Christopher Smith, A.K.A. Peacemaker, is currently the star of his own HBO Max series where he's played by WWE legend John Cena. Due to that and the warm reception received by his DCEU debut in 2021's The Suicide Squad, the character has never been more popular.
With interest piqued on DC's lethal anti-hero, there are plenty of new readers who may need a proper guide through Peacemaker's surprisingly convoluted history. As such, the following has been crafted to quickly catch fans up to speed on the rogues' gallery of his most notable foes.
10 Emil Bork, The Duplicitous Arms Dealer
Emil Bork was the first foe that Peacemaker faced, not in his own solo series, but in his first appearance as a backup tale in Fightin' 5 #40 from 1966 by Joe Gill, Bill Montes, and Ernie Bache. Christopher Smith was working in Geneva in hopes of quelling a border dispute between two South American countries. Part of this mission involved investigating Emil Bork, who was arming both parties to further his own wealth. After a dizzying series of events, Peacemaker finally killed Bork by guiding one of the warmonger's own weapons into his fleeing craft in Fightin' 5 #41.
9 The Enigmatic Commodore
Finally starring in his own ongoing title, which had actually just replaced Fightin' 5 as his popularity overtook the title team's, Peacemaker took to the Thousand Mile Reef. Peacemaker #1 by Joe Gill and Pat Boyette saw the hero fight the Commodore, who sabotaged fishing vessels from multiple countries using his own nuclear submarine. Upon his capture by Christopher Smith, he revealed he was planning on teaming up with fellow evildoers in the South Pole. Whether these were mad ramblings or genuine threats, this plot point was never picked back up.
8 Beel And The Survivors
While investigating a mine in the Ural Mountains, Christopher Smith was captured by mutated miners called "The Survivors" who had been transformed by uranium into big pale Silly Putty men. This group of ClayFighters was led by the charismatic Beel who planned to use the weapons of the remains of an ancient civilization to conquer the world. Thankfully, Peacemaker defeated the army using a large laser beam to collapse the mine and bury his enemies. These events transpired in Peacemaker #2, again by Joe Gill and Pat Boyette.
7 Gekk, the Premiere Of A Non-Descript Communist Nation
As with most Silver Age superheroes, it wasn't long before Peacemaker came into conflict with communists. Gekk, the Premier of an unspecified Eastern European nation, had developed new high-tech weapons and threatened the United States with war.
Christopher Smith went to the country in hopes of quelling the violence until he was met with Gekk's new U-X airplanes. Realizing that Gekk wouldn't stop, Smith quickly changed into Peacemaker and made short work of the entire nation's supply of weaponry.
6 Enrico Lucetti, Leader Of The Fishmen
Joe Gill and Pat Boyette continued to create adventures for Peacemaker in Peacemaker #3, where the hero comes face to face with more mutated menaces like the Mighty Morphin Power Ranger Putties he fought in issue #2. This time he had to battle fishmen, clearly modeled after The Creature From The Black Lagoon. The monsters were led by Enrico Lucetti, who had worked for 15 years in an underwater complex and was the creator of the new green-gilled foes. After they kidnapped Christopher Smith's date, Peacemaker made short work of them.
5 The Bulgarian Arms Theif, Colonel Uz
In Peacemaker #4, again by Gill and Boyette the Peace Palace, home to Christopher Smith located in the Swiss Alps (Get it?), is attacked by the weapons-dealing crook Colonel Uz. Despite promoting peace, Smith had actually developed a variety of superweapons, including a personal attack jet which made the Palace a prime target for a criminal weapons dealer in need of stock. This story marked the first appearance of Nora O'Rourke, who played the part of Smith's secretary for the few remaining issues of the series' original run. Smith, feigning surrender, is taken to Uz's base and rigs all of his weapons to malfunction. Similar to Tony Stark building his suit in a cave with a box of scraps, Smith betrays Uz and eventually murders him when the Colonel tries to escape in one of his planes.
4 Mr. Blaze And The Firemen
The final villain to face Peacemaker in the original 5 issue run of his ongoing title would be Mr. Blaze and his parade of firemen. After earthmen, and fishmen, it only makes sense that Smith continued his battle with the base elements. Blaze had stolen a fireproof chemical from Smith, who randomly began a new career in the sciences and departed to a small volcanic island populated by molten monsters. Blaze was a former stage magician who joined forces with the lava people, but luckily Peacemaker had just begun developing a Captain Cold style absolute zero cannon. As dictated by the law that is Pokémon type advantage, the fire-based Mr. Blaze stood no chance.
3 The Racially Insensitive Doctor Tzin-Tzin
Once his solo series was canceled Christopher Smith fell into obscurity until DC purchased his parent company, Charlton Comics and used its 50th-anniversary event Crisis on Infinite Earths to fold the batch of new heroes into its continuity. His new four-issue mini-series by Paul Kupperberg, Tod Smith, Pablo Marcos, Gene D'Angelo, and John Costanza would drastically reinvent the character as a lunatic killing machine sponsored by the U.S. government. In this 1988 story, he came face to face with Doctor Tzin-Tzin. The weakest part of this otherwise fantastically wild series, Tzin-Tzin is a clear riff on Fu Manchu and both characters are racist anti-Asian caricatures playing on decades-old stereotypes. To be fair, this character was previously created in 1966's Detective Comics #354 by John Broome, Sheldon Moldoff, Joe Giella, and Gaspar Saladino, where the anti-Asian influence was much more apparent. Despite technically being white, his dress and looks reinforced negative concepts of the Asian community and would have been better off left in Earth-One rather than reintroduced in New Earth. Thankfully, he meets his demise in Peacemaker's series and he hasn't been used since.
2 Eclipso, The Spirit Of God's Wrath
Eclipso first appeared in House of Secrets #61 by Bob Haney and Lee Elias. His original incarnation was a cheesy costumed crook, but his Post-Crisis reinvention was as the original Spirit of God's Wrath (Yes, with a capital G), who had been replaced by the Spectre.
Constantly seeking new hosts to abuse the power of, Eclipso was targeted by Checkmate in the eleven-issue mini-series Janus Directive by John Ostrander, Kim Yale, Paul Kupperberg, Cary Bates, Greg Weisman, John K. Snyder III, Rick Hoberg, Rafael Kayanan, Tom Mandrake, and Pat Broderick. Among the characters recruited to take down the Angel of Vengence would be Smith, but he would wind up brutally killed in a failed assault. Thankfully, he got better.
1 The Legacy Of His Nazi Father
Easily the biggest Peacemaker enemy over his 50+ year history was his Post-Crisis father and unapologetic Nazi, Wolfgang Schmidt. It should be remembered that Post-Crisis DC started in 1987, so the adult Peacemaker having a father that served in World War II was still possible. The series on HBO Max actually adapts this element by revealing in episode 3 (SPOILERS) that Smith's father is actually the white supremacist supervillain, White Dragon. Another element the show expertly adapts is how his father haunts Christopher Smith. In the show, it's as a physical representation of Smith's toxic upbringing, but in the 1988 series, it was as hallucinations that push Peacemaker to be ever more violent in his war against evil. These images got worse and worse as the series continued until Peacemaker finally snapped and began to see images of his father in everyone he fought. Even in the Janus Directive Peacemaker mistook other villains for his father and quickly began to lose his grip on reality. Hopefully, the mental health of his television counterpart will remain more intact. As mentioned by James Gunn in an interview with Nerdist's Hector Navarro, the 1988 series is one of the largest influences on the show, making it prime reading material for anyone who enjoys the HBO Max series.