Peacemaker actress Jennifer Holland explains the fight training she had to go through to play Emilia Harcourt. As of last week, HBO Max's Peacemaker is up and running with new episodes arriving every Thursday. The series is a spin-off of last summer's The Suicide Squad, a bloody and profane effort directed by James Gunn. The film introduced audiences to Peacemaker (John Cena), a man so determined to achieve peace, he doesn't care who he has to kill to get it. The Suicide Squad nearly killed him off, but a post-credits scene found him recovering from his wounds in a hospital.
Peacemaker then picks up with the anti-hero (officially named Christopher Smith) joining up with a new team known as Project Butterfly. In addition to new characters like Vigilante (Freddie Stroma) and Leota Adebayo (Danielle Brooks), Peacemaker features some additional Suicide Squad holdovers. A.R.G.U.S. agents John Economos (Steve Agee) and Harcourt are prominent members of Project Butterfly, which has given the actors and Gunn the chance to expand upon their characters. In the case of Harcourt, Peacemaker has pulled her out of the office and pushed her right into the action.
That means Holland had to up her training regimen in a big way. Speaking to Screen Rant while promoting Peacemaker, Holland detailed the intense stunt training she went through while making the series. Whenever she wasn't needed on set, she would be perfecting her moves. Holland said:
I did. Anytime I wasn't on set, really, I was working with the stunt team, and the fight team, and the tactical guy on just training. We did a ton of just general fight training, they taught me a lot of basics of certain things, and then we did a lot of training for the specific fights that we have in the show. The stunts team, led by Wayne [Daglish], was just incredible. I think they created some really amazing sequences in this show and I'm so grateful to be a part of them. It's been a dream of mine to be able to meld the physical part of myself, the athletic part of myself, with acting and I got to fully do that in this series and my stunt double, Yulia, is incredible. She makes me look like way more of a badass than I am. She taught me all of the fights. We worked tirelessly to make sure that I could do everything almost as well as she was doing it so that whenever they needed to shoot, they wanted certain shots, I was able to do it and sell it and she just worked really, really hard with me to make sure I was able to do that. I wouldn't have been able to do any of it without her. I owe so much of this character to her, definitely.
Peacemaker has allowed for some quieter moments between Harcourt and Smith, but there's no question that the A.R.G.U.S. agent is one of the fiercest members of the team. She already got a moment to shine during an early scene at a bar, and a Peacemaker teaser put the spotlight on a major fight Harcourt has with Judomaster (Nhut Le). It's no wonder Holland had to put in a lot of work to master Harcourt's moves; in the world of Peacemaker, these fights would come as second nature to the experienced agent.
So far, it's safe to say all of Holland's training paid off. Peacemaker is now officially halfway through its first season, and she, much like everyone else, has already received some great moments in the spotlight. That's the benefit of a television show over a movie: There is more time for arcs to grow and deepen. Holland also told Screen Rant that Peacemaker episode 6 is where a lot of those arcs come together, so fans have much to look forward to over the next few weeks.
Peacemaker releases new episodes Thursdays on HBO Max.
