This show does not stay fixed on one premise for too long. Which keeps the viewers coming back every week. But leaves the show feeling unanchored and unrelated to the larger Marvel/SHIELD storylines. In the first and second episodes, we think it's a MacGuffin/Double Agent show. Then the third episode wraps up the MacGuffins, and kills off one of the most annoying characters. This week introduces another MacGuffin that ends Howard's and Carter's partnership. And each episode teases, some more than others, the existence of a Larger Evil that's coming.
I wish that the show would stop worrying about MacGuffins and get to Leviathan, which is a shadowy prescense in each episode. Each episode makes it seem like the SSR will finally openly confront Leviathan, only to end up stuffing them back in the background. This episode takes the teasing to a new level, as a new Leviathan agent is revealed, and Chief Dooley gets his first big break from the Magic Typewriter. But will they turn out to be stuffed back into the shadows so we can see, once again, how sexist the 1940s were?
I'm as much a fan of exposing history's patriarchy as any feminist. But, even the Mary Tyler Moore Show branched out and showed Mary enjoying the freedoms she had as much as the bullshit she had to overcome. Agent Carter is still obsessed with showing Peggy being dragged two steps back for every step she takes forward in those awesome 1940s heels. Maybe if she wore more sensible shoes, she'd never lose any ground. Just sayin'.
Team Guy Agents continues to make baby steps progress on what they're up against, while Peggy has more information already that she can't share. Chief Dooley reveals himself to be cannier than I thought. On the trail of the Russian identities stolen by his two enemies, he decides to confront a Nazi Colonel who may have killed the original Russians and confirm that they did die. Thompson thinks it's a pointless base-covering exercise, but supports it because it enables him to be temporary Chief and make everyone but Carter do double overtime. The job of a substitute is to make people grateful when the real boss returns.
Sousa decides that it's time to make good on the bitter words he gave Carter last episode, and spends his overtime working on what he thinks is a witness to the discovery of Howard's merch. Sousa, cane and limp and all, literally strikes a blow for handi-capable people by dropping a homeless drunk who won't cooperate when he asks questions about the night of the bust. He suspects that the man, who is dressed in his old war uniform, saw something and is lying about it, because otherwise the guy would have just said he saw nothing and let it go. Instead, Homeless Witness simply doesn't want to talk to cops.
Sousa uses his cane to drop the man, holding it against the man's neck and somehow dragging him into his car and to the SSR for questioning. Thompson is confused by Sousa's move, totally doubting that the man even saw anything or would tell Sousa if he did. Sousa tries playing Good Cop by comparing his physical war injuries with Homeless Man's psychological ones. He wants the guy to see that he's among people who "get" him, but Homeless Man tells him to check his privilege. In the end, it's Thompson who gets Homeless Man to talk, but not with his trusty Stick. He simply baits the witness with food and booze, and happily hands the whole thing over in return for finding out that two people, a fancy-looking man and brunette woman, were at the docks that night before the SSR. Sousa is crushed he can't link the blonde in the photo to Howard's merch. Thompson appreciates Sousa's efforts, but thinks it was a waste of time anyway.
Chief Dooley founds out from Colonel Mueller that the Germans didn't kill a single Russian at a place called Fennel, where the original Russians died. Instead, the Nazis came upon a massacre that seemed to have no explanation. Chief Dooley ended up getting more mystery than answers, but reveals that he's pretty clever at manipulating Nazis into thinking they're getting a painless death while leaving them to hang after all.
Carter and Jarvis work together to make sure a certain package is smuggled back into the States successfully, and only for the agree-upon price. Howard Stark is back! He spent his trip back playing pool in a cargo container. He spends the car ride in NYC hunkered down in the back seat, with Carter realizing at the last minute that his home is surrounded by SSR agents. Here's a clue. If you can see them, they can see you. They can see that you're with Stark's butler, in a car at night. And they can see you turning for the detour. How they didn't get pulled over is anyone's guess.
Carter decides the only safe place to stash Stark is right under her landlady's nose. When Miriam Fry finds her in the laundry room, playing with the dumbwaiter after shoving Stark in it, Miriam can't contain her glee as she insists on making sure Carter goes to her floor and opens the dumbwaiter for inspection, only to find it empty. Carter is relieved until she realizes what that means, and once Miriam is gone, she has to find which woman Stark is hiding out with. Stark will spend the episode really enjoying his stay at the Griffith.
Stark has another mission for her: find out if the SSR really has the rest of his merch. Which Carter can do with his super duper camera pen. It's awesome, and I can't figure out why no one's actually made one in real life in 2015. And it works perfectly when Carter uses it the next day in the lab, while supposedly taking a lab tech's lunch order. And Carter and Howard have fun developing the pictures in a makeshift photo lab in Carter's room, which somehow got a red light. Howard confirms that the SSR really does have all his stuff, which makes him sound mildly disappointed. After all, he claimed in the first episode that even the good guys shouldn't have this stuff. Carter is sympathetic, especially when he says it's imperative that one of his Bad Babies be shut down and replaced with a fake, so Howard can hold on to a small globe that could cut all of Manhattan's power.
Carter is willing to go along, but she's a little skeptical- why does Stark worry so much about something that will just cut the power off, even if it's for a while? When Jarvis gives her a lift to SSR Headquarters, she tries asking him if Stark is keeping something from her, and his nervous tell gives her all the reason she needs. While successfully retrieving it secretly during her overtime shift, she decides to risk activating it by pressing the button Stark insisted would plunge Manhattan into darkness. Instead, the lights stay on, a compartment opens, and Carter plucks out a small vial of a blood-looking liquid. And realizes Stark's been playing his own game. And she's been his playing piece.
She would love to angrily confront Stark, but before she can, Thompson decides that belittling Sousa isn't enough, and wants her to go home and leave the hard work to the guys. Instead of sexist jokes, he simply tells her that he can't possibly understand why she bothers trying to be a real agent, because the SSR is never going to treat her like one. Carter doesn't really have an answer for him, as there's really no joke that can respond to being told you're wasting your life. So, when she arrives back at the Griffith, peels Howard away from whatever resident he's canoodling with now, she maybe gives him what she'd like to give Thompson.
Stark can tell she's mad, and would love to evade telling her what's in the vial, but Carter won't let it go, and when she find's out it's her Captain Rogers' blood, she lets loose against Stark. Stark claims to want it for research into vaccines, as if he knows anything about developing them. Carter isn't having it; she won't hand it over, and she won't let Stark, in any way, profit from his experiments with Captain Rogers. She ends up throwing Stark out, telling him it's on him to get out undetected. He does, but he can't resist sending Jarvis to waylay her the next morning and try to get Carter back on his side.
It fails, with Carter almost as angry at Jarvis as she is at Stark. And to make it worse, Jarvis can't even enjoy a shoe shine without Stark telling him to keep at it. Stark still needs her for Operation Secret Lying Stuff. And by the way, Stark, if Stan Lee asks nicely for the Sports Section, don't be a dick when you hand it to him. He's fucking Stan Lee.
And now, for our Leviathan teases. The first happens when one of the smugglers who made Stark's return possible is unhappy that his goons didn't manage to collect the extra money. He shoots them nonchalantly, and goes on to do his own collecting. Blondie manages to get into the Griffith (is Miriam Fry even trying to catch these guys? I thought Houdini couldn't even do this), and on to Carter's floor, somehow knowing it was her, but he's met in the hallway by new resident Dottie, home from ballet practice. And, somehow, totally not scared of Blondie or his automatic pistol. Instead she leaps all over him and the walls, quickly knocking him to the ground and taking his gun for herself. Sisters doing it for themselves.
Carter decides that Stark is right about one thing. No one, not even the good guys, should have Captain Roger's blood. In fact, it should live in Carter's wall, which she punches a hole in and seals back up while we see Dottie wonder at her new toy, while it's former owner lies, dead and certainly starting to smell by now, under her bed. Maybe he'll be the body rotting at the bottom of the dumbwaiter instead of Stark.
Chief Dooley returns from Europe. He chit chats with Thompson, and the office looks otherwise empty. Is the double overtime over for now? Maybe, because Thompson has a new piece of the puzzle to show for the agents' work: some travel record that shows Stark has returned to the States. Dooley and Thompson share a moment savoring his capture before Thompson leaves Dooley alone. Which means, that Dooley is the only one who hears the Magic Typewriter come to life and the keys typing on their own. Mr. Green's employers are making contact. He doesn't react, only stares ominously as he realizes that their might be worse things than Nazis, and that those worse things have a communicator in his headquarters.
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