Leota Adebayo, You’re My Hero

SPOILER ALERT: The beneath characteristic comprises minor spoilers from season certainly one of Peacemaker.

She loves animals and dressing up her tiny canines. She’s by no means been within the discipline. Generally she will’t cease speaking. Actually, nobody’s fairly certain why she’s even on the group. However Danielle Brooks’ Leota Adebayo is simply as priceless as anybody on Amanda Waller’s secret job power—actually, I feel she’s Peacemaker’s actual hero.

“However the man with arms as large as tree trunks,” you may be saying, “or the tough-as-nails discipline agent. Or the freakin’ PET EAGLE.”

I hear you! However let me clarify why Leota Adebayo is prime of the group.

Leota is all of us.

Peacemaker is the muscle. Murt is the chief, Harcourt is the handler, Economos is tech and techniques. So, what does that make Leota? The previous proprietor of a Gotham Metropolis canine shelter is the brand new woman on the group. She’s additionally…properly, us.

“She turns into the viewers’s perspective,” actor Danielle Brooks stated in Podly: The Peacemaker Podcast.

Leota is an peculiar particular person thrown into a rare group of skilled brokers and combatants who’ve taken out numerous unhealthy guys—and a few of the good guys, too. She’s scrambling to maintain up as she’s confronted with one weird factor after one other. She will be able to’t imagine what she’s seeing and asks the questions we’re all asking. It doesn’t matter what’s thrown at her, although, Leota stands her floor and is there when the group wants her.
 

She may be faking it till she makes it, however she doesn’t hand over.

“I do know that I’m not made for this shi*t,” she tells her spouse, however Leota provides it her all anyway. Whereas her duties embrace making dinner reservations and the occasional bribing of witnesses, Leota can deal with herself. She has weapon coaching and acquired fight certification as a young person. And she or he’s a dope wheelman.

She learns rapidly that the job is much more harmful than she anticipated, however she does the whole lot in her energy to again up her group with enthusiasm. If Leota is the viewers surrogate, 99.9% of us would have give up on the primary day, however not her.
 

She treats Peacemaker like an individual—and a good friend.

Leota is the primary member of the group to have a look at the superhero on the squad not as Peacemaker, however Chris Smith. She calls him by his given identify virtually instantly. Leota sees Peacemaker as an individual, flaws and all, and he or she’s keen to spend the time to get to know him. She likes him, and the sensation is mutual. Nicely, with Eagly anyway.

“I belief her probably the most as a result of Eagly preferred her,” Peacemaker says merely.

Not solely does Leota give Peacemaker a sympathetic ear, however she’s additionally not afraid to name him out when he says one thing insensitive and/or offensive. (Normally each.) Together with her assist, Peacemaker can begin to work on being a greater particular person. Now that’s an actual good friend! (Nicely, okay, there was the entire thing with the diary, however we will overlook that. In spite of everything, you strive saying no to Amanda Waller!)

She’s risking the whole lot for her household.

Leota is the rookie who’s on the group only for the paycheck. She might have fibbed to her spouse Keeya by describing the job as merely submitting papers, however they’re each clear about the actual causes she took it. Not solely do Keeya and Leota want the gig to get again on their ft, Leota is on the group on the request of her mom—Amanda Waller.

“You’re the one one I can belief,” the director of Process Drive X tells Leota with uncharacteristic honesty. Secretly on the group as Waller’s eyes and ears, Leota could also be risking her life within the discipline, however her hidden true function proves to be the actual hazard for her. Nonetheless, together with her household’s security and her previous lifestyle at stake, Leota arguably has probably the most to lose of all the Undertaking Butterfly group. Talking of which…

Leota is the center of the group.

She talks, she listens, and he or she provides folks an opportunity. She additionally messes up and needs to make it proper. Leota is the emotional coronary heart of the group. She may be the daughter of Amanda Waller, however that doesn’t make her like Waller.

“Empathy?” asks her mom. “On this enterprise, Leota, that may get you killed.”

Due to her, we see the identical humanity and unhappiness in Peacemaker that she does. He’s a violent vigilante, sure, however he additionally experiences loneliness and remorse. By means of Leota, the viewers sees previous Peacemaker as a caricature and sees him as a substitute as a character.

Compassion is in her nature, and even in a world with the likes of the Flash and large alien starfish, it’s one of many strongest superpowers there’s. Our woman Leota may be peculiar, but it surely’s her empathy that units her aside and makes her keep together with her group when nearly anybody else would have bailed instantly. It’s additionally what makes her my hero.
 

Peacemaker’s first season is now streaming on HBO Max. Are you as smitten by peace as Christopher Smith? Try our official Peacemaker sequence web page!

Kelly Knox writes about all-ages comics and animation for DCComics.com and her writing may also be seen on IGN, Nerdist and extra. Observe her on Twitter at @kelly_knox to speak superheroes, comics and popular culture.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed on this characteristic are solely these of Kelly Knox and don’t essentially mirror these of DC Leisure or Warner Bros.