Peggy faces destruction, death, and difficult decisions in the Agent Carter season 2 finale — but was this really a “Hollywood Ending”?
The importance of Peggy Carter in today’s TV landscape has been discussed at length on the internet and beyond; it’s not a new story. As an active, powerful woman, undeterred from her goals by any obstacle, standing in the center of the frame, Peggy acts as a rejection of the way female characters are (often subconsciously) perceived. Passive. Flighty. Taking little action, owning little agency. This is the identity that Peggy sheds, that Dottie exploits, that Whitney moves the heavens to escape — a veneer. Being merely half.
Unfortunately, those adjectives aren’t a bad way to describe tonight’s finale. “Hollywood Ending” is featherlight, nonchalant, and unconcerned, bringing Agent Carter‘s sophomore season to a mostly (though not entirely) half-measured conclusion.
The scene following Jason’s combustion is as illustrative as any. The waste-management facility may look like a scene of chaotic danger, but any jagged edges are swept up with brisk efficiency. Jason is not only alive, but he has expelled the Zero Matter without a single side-effect — who knew that the equivalent of a sneeze could cure you of deadly, intelligent space slime?
Nor are we treated to a high-stakes transfer of the Zero Matter and its power. The stuff just pools on the floor and the slurps it’s way into Whitney Frost, where it will remain untapped for the rest of the episode. Perhaps Agent Carter‘s special effects budget was drained, because there is no reason for Whitney not to use her power on Peggy and her friends immediately; instead, she waits long enough to be humorously interrupted by Jarvis’s front bumper.
Don’t get me wrong: Lightheartedness is an important part of Agent Carter‘s DNA. Some of the humor in the Agent Carter season 2 finale compliments the theoretical drama well — Howard driving golf balls into the incomprehensible void of Zero Matter particularly stands out — and I couldn’t be happier to have Jason back to his old self.
But nonchalance is a fatal tone for a season (and perhaps series) finale, particularly when coming off of last week’s flawed but genuinely gripping episodes. Jason’s health goes hand-in-hand with Peggy’s newly relaxed attitude toward Whitney Frost. Nuclear bomb or no nuclear bomb, the woman is filled to the brim with Zero Matter — shouldn’t the stakes should be higher than ever? Shouldn’t allying with Joseph Manfredi should be a subject of serious debate and risk? Shouldn’t some meddling person come looking for Vernon Masters?
The answer provided by the Agent Carter season 2 finale is, “Nah.” Peggy and crew causally consider the destruction of the world over breakfast. Jarvis’ life is threatened by a murderous criminal for a joke. And the grand plan to abscond with Whitney’s research is executed by Peggy and Sousa, who — in the dramatic heights of espionage — snap a few pictures in a dark room and flit away with the merest whisper of slapstick mishap.
And so it goes. Were you looking forward to a thrilling standoff between Peggy’s kickass power and Whitney’s brilliant black-gooped madness? I was — but there is no room for such hard-earned drama in “Hollywood Ending.” Instead, Howard’s gamma cannon defeats Agent Carter‘s season-long antagonist like the practice levels of a video game, leaving Whitney shrieking, struggling, and utterly impotent.
The problem is not that Whitney is defeated, but rather how — and that is, easily. The problem is not that Whitney suffers the consequences of her evil, but rather why — and that is, for the purposes of utter reduction. With her power gone and her face restored, Whitney is once again a flat, flawless canvas for the world to ogle and dismiss. “You’ll look pretty in prison,” Thompson grins as he hauls her away.
Away to dream in madness of the husband she murdered, away to be leered at by a man who claims to understand her. In a direct contradiction to Agent Carter‘s professed feminist values, the last shot of Whitney’s storyline is not Whitney at all — but the disappointed gaze of Joseph Manfredi.
Well, this is Hollywood, after all.
That said, if Agent Carter was aiming for a truly cinematic climax to their Zero Matter adventures, it failed. In addition to the easy nullification of Whitney Frost, Peggy’s attempt to rescue Sousa from falling into the rift is visually silly and thematically meaningless. (Using the hover car to blow up the rift from within might be a neat suggestion of Iron Man in The Avengers, if intentional… but even still.)
It pains me to say this as great fan of both Sousa and Enver Gjokaj, but Sousa’s life or death are insufficient stakes for what this scene evidently means. Peggy never comes within spitting range of the vortex, she is never affected by the Zero Matter, and faces no particular struggle in the scene beyond physical effort. There is no conflict, and without conflict, there is no entertainment.
In fact, the whole floaty endeavor seems to serve the singular purpose of proving that Peggy is in love with Sousa — after all, why else would she refuse to consign him to the horrific darkness of Zero Matter? But that argument (which comes from Sousa himself) fails on the grounds of the above qualifications. The Peggy Carter I know would have risked her life ten times over for any man there, but even if I’m wrong, the risk was never great enough to abandon the hope of saving Sousa in the first place.
That’s not to say that it isn’t satisfying to watch Peggy and Sousa’s enthusiastic makeout session at the end of the episode, but the preceding action adds nothing to this denouement. It is, without question, very satisfying, and it would be quite intriguing to see how Peggy and Sousa actually function as a couple amidst the changes in the S.S.R.
And changes certainly are coming. By far the most effective scene in the Agent Carter season 2 finale is the stinger, featuring the assassination of Jack Thompson and the theft of that redacted “M. Carter” file. I’m not just saying this because I have hated Thompson since we first saw his stupid blonde hair — Thompson’s death embodies the best use of the nonchalance which drowns most of the episode. Acting as a careful contrast of brutality and ease, the stinger executes the threat made when Peggy holds her gun on Thompson at the start of the episode — and ignites an inferno of possibilities for Peggy’s embattled future.
But whether or not this future is meant to be, only time will tell. For now, this feels like an oddly fitting way to say goodbye to Jack Thompson. It feels odder to send Sousa, Jason, Ana and Jarvis off like this, and stranger still to bid farewell to Whitney’s potential and Dottie’s skill, and Peggy herself on such an unsteady note.
But hey — I guess that’s Hollywood.