In “One other Rick Up My Sleeve,” the third episode of James Gunn’s Peacemaker, season 2, anti-hero Chris Smith (John Cena) reaches his most heroic level thus far — and by that, we imply “He brutally kills plenty of unhealthy guys.” However in contrast to in earlier circumstances, the general public and his friends aren’t chiding him for it. Witnesses on the road cheer Peacemaker and reward him for cold-bloodedly killing a bunch of the Sons of Liberty, a terrorist group combating what it identifies as authorities oppression by blowing up authorities places of work.
Peacemaker, aka Chris, isn’t in his personal world doling out indiscriminate justice: He’s in an alternate world the place his brother and father are nonetheless alive, and the woman of his goals truly desires to be with him. The most recent icing on this dream world of a cake is that it additionally sees his traditional sociopathic tendencies as heroic. The violent, heedless manner he handles the state of affairs is the ultimate affirmation viewers must deduce that that is simply who Chris is, no matter what he tells others about his emotional progress or newfound respect for all times. Left to make his personal choices, he’s harmful at the start, and his harmful tendencies are solely heroic to the extent that he chooses to purpose them in the appropriate route.
[Ed. note: Spoilers ahead for the rest of “Another Rick Up My Sleeve.”]
Close to the ultimate stretch of the episode, Chris and his former handler, Harcourt (Jennifer Holland), are sharing a lighthearted second on a bench when the terrorist assault begins. Their banter hints at a spark, a doable rekindled romance. As revealed within the season 2 premiere, Chris solely ever had a one-night connection along with his personal universe’s Harcourt — and this isn’t even the identical girl. This Harcourt belongs to the alternate universe, the place she apparently shared a deeper relationship with that world’s model of Chris. Out of the blue, one of many terrorists sneaking by them journeys and falls on his bomb, inflicting an explosion that knocks them each again and initiates the group’s scheme of destroying one authorities company per week.
The Sons of Liberty use hostages as scapegoats of their ways, and Chris goes Peacemaker mode in his try and thwart them. These terrorists look fairly novice, in that they appear to be common, unusual individuals and never educated killers. (One in every of them tripped and fell on his personal bomb, for goodness’ sake.) Nevertheless, they’re all keen to take lives, as demonstrated by the best way they shoot their manner into the power, maintain a girl at knifepoint, and arrange explosives to take the constructing down.
However Peacemaker handles all perceived villains the identical manner, with ruthless aggression, whether or not they’re human, metahuman, or alien. He doesn’t make any try at disabling or arresting any of the terrorists. He doesn’t attempt to launch any conversations or discuss anybody down. He simply skulks into the federal government constructing and dispatches all of the terrorists like Rambo stalking by means of the jungle in First Blood.
Peacemaker crashes into the occupied constructing by leaping by means of a window from a close-by roof, and instantly takes an axe to 1 terrorist’s head. He stabs one other within the eye by commandeering his personal knife. He crushes one other man right into a wall with a printer, kicks his head in, then makes use of his gun to take out one other sufferer. Lastly, he sticks two pencils in a sufferer’s ears on the similar time.
It’s a gnarly battle, and it isn’t performed for laughs the best way Eagly’s motion sequence was within the earlier episode; as a substitute, it is nearly sheer terror. Director Greg Mottola goes out of his strategy to make this sequence darkish and brutal, turning up the ultraviolence to 11, zooming in on the gore, and even exhibiting blood splashing throughout Peacemaker’s vacant expression as he chops a person’s head off his shoulders.
These grotesque actions are all true to who Chris has been from the beginning. Certain, he has moments of empathy, the place he desires to do higher and be a greater individual. However these moments are fleeting, and so they go in opposition to his pure inclination to shoot (or pencil-stab, or printer-smash) first and ask questions later. His actions are morally grey, however Chris can solely see in black and white, no pun meant, as his beliefs have been constructed on the foundational teachings of his white-supremacist father, Auggie (Robert Patrick).
Chris is best than Auggie; he doesn’t share the identical beliefs as his father. Chris isn’t a racist, and he doesn’t snigger at human distress the best way Aussie does. However he’s unable to keep away from seeing the world the best way his father does, in full absolutes. The beliefs he was raised with and his introduction to violence at a younger age turned Chris right into a sociopath, and at the least he appears semi-aware of that in his makes an attempt to be a hero. He tries to do good, however it looks like that solely occurs when he does unhealthy issues within the identify of heroism. His new alternate actuality affords him the peace of being seen as a hero even when he does actually horrible issues. Being praised for informal homicide permits him to really feel heroic with out having to do any of the legwork concerned with bettering himself and turning into a real hero. The place he describes because the “greatest universe ever” rewards him with a loving household and romance with the lady of his goals.
It simply goes to point out that each one the common-or-garden, contrite issues about studying to respect human life that Chris informed Maxwell Lord and the Justice Gang in episode 1 weren’t fully true, even when Chris is truthfully describing who he thinks he’s, or needs he may very well be. He hasn’t discovered learn how to worth human life; in reality, he’s delighted to seek out himself in a actuality that rewards him for caring much less. He’s Deadpool in additional grounded circumstances, however as a substitute of wanting to hitch the Marvel Cinematic Universe, he actually desires to be a part of the Justice Gang, so he can lastly be the hero he is aware of he isn’t minimize out to be alone. He wants an ethical compass. And although the Justice Gang members are all various levels of douchebags, at the least they’re seen as heroes. Chris has grown as an individual since The Suicide Squad, however he’d nonetheless relatively be perceived as a hero than constrain himself in all of the ways in which would make him one.
To shut out on what this alternate actuality may actually be conveying about morality, the incident ends when Chris’ brother, Keith (David Denman), swoops in, carrying a supersuit, and obliterates the final of the escaping terrorists, with a equally cavalier perspective towards regulation and human life. He additionally isn’t making an attempt to arrest or incarcerate the bombers; he simply kills all of them in chilly blood. And whereas the Sons of Liberty are hardly harmless, gunning down civilians and storming authorities amenities with lethal drive, the heroes’ informal perspective towards homicide raises a much bigger query: Has this world been stripped of empathy altogether? Is that this really a spot the place Chris’s id can simply roam free? Or will his empathy get the higher of him and expose him as a fraud to his household and would-be love? Will being perceived as a hero finally imply extra to Chris than being an precise hero? It might all depend upon what Peacemaker finally reveals about what these so-called terrorists are combating for — and how much world they’re combating in opposition to.
Peacemaker is out there on HBO Max, with new episodes each Thursday by means of Oct. 9.
