Contains spoilers for “Peacemaker” Season 2

As Chris Smith, John Cena headlined the first season of “Peacemaker” right as the DC Extended Universe was winding down. More than three years later, “Peacemaker’s” second season is now the first live-action TV show set in the DC Universe and directly follows up on the events of 2025’s smash hit of the summer, “Superman.” While “Peacemaker” previously provided a standalone, anarchic corner of a now-defunct franchise that was at the time putting all its chips on “Black Adam” and “The Flash,” this new season is very much teeing up years of further DC Universe storytelling. And while many things stay the same across these two seasons of television, the show’s relationship to cinematic universe connections has very much been overhauled.

With that in mind, it shouldn’t be surprising that the new season of “Peacemaker” features tons of connections and teases for other DC Comics properties. Some of these are just subtle nods to DC’s lengthy past, like Emilia Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) briefly shopping at Vaughan Drugs, the place where obscure former-Charlton superhero Great Defender’s mild-mannered alter ego worked. Other nods and bits across “Peacemaker” Season 2’s first five episodes, though, certainly point towards greater potential future developments in the DC Universe, including some major superhero introductions and imminent standalone shows on the horizon.

If you want to watch John Cena’s Peacemaker viciously fight bad guys and contemplate his trauma, then this season of television works fine on that exact level. However, the first five installments of “Peacemaker’s” second season also contain several clues about the DC Universe’s exciting future.

Through its first three projects, the DC Universe has been very insistent that Bruce Wayne/Batman and his mythos exist in this universe. In “Creature Commandos,” Batman appeared as a silhouette, while a road sign indicated the distance from Metropolis to Gotham City in “Superman.” In “Peacemaker’s” Season 2 premiere, this phenomenon materializes again in a news report about a rash of meta-humans breaking out of confinement. One place that’s been hammered by this phenomenon is Belle Reve, the prison Peacemaker was previously incarcerated in during “The Suicide Squad.”

Another location mentioned, though, is none other than Arkham Asylum. Audiences don’t see what the DC Universe version of Arkham looks like, but just getting explicit confirmation that it exists is enough. It’s worth remembering that plans for “The Brave and the Bold,” which will feature Batman accompanied by his son Damian Wayne/Robin as his crime-fighting sidekick, suggest the DC Universe’s Dark Knight will be a bit older and more experienced. This means Arkham could already be crawling with famous Batman foes locked up behind bars, just waiting for a chance to cause mayhem. Considering the DC Universe is starting in media res, there are untold possibilities for what’s already going down in Arkham.

For now, though, the Arkham Asylum mention simply helps to flesh out the chaotic world the show’s characters are inhabiting. As a bonus, it continues the fascination these early DC Universe properties have with teasing Batman’s eventual arrival.

At the end of “Peacemaker’s” first season, Amanda Waller’s (Viola Davis) involvement with matters like Project Butterfly and Task Force X is leaked to the public, putting her in an immense legal bind. As the DC show’s second season begins, she’s been forced to step down as director of A.R.G.U.S. (Rick Flag Sr. has taken over that position) and has been forced out of the public limelight. However, as seen by her assembling the titular team of the animated “Creature Commandos,” just because Waller’s down doesn’t mean she’s out of the DC Universe. 

On the contrary, her shadow looms large over the first five episodes of “Peacemaker’s” second season. Though never seen on screen, she’s still adversely affecting all of the show’s primary characters. She’s especially impacting Emilia Harcourt’s (Jennifer Holland) job prospects, as Waller made sure one of her last actions as A.R.G.U.S. director was to blacklist the Peacemaker ally from all potential intelligence agency jobs. Though no longer occupying the lofty job she once exploited for all its worth, Waller’s legacy and might are still making Harcourt’s existence a nightmare. Meanwhile, the struggles Peacemaker has in being seen as “a hero” are a lingering byproduct of Waller’s earlier plans to use the crime fighter as a scapegoat.

Given that she’s still an immensely influential off-screen presence, it’s clear that the show is quietly teasing what kind of mayhem she could unleash in more prominent DC Universe appearances down the line, including in her own show, currently entitled “Waller.”

One of “Superman’s” most inspired visual touches, a quiet apartment scene between Lois Lane and the titular superhero, is set against a background fight involving the Justice Gang duking it out with a brightly colored imp from another dimension. Initially, this is just a funny joke centered on relegating such a big battle to a visual side note. However, as the heroes fight the imp, the creature unleashes bursts of bright colors that reflect off the faces of Lois and Superman as they talk. Hues of green, pink, and other colors cascade across this intimate exchange and lend one of the quietest “Superman” moments striking vibrancy. Plus, this sequence is just one example of “Superman” setting up the new DC Universe, as it confirms that those mischievous imps also exist in the silver-screen DC Universe.

Those creatures surface again in an early Season 2 episode where Chris Smith is having a conversation with the alternate universe versions of his brother, Keith (David Denman), and his dad, Auggie (Robert Patrick). Here, the latter two characters recall how their universe’s Chris Smith kept getting into wacky shenanigans with imps from another universe. These troublemakers were so common in this version of the Smith household that Auggie even recalls them getting into their cereal.

This moment is designed to show Peacemaker processing his emotions as he’s chilling with ideal versions of his family, but it also illustrates the kind of mayhem the imps are capable of. Referencing these creatures so much in early DC Universe properties could also presage famous DC Comics imps like Mister Mxyzptlk and Bat-Mite eventually making their way to the cinematic franchise.

“Peacemaker’s” Season 2 premiere kicks off with its titular lead heading into an interview with Maxwell Lord (Sean Gunn), Hawkgirl (Isabela Merced), and Guy Gardner/Green Lantern (Nathan Fillion) for potential membership into the Justice Gang. The Lord-financed superhero group, however, views Peacemaker as a joke, which the troubled crime fighter unfortunately finds out due to a technological malfunction. This sequence not only establishes just how detached Peacemaker feels from even other superheroes in his dimension, it also makes it clear that the Justice Gang is looking for additional members to fill out its ranks.

In “Superman,” audiences saw the group inhabiting a Hall of Justice that was deeply under construction. Scaffolding was up and wallpaper was still being added, a reflection of how this group (which only totaled three members at “Superman’s” start) was in its nascency. In short, they’ve got a long way to go before they’re the Justice League. One of the many steps in that evolution is filling out their ranks with additional superheroes, as seen by Metamorpho (Anthony Carrigan) joining the group after “Superman’s” climax, and Lord’s interview process for finding more new recruits indicates that the Justice Gang has no plans of slowing down anytime soon.

For further DC Universe projects, particularly those featuring core Justice League members like “Lanterns,” expect this gaggle’s ballooning nature to come up again. It’s also a certainty Peacemaker won’t be joining their ranks anytime soon, though, judging by Lord’s insulting comments about the poor guy.

James Gunn has made it clear that characters who die in the DC Universe will stay dead. However, “Peacemaker’s” second season solidifies one way this franchise can “cheat” around this rule and wring more stories out of deceased figures. Whereas “Superman’s” use of alternate dimensions was limited to a realm dedicated to imprisoning people, Chris Smith/Peacemaker stumbles onto another universe in “Peacemaker” Season 2, where his brother Keith didn’t die as a child, and his dad, Auggie, is also alive. The season’s third episode, meanwhile, opens with a flashback to Emilia Harcourt and Rick Flag Jr. (Joel Kinnaman) waking up in bed together the morning before he heads off for that fateful “The Suicide Squad” mission that ends in his death.

This cold open appearance precedes a new iteration of Rick Flag Jr. showing up alive in Peacemaker’s utopian alternate universe. With this appearance, the DC Universe tosses down the gauntlet and makes it clear that different dimensions can kind of resurrect characters previously killed on-screen. Granted, these would be radically different versions of familiar faces, much like how Baby Groot is a separate organism from the original Groot introduced in “Guardians of the Galaxy.”

Still, there’s now hope for other perished DC Universe souls to have a future. Rick Flag Jr., once the source of internet mockery for how he introduced Katana, becomes, in “Peacemaker,” a shining symbol of how alternate dimensions can be utilized in the DC Universe’s future.