The heroic queerness of “Peacemaker”

Just when we thought the superhero genre had wrung the last of its ability to shock from its tights, “Peacemaker” drops an orgy into its second season premiere. Series creator James Gunn doesn’t include the sex-a-palooza simply because he could; the scene highlights the depths of the namesake hero’s despondency.

Peacemaker, the alter-ego of Christopher Smith (John Cena), is frowning, drug-numbed, and the only fully clothed, unattended person in the center of the naked rager he’s hosting. Everyone in this anything-goes skin tornado is ecstatic but him. Then something subtle but definitive occurs as Chris rises off his couch: a man and a woman lean in and nuzzle his neck, coaxing both a shiver and a smile out of him. If Chris weren’t miserable, he’d tangle with either or both. Instead, he stumbles into another room to wallow.

This is the first visual confirmation of Peacemaker’s bisexuality, which Gunn has confirmed, crediting Cena for inspiring that character profile addition. Peacemaker never masked his sexual proclivities, but until the show’s second season premiere, it has only been referenced in easy-to-miss dialogue.

Early in the first season, for instance, he confesses to his colleague Emilia Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) that he hasn’t had sex with anyone in years, before correcting himself to specify he hadn’t had sex with women.

Much later that season, his white supremacist father, Auggie (Robert Patrick), screams, “I knew you was [sic] unclean when you were born. I knew when you slept with the whores of polluted blood — and men!”

Chris survived that, only to experience a deadly blow to his ego in the second season premiere when he overhears fellow superhero Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion) make a fellatio joke at his expense during an interview to be considered for the Justice Gang. “Apparently, one of my skills is sucking d**k,” Peacemaker fumes to his friend and teammate Leota Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) after he’s stormed out. “That’s not a put-down, that’s a f*****g compliment!”

Gunn ties the second season of “Peacemaker” into the overhauled DC Cinematic Universe introduced in the latest “Superman” movie, which he also wrote and directed. But although the red, white and blue-loving “Peacemaker” occupies the same universe, this show wouldn’t earn a PG-13 rating – you know, in case you couldn’t tell from the salty language, not to mention the orgy of it all.

The second season premiere, appropriately titled “The Ties that Grind,” is violent, gory, and trades in uproarious humor that doesn’t give a bleep about delicate ears and sensibilities. It also boasts one of the most evenhanded depictions of queerness shown in superhero movies and TV series.

The unofficial squad at the heart of “Peacemaker” calls themselves the 11th Street Kids, and includes Harcourt, Adebayo, John Economos (Steve Agee) and Adrian Chase (Freddie Stroma), who goes by Vigilante when he’s masked and suited up. Out of everyone, only Adebayo is married, and to another woman, Keeya (Elizabeth Faith Ludlow).

Vigilante, meanwhile, is asexual, Stroma confirmed to The Hollywood Reporter.  “I’m not into sex because, like, it’s sex,” Adrian tells Chris in the second episode of Season 2, explaining why he’s upset that he wasn’t invited to the orgy. “I’m into sex because, like a lot of people, it’s an opportunity to bond with my best friend! I’m not a pervert, is what I’m saying. I don’t, quote-unquote, ‘like sex.’”

Aside from Vigilante, Chris Smith’s friends are normal. But his solo status is due to a variety of factors, starting with his desperation to atone for his past mistakes — the worst of which exploited his awful father’s conditioning to obey authority. He’s also working to overcome childhood trauma, including his father’s homophobia. That makes him the standard superhero with a tortured origin story, but a more down-to-earth version.

(Erin Sintoes/HBO Max) Freddie Stroma in “Peacemaker”

Peacemaker represents other identities, too. He’s a jingoistic caricature of benighted American exceptionalism, only now he’s reaching for the light of genuine goodness. He’s an unabashed lover of hair metal, a throwback genre defined by its performers’ androgynous costumes that, in Peacemaker’s estimation, made them “real men, because they weren’t afraid to be women!”

He’s also played by Cena, a retiring professional wrestler who embodies the white American male ideal – brawny, handsome, a good guy. For most of his time with the WWE, Cena wrestled opponents decked out in flashy costumes while he wore jorts. His finishing move, the Attitude Adjustment, involves him slinging similarly beefy opponents over his shoulders, sometimes two at once, and tossing them out of the ring, onto breakaway tables or metal chairs — any place, really.

All kinds of people love John Cena. The fact that he’s using that currency in “Peacemaker” to portray the character’s “up for anything” attitude as encompassing his sexual menu is significant. Cena is daring the close-minded gatekeepers populating toxic fandoms to resist his charms, and those of “Peacemaker” by extension.

So far, the second season premiere’s viewership is up 22% from the series’ debut in 2022, according to media analytics company Samba TV.

Queer superheroes are less novel these days than even a decade ago, when “Wonder Woman” writer Greg Rucka, who wrote arcs for her, Batman and Superman throughout the 2000s, confirmed that the character had relationships with other women. (Themyscira’s population is entirely female, but that doesn’t make it a convent.) DC’s animated series “Harley Quinn,” introduced in 2019, entirely revolves around the title character’s romance with fellow Gotham villain Poison Ivy.

Meanwhile, in the Marvel-verse, Bobby Drake, a founding member of The X-Men, came out in 2015 – in the comic books. Same-sex relationships are more easily drawn than depicted in live-action superhero movies and TV shows; we’ve only seen established metahumans and other powerful superheroes identify as LGBTQ+ in recent years.

Elizabeth Faith Ludlow and Danielle Brooks in “Peacemaker”

The Disney+ series “Loki” confirmed the bisexuality of Tom Hiddleston’s star hero and his alternate universe doppelganger, Sylvie (Sophia Di Martino). “Thor: Love and Thunder” establishes Tessa Thompson’s Valkyrie as bisexual and introduces the husband of Thor’s pal Korg.

Kathryn Hahn’s Agatha Harkness is chased by her vengeful lover, played by Aubrey Plaza, in “Agatha All Along.” That series ultimately served as a vehicle to introduce one of the modern “Avengers” biggest characters, Wiccan (Joe Locke), who’s shown with a nurturing boyfriend named Eddie (Miles Gutierrez-Riley).

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Even in that, these depictions aren’t equal in quality or honesty. Ryan Reynolds got loads of mileage out of insinuating Deadpool’s pansexuality. But Deadpool’s main motivation has always been the love of his life, Vanessa. He’s never seen in a non-heterosexual coupling.

“Peacemaker” follows a similar pattern, with Cena’s Chris proudly owning his penchant for penis while pining for Holland’s Harcourt. He’s not gay, you see, just open to all possibilities. Well-meaning as Peacemaker’s declared sexuality may be, it also perpetuates the stereotype of bisexuality as a broadly palatable version of queerness, with bisexual men frequently shortchanged in these depictions.

What limited outrage that’s been expressed about the orgy scene, then, has less to do with its existence than its freewheeling inclusion. Men bang women, and other men; women do the same. Women cavort around naked, but so do the guys, all in full-frontal glory. Cena’s Chris doesn’t partake, although it’s implied that he pulled that huge party together in a very short time — an impressive feat for anyone. But it’s just another perk of the liberty our free-spirited hero dedicates himself to defending, and it’s only as big a deal as others want to make it.

New episodes of “Peacemaker” debut  9 p.m. Thursdays on HBO Max.