Peacemaker: Vigilante's 10 Best Quotes | Screen Rant
WARNING: This article contains SPOILERS for Peacemaker.
Out of all the characters in Peacemaker, Vigilante is arguably the most quotable. As a foil to Peacemaker, Vigilante's behavior leads to many bizarre, disconcerting, and sometimes unintentionally hilarious lines.
Many of these lines are said in conversation with Peacemaker and are a result of their lively and often ridiculous banter. No matter how amusing or random Vigilante's quotes may be, they also reveal insights into his character's identity and thinking.
When Goff takes off Vigilante's mask, Vigilante begins contorting his face, rolling his eyeballs, and twirling his tongue in bizarre fashion. When Peacemaker asks him what he is doing, Vigilante insists that if he keeps changing his facial expressions, Goff will not be able to pick him out of a police lineup.
Even though he is being interrogated by a politician controlled by an alien butterfly, Vigilante is most concerned with protecting his secret identity, and somehow believes that simply doing weird things with his face can protect his anonymity. Freddie Stroma's physical acting and the sincerity with which he says this ridiculous line is pure Vigilante and proves that is one of Peacemaker's least intelligent characters.
Criticizing one's torturer while being tortured is usually not an advisable move. Common sense is not one of Vigilante's strengths, though. Instead, he admonishes Goff for not maintaining his torture tools, as the blades used to cut off Vigilante's toes are dull.
Vigilante rarely hesitates to take an opportunity to critique others, even when being on the receiving end of torture. He takes pride in maintaining his weaponry and would never allow them to get dull.
Peacemaker refused to give up information about Project Butterfly to Goff, even when it meant Vigilante would continue to be brutally tortured. Vigilante is frustrated and hurt by Peacemaker's actions. Peacemaker didn't even consider the pain Vigilante was in or try to deal with the situation in a way that didn't require Vigilante to be tortured.
Vigilante thanking Peacemaker for allowing him to be tortured does seem like something twisted that he would say, but it is actually the beginning of Vigilante passive-aggressively sharing his frustration and hurt with Peacemaker. Vigilante does not know how to appropriately express his emotions, which can manifest in some truly memorable dialogue.
Everyone must deal with things in life that are unfair. For Vigilante, the great injustice that he must face is that he cannot bring a chainsaw to a potential fight. The fact that he is more focused on bringing a chainsaw than on the actual situation with the butterflies speaks volumes about his character.
Of course, the "injustice" of the situation only escalates for Vigilante after John Economos shows up to the fight with the chainsaw. Economos uses the chainsaw to kill the butterfly-controlled gorilla attacking Peacemaker and saves Peacemaker's life. While the moment proves to Peacemaker that he misjudged Economos, to Vigilante he is bitter that Economos got to use the chainsaw and he didn't.
As the brave Peacemaker gradually begins confronting his demons, Vigilante admits that he runs from his. Unlike Peacemaker, Vigilante has no desire to deal with his dark side and does not think there is anything wrong with the way he acts, thinks, or feels.
This is the key difference between Vigilante and Peacemaker, as one of them is interested in growth and the other has no interest in it at all. Vigilante is committed to violence and does not want to dive into the introspection needed to bring about any meaningful change in his identity or thinking.
Vigilante gets fixated on certain ideas sometimes and cannot let them go. When Peacemaker wants to figure out why the Goff butterfly drew a peace sign on the jar, Peacemaker tries to ask yes or no questions to figure out what is really going on with the butterflies.
Meanwhile, Vigilante wants to figure out what the butterfly's favorite color is and whether it is teal. Vigilante is nothing if not random, obsessive, and obstinate about how he approaches situations, and this is no exception.
When Peacemaker tries to get Vigilante to be quiet, Vigilante angrily points out that Peacemaker's preferred conversation partners--Eagly and the Goff butterfly--are not capable of speech. Vigilante's response is partially a product of envy, as he is jealous that Peacemaker seems to enjoy communicating with and being around Eagly and Goff more than he enjoys communicating with and being around Vigilante.
Vigilante is not just resentful in this situation, though. He is on to something about Peacemaker's challenges when communicating with others, as he can become easily frustrated and upset when communication isn't going the way he likes. Vigilante is both a possessive friend and someone who surprisingly understands some key facets of Peacemaker's behavior.
The fact that Peacemaker doesn't want to kill people anymore shows tremendous growth for the character. In one of Peacemaker's funniest quotes, Vigilante cannot wrap his mind around this change in Peacemaker. In fact, Vigilante sees it as regression rather than growth. Not killing is a basic tenet of human existence, so it is amusing to hear Vigilante refer to it as "a new-age belief."
Vigilante is desperate to be friends with Peacemaker. Their vigilantism is the main thing that they share and without it, Vigilante is concerned about their relationship and what it will be like without killing.
There is almost no bad time to listen to rock and roll, but being pursued by White Dragon and his band of white supremacists, their car stuck, and Vigilante being seriously wounded would qualify as a bad time.
Even in this awful situation, Vigilante turns up the music in the car and insists that there is never a bad time to rock. His enthusiasm is admirable, but even Peacemaker recognizes that it is not the time or the place for it.
When Vigilante catches Peacemaker crying earlier in the season, Peacemaker tells him that he's not crying, but is doing face exercises to keep his face muscular. Being the gullible individual that he is, Vigilante believes Peacemaker, and thinks any time Peacemaker cries, he is doing the face exercises.
In fact, after Peacemaker kills his father, Vigilante thinks Peacemaker is doing his face exercises, not that he's crying. Vigilante being unable to understand why Peacemaker is crying after killing his father says everything one needs to know not only about Vigilante being gullible, but about being an apathetic, unfeeling person who does not basic aspects of human emotion and behavior.