Agent Carter S:01 E:07

Episode Title: SNAFU

Original Airdate: 2-17-15

After the suspenseful cliffhanger last week, the interrogation of Agent Carter’s and the culmination of the bad guys’ plan is what this week’s episode is all about. After being ‘caught in the act’ by fellow S.S.R. Agent Sousa, her whole team came down on her last week and everything since has hit the fan as we countdown to the end of Marvel’s ‘Agent Carter’ miniseries.

A semi montage sequences shows Sousa, Jack and Chief Dooley take out their anger, disappointment and frustration on Carter in the interrogation room. While nicely done, the interrogation lacks any professionalism but reeks of emotional baggage, which even Carter points out. But it’s a good culmination of the pent up tension between all these characters and how they treat her. I guess it was also meant to be amateurish to portray police processes at the time, which may have been crude and impulsive. It’s also a great way to break down those misogyny issues and put Carter on the same playing field as the others, and resolving a plot point that otherwise felt a little dragged out through out.

This episode, entitled ‘Snafu’, also gives us a bit of a vague backstory on the Russian Doctor Ivchenko, who seems to have the power of influence. Apparently his power is that he can hypnotize a man so strongly, that they can have a limb amputated off without any drugs and not feel a thing because their mind is focused elsewhere. This was shown as a flashback of a war scene in Russia. In the present, the doctor seems to be manipulating Dooley to freely roam the S.S.R., for his own purposes.

After Carter is condemned, Jarvis arrives with a hackneyed plan to save her , which blows up in his face, leaving them both in custody. Sadly, Jarvis is this show’s comic relief. As much as I wanted the man who was the inspiration for Iron Man’s Artificial Intelligence butler, and the eventual MCU Vision, to become more badass as the show progressed, he seems relegated to being the joke in every scene. I just hoped there would be more depth to the character given his eventual significance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. While in custody, Carter discovers Ivchenko’s  involvement in something by intercepting a Morse code message from him to Dottie, the Russian sleeper spy played by Bridget Regan. Carter convinces everyone of his involvement, but while Jack and Sousa go off to find Dottie, the doctor’s partner in crime, he takes over Dooley’s mind and steals something of Stark’s from the lab and makes his escape.

This episode is very action packed, but the slower moments come with Dooley. The typical hard-nosed Police Chief archetype is softened as we get some insight into his troubled family life. This weakness is exploited by the doctor to hypnotize him (for lack of a better phrase) under his control and masks his escape by making him wear one of Stark’s experiments: a malfunctioning vest of armor that has been known to explode. With the entire S.S.R. in danger, in a touching moment of self-sacrifice, Dooley gives his life to save the rest of the S.S.R., but not before making Carter promise that she’ll catch the bad guys. It’s one of the most emotional scenes of the show and Shea Wingham infuses so much life to the character that it’s to hard watch as well.

‘Snafu’ delivers the goods in its penultimate episode before the Series Finale next week with great highs and lows, as well as bringing some series wide plot points to a satisfactory resolution like Carter’s vindication among her peers, and the exposure of Leviathan. The episode ends with another screamer of a cliffhanger as Dottie and the Ivchenko commit an act of terrorism by unleashing a gas in a movie theatre that enrages everyone into mass violence resulting in everyone’s death. I really hope that the finale has at least one fight scene between Carter & Dottie.

‘Agent Carter’ is one episode away from the finale, and it’s shaping up to be a good one. While not perfect, the show thus far has been entertaining and light enough to be enjoyable and the content has been unique enough to not draw out too much criticism with its potential connections to the rest of the Franchise or comic books. I have a lot of questions that I need answered by the finale, so tune in next week for the end of ‘Agent Carter’, where I will review the entire Series as a whole as see how right or way off I was about my predictions regarding the series before it started.