by Ice Cream Jonsey » Sun Mar 06, 2022 11:17 am
James Gunn wrote and directed Peacemaker, an 8 episode TV show on HBO Max about one of the most ridiculous comic book characters ever, Peacemaker - a vigilante that desires peace at any cost, no matter how many people he has to kill for to get there. I'm pretty well-read on comic book characters and the only memories I have of Peacemaker is the character getting made fun of in the "letters" column of Justice League America in the 1980s, with most jokes centered around the fact that as a character he was a joke and he wears a helmet on his head that looks like a toilet.
The helmet in this live adaptation does still look like a toilet. First I will give James Gunn credit because he certainly doesn't believe in the "dress 'em all in black" idiocy that plagues the X-Men movies, the Daredevil TV show and others.
James Gunn was working for Marvel/Disney, but he had the AUDACITY to use his Twitter to discuss what a piece of shit the former President was, and some alt-right asswipe went digging through Gunn's tweets and found P R O B L E M A T I C ones. God, this sounds like the stupidest drama ever, typing it out. Nobody comes off good in this - having actually read what these "problematic" tweets are, they are stupid, cringeworthy, edgelord shit and Gunn was in his 40s while tweeting them. On the other hand, it's fucking Twitter and most people tweet whatever brainless garbage enters their minds at any one time and I haven't hit the "like" button on anything other than Amiga Retweets and my brother causing some self-important douchebag to object over claims that Benjamin Franklin invented the combustion engine in a long time.
This does require another paragraph. It's a very despicable part of our society. Pinback calls it "telling Mom on people" which becomes "crying to moooooom" and other variations. The fascist shitbag who is "telling on people" (who I am not linking to, because fuck him) has not stopped tweeting for more than 45 minutes in the last two days and is apparently on Russia's side in the invasion. So years later he's still coming off terribly. Anyone that would fire someone because of P R O B L E M A T I C T W E E T S is garbage but also I am shocked that so many people use Twitter in the way that they do.
What does any of this have to do with Peacemaker?
Peacemaker is a great show but it really could be about any particular character from any comic. Gunn is very, very aware of the shitastic, constantly offended and outraged (on both sides) society we endure. When Disney fired him, Warner Brothers signed him to fix their movies, because, in my opinion, their super hero movies were becoming critically-panned disasters and they understood that stupid tweets don't matter. Given this additional chance, there are plenty of lines and gags about people getting offended and being overly outraged at various triggers. It's great. The show carries a plot that is exactly as complicated as it needs to be, and at any time is not afraid to go off on the kind of people that can't enjoy anything with a knowing wink to the audience. I believe it was a huge hit and Disney did hire Gunn back for their third "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie, which is a crushing blow for the offenderati.
Music has been a big part of Gunn's stuff and that carried over to Peacemaker, where everyone is all in on hair metal or glam rock. I think you guys like that? I think Pinback hates it but I think the rest of you do? I had never heard any music by "Hanoi Rocks" because that is one of the dumbest names for a band ever made, but there is one bit in Peacemaker about them and whattaya know, their music is entirely listenable to someone like me. While hair metal may not be for everyone, at least Peacemaker (the show) likes things, at least is is a liker. Fuck, it may not be the thing for every audience member, but what is and who cares? I was really into dubstep when I started making Cyberpunk and while that genre of music is drying up and there wasn't enough made to sustain a video game exclusively, I am a big fan of what Gunn did here with the soundtrack and bits: there is one point in the show where Peacemaker (the character) has to be distracted by something because he is going to get attacked, and Gunn chose to do it with metal albums. Love it.
The sad fact of most big budget Marvel movies is that many of them come down to fighting an antagonist that is going to "blow up the world" where world can be the city, the country, the literal Earth, the galaxy, the universe, whatever. They made a mistake in having so many pointlessly end that way, but that's where we are now. (Maybe it's different for the current batch coming through, I dunno, I haven't been to a theater to see them yet.) There is a fight at the end of Peacemaker and at least it looks good. It's not as meaningful as the Vader / Kenobi fight in Star Wars or the (two? I don't remember) times that Luke and Vader dueled, but the final fight is also:
1. Not as stupid as the CG garbage in the Star Wars prequels
2. Not about misfits saving the DESTRUCTION OF THE UNIVERSE
So that's good.
One other word about the cast - everyone really does a great job. I never really "got" John Cena or any of the post-1988 WWF wrestlers, because they were just dudebros with their real names and not, like, Junkyard Dog or Koko B. Ware, but Cena's great in this. The thing I really like is that each character has their own dignity in their own mind, Gunn does a great job not setting up pins to simply be struck down to show you how clever the main cast is. They squabble, they fight, they ruin things for each other and it's satisfying to see teamwork in spite of that.
Anyway. Each episode is its own thing, there wasn't a single one that I thought was bad and there wasn't much if any wasted time. With one of the most pointless jokes of a character, Gunn has created something fun, funny, well-written and entertaining.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mrr3UNALww
James Gunn wrote and directed Peacemaker, an 8 episode TV show on HBO Max about one of the most ridiculous comic book characters ever, Peacemaker - a vigilante that desires peace at any cost, no matter how many people he has to kill for to get there. I'm pretty well-read on comic book characters and the only memories I have of Peacemaker is the character getting made fun of in the "letters" column of Justice League America in the 1980s, with most jokes centered around the fact that as a character he was a joke and he wears a helmet on his head that looks like a toilet.
The helmet in this live adaptation does still look like a toilet. First I will give James Gunn credit because he certainly doesn't believe in the "dress 'em all in black" idiocy that plagues the X-Men movies, the Daredevil TV show and others.
James Gunn [i]was[/i] working for Marvel/Disney, but he had the AUDACITY to use his Twitter to discuss what a piece of shit the former President was, and some alt-right asswipe went digging through Gunn's tweets and found P R O B L E M A T I C ones. God, this sounds like the stupidest drama ever, typing it out. Nobody comes off good in this - having actually read what these "problematic" tweets are, they are stupid, cringeworthy, edgelord shit and Gunn was in his 40s while tweeting them. On the other hand, it's fucking Twitter and most people tweet whatever brainless garbage enters their minds at any one time and I haven't hit the "like" button on anything other than Amiga Retweets and my brother causing some self-important douchebag to object over claims that Benjamin Franklin invented the combustion engine in a long time.
This does require another paragraph. It's a very despicable part of our society. Pinback calls it "telling Mom on people" which becomes "crying to moooooom" and other variations. The fascist shitbag who is "telling on people" (who I am not linking to, because fuck him) has not stopped tweeting for more than 45 minutes in the last two days and is apparently on Russia's side in the invasion. So years later he's still coming off terribly. Anyone that would fire someone because of P R O B L E M A T I C T W E E T S is garbage but also I am shocked that so many people use Twitter in the way that they do.
What does any of this have to do with Peacemaker?
Peacemaker is a great show but it really could be about any particular character from any comic. Gunn is very, very aware of the shitastic, constantly offended and outraged (on both sides) society we endure. When Disney fired him, Warner Brothers signed him to fix their movies, because, in my opinion, their super hero movies were becoming critically-panned disasters and they understood that stupid tweets don't matter. Given this additional chance, there are plenty of lines and gags about people getting offended and being overly outraged at various triggers. It's great. The show carries a plot that is exactly as complicated as it needs to be, and at any time is not afraid to go off on the kind of people that can't enjoy anything with a knowing wink to the audience. I believe it was a huge hit and Disney did hire Gunn back for their third "Guardians of the Galaxy" movie, which is a crushing blow for the offenderati.
Music has been a big part of Gunn's stuff and that carried over to Peacemaker, where everyone is all in on hair metal or glam rock. I think you guys like that? I think Pinback hates it but I think the rest of you do? I had never heard any music by "Hanoi Rocks" because that is one of the dumbest names for a band ever made, but there is one bit in Peacemaker about them and whattaya know, their music is entirely listenable to someone like me. While hair metal may not be for everyone, at least Peacemaker (the show) [i]likes[/i] things, at least is is a [i]liker[/i]. Fuck, it may not be the thing for every audience member, but what is and who cares? I was really into dubstep when I started making Cyberpunk and while that genre of music is drying up and there wasn't enough made to sustain a video game exclusively, I am a big fan of what Gunn did here with the soundtrack and bits: there is one point in the show where Peacemaker (the character) has to be distracted by something because he is going to get attacked, and Gunn chose to do it with metal albums. Love it.
The sad fact of most big budget Marvel movies is that many of them come down to fighting an antagonist that is going to "blow up the world" where world can be the city, the country, the literal Earth, the galaxy, the universe, whatever. They made a mistake in having so many pointlessly end that way, but that's where we are now. (Maybe it's different for the current batch coming through, I dunno, I haven't been to a theater to see them yet.) There is a fight at the end of Peacemaker and at least it [i]looks good[/i]. It's not as meaningful as the Vader / Kenobi fight in Star Wars or the (two? I don't remember) times that Luke and Vader dueled, but the final fight is also:
1. Not as stupid as the CG garbage in the Star Wars prequels
2. Not about misfits saving the DESTRUCTION OF THE UNIVERSE
So that's good.
One other word about the cast - everyone really does a great job. I never really "got" John Cena or any of the post-1988 WWF wrestlers, because they were just dudebros with their real names and not, like, Junkyard Dog or Koko B. Ware, but Cena's great in this. The thing I really like is that each character has their own dignity in their own mind, Gunn does a great job not setting up pins to simply be struck down to show you how clever the main cast is. They squabble, they fight, they ruin things for each other and it's satisfying to see teamwork in spite of that.
Anyway. Each episode is its own thing, there wasn't a single one that I thought was bad and there wasn't much if any wasted time. With one of the most pointless jokes of a character, Gunn has created something fun, funny, well-written and entertaining.