I’m still getting used to getting new episodes of shows on Thursday after Disney+ has me well conditioned to new stuff dropping on Wednesdays, but slowly but surely, I’m coming around. I woke up slightly early today to watch the latest episode of Peacemaker, the James Gunn-helmed spin-off series of last year’s The Suicide Squad. After a rocky start, it seemed to find its footing with the previous episode, but will Episode Five maintain that momentum?
As usual, the following contains spoilers for the latest episode of Peacemaker. You’ve been warned.
Episode Five, “Monkey Dory,” finds Peacemaker finally being brought into the loop on what the butterflies are. Through a spirited Powerpoint presentation, Murn (Chukwudi Iwuji) elaborates on the alien species who enter into their hosts and control them. Though it’s left unclear whether one of those orifices is buttholes, it is clear that Peacemaker (John Cena) is still angry at Economos (Steve Agee) for framing his father.
This briefing leads into their next mission: to infiltrate a factory where they believe the butterfly’s food is being produced. On the way to the factory, the seeds to Peacemaker and Economos burying the hatchet begin to get planted (spoiler alert: those seeds bloom by the end of the episode).
Peacemaker and Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) go through the front of the factory and using an x-ray helmet, Peacemaker can see who is infected with a butterfly, which is everyone. So in true Peacemaker style, he starts killing everyone.
Meanwhile, Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) and Vigilante (Freddie Stroma) sneak into the back and are quickly discovered by some workers/butterflies. They get chased into a dead-end room and are quickly subdued by a butterfly-infected gorilla. (Yes, the gorilla mentioned in the previous episode turned out to not be a Gorilla Grodd situation, much to my chagrin).
Peacemaker and Adebayo attempt a rescue, but they are overpowered as well. Luckily, Economos shows up in time to kill the gorilla with a chainsaw. The entire sequence is bloody, brutal, and kind of funny. This is The Suicide Squad spin-off that I enjoy.
After the mission, Peacemaker invites Adebayo to his place for a drink to celebrate, which gives her the chance to fulfill the mission Amanda Waller gave her: to plant a fake diary in his house. She does so but is so upset with herself that she can’t go home, so she heads to the office, where Murn is working late. She finds Peacemaker’s x-ray helmet and begins to play with it, discovering that Murn is infected with a butterfly.
There’s also the continuing subplot involving Peacemaker’s father, Auggie Smith (Robert Partick), the super-villain known as White Dragon. The detectives run Auggie’s fingerprints and learn that they don’t match the prints found in the car. However, through Murn’s involvement, the new police captain disregards this information, keeping Auggie locked up. And even though it doesn’t get a lot of screen time this episode, I still don’t care at all.
The plot with Auggie is nothing but filler to me. Every time the show breaks away from the main story to go back to him, I lose interest. We’re five episodes in and Auggie’s been in the same place for four of those episodes. I still assume that it’s going to cross over into the A-plot at some time. Hell, we saw Auggie’s White Dragon suit, and according to the law of Chekov, that has to come into play at some point. But the show is taking so long to get there, by the time it happens, I probably still won’t care.
For me, the only scene that mattered was the first one, with Peacemaker waking up from his hangover and being consoled by Eagly. The bald eagle flies off and returns to Peaceaker’s side with a dead squirrel, offering it to the man as a gift to boost his spirits. Though Peacemaker doesn’t want it, he talks tenderly to Eagly, like a man to his dog. I love the personification of Eagly and his desire to make Peacemaker happy. It truly is the most enriching relationship that Peacemaker has.
Despite the good things in Peacemaker, it continually gets bogged down in extraneous crap. It continues to mistake long, drawn-out dialogue exchanges for comedy and insists that the White Dragon subplot will be interesting. While one of those things may be true, the fact that the show concentrates too much on it is disheartening. I may have become more invested in the main storyline since the show first premiered, but it’s trying my patience with everything else at this point.
