Peacemaker Has A Crisis Of Conscience In 'Better Goff Dead'

While rescuing Peacemaker from the aftermath of his hookup with a butterfly was certainly full of adventure, it wasn't technically a mission for Project Butterfly. Their first job is to kill Senator Goff and potentially his wife and two children as well. On the way to the job, the crew have an awkward conversation that starts with climate change and eventually ends with Peacemaker explaining the concept of "butt babies." According to his older brother, some babies were born vaginally and others anally, and those who came out the second route were worse in every way. Apparently his brother told him that he was a butt baby, and he believed it until he was 14. After Peacemaker discovers that Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) is married to another woman, he asks her about scissoring and she tells him that she suspected he was a butt baby all along. So much for team bonding. 

Peacemaker, Harcourt (Jennifer Holland), and Adebayo watch through a window as the Goff family grow proboscises and begin sucking a honey-like substance from mason jars. When it comes time for Peacemaker to take the shot, he can't do it, even though he knows that the creatures in front of him are clearly not human. He has a crisis of conscience, and Vigilante (Freddie Stroma), who had been lurking nearby, ends up taking the shots for him. Vigilante hums while he kills the mother and two children, but Judomaster (Nhut Le) dropkicks him out of nowhere before he can kill the senator. What ensues is another absolutely bonkers battle between Harcourt, Peacemaker, Vigilante, and Judomaster, and the martial arts-inclined bodyguard ends up disabling all of them before taking a car and leaving. Thankfully, Economos (Steve Agee) is waiting in the van, and he rams Judomaster's getaway vehicle before clocking him over the helmeted head with a pipe. 

Meanwhile, Goff captures both Peacemaker and Vigilante. He's hooked up jumper cables to Vigilante's genitals and starts electrocuting him whenever Peacemaker refuses to answer his interrogations. Goff also attempts to cut off Vigilante's pinkie toe, but bone is tougher than his garden shears could handle. When they finally manage to get free of their bindings and Peacemaker shoots Goff in the face, we discover what butterflies actually are. A tiny, butterfly-like alien flies out of the still-smoking hole in Goff's head. What is it with Gunn and brain parasites? That means anyone could be a butterfly, anyone could become a butterfly, and a map at the end of the episode shows us that there are potentially thousands of them across the globe. 

Adebayo's wife Keeya (Elizabeth Faith Ludlow) sends Adebayo a sext that includes a flash of full frontal nudity that pops up on an iPad mid-briefing before the mission. She's embarrassed, but Peacemaker makes it worse by making a bunch of lesbian jokes. The rapport the two had been building last episode seems a bit damaged, at least for the moment. Harcourt is completely fed up, though she didn't really have much patience from the beginning. 

The fight with Judomaster is as brutally hard-hitting as the one Peacemaker had in his hookup's apartment, and it's pretty impressive seeing the tiny green guy beat the crud out of two much larger men. Vigilante even tries to run from him, which is brilliant and a little sad. Vigilante's torture is somewhat graphic, though the worst of it is definitely the failed attempt at removing his pinkie toe. Throughout the interrogation, Peacemaker keeps promising his friend that he won't give up any information, and Vigilante begs him to give up "just a little." Goff explains that the best way to hurt humans, who are "creatures of empathy," is to hurt their friends. Unfortunately, Peacemaker's sense of empathy is still very new, and he lets Goff torture Vigilante without much struggle for far too long. 

The deaths of the two kids are not shown onscreen, but they do happen. Even if we know they had butterflies in their brains, at one point those were human kids. Vigilante humming while killing them is some seriously twisted stuff.