Fortnite Deactivates Peacemaker Dance Emote Following Recent Episode: Here’s the Reason


Fortnite has deactivated the Peacemaker dance emote following the airing of the series’ newest episode on Thursday. While the Peaceful Hips emote’s silly choreography may seem harmless initially, Peacemaker’s revelation this week adds fresh significance to the moves, evidently leading Epic Games to reconsider the partnership.

“We’re disabling the Peaceful Hips Emote in Fortnite as we investigate our partner’s creative objectives in this collaborative emote,” the official Fortnite status X account declared over the weekend. “If it’s not returning, we’ll provide refunds in the coming days. Apologies, everyone.”

It appears that the Peaceful Hips Fortnite dance could hold intentional references to deeply offensive symbols, which went unnoticed until Peacemaker’s latest episode clarified them.

Caution, spoilers for Peacemaker follow.

The sixth episode in Peacemaker’s second season, “Ignorance is Chris,” continued to follow the titular vigilante (John Cena) as he sought to escape his dimension to create a new life in an alternate one. However, towards the end of the episode, it was disclosed that Nazi Germany triumphed in World War II in this universe, leading to a reality governed by white supremacists.

Although this twist was kept largely secret, Peacemaker did allude to it in earlier episodes. Most notably, the show hinted at it through the dance Peacemaker performs during the opening credits of the second season. In this sequence, the vigilante bends both arms at right angles in a movement that, in light of last week’s disclosures, now seems to be a purposeful reference to the Nazi swastika.

“Season 2, there’s significantly more of the season’s story in the intro [dance],” Peacemaker choreographer Charissa Barton mentioned in August.

Fortnite’s Peaceful Hips emote was inspired by this dance, imitating the same bent-arm gesture.

The dance move could be interpreted as a clever, subtle nod for Peacemaker viewers in the right context. Unfortunately, it adopts a noticeably different connotation when converted into a Fortnite dance that players can make their characters execute in the competitive first-person shooter. Numerous young players also learn these dances and reproduce them in reality.

Introduced to the game earlier this month, Fortnite’s Peaceful Hips emote was available for purchase in the Item Shop either individually or as part of the Peacemaker Bundle. As of this writing, all Peacemaker items seem to have been removed from the shop; however, all except the Peaceful Hips emote can still be utilized by players who previously owned them.