John Cena’s Peacemaker was one of the stand-out characters of DC’s new smash hit, The Suicide Squad — and if you can’t get enough of him, the good news is we’ll see plenty more in the Peacemaker TV spin-off currently in the works for HBO Max.
Now that The Suicide Squad is out in the wild we know a lot more about the title character, including why he deserves a spin-off over characters like Ratcatcher 2 and the Polka Dot Man.
Here’s everything we know about the show so far, including when we’ll be able to watch it in Australia.
Peacemaker: Release Date
Currently, Peacemaker is set to air in January 2022, with all episodes airing first on HBO Max in the United States.
While we don’t have HBO Max in Australia, Binge tends to get most HBO shows locally so we could still see the series launch in a similar timeframe here.
The first season of the show will have eight episodes, although writer/director/creator James Gunn is already teasing a second season.
Peacemaker: Cast
So far we know of three key Suicide Squad members joining the Peacemaker cast: John Cena himself as Christopher Smith / Peacemaker, Steve Agee as John Economos (one of Amanda Waller’s Suicide Squad aides) and Jennifer Hollland as Emilia Harcourt (another part of the Suicide Squad logistics team).
They’ll be joined by Danielle Brooks as co-lead Leota Adebayo, Robert Patrick as Peacemaker’s father Auggie Smith, and Freddie Stroma as Adrian Chase / Vigilante, who Arrow fans will be very familiar with.
Rounding out the cast is genre-extraordinaire Christopher Heyerdahl, Lochlyn Munro, Annie Chang, Elizabeth Ludlow, Rizwan Manji, Alison Araya, Lenny Jacobson, and Nhut Le as Judomaster, one of DC’s martial arts-themed heroes.
What we know about Peacemaker‘s plot
According to Gunn, Peacemaker will continue the violent tone of The Suicide Squad in a new, more grounded story.
“There are a lot of similarities to The Suicide Squad in that it’s no holds barred, but there are also a lot of things that are very different, in that it’s quieter in some ways,” Gunn told The Hollywood Reporter in a recent interview. “It’s very specifically about a different group of people, so it’s a little bit more about society.”
Given there won’t be any giant, sentient starfish floating around, Peacemaker doesn’t really have to do much work to be ‘quieter’ than The Suicide Squad.
Currently, we know John Cena’s Peacemaker will have the title role, but Gunn also indicated Danielle Brooks’ Leota Adebayo would be a co-lead. We don’t know much about this character outside of her mysterious connection to Peacemaker, but we do know she’ll play an important part in grounding the show.
As Gunn describes, it’s still set to take place within a “big science-fiction storyline” so the term “grounded” is used a bit loosely in this case. Still, what little details we do have are very exciting.
How does Peacemaker connect to The Suicide Squad?
While Peacemaker was initially announced as a prequel series, it appears this may have changed.
Given John Cena’s Peacemaker survives the end of The Suicide Squad (as seen in a post-credits scene) it was natural to assume his fate would be told in the Peacemaker spin-off.
Now, James Gunn has confirmed Peacemaker will act as both a sequel and a prequel, with scenes set in the future and past. So while we can expect the show to explore Peacemaker’s origins, it’ll also act as a continuation of The Suicide Squad and follow Peacemaker after he recovers from being shot by Idris Elba’s Bloodsport.
As far as audiences know, he still has the Suicide Squad chip implanted in his brain (and therefore could be killed at any time) but outside of his recovery, we don’t know where his character will go or how he’ll be used in the upcoming spin-off outside of hints from James Gunn.
“There’s a moment in the movie where Bloodsport talks about his father and what his father was like, and you cut to a shot of Peacemaker, and Peacemaker nods,” Gunn recently explained to Variety.
“That’s the seed of the entire Peacemaker series. So we get to see Peacemaker with his father, who’s played by Robert Patrick, where he came from, what he’s done, what that means to him, and where he’s going after all of this. Because he’s not an evil person, he’s just a bad guy.”
We’ll know more about HBO Max’s Peacemaker spin-off as we exit the hype cycle for The Suicide Squad and head towards the wild and weird future of the DCEU.
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