James Gunn Made The PEACEMAKER Spinoff Series Because The Character is "a Rotten Piece of Sh*t"
The Suicide Squad writer-director James Gunn recently talked about the upcoming Peacemaker spinoff series that’s coming to HBO Max and explains why he wanted to focus on this character.
Gunn wrote the series and is directing multiple episodes of the eight-episode series. Peacemaker is described as being an action-adventure comedy and it will “explore the origins of Peacemaker, a man who believes in peace at any cost, no matter how many people he has to kill to get it.”
So why did Gunn decide to make a series about this “fucked up superhero”? Well, it’s because he’s such a “rotten piece of shit”. During an interview with Total Film/GamesRadar, Gunn explained:
"I was finished with a draft of Guardians 3 and I’m editing [The] Suicide Squad, but that's starting to slow down. I was like, 'Oh my God, I’m going to be trapped in here [during coronavirus lockdowns] for another year before we start shooting Guardians! What am I going to do?'
So I talked to the folks at HBO about it, and they were like, 'Hey, if you could do any character at all from Suicide Squad for a movie, who would you do?' I said it would be Peacemaker, because he's a pretty rotten piece of shit, and I thought he had more room to grow than some of the other characters. I wrote eight episodes in two months and [the story] hasn't changed since then. The truth behind it is that I was just so miserable, I was like, 'I’m going to be stuck here with my own thoughts unless I do something to get my mind off of it.'"
The series is sure to bring the fans some fun and insane entertainment. John Cena is set to reprise his role and when talking about how the series came together, he said:
"James and [The Suicide Squad and Peacemaker producer] Peter Safran approached me and said, 'We have this idea. We'd like to do a spin-off series about Peacemaker, would you be interested?' I said, 'You guys had me at, 'We had this idea...' I normally do a lot more due diligence, but James is the one individual that if he says, 'Hey, I got this idea, I can't tell you anything about it, but I need a yes or no right now,' it would always be a yes.'"
Cena is joined by Robert Patrick (Terminator 2: Judgment Day; HBO's Perry Mason) as Auggie Smith, Danielle Brooks (Orange is the New Black) as Leota Adebayo, Chris Conrad (Patriot) as Adrian Chase/Vigilante, Jennifer Holland (Brightburn, American Horror Story) as Emilia Harcourt from The Suicide Squad film, Steve Agee as John Economos, and Nhut Le (The Kroll Show, Raven’s Home) in the role of Judomaster.
The Suicide Squad releases in theaters and on HBO Max on August 6. Peacemaker premieres in January 2022 on HBO Max.