WARNING: Spoilers for Peacemaker below.
With the Peacemaker finale now available for streaming, fans of the John Cena series no doubt have lingering questions as the show wrapped up its Season 1 story with a bang and one heck of a surprise cameo. Fortunately, creator James Gunn has already started to explain some of the choices made in the finale, and for the other big moments, well, we’ll do our best to tackle what they might mean.
Why did Peacemaker turn down Goff’s offer?
While controlling the body of Officer Song (Annie Chang), Goff reveals the Butterflies’ plan in the hopes that Peacemaker — real name: Christopher Smith — will join them in their cause. Like him, the Butterflies want peace. Their goal is not invasion but instead, to steer humanity away from destroying the planet. However, that plan will involve killing some people and taking over the world’s government, but ultimately, it will be in humanity’s best interest.
Despite claiming to love peace so much that he’ll kill every man, woman, and child to get it, Peacemaker turns down the offer and destroys the Cow, the Butterflies’ sole source of food. At the end of the episode, he tells Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) that he couldn’t take Goff’s offer because he knew it would result in his friends being hurt. As Gunn explains in a new interview, this represents a significant change in Peacemaker’s development after previously murdering Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) in The Suicide Squad to complete his mission. Via Vulture:
She makes a lot of sense. But what’s more important for our story is that Chris has disconnected himself from other human beings by making every person an object to fulfill his goal. He did it in The Suicide Squad, and all through this story he had to fight the urge to do exactly the same thing. In that moment in the end, he takes a different path.
However, it’s clearly a difficult choice as Gunn himself admits he’s “not even sure if Chris is doing the right thing.”
Why did Peacemaker let Goff live and stay at his house?
This questions a trickier one because there isn’t a clear answer from Gunn yet. Although, going by what he’s said about Goff’s offer, it’s easy to see why Peacemaker would be reluctant to kill the Butterfly leader. There’s also the bond they formed when he previously kept her in a jar in his house, which led to her making the offer in the first place. She knew how to connect to Peacemaker and his mission to bring about peace no matter what the cost. However, it’s clearly shown that Peacemaker only has a very small amount of the alien goo left from the Cow, so there’s a good chance that Goff might not be around for long.
What does the Justice League cameo mean?
After Peacemaker and his ARGUS team basically did all the work and stopped the Butterfly invasion, the Justice League made a surprise appearance at the end. True to character, Peacemaker called them “d*ckheads” and made a joke to Aquaman’s face about him “f*cking fish” before walking off to take a wounded Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) to the hospital. As for the greater implications of the Justice League showing up, the cameo firmly plants Peacemaker in the DC Extended Universe that started being built in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. Peacemaker is now officially part of that cinematic universe, and on the Justice League’s radar, which could have some interesting effects on Season 2.
What happens to Task Force X now that Adebayo revealed its existence?
After completing their mission, Adebayo goes public with the ARGUS team’s actions and reveals the existence of Task Force X (a.k.a. The Suicide Squad) in an effort to cement Peacemaker’s status as an American hero. With the covert group now exposed and Adebayo’s mother, Amanda Waller (Viola Davis), none too pleased about it, Task Force X’s future is now in serious jeopardy. Considering Waller is not a person to be messed with, even by her own daughter, there is sure to be blowback from Adebayo’s press conference.
Is Peacemaker’s dad going to haunt him in Season 2?
In the final moments of the finale, Peacemaker is seen sitting on his porch after feeding Goff and watching Eagly fly off to hunt possums. However, Peacemaker’s deceased father (Robert Patrick) appears on the porch to haunt his son for what is now a second time. Judging by his silent laughter and Peacemaker’s visibly frightened face, it certainly seems like this will be a lingering issue going into Season 2. Particularly after Harcourt saw Peacemaker talking to the vision in his head earlier in the episode. If his teammates start to question his sanity, that can only spell trouble for Peacemaker down the road.
Peacemaker Season 1 is available for streaming on HBO Max.