‘Peacemaker’ S2E07 Review | “Like a Keith in the Night”
Maybe the Nazis were just the friends we made along the way...
[Welcome to Decoding TV’s coverage of Peacemaker Season 2! For each of Peacemaker’s eight episodes, we’ll run reviews by Dan Gvozden. If you’d like to support what we’re doing here, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. The review below contains major spoilers for Season 2, Episode 7 of Peacemaker.]
Last week’s episode of Peacemaker, “Ignorance is Chris,” boldly announced that this season would stop looking back to the past and instead focus on the spectacular explosions of metaphorical fireworks that James Gunn and his team of creatives had been meticulously rigging all season. The show promised that we would understand the unvarnished reality of the alternate Earth that Chris found through his quantum unfolding chamber, come to some kind of resolution or revelation about Chris’s strained, lovelorn relationship with Harcourt, witness the fallout between Rick Flag Sr. and Chris over the murder of Jr., and a half dozen other major and minor narrative threads and thematics that have made the season such a rich text, even if the pacing took a hit mid-season.
And while some of the surprise intended by the revelation that Chris had found himself stranded in a universe where Nazis run America was dulled by my own eagle-eyed sleuthing, the promise of how Peacemaker’s motley cast of characters would react to this revelation was always more important. So, it brings me no joy to admit that I found episode seven, “Like a Keith in the Night,” a disappointing follow-up to not only the previous episode, but to so much of the complex character work that Peacemaker has labored over up to this point.
This isn’t to say that the episode doesn’t feature many of the show’s strengths, but that it just as quickly eschews those qualities in exchange for additional surprise, subversion, and narrative shortcuts. Just as speedily as Chris races away from A.R.G.U.S. on his Peace-Cycle, I felt by the end of “Like a Keith in the Night” that Peacemaker Season 2, which I’ve criticized for advancing at the pace of a moving sidewalk, had opted to go full throttle towards its conclusion, momentum be damned!
But let’s not beat around the bush and instead dive straight into the heart of “Like a Keith in the Night,” which embraces that “full throttle” attitude right from the start. Not only does the episode omit this season’s signature cold-open flashback sequence, but it begins precisely where the previous episode left off, even repeating that chapter’s final moments, as if this were part two of one longer, chopped-up episode. And, honestly, I think the problems with the episode are apparent right from the start, as Harcourt, in disbelief, assails Chris, “I can’t believe you didn’t realize we are in Nazi world!”
And honestly, reader, as someone who recognized from the start that Chris was in a “Nazi world,” even I was willing to cut Chris more slack than the show does, while questioning how his character and upbringing shaped a worldview that somehow overlooked the fact that Evergreen was suddenly entirely lacking in diversity. But instead, Peacemaker opts for a joke - a hilarious one — that, I think, undercuts the subtlety of the point the show had been working hard to make. Instead of highlighting the nuanced and yet profound differences between the DCU and this “Earth-X,” the Nazi version of the DC universe from the comics, we learn that Chris had been ignoring — just off camera — that every desk in A.R.G.U.S. featured a prominently displayed copy of Mein Kampf (did the production design team’s Amazon cart get flagged by the FBI?). That’s not to mention that entire walls of their headquarters featured giant murals of Adolf-fucking-Hitler! Chris’s remark that “You think I’d be this buff if I looked at books?” made me laugh. But, I honestly felt this choice was an overly broad way to shortcut and cheapen the exploration of Chris’s flawed character, and it marked the first domino in a series of story choices that flattened this episode for me.
Then, seconds later, Chris breaks up with the Nazi version of Harcourt and starts to book it out of A.R.G.U.S. with the original recipe version of Harcourt, while taking down their Nazi agents in silly comic book fisticuffs and poorly calculated jetpack antics. Man, the Rocketeer made flying through the air on a jetpack while holding Jennifer Connelly look a whole lot easier than Chris does!
Their escape is only punctuated by the return of the show’s title sequence dance number, whose typically melancholy vibes are somewhat at odds with the high-action pacing of the episode’s opening. Since this is as good a time as any, I need to point out that while I may have been one of the early adopters of the “Nazi world” theory, I somehow missed the most damning evidence that was being paraded before my eyes all season. As the lights fade up on Chris, in full Peacemaker regalia, he begins his dance with his arms bent in a particularly unusual fashion, which, in hindsight, is clearly meant to resemble a swastika. I even mentioned in my first review of this season that the title sequence likely held clues to the season’s full plot. Although I noticed this strange dance move, which The Top Trio shortly thereafter repeats, followed by the entire cast, it was missed not only by me, but also by Epic Games, who removed the dance move as an emote from Fortnite.
We then return to Vigilante and Vigilante 2, as the latter explains why he hated his universe’s Smith family, enough to join the “Sons of Liberty” to fight back against the Nazis. (Quick query: Anyone else find it odd that despite the high-action events of this culminating “Earth-X” episode, we never see the “Sons of Liberty” again?) It’s also here where my secondary theory about this universe’s inciting differentiation from the prime DCU was fully extinguished, as we learn from Vigilante 2 that in this universe the Nazis won World War II and have forced “outsiders” to work in camps for their entire lives. I have no hang-ups about my predictions being proven incorrect; it isn’t the first time, and it won’t be the last. (For the record, I theorized it was Chris, not killing Keith, that doomed this world.) But, boy, do I have a million questions about how this universe got from Nazis winning World War II to a world that could be conceivably mistaken for ours, no matter how much Peacemaker goes out of its way to mock the dystopic similarities between this universe and ours.
The immediate impacts of this “Nazi world” revelation hit Adebayo most directly, as the show picks back up with her running from the zombie-like hordes of white suburbanites and Keith Smith. I don’t quite understand the mindless depiction of the Nazi citizens, who drop everything they are doing to chase after Adebayo, as if they are ravenous for black flesh. Regardless, Adebayo hops a fence, with just slightly fewer cuts than it took Liam Neeson in Taken 3, and dives into a pool, when Judomaster reappears and joyfully uses a random downed telephone line to electrocute all of her pursuers. The scene is punctuated with a hilarious image of a single black Croc with a swastika Jibbitz. (Again, did the production design team have to special order this?)
Keith, who abandoned chasing Adebayo, returns to his home to find his father, Auggie, standing over a rope-bound Economos, who unsuccessfully tries to bluff his way out of revealing the multiversal origins of his 11th Street Kids allies. Auggie reveals the fate of their Chris to Keith, as well as his own experience of meeting his own doppelganger in the quantum unfolding chamber many years earlier. He suggests of that Auggie, “There was something wrong about him. Cruel. Like, he came from a world that was a dark version of ours.”
It was then that I fully suspected Gunn had another twist up his sleeve, fueled by a curiosity about what it meant that “Earth-X”’s Auggie’s family unit remained intact, seemingly held together by an emotional honesty between the men not reflected by the state of their world and their position of power within it. In contrast, the DCU’s version of the Smith family was driven by manipulation, hate, and ultimately murder, in a world where they remained poor, unloved, and where white supremacy isn’t the plainly stated objective and reigning ideology of the state. What it all means, I’m unsure, and for reasons I’ll detail later, I suspect we might never find out. Still, at the very least, Gunn has presented a compellingly complicated dichotomy between these two families and their worlds, as well as the roles of nature and nurture in shaping our lives.
Auggie and Keith leave to discuss their plans while Economos tries to signal Eagly to rescue him from his bindings. The father and son decide that they must kill Chris to hide the evidence of their dimensional portal, for whatever reason. Keith puts together that their world was also invaded by an alternate Harcourt, whom he noticed both wore pants and never heard of Helloween! And, in an allusion back to this season’s opening scene where Keith attempted to stay his father’s gun from murdering the dimension-hopping alien, Auggie tells Keith that, “We’ve got to round them up. You were always the son who could keep his head on straight. You’ve gotta help me.”
Meanwhile, Judomaster secrets Adebayo away to his makeshift hideout in a vacant home, where he’s been munching on their “Cheet-ohs!” The two acknowledge their history of fighting each other and settle down into a game of “Scrobble” while they wait for night to fall. Judomaster plays an all-timer, 20-point, “Scrobble” word, “Squirmed,” as they slowly settle into a mutual friendship. Adebayo mentions that her wife, Keeya, hasn’t accepted her dreams of becoming a private investigator, but Judomaster deploys a verbal judo move by flipping her assertions back on her, suggesting that perhaps it is Adebayo who won’t accept Keeya’s dreams. Adebayo turns the tables on Judomaster, too, by suggesting that his opposition to Chris is also misplaced and that “he’s about the sweetest guy there is” if you can just get past his cheesiness.
She continues, “The sad part is, I’m not so sure this Nazi world is as different from our own world as we wish it was.” And, look, James Gunn, that line does a lot of worldbuilding heavy-lifting to explain the similarities between the two universes, but it can’t do that much lifting. Things in America might currently be bleak, with a history that’s dominated by an endless fight against the powerful forces of white supremacy. However, I still find it nearly impossible to reconcile the fairly cynical, almost identical appearances of the two universes, as if virtually every aspect of America would stay the same under Nazi rule, apart from the visual disappearance of people of color and the letter “a” in Scrabble. I understand this is the kind of shorthand that a comic book show and other fictional allegories might use to help audiences overlook the messy details of their worlds. Still, I must admit that I had more faith in Peacemaker’s interest in exploring its own ideas and worlds with curiosity, so it could later use them to explore its characters more deeply, than I feel is reflected here.
Chris and Harcourt race the Peace-Cycle down a forested road as a fleet of police cars pursues them. And yet, despite the tension of their escape, the two exhibit a sense of almost eerie calm, enough that Harcourt rests her head lovingly on Chris’s shoulders. This moment continues to baffle me, as it was only moments earlier that she wouldn’t open up about her feelings for Chris, was mad at him for believing she’d backstab him, and for not noticing that he had chosen to live in a “Nazi world” over staying in a world with her and the 11th Street Kids. What, exactly, changed Harcourt’s mind about Chris? His lackluster jetpacking skills? Is it that he looks cool on a motorcycle? We spent a whole season exploring their divide. At the very least, I’d hope to understand what healed it.
Soon, they are surrounded by police cars, and two dozen guns are aimed at their heads. Until, all at once, the police cars begin to explode, and Auggie and Keith fly into the scene to, in a twist, gun down all the police. With the officers all dead, Auggie extends his hand and essentially tells them, “Come with me if you want to live,” which is rich coming from the actor who portrayed the T-1000.
Then, the show returns to everyone’s least favorite Peacemaker subplot and broader DCU connective tissue, as Rick Flag Sr. and Bordeaux meet with Sydney Happersen, the mustacheed, Superman supporting cast character portrayed by actor and James Gunn’s self-described best friend, Stephen Blackehart. Formerly a member of Lex’s anti-Superman tech-team, Sydney is brought from prison to aid Flag Sr.’s search for dimensional rifts. And, after a comical back-and-forth between Sydney and Flag Sr., who offers him no rewards for his assistance, Sydney identifies a stable portal in less than a second.
The episode’s finale plays out as one extended sequence on the grounds of the Smiths’ home, as the 11th Street Kids are eventually reunited and brought into conflict with the Smiths and “Earth-X”’s extended police force. Outside the Smith house, hidden from view, the Vigilantes, Judomaster, and Adebayo meet to plan their exit path through the home and back into the quantum unfolding chamber, with their conversation resulting in a plan to kill the cops. But first, Chris and Harcourt arrive at the home, where Auggie, with utmost sincerity, assures them that he just wants an explanation from them. Chris obliges and unfolds the entire story of his first drunken venture into their world, his revelation about Keith’s existence, and the accidental death of their Chris. “Earth-X” Keith reacts in anger to Chris’s story about his brother’s death, but Auggie pulls him back and accepts Chris’s apology and rationale that “I wanted to feel what it felt like to have a family.”
A knock on the door pulls Auggie away from the conversation to reveal Larry Fitzgibbon (Lochlyn Munro), Evergreen PD, who is inquiring about Chris’s location. Fans of Peacemaker will remember that Larry was investigating the death of Annie Sturphausen in the first season, before the parasitic alien Butterflies took control of him and his partner Sophie Song. It’s impossible to say whether the Butterflies exist in this universe. Still, Sophie’s absence is subtly profound and a suggestion that her Asian descent likely meant that she either never existed or is currently working in a labor camp. Auggie half-lies that his son isn’t home, insisting that Larry get a warrant, but admits that “I never said that my son was innocent” and closes the door in their faces.
It’s then that we experience the full, and frankly, unexpected, heel-turn of “Earth-X”’s Auggie Smith, who we learn isn’t a Nazi and has been secretly waging his own war on the state’s authorities. Not only does he intend on helping Chris and his friends return to their dimension, but he also completely forgives Chris, while admitting, of his own son, “I loved the boy, but he had issues. He was out of control,” a characterization which Keith insists ignores that Chris was a good person underneath it all. But, he insists to Keith that “revenge isn’t going to bring your brother back,” to which Harcourt responds, “Awfully generous for a Nazi.” To which actor Robert Patrick responds with his potential Outstanding Supporting Actor Emmy clipped speech:
“Don’t call me that. I didn’t create the problems in my world, Missy. I don’t agree with them. And I applaud you if your world is perfect and you fight every injustice you ever see. Is that what you do? Unfortunately, I don’t have the strength for that. I fight the madmen, murderers, and monsters in front of me because that’s all I can control. And at the end of my life, when I stand in judgment before God, I hope that he knows that I did the best that I could, and I left this world a better place.”
What’s even more unfortunate for this upstanding alt-Auggie is that he’s suddenly found himself in the show Peacemaker, where any sign of goodness is rewarded almost immediately with a series of sharp stabbings to one’s face. And so, within seconds of his moving speech, backed by swelling music, the Vigilantes jump through the window and reward him with a series of sharp stabbings to his face. And so, Keith jumps into violent action, the cops rush the house, the Vigilantes engage them in a shootout, and Chris cries, “He wasn’t a Nazi…” as he stares up at a dignified portrait of the man he wishes was his father, and is pulled towards the open portal back to the quantum unfolding chamber.
But, before Chris and the rest of the 11th Street Kids can flee, Keith, in full superhero armor, delivers several brutal blows to Chris’s head. Yet, before he can kill Chris, Eagly and the rest of the 11th Street Kids leap on Keith and begin to viciously attack him with the intent to kill. But Chris, who experiences a series of flashbacks to all the people he’s killed over the years, including his brother, orders them to stop and demands of them: “What’s wrong with us? What the fuck is wrong with all of us?” He apologizes to Keith, who is moments away from death, “I’m sorry. This is me. Everything I touch… It’s not your world that’s wrong, or mine. It’s me. Fuck!”
The moment is meant to be a tremendous emotional catharsis for the character, and one that I suspect that we, the audience, are meant to sympathize with in some way. Except, again, I didn’t, because I think the show not only took shortcuts to get to this moment but undermined it primarily with how Peacemaker prioritized the reveal of its twisted inversion of Auggie Smith and “Earth-X.”
Not only did Auggie forgive Chris, moments earlier, for an admitted accident that killed his troubled son, who we understand instigated the violence that led to his death, but Chris does nothing to fight back against Keith’s anger and even orders his friends to stop. Sure, none of these events would have happened if Chris had never entered “Earth-X” or returned to it, with the intent to stay. Still, even then, he told his friends not to follow him, and - just like with his brother’s death - finds himself the victim of circumstance rather than any real moral failing on his part.
And, yes, there’s a certain logic to Chris continuing to place blame on himself for how he’s allowed the circumstances of his life to shape his actions and worldview. Still, I was honestly hoping this season would have moved past that step in Chris’s journey of self-discovery and healing from season one, and instead dealt with how Chris’s present, self-destructive actions and narcissism push away not only the woman he loves but his found family. That’s not even to mention how his upbringing in a white supremacist household may have allowed him to ignore the realities of “Earth-X” and what it means about his character…
And, look, there may still be time for the show to explore Chris in this way, but as the gang exits “Earth-X,” I suspect that the show, too, is moving on to new things. Harcourt attempts to finalize that decision by executing the wounded Keith with Vigilante 2’s gun, to prevent him from coming after Chris. She’s unable to finish the job before being pulled back through the portal, which, in all story logic, means that Keith’s likely to return for the season’s finale or as the “big bad” in the inevitable season three of Peacemaker.
And so, the episode ends with Keith being taken away by ambulance, assuring that he’ll live to fight another day, and Chris closes down the portal as A.R.G.U.S. surrounds them, guns drawn. As Judomaster rejoins A.R.G.U.S., Chris unexpectedly hands over the portal control device to Rick Flag Sr. and insists that the 11th Street Kids came to get him and forced him to give up the alien technology. And so, he’s arrested and is silently driven away in the back of a police car, with a look on his face that suggests that he’s essentially bought into his claims about his worthlessness and has given up on any hope for redemption in his life.
It’s a poignant ending, and one that I think works in the abstract, but doesn’t quite hit the emotional landing due to both the execution and the details. We’ve still got the season finale to pull the whole thing together and complete Chris’s journey across season two. But, given how much this episode seems to have sped-run through so many of the painstakingly established narrative and thematic threads, to mixed results, I’m skeptical that one episode will be able to pull it all together to make whatever bold statement Gunn and his teams hoped to say with this season, despite all of its best and numerous qualities.
Stray observations:
I wanted to, yet again, draw attention to this episode’s emphasis on the stability, or lack of “wobble,” to the dimensional portal created by the quantum unfolding device, as noted by Sydney Happersen. I believe this is an intentional move to emphasize the device’s extraordinary significance, as it will play a crucial role not only for Rick Flag Sr. and A.R.G.U.S. but also for the overall DCU. As I’ve said in my previous write-ups, I believe this device to be some version of a “Mother Box,” an all-powerful supercomputer in DC Comics with connections to the “Fourth World” of characters, such as the evil Darkseid, which can open dimensional portals and tears in space-time called “Boom Tubes.”
Sydney Happersen and his mustache play a prominent and similar role in the life of Superman in the DC Comics. In one crucial story, “The Fall of Metropolis,” Lex Luthor and Superman have a standoff, where Luthor threatens to launch missiles at the city if Superman doesn’t stand down. When Superman appeals ot Lex’s humanity by reminding him that an attack would solidify his legacy as a mass murderer, he backs down. But Sydney won’t accept Luthor’s “cowardice” and launches the missiles himself, dying in the process, only for the various Supermen and Superwomen to eventually save the city.
Dan Gvozden is a film and comics critic who lives and works in Baltimore. If you enjoyed this review, check out his Spider-Man podcast, The Amazing Spider-Talk.