Peacemaker Season 2 Episode 1 Easter Eggs

This article contains spoilers for Peacemaker Season 2, Episode 1

In its first season, Peacemaker established itself as a show deeply steeped in DC Comics lore, dropping references to Bat-Mite, Kite-Man, and Matter-Eater Lad of the Legion of Super-Heroes. In its season two opener, it’s clear that Peacemaker intends to continue the tradition. An d between the ongoing changes in the DC Universe, dangling plot threads from this summer’s Superman, and access to alternate realities, there’s lots of room for James Gunn to drop his comic book knowledge. So let’s take a look at all of the nerdy easter eggs in the Peacemaker season 2 premiere!

Krank Toys

More than just establishing canon, the retconned scene from the season one finale sets up an awkward moment when John Cena’s Chris has an interview with the Justice Gang. But the real easter egg here is the location of the meeting. The interview occurs within an abandoned Krank Toys store, and that’s a name that might mean something to fans of the animated series The Batman (not Batman: The Animated Series, however…).

Voiced by Patton Oswalt, Cosmo Krank was a variation of the classic Superman baddie the Toyman, who sought revenge against Bruce Wayne after his business Krank Co. was shut down. In the series Gotham, Chris Perfetti played a live-action version of Krank, who there was the son of Griffin Krank (Thomas Lyons), an assassin called the Toyman. Finally while Krank doesn’t show up, his toy shop is in the background of the video games Batman: Arkham City and Batman: Arkham Knight.

Cries of the White Rabbit

As Chris makes his way into Krank Toys, he passes a sobbing woman in a bunny costume. Some have already speculated it’s a 1960s comics deep cut named Dumb Bunny (which would be on brand for Gunn). However, this is actually White Rabbit, a minor Batman villain introduced in 2011. Created by David Finch and Paul Jenkins, White Rabbit is Jaina Hudson, the privileged daughter of an American diplomat and a Bollywood actress. Although she has some compelling qualities, such as the ability to split into two distinct people, White Rabbit mostly plays like a lesser version of Catwoman or Spider-Man foil the Black Cat, making her brief appearance in Peacemaker—portrayed by Brey Noelle—also one of her most important moments.

Laughing at Suicide Squad’s Joker

When Harcourt returns from an unpleasant therapy session, she takes out some of her anger on her dashboard, leaving welts on her knuckles that Chris can’t help but notice. Harcourt blows it off and Chris plays along, making a joke about being angry about the car playing Thirty Seconds to Mars and suggesting that maybe she’s okay with the band. “I am not on good terms with Thirty Seconds to Mars, how dare you,” Harcourt fires back.

Thirty Seconds to Mars is, of course, the rock band fronted by Jared Leto. Leto was allegedly awful while making 2016’s Suicide Squad, and was pretty terrible at playing the Joker to boot. Even though Harcourt and Peacemaker made their live-action debuts in The Suicide Squad, these jokes make it pretty clear that Leto’s twisted Joker won’t make it into the new universe.

The Quantum Folding Chamber

As we’re reminded during the “Previously On…” montage, the Quantum Folding Chamber that Chris uses to visit an alternate reality did show up in Peacemaker‘s first season as the place where Auggie Smith stores his equipment. Gunn returned to the idea for Superman, with Lex Luthor using the technology for his devious plans. As Mr. Terrific observed in that movie, Luthor specializes in reckless science, so this is a much more stable version of the same technology.

Still, it’s enough to worry Rick Flag Sr., who has his people at ARGUS monitoring anything that recalls “the Luthor incident.” One also cannot help but smile a bit at the fact that Flag and ARGUS refer to the use of the technology as a “blip,” the official MCU term for Thanos’ actions in Avengers: Infinity War where he snapped away half of everything in existence for five years.

Is it a White Martian This Time?

When he enters the Quantum Folding Chamber, Chris sees a large white alien who rudely ignores his greeting. Also the alien incinerates a kitten. DC nerds are probably hoping that this is a white Martian, the evil aliens who committed genocide against the green martians, leaving only one survivor: J’onn J’onzz, the Martian Manhunter of the Justice League.

But given that the creature portrayed by Dorian Kingi is billed as “Kyphotic Alien”—”kyphotic” is the proper term for an extended curve in one’s back—this is probably just some weird thing Gunn came up with, kind of like the other not-white Martian, Mr. Handsome from Superman.

Alternate Places, Alternate Adventures

Once Chris goes through the Quantum Folding Chamber, he arrives in an alternate reality, one where his father Auggie is kind and supportive and not a white supremacist and where his brother Keith is still alive. This version of Chris, along with Keith and Auggie, are members of the Top Trio, whose title recalls the name of the villainous Terrific Trio from Batman Beyond. They however seem to be original to Peacemaker here.

What’s not original are the team’s adventures. In one newspaper clipping, we learn that the Trio defeated the Rainbow Creature (not, sadly, classic Flash villain the Rainbow Raider), an incredibly deep-cut giant monster created by Bill Finger and Sheldon Moldoff for 1960’s Batman #134.

More significantly, another clipping shows that the Trio defeated the Ultra-Humanite. Introduced in 1939’s Action Comics #13 and created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the Ultra-Humanite is the first real supervillain in the DC Universe. A malevolent mad scientist who predates even Lex Luthor, the Ultra-Humanite has several forms as he moves his brain into different bodies. But he’s most often in the form of a hulking white gorilla, proving once again that Gunn understands that super-primates belong in superhero stories.

Over drinks, the Trio shares memories about another DC location when they joke about dealing with Imps. Although it’s not stated directly, these are Imps from the Fifth Dimension, a topsy-turvy universe filled with nigh-omnipotent genie-like tricksters. We saw the Justice Gang battle an imp over Metropolis in Superman and, as Gunn recently told Den of Geek, he really wants the Batman-obsessed imp Bat-Mite to appear in the DCU. And while DCU references to the Justice Society have been thus far limited to a mural in the Hall of Justice in Superman, it would be nice to see the heroic imp Thunderbolt. But the most famous imp of them all is Mister Mxyzptlk, who regularly shows up to irritate Superman.

It’s also worth noting that Evergreen is the name of two cities in the DC Universe. Evergreen is the hometown of the Comet, a minor hero who appeared in DC’s brief (but underrated!) Impact Comics line, which rebooted superheroes from Archie Comics. Evergreen City, located in Washington, is also the old stomping grounds of a major Earthling Green Lantern, Hal Jordan, when he quit being a test pilot and took on the exciting profession of traveling insurance salesman.

Lastly when Chris and Keith meet, the latter makes a passing reference to Blüdhaven. Blüdhaven is the more economically depressed and dangerous sister city to Gotham, if you can believe it. Since graduating from being Robin and taking on the codename Nightwing, Bruce Wayne’s former ward Dick Grayson tends to spend his time in Blüdhaven, which means that the city may return in the upcoming Batman movie, Brave and the Bold.

The Growing DC Universe

Evergreen and Blüdhaven aren’t the only DCU locales to get a name drop. During a clip of the right-wing talk show The Sphere—a show that once invited Chris Smith to come on and talk trash Superman—host Clevis Thornthwaite (Michael Ian Black) rants about breakouts in Belle Reve and Arkham.

Belle Reve is the supervillain prison where Amanda Waller picks members for Task Force X, the Suicide Squad, and Task Force M, the Creature Commandos. It’s also where John Economos says he’s working when he talks to Vigilante on the phone in Peacemaker, even though Economos is actually surveilling Chris’s house. Also working for ARGUS is Sasha Bordeaux, a newcomer to Peacemaker played by Sol Rodríguez. Introduced in 2000’s Detective Comics #751 by Greg Rucka and Shawn Martinbrough, Bordeaux was a former intelligence agent who becomes a private security consultant for Bruce Wayne. In the comics, Bordeaux becomes infected with an AI called Brother Eye, which Batman created in one of his most paranoid moments.

Arkham is, of course, Arkham Asylum, the famously penetrable mental health hospital where Batman deposits baddies only to have them break out a few days later. Given Chris’ season one rant about Batman failing to kill his enemies, Peacemaker will probably drop by The Sphere again to share some thoughts.

DC Comics fans watching Superman were quick to point out that even though Clevis Thornthwaite was an original character created by Gunn, he has a lot in common with some important established comic book characters. Jack Ryder, aka the Creeper, and Vic Sage, aka the Question, are both television hosts who sometimes have a right-wing angle, depending on who’s writing them. More compellingly, there’s the Glorious Godfrey, one of Darkseid’s minions from the New Gods franchise who uses media to spread misinformation about Earth’s heroes. It could be (and probably is) nothing, but the secretary (Angela Ray) working with Harcourt’s psychologist is named “Ms. Godfrey.”

Again it seems like Gunn probably has something else in mind for Thornthwaite and probably nothing in mind for Ms. Godfrey. But when a show includes references to Krank imps and the Rainbow Creature, everything is worth noting.

Peacemaker streams at 9pm EST every Thursday on HBO Max.