When James Gunn and Peter Safran took over the DCU, it was believed that they were mostly hard-resetting the cinematic world – replacing Henry Cavill with David Corenswet as Superman, with more changes planned down the line. But there one show was a potential spanner in the works: Peacemaker.  

Gunn spearheaded this show before he landed his big role at DC. As such, Christopher Smith’s (played by John Cena) origin story was tied to the now-defunct DCEU. He debuted in The Suicide Squad, which also featured Margot Robbie’s Harley Quinn.  

Plus, the end of season 1 also featured cameos from Jason Momoa’s Aquaman and Ezra Miller’s The Flash, along with two other silhouettes that were clearly meant to be Cavill’s Superman and Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman. You can see the original clip below:

The suspicion was that, as season 2 was confirmed to be dealing with dimensional portals and parallel worlds (or as fans call it, the multiverse), it would show the anti-hero crossing over between the DCEU and DCU. However, I’ve now seen the first five episodes of Peacemaker, and while season 2 does explore the subject of parallel universes, it’s not what you’re expecting.  

Spoilers for the opening of Peacemaker season 2 

Peacemaker’s season 1 story has been retconned (sort of)

Season 2 of Peacemaker opens with a brief montage of the events of season 1, recapping the formation of the 11^th Street Kids, their mission on Project Butterfly and Chris’s tragic backstory and the fallout with his abusive, racist father, August Ransom “Auggie” Smith/The White Dragon. This is all shown with the title: ‘Previously in the DCU’. 

While most of the footage has been directly lifted from season 1, there are some changes. Firstly, Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) references the ‘Justice Gang’ rather than the ‘Justice League’. We then cut to Chris telling Harcourt about a time that he threw up all over Green Lantern after flying on his green magic carpet.  

If this dialogue passes you by, then the next visual shot won’t. As the 11^th Street Kids limp away from their last battle to take down The Cow, with Chris carrying Harcourt, we see a different set of silhouettes than the former Justice League, with five members rather than four.  

Aquaman, The Flash and Wonder Woman have clearly been replaced by Mister Terrific, Green Lantern, Hawkgirl and Supergirl – four characters that made their debut in the DCU’s first feature film, Superman.  

Superman is the only character that stays the same in the line-up, but his outline is different – modelled after Corenswet’s build rather than Cavill’s. His cape is also (disappointingly) less flowy.  

Peacemaker still calls them out for being late, while Hawkgirl and The Green Lantern insult him as he walks past. Nathan Fillion and Isabela Merced are the only two actors who seemed to be on set, as they speak and show their faces in this scene (just as Ezra Miller and Jason Momoa did).  

So, what does this mean? 

Peacemaker’s season 1 events still stand, just in a different universe 

Put simply, the opening of Peacemaker season 2 establishes that while the story of season 1 all went down the same, these characters now exist in the same universe as David Corenswet’s Superman and The Justice Gang, and Peacemaker has an established history with them.

So, if you’re hoping for some major Marvel-style explanation about the logistics, you probably aren’t going to get it.  

Without giving much else away, the show does deal with the concept of parallel universes that was teased in the trailer. However, it has nothing to do with the DCEU – or at least, it doesn’t in the five episodes I’ve seen (there are eight in total).  

Gunn is essentially leaving the audience to fill in the gaps. Either you can believe that the DCEU does exist as another parallel universe somewhere, or that it’s gone forever. Either way, at the time of writing, it has no impact on the story of Christopher Smith. Peacemaker’s team has been lifted straight into the new DCU, with a few minor changes to the world surrounding them. 

Katie Yu/ HBO Max

That makes giving creative freedom over different DC characters a lot easier. Gunn and Safran can now reset the character of Batman with few repercussions, while showing other versions of the story (such as Matt Reeves’ universe) that happen in another dimension.  

It’s unsurprising, given that the MCU has been going hard on unifying its various universes and is suspected to make them a crucial plot point in Avengers: Doomsday. The DCU is not going down the same path, but it is making things very clear-cut.  

It also seemingly confirms that both Superman and Supergirl are now part of the Justice Gang, something that wasn’t clear after the first DCU feature film.

Peacemaker season 2 drops on HBO and HBO Max on Thursday, 21 August 2025 in the US, and on Sky and Now on Friday, 22 August 2025. New episodes will drop weekly.  

Related articles