“Now is not the End”

After watching the Agent Carter Marvel One-Shot for this past Saturday Shorts day, I decided that I would begin a rewatch of Agent Carter’s ABC TV show that ran for two seasons after Captain America: The First Avenger. I remember that series being a lot of fun and ahead of its time.

Peggy Carter is working at the Strategic Scientific Reserve (SSR) in New York City, but the other agents are anything but welcoming. One of the key sections of this series was the inclusion of how men treated women in the mid 40s and how Peggy Carter was not going to take such behavior.

Howard Stark, played in this series by Dominic Cooper, is believed to have sold some of his weapons to enemies of the USA and has become a fugitive, wanted as a traitor. Howard approached Peggy, along with his butler Edwin Jarvis (James D’Arcy), and asked her to investigate this case. He needed her to prove him innocent. Peggy decided to help him, even though helping him might be seen as her turning traitor too.

Peggy is shown as remarkably capable and she is able to retrieve one Stark bomb and disable it. However, it led to the death of her roommate. This scene and the following one of Peggy with Jarvis at the restaurant was pretty strong. Hayley Atwell is an excellent actress and can take the material to another level with her performance.

There is a great chemistry between Peggy and Jarvis, and their bickering and interactions are funny and endear us to the characters immediately. Comic fans knew of Jarvis, since he was the comic book butler for the Avengers and in the MCU is the person whom Tony Stark originally named his AI in his armor.

The show started by highlighting Peggy’s co-worker, Daniel Sousa, who had been wounded in the war and needed a crutch to move around. I have a much more positive memory of Sousa from later when he joined Agents of SHIELD and was matched up with Quake.

This introduction does a great job setting up the series and what is to come.