On February 16, 2022, just one day before the Peacemaker Season 1 finale was released on HBO Max, it was announced that the show was renewed for a second season. However, by January 2023, DC Studios heads James Gunn and Peter Safran revealed that the DC Extended Universe was ending and the DC Universe franchise was taking its place. This called into question if Peacemaker would be taken off the upcoming DC TV shows slate, though this ultimately ended up not being an issue, as we’re a week away from Season 2 premiering on the 2025 TV schedule. But what did the Peacemaker stars think at the time of this major shakeup?
I asked John Economos actor Steve Agee about this in an interview ahead of Peacemaker Season 2’s arrival, and he explained to me that because this spinoff of The Suicide Squad meant so much James Gunn, there wasn’t any concern about it going away just because the DCU was pressing the continuity reset button. As Agee explained to CinemaBlend when recalling how he learned about the forthcoming superhero franchise:
I was one of the early people that knew about it before it was announced, but I don't think we had talked about Peacemaker. I know this is one of James' favorite projects. He loves it. I think he really loves the aspect of working in TV because you're basically able to make an eight-hour movie, So I kind of assumed we would keep going on. And I also think that by that point, I feel like it had been announced that there was gonna be a Season 2.
When Peacemaker was shot by Bloodsport in The Suicide Squad, originally the plan was for him to die right then and there. However, while James Gunn was completing post-production work on the movie in summer 2020, he started writing a spinoff based on John Cena’s character, and HBO Max was so impressed that it ordered the project straight to series September of that same year. Now, even though the DCU has succeeded the DCEU, Peacemaker is among the few remnants of the prior franchise that’s stuck around, although that Justice League scene in the Season 1 finale is no longer canon.
Peacemaker is important to James Gunn, so he found a way to make Season 2 work as a follow-up to Superman rather than just scrap the show entirely just because it originated from the DCEU. In any case, Steve Agee was confident right from the start that James Gunn would do a great job steering the DC Studios ship on the creative side of things, telling me:
And I'm not hugely into comic books. Growing up, my basic knowledge of superheroes was the big 3, like Superman, Batman, Spider-Man. But I know how important comic books have been in James' life, so I felt like DC was in good hands.
As with Season 1, James Gunn wrote all of Peacemaker Season 2’s episodes. However, because of his directorial duties on Superman, he only had time to helm three of the new season’s episodes. Last month, John Cena cameoed as Peacemaker in Superman, and in Season 2, we’ll reunite with Justice Gang members Guy Gardner and Hawkgirl, as well as finally get our full introduction to Sean Gunn’s Maxwell Lord. Cena and Steve Agee are once again joined in the main cast by Jennifer Holland, Danielle Brooks, Freddie Stroma and Robert Patrick.
Peacemaker Season 2 begins on Thursday, August 21. The DCU will then continue own the television front when Lanterns premieres on HBO sometime in early 2026, and then Supergirl will arrive in theaters on June 26 of the same year.
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