Full spoilers ahead Peacemaker Season 2 Episode 8 – “Full Nelson.”
After a fun yet tough season and certainly uneven in terms of pacing, the second season of James Gunn's The Peacemaker comes to an end with the weakest episode of the bunch. While “Full Nelson”—the season's longest segment at 58 minutes—expels the season's major storylines, it only deals effectively with one of them: Chris and Harcourt's relationship. Everything else, from Rick Flag Sr.'s real plan to Adebayo's marriage and career and this whole Nazi world – remember them? – is overlooked in this ending, despite the extended length. Besides, everything they say about this season making the Superman sequel “Man of Tomorrow”…well, I think that's it?
First the good: John Cena as Chris Smith/Peacemaker and Jennifer Holland as Amelia Harcourt have been great all season long, and the Moonlight Will They/Won't They Plot style finally reaches catharsis here. Gunn, who wrote the entire season and returned to direct the finale, finally takes us back to that “night on the boat” we've been hearing about for the last two months, when Chris and Harcourt apparently got together in a drunken affair that at least one of them seems to regret.
Gunn, always a master when it comes to weaving pop music into his stories, says that that evening they got drunk and commiserated about Harcourt's work situation before going on Nelson's early '90s duo “rock cruise.” This is textbook James Gunn, and it does a great job of getting across the idea that Chris and Harcourt are having a real moment of connection, even if it happens in the most unexpected places. It's wonderful, and the actors once again demonstrate the evolution that these two have undergone since their first meeting, and it's made even better by the fact that it turns out that the “night on the boat” wasn't some random hookup. No, it was just a quick kiss, a glance and feeling. This is much better than casual acquaintance.
I also love how Chris takes the hit that Harcourt is willing to give to that random dude at Big Belly Burger, and how his outlook on life is, “Look at the moon! Look at the stars!” – serves as an illustration of why Harcourt might fall for the bait. Considering that and the fact that she was caught up in Nelson's magic, how could she not do it?
Of course, Harcourt and 11th Street Kids use that same Chris vibe to snap him out of his panic mode later in the episode when he's at his lowest and feels like he's “cursed” because of all the bad things that happened around him. “Thanks to you, I believe in miracles. I saw an eagle hugging a man!” Eds (Danielle Brooks) is crying and it's not funny. It's like, “Man, these guys really love each other.” But it still comes back to Chris and Harcourt, the latter of whom finally admits that yes, of course, the night on the boat meant something – “It meant everything.”
Unfortunately, little else in this episode comes together as well as Chris/Harcourt, and Frank Grillo's Rick Flag Sr. really comes across as a mess at this point. Did I miss something? Why was he having fun with the rest of the staff in Lex Luthor's old command center while his ARGUS men were chewing their faces off in Candyland and the like? (And sure, the other dimensions those poor QUC people encountered were cool, but we kind of saw too much of them in the trailer for this week's episode.) I understand that Rick Sr. holds a grudge against Peacemaker and that he may very well never forgive him for killing his son, but his slide from good guy in Creature Commandos to neutral/good Superman and the outright villain in this finale surprises me. I like Grillo too much as Rick Sr. and it's hard to believe he would act the way he does here.
That doesn't mean his plan to lock up metahumans on this extra-dimensional prison planet (Salvation in the comics) doesn't make sense for the character. And, of course, this is where “The Peacemaker” connects the series with movie “Man of Tomorrow” Enter Rick Sr., now so closely associated with Lex's old henchmen, and admits that he doesn't like the billionaire villain, but “he's the smartest man in the world. Why not use his brain to make the world a better place?”
Then there's a scene between Eds and her wife Kya (Elizabeth Faith Ludlow) that is well-acted but also feels too little, too late, as the issues the couple faced simply didn't have enough room to breathe over the last eight episodes. As for Freddie Stroma's Vigilante and Steve Agee's John Economos… well, again, they had a few funny moments this season (and this episode), but that's about it. Of course, this is a John Cena show first and foremost, but this cast just needs a little more attention.
Speaking of fun, seeing Foxy Shazam perform the season's title track on the same “rock cruise” is pretty cool, even if it's interspersed with a montage that introduces the group's creation of Checkmate, a new super-spy organization they're about to run. However, I'm not sure I've fully followed the thread that led to the decision to just start my own black ops team? This comes as Harcourt and the others beg Chris to get back on track, but still.
And while we didn't return to the Nazi planet or visit Keith Smith (David Denman) at all this week, we have to assume that this won't be the last we see of the character. It's a little disappointing that this particular story was left so open-ended here, and also that Gunn didn't treat us to one last big fight scene this week. Instead, Chris getting stranded by Rick Sr. in “Rescue” should pass for our big QUC twist, and there's no denying that the prospect of Chris having to fend for himself, Cast Away style, with nothing more than the Foxy Shazam shirt on his back and his ingenuity is a tantalizing setup for a third season.
Thoughts from the Quantum Unfolding Chamber:
- Always be proud of your freckles, just like your mom taught you!
- Damn, it's Vig So means for his mother.
- Speaking of Vig, this is similar to rumors from some fans that the wrong Vig is back. Earth X was, well, wrong.
- I think I was also wrong about Michael Rooker returning as an alternate version of Red St. Wild. Well, there's always next season!
- And so 11th Street Kids is joining forces with some former foes to make Checkmate, including Sol Rodriguez's Bordeaux, Tim Meadows' Fleury and Nhut Le's Judomaster.
- Igli and Economos, man!
- It's been a while since I've done a weekly review like this. I forgot how fun this can be. Hope to see you on another show soon!
