Yeah, that was another unnecessary element within the show. 

Another reason why writers like James Gunn probably need checks and balances. Episode six was titled Ignorance is Chris. The 11th Street Kids activate the dimensional portal at Adrian's home and travel to retrieve Chris. In Earth X, Harcourt X meets Chris with help from Keith, while Adrian meets his counterpart, who reveals he joined the Sons of Liberty because of Peacemaker X. 

Economist is found and stabbed by Augie, forcing him to confess that Peacemaker X is dead. Chris admits his love for Harcourt but refuses to leave the dimension. When Chris discovers a US flag replaced with a Nazi swastika, Harcourt X alerts security. Meanwhile, Adebayo is hunted by Earth X residents and Flagg Senior makes a deal with Lex Luthor to help locate Peacemaker's portal in exchange for a transfer to Van Kul prison. It was cool to see a cameo by Nicholas Holt as Lex Luthor in this series. Yeah, I forgot to mention it, but Joel Kineman also had a cameo in a couple of episodes here. It was cool to see him back. The guy was actually pretty damn funny in his Earth X appearance. I thought that was pretty damn good. It did make me miss him as Ric Flagg Junior. 

Yeah, he was a good character. For sure. What was your reaction to the Earth X reveal? Really? I thought I was like, oh, that's a cool Easter egg. I thought so too. I was like, oh, shit. Shit just got real. 

This is going to be an awesome season. And then like after the next episode, nothing really happened with it. It's almost like the show let Earth X off the hook for being this like Nazi controlled nightmare universe, just completely forgot about it. 

Sort of. I mean, with Augie revealing that not everyone wants to be under Nazi control kind of made it a little bit more sympathetic. But still, you would think that if you visit a place where Nazis took control, you would want to do everything you can to stop that. Yeah, I don't think that Augie's reasoning, therefore, accepting the status quo was good enough because, you know, superheroes are meant to fight Nazis. It's the whole reason comic book superheroes were invented to begin with. 

And, you know, any true superhero would have taken it to the regime. And that would have been the big battle, I think, that this series sorely needed. It would have been cool to see the 11th Street Kids team up with White Dragon and Keith's character partnered maybe with even the freedom fighters and see them all take down the Nazis. That's what I wanted to see. 

That would have been awesome. Moving on to Episode 7, it was titled Like a Keith in the Night. Chris and hardcore escape Argus, but are captured by Augie and Keith. 

Judo master rescues Adebayo as Flag Senior and Bordeaux team up with ex Luther Corp employee Sydney Happerson to find the portal. When the police arrive, Augie lets Chris and his friends go despite Keith's protests. Adrian kills Augie, horrifying both brothers. The group flees toward the portal pursued by Keith, who is badly injured by Eagle, Adrian and Harcourt before Chris stops them from killing him, overcome with guilt over the deaths around him. After a shootout with police, the group returns home and seal the portal, only to be surrounded by Argus. 

Chris surrenders and hands over the QC device to Flag Senior. My favorite line from this episode was, that was the most people I've ever killed with an electrical cable in a swimming pool. I actually really liked Judo master this season. 

Yeah, he was better in this season than last I would agree. Mainly because he teamed up with the 11th Street kids. And I feel like he's better served as an ally because he's just such an asshole. 

But they're all assholes, you know? Right, right, right. Again, the season should have ended here and the story picked up in the next season. Because you had like the perfect setup where like Judo master was on the team of the 11th Street kids, but also it was the culmination of the Earth X storyline. Right, exactly. And it was a great culmination, too. Like Peacemaker just feeling so much guilt again over his father's death and the near death of his brother once again. That was powerful stuff. 

Yeah, for sure. But it didn't end there. There was one more episode, episode eight titled Full Nelson. A flashback shows Chris in hardcore sharing a kiss during a boat concert before she walked away in the present. 

Chris sits in prison, refusing visitors. Argus investigates new doors and worlds accessible through the QC, where numerous agents are killed. Adebayo and Adrian bail Chris out, but he vanishes with eagerly. Argus discovers a livable dimension dubbed salvation, which flag senior proposes as a metahuman prison. Disillusioned, Bordeaux exposes the plan to Harcourt and the two quit Argus. Together with Adebayo, Adrian and Economus, they find Chris at a motel and reassure him of his worth. 

Harcourt admits that their kiss together meant something and they begin dating. A week later, the group forms a new agency, Checkmate, alongside Bordeaux, Flurry and Judo Master. But in a final twist, Peacemaker is abducted and trapped in salvation by flag senior and Argus, who also closed the portal back. Now, here's the main problem I have with this finale and the reasoning of Rick flag senior. If he didn't care what happened to the prisoners, knowing that they would eventually just kind of die by being stranded on salvation. Why even put them on a livable dimension to begin with? Like, why not put them in the candyland dimension if you don't care about them? 

I thought the exact same thing. Literally, it doesn't matter where you dump them. If what happens to them is of no consequence to you. I thought maybe he was trying to work around a legal issue, but I don't even think that was the case. Well, yeah, if it was, that was never explained. 

So I don't think it was. It's really weird because he could have done two different things. He could have put prisoners in a lethal dimension and exploited salvation for its resources, and it seems weird that that's not what he chose to do. 

You would think that he would just toss Peacemaker in that hell dimension, which I thought was hilarious because like they opened the door and they're like, let's not go in there. Yeah. Yeah, but the whole thing could have been about resources. Like they hypothesized in this episode. 

You're totally right. It was weird, just a weird ending. I didn't like it at all. It just felt really rushed and tacked on. 

It left me really disappointed with this season. Well, it also provides a stumbling block for checkmate, right? Because now they don't even get to be the organization they want to be until they finish the side quest with Chris. Right. If they had plans for a season three, which they don't, they could have started that season off with them doing investigative work. 

But now they can't do that. Unless again, they're planning on appearing in Man of Tomorrow, which that's a huge cast of characters to have appear there. Overall, I think while this shows heartfelt and humorous ensemble cast delivers, the story fails to live up to its potential, making for a disappointing early entry in the DCU. I'm giving it two and a half out of five stars, which is a rotten rating on rotten tomatoes. 

It's a little harsh, but I don't fully disagree with that rating. Again, I really liked like the first three to four episodes of this show. And really, what happened is that it didn't go where I thought it would. And it didn't fulfill that potential, that great potential that it had established. There were some weird moments. A lot of it was just kind of like jumbled together in a way that made it feel half hazard. 

Absolutely. Yeah, between the filler, the plot holes, the unnecessary characters and subplots, the missed opportunities and unsatisfying ending, I really had a hard time justifying a higher rating than this, which I agree does feel harsh, especially considering a majority of critics liked it. Like we're late in getting up this review. Currently, season two is standing at a 95 percent on the tomato meter. 

Although I think most of those reviews were just of the initial episodes. Hopefully they do announce a season three and maybe the show can redeem itself. I feel like they're not going to announce anything until this potential Warner Brothers acquisition happens. So who knows how long it'll be before we get some news. That's just a guess, though. But that does it for this review. A.G .9K help close us out. 

Support the show on Patreon at patreon.com slash dynamic dual and joining a tier that works for you or by rating and reviewing dynamic dual on Apple podcasts, Spotify, Podchaser or on our website. Don't forget to listen to the other shows in the dynamite podcast network, including Max Destruction, Senjo World and Console Combat. 

In our next episode, we're getting back to the duals. Actually, it's going to be a team dual where we find out who would win in a fight between the authority originating in DC's Wildstorm Universe and the Cabal, which is like the villain version of the Illuminati in Marvel. That does it for this episode. We want to give a big thanks to our executive producers, John Starosky, Zachary Hepburn, Dustin Belcombe, Nathaniel Wagner, Levi Aitin, Austin Wazalowski, AJ Dunkerly, Nikobanto, Scott Camacho, Gil Camacho, Adam Speese, Dean Molesky, Devin Davis, Joseph Kirsting, Mike Williams and Paul Graves for helping make this podcast possible. We'll talk to you guys next week. Up, up and away, true believers. 

Don't talk your joke. You'll go blind. 

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