Poll
‘Peacemaker’ Season 2: Is Adrian In Love With Chris? (POLL)
[Warning: The below contains MAJOR spoilers for Peacemaker Season 2 Episodes 1-5.]
We all know that Chris (John Cena) is hung up on Harcourt (Jennifer Holland) in Peacemaker. Heck, it was her rejection that put the final nail in the coffin of Chris moving to a whole new dimension. Though their relationship (or lack thereof) is the focus of Season 2, we’ve also been wondering if another member of the gang has feelings for the titular character.
Vigilmaker isn’t a totally new concept. Some fans started shipping the unhinged yet lovable vigilante Adrian (Freddie Stroma) with Chris all the way back in Season 1. The former is completely and almost blindly devoted to Chris, who teeters back and forth between being annoyed by Adrian and appreciating him. They haven’t interacted quite as much in Season 2, but after Adrian’s breakdown over Chris’ departure in Episode 5, we asked ourselves again… Is Adrian in love with Chris?
Let’s look closely at what we’re working with. First, Peacemaker creator James Gunn has already addressed the Vigilmaker ship head-on. Back in 2022, he told Variety that he didn’t understand why fans were hoping for a Chris and Adrian romance, but he didn’t completely shut it down.
“I understand how you could think that Vigilante is in love with Peacemaker,” he said. “I’m not sure how I would see that Peacemaker’s in love with Vigilante. Peacemaker, to me, he just seemed irritated by Vigilante for eight episodes, for the most part. I mean, there’s times when he cares about him. He doesn’t want him to die in Episode 7. I don’t know that that’s love. I mean, it’s a kind of love.”
Gunn also addressed if he’d explore Vigilmaker in Season 2. “I mean, I can think about it,” he said. “Honestly, it comes up a lot. Vigilante’s latched onto Peacemaker. That’s obviously the case. And that’s important to who Peacemaker is. I’m just not sure — I mean listen, I’m not sure Harcourt would ever really want to be with Peacemaker because he’s problematic. And in the same way, I’m not sure Peacemaker would ever want to be with Vigilante, because he’s problematic. They’re sort of in different worlds in some ways.”
When he wrote Season 2, did Gunn make Adrian have a one-sided crush on his partner in crime? He didn’t seem completely opposed to the idea back then. Speaking for ourselves, Adrian’s reaction to Chris’ abandonment — we’re still mad that he didn’t mention Adrian in his goodbye letter — seems not-so platonic. He was by far the most broken-up about the situation compared to the rest of the gang. And now he’s going with them to bring Chris back home, so it’s clear he’s just as dedicated to Chris as ever.
What do you think: Does Adrian simply idolize Chris and view him as a friend, or do his feelings run deeper? Let us know in the poll below!
Peacemaker, Season 2, Thursdays, 9/8c, HBO Max
