The DCU’s Moral Stance Proves Marvel’s Cowardice

The DCU is barreling forward with Peacemaker Season 2 and fans have already sussed out the big reveal regarding the alternate dimension storyline. So, if you don’t want to know what the twist is for this season, you better bow out now. I’m not going to put some bracketed spoiler warning at the top of this. You’ve got the capacity to read (unless this is being read to you by your AI nanny. If so, I’ll make them say, “You’re an unimaginative loser that smells bad and nobody will ever truly love you!”) so you know what’s coming.

It’s pretty clear that the alternate universe Chris Smith is visiting in Peacemaker Season 2 is a fascist utopia built upon white supremacy. That’s why his father and brother are celebrated as heroes. Remember, Auggie Smith in the DCU was a white supremacist. There’s no reason to think he wouldn’t be in this alternate world. Plus, plenty of viewers have noticed that all the happy citizens of the alternate dimension are all white.

James Gunn has been using his time in the DC universe to pointedly attack fascism. It’s played a prominent role in all of his DC projects; The Suicide Squad, Peacemaker, and Creature Commandos are violently unabashed in their depictions of fascists as unquestionable villains, with Superman being a touch more cheeky with its amalgamated evil president. Still, all these projects showcase why these characters’ beliefs are horrendous and gives them their proper comeuppance.

Which has made me look back at the MCU and realize how utterly toothless its moral stances seem in comparison.

Softening Evil Allows Evil To Seem Soft

Let’s take a look at the most politically charged of Marvel’s cinematic output: the Captain America movies. The first film was set during World War II and certainly acknowledged the existence of Nazis and Adolf Hitler as bad, but Marvel also got around being as direct as possible by focusing on HYDRA, the fictional organization that was really the bad guys. By doing this, it allowed for a buffer between the real evils of Nazism and the audience by grafting a fictionalized entity onto real world evil.

Similarly, Captain America: The Winter Soldier seems to be saying something about the surveillance state and government control over its citizenry, but it isn’t actually a movie that’s interested in tackling those subjects in a substantive way. Where its interests actually lie is in the story about Steve and Bucky. And look, it tells that story well! But it only has the illusion of political thematics to help sell the magic trick it’s performing.

I could keep citing these movies and shows — Civil War does the same thematic “character-focused sleight of hand” as The Winter Soldier, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Brave New World are similarly limp with their depictions of evil — but I think there is more than enough evidence to argue that the Marvel Cinematic Universe is comparatively cowardly when you look at how much James Gunn has done with the DCU.

Make Nazis Dead Again

I grew up in the era of Indiana Jones and Wolfenstein 3D. No one used to bat an eye at Nazis (and those aligned with Nazi beliefs) being depicted as unrepentant villains who deserved every bit of fantastical violence set upon them as artistic revenge for the true horrors they unleashed upon the world. Sadly, that’s not the society we encourage today. I won’t be surprised if the High Sheriffs ‘round these parts wrangle me into jail for even talking about this stuff since we’re in an era of silencing dissent against fascism.

Which makes what James Gunn is doing with the DCU so invigorating and even brave to a degree. The decision to call out these hateful positions and groups matters the most in our popular and prolific pieces of pop culture. And looking back, Marvel has never taken this strong of a standpoint in any of their most successful endeavors. Oh, I’m sure one of you is foaming at the mouth about something from Daredevil or some other Disney+ show that made the tiniest of ripples in the pop culture pond.

But when you put it up against key moments in James Gunn’s DCU — Harley Quinn killing dictator Silvio Luna, G.I. Robot slaughtering a neo-Nazi group, everything with Auggie in Peacemaker Season 1, the child about to be murdered by a soldier in Superman — it’s no question which comic book giant is saying the stronger statement. And it’s a statement we need to hear right now because some folks are too chicken to make a stand. Marvel is one of them.