Warning: Contains spoilers for Peacemaker episode 4.

The Peacemaker episode 4 ending includes a reveal that Clemson Murn is a Butterfly, but this could create a huge plot hole for the DC TV show’s villains. James Gunn’s second take on the character of Peacemaker after resurrecting him from The Suicide Squad sees him and a team go up against a world-threatening invasion. While a lot of the focus has been on who Peacemaker is as a character, this plot might have just tripped itself up.

Clemson Murn (Chukwudi Iwuji) is introduced in Peacemaker episode 1, “A Whole New World,” as the leader of the ARGUS team in charge of handling Peacemaker (John Cena). He’s notably stoic and closed off as a person, a matter that is raised in Peacemaker episode 3, “Better Goff Dead,” when he admits that he is trying to be more open about his emotions, with limited success. Throughout the first part of the Peacemaker TV show, it has been repeatedly hinted at that Murn has a dark past that he is now trying to atone for, but little information has been given about what that past might entail or why working for Amanda Waller would be a reasonable way to atone for any misdeeds.

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In the final moments of Peacemaker episode 4, “The Choad Less Traveled,” Leota Adebayo (Danielle Brooks) finds a lead on the Butterflies and calls Murn to tell him. As the camera pans out Clemson Murn is revealed to be a Butterfly as he extends a proboscis to eat the same strange goop as the Goff family did moments before Vigilante killed them. However, if Murn had been a Butterfly all along, then it seems strange that he would have allowed the Butterflies inhabiting the Goff family to be killed. If Murn was a Butterfly and is secretly the mole that the team was concerned about, it would have been in his best interests to sabotage the team and save senator Royland Goff and his family.

While it could be argued that it was necessary for Murn to allow the Goff’s to be killed to maintain his Peacemaker cover, a major part of the episode undermines this idea. While Murn’s position under Waller might have made it hard to discreetly prevent the assassinations of the Butterflies, he was handed ample opportunity to at least help senator Goff himself survive. The ARGUS tech that he is using to blow open the wall is experimental and problems with it seem to be a known issue. Murn could easily have not had the bomb go off at all and reasonably claimed it was only the failure of the tech that prevented them from killing the last Butterfly

There are two possible explanations that avoid this being a large Peacemaker plot hole for Clemson Murn. The first is that Murn was infested by a Butterfly after the attack, but the opportunity for that to happen was not shown. The alternative is that Murn has turned against his own kind for some reason. It is perhaps a common problem in science fiction that all members of an alien species are assumed to be on the same side (despite humanity proving that that is not a given). If Murn has betrayed his species, or was betrayed by his species, he might have sided with Amanda Waller to help take them down. If this is the case, it would help to explain Murn’s mysterious past, but given Judomaster’s claim that the Butterflies aren’t what Peacemaker thinks and Waller’s history of not always being on the morally right side of any given conflict, this would beg some questions about whether the Peacemaker team should go through with killing the Butterflies.

Peacemaker releases new episodes Thursdays on HBO Max.

Key Release Dates
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  • DC League of Super-Pets (2022)Release date: Jul 29, 2022
  • Black Adam (2022)Release date: Oct 21, 2022
  • The Flash (2023)Release date: Jun 23, 2023
  • Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom (2023)Release date: Mar 17, 2023
  • Shazam! Fury of the Gods (2022)Release date: Dec 16, 2022
  • Blue Beetle (2023)Release date: Aug 18, 2023
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Faefyx Collington
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Faefyx Collington (They/Them) is a senior features writer for Screen Rant. They’re a British writer of both fiction and non-fiction, focussing on science fiction, fantasy, and mystery for the former and on culture, gender, and current affairs for the latter.
Never content to settle to one thing, Faefyx is also a co-host and producer of the podcast and video series “Unramblings,” and can occasionally be found making music around the internet as well.
Having acquired degrees on both sides of the Atlantic, Fyx has settled (for the moment) in the southern United States where they live with their spouse and an entirely appropriate number of cats.

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