| 1 | [[quoteright:315:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/1c8dd69a674d8bb093be85ef6d46920e.png]] |
| 2 | [-[[caption-width-right:315:While [[ComicBook/CaptainAmerica the star-spangled man with a plan]] is away, the red, white, and blue lady shall defend the USA.]]-] |
| 3 | |
| 4 | ->'''Hugh Jones:''' I didn't know our government had such good taste in secretaries. What's your name, darling?\ |
| 5 | '''Peggy Carter:''' ''Agent''. |
| 6 | |
| 7 | ''Agent Carter'' is a television series set in the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse. It stars Creator/HayleyAtwell as ComicBook/PeggyCarter, a British officer of the Strategic Scientific Reserve and co-founder of ComicBook/{{SHIELD}} who was professionally and romantically involved with [[ComicBook/CaptainAmerica Steve Rogers]] during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII in ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger''. Supporting cast includes Creator/DominicCooper as Howard Stark, [[Creator/{{James DArcy}} James D'Arcy]] as Edwin Jarvis, Creator/ChadMichaelMurray, Creator/EnverGjokaj, Creator/SheaWhigham, Creator/LyndsyFonseca and Creator/BridgetRegan. |
| 8 | |
| 9 | It is 1946, a year after the end of the war and the disappearance of Captain America. Thousands of trained men and women have come home from fighting, looking for a new place to use their skills. One of those is Peggy, still despondent after the loss of Steve and hampered from getting a better job by the misogyny of the times. But in between tedious office work for the SSR, she is contacted by her old friend Howard Stark, eventual father of [[ComicBook/IronMan Tony Stark]], who needs her help in clearing his name and finding whoever is stealing his restricted weapons. Accompanied by his butler Edwin Jarvis, Peggy puts her skills to the test, beating up bad guys and laying the foundation of S.H.I.E.L.D. itself. |
| 10 | |
| 11 | In Season 2, the setting shifts to 1947's southern California, with Peggy uncovering a new conspiracy while working for the new Los Angeles SSR branch. D'Arcy as Jarvis and Cooper as Stark return, along with new castmembers Creator/WynnEverett as Whitney Frost, Creator/LotteVerbeek as Ana Jarvis, and Creator/ReggieAustin as Jason Wilkes. |
| 12 | |
| 13 | The series was initially tested out with a [[Film/MarvelOneShots Marvel One-Shot]] [[Film/AgentCarter short of the same name]] released with the ''Film/IronMan3'' Blu-Ray in fall 2013. The executive producers of the show were [[Series/{{Reaper}} Michele Fazekas and Tara Butters]], Steve [=McFeely=] and Christopher Marcus (writers of the ''Captain America'' movies), and Creator/JephLoeb. |
| 14 | |
| 15 | The first season, consisting of eight episodes, aired from January 6 to February 24, 2015, while the second season, consisting of 10 episodes, aired from January 19 to March 1, 2016. The series was cancelled on May 12, 2016 after its second season. Although numerous plot points[[note]]such as who shot Thompson and why they wanted the redacted dossier on "M. Carter", and the fate of Dottie Underwood after her escape[[/note]] have as such never been resolved, we do learn some of what happened to Peggy and Howard after the events of the show in ''Film/CaptainAmericaCivilWar'' and ''Film/AvengersEndgame''. |
| 16 | ---- |
| 17 | !! ''Agent Carter'' contains examples of: |
| 18 | |
| 19 | [[foldercontrol]] |
| 20 | |
| 21 | [[folder:A-D]] |
| 22 | * ActingUnnatural: |
| 23 | ** After a botched attempt to get some risky files out of a coworker's desk, Peggy pretends that nothing's the matter by eating a scone with her legs up on her desk, completely at odds with her usual proper demeanor. |
| 24 | ** The SSR agents who clear out the automat in "A Sin To Err" continue to act like customers, perusing the menu and sitting down, even though the suddenly near-empty restaurant is a huge tipoff that something's about to happen. |
| 25 | * ActionGirl: Agent Carter, of course. From officer in the British armed forces to Agent/Co-Founder of S.H.I.E.L.D, and with [[LadyOfWar impeccable sense of grace]] and fashion to boot. |
| 26 | * ActionHeroine: Peggy Carter. Throwing punches and shooting guns are her preferred ways of beating her enemies in the course of her secret agent work. |
| 27 | * AdaptationalAttractiveness: |
| 28 | ** James [=D'Arcy=]'s portrayal of Jarvis is a good sight better looking than the portly, balding man from the comics. This version is several decades younger. |
| 29 | ** Whitney Frost in the comics started off as a beautiful woman, but was disfigured in a plane crash. Here, no such thing happened. |
| 30 | * AdaptationalHeroism: |
| 31 | ** Roger Dooley, whose comic counterpart is a creep who had ComicBook/SheHulk strip searched for his own enjoyment, is portrayed here as AFatherToHisMen and a ReasonableAuthorityFigure. it doesn’t stop him using the titular character as a glorified gofer, when anyone who is not using her gender against her knows she could probably out shoot and out fight every single guy in that office. |
| 32 | ** In his single comics appearance, (a "weird science" type story in ''Tales of Suspense'' #25), Jason Wilkes plans to sell his inventions to the DirtyCommies. His live action counterpart is briefly framed for this [[spoiler:and later temporarily throws his lot in with Whitney out of desperation]], but is a good guy. |
| 33 | * AdaptationalWimp: In-universe with the [[ShowWithinAShow radio show]]. Peggy's character [[{{Chickification}} is reduced to]] being a DamselInDistress nurse who keeps getting kidnapped by Nazis. She is naturally irritated. |
| 34 | * AffablyEvil: Joseph Manfredi [[spoiler:(Hydra's Blackwing, in the comics)]] is very chipper and personable in spite of being a murderous mobster who might beat you to death if you cross him. |
| 35 | * AffectionateNickname: Both Colleen and Howard call Peggy "Peg." Angie calls her "English." Dum Dum suggests giving Peggy the nickname of "Miss Union Jack", but she disagrees. |
| 36 | * AllWomenAreLustful: Well, maybe ''not'' all women, but some women in Griffith Hotel clearly take ''pride'' at their ability to smuggle men to their room under the landlady's nose. They even ''congratulate'' each other if they succeeded. At least three of them are shown smuggling men on-screen, with two of them being Howard Stark's brief flings (and he implied there are more). |
| 37 | * AlliterativeFamily: The siblings Michael and Margaret 'Peggy' Carter. |
| 38 | * AlmostDeadGuy: Unfortunately Brannis's voice synthesizer is broken. So he draws a clue in the dirt next to him. |
| 39 | * AlternateCharacterInterpretation: Peggy observes InUniverse that the men of the SSR see her the way they ''want'' to see her and not as she actually is -- Dooley saw her as "a stray kitten" left on his doorstep that needed sheltering, Thompson saw her as "a secretary turned damsel", etc. Basically, everyone saw her as this fragile English rose that needed protecting when in truth she is twice the badass they are -- something Peggy ultimately ended up using to her advantage in her own quest to learn the truth about Howard Stark's alleged crimes, since, as she notes, everyone acts like she's "invisible" unless she's got (their) coffee, (their) lunch or reports (they asked for). Even Sousa, who came closest to respecting her abilities, saw her as "the girl on the pedestal", rather than an actual person. (And when he stops putting her on a pedestal she's "transformed into a daft whore"). |
| 40 | * AmazonBrigade: Leviathan's Black Widow program. |
| 41 | * AnachronisticSoundtrack: The first episode opens with "That Man" by Caro Emerald. The episode is set in 1947 but the song is from 2010. |
| 42 | * AndStarring: Shea Whigham (Chief Dooley) in the OBB. Creator/DominicCooper (Howard Stark) always gets billed under the "Special Guest Star" citation separated from the regular guest cast list every time he appears. |
| 43 | * AnyoneCanDie: Peggy and Howard Stark are protected (see DoomedByCanon[=/=]SavedByCanon) because we already know their post-1946 fates. Anyone else is fair game. Examples include: [[spoiler:Colleen, Krzemenski, Yauch, and most shockingly, Chief Dooley who's [[DeadStarWalking billed as a regular]] but dies in the penultimate episode.]] |
| 44 | * ApologeticAttacker: Peggy apologizes profusely before attacking Thompson in order to run away. |
| 45 | -->'''Peggy:''' I'm so sorry, Jack. |
| 46 | * ArcVillain: Dr. Fennhoff for the Season 1. He masterminded the theft of Howard Stark's inventions and framed Howard for the sale of his dangerous tech on the black market as revenge because Howard invented the chemical that killed his brother. |
| 47 | * ArtisticLicenseHistory: Many historical inaccuracies can be found in the show. |
| 48 | ** When Peggy is crossing the street in the first episode, a train of R32 "Brightliner" cars is visible in the background... in 1946. New York did not see R32s in their subway lines until 1964. |
| 49 | ** When the SSR goes through fake passports with combined movie director names, the stack includes "[[Creator/FedericoFellini Federico]] [[Creator/RobertoRossellini Rossellini]]" as one of the names. Roberto ''might'' have been notable enough for a European to include him as an alias, but it'd be at least a year from the presumed setting for Fellini to be on enough radars to be on a non-Italian's fake passport. |
| 50 | ** The battle of Finow is said to have been fought in "spring 1944" in Germany between German and Soviet forces. This is several months before the first Red Army troops actually entered Germany. |
| 51 | ** In "The Iron Ceiling" Dooley makes a reference to the Vice President of the United States calling him for updates. There was no Vice President in 1946--[[UsefulNotes/HarryTruman Truman]] had succeeded to the White House in 1945 and, since [[TwentyFifthAmendment the 25th Amendment]] did not exist, the post remained vacant until the next election and Alben Barkley's swearing-in in 1949. |
| 52 | ** Also in "The Iron Ceiling", the "Black Widow" trainees are shown learning to speak English from watching ''WesternAnimation/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs'' in 1937. That movie first premiered to a limited audience on December 21, 1937 (It was not released for general distribution until February 1938). It seems unlikely that the Russians would be able to acquire the movie, approve it for use as a training tool, and get it ready for said use in a matter of ten days. |
| 53 | ** InUniverse, the Captain America Adventure Hour has little interest in portraying the adventures of the titular hero accurately. Even setting aside the little detail of Cap's girlfriend on the show having nothing in common with his real girlfriend beyond a similar name, one episode of the show had him single-handedly saving units in the Pacific when he spent his entire Army career fighting HYDRA in Europe. If Cap was around to listen to that show, he'd probably be turning in his icy grave. |
| 54 | ** The periodic tables in the series' various labs have 15 or so elements too many. They are so modern that they feature copernicum (Cn), which was only given a symbol in 2010, whereas a periodic table from 1946 wouldn't even have ''plutonium''. |
| 55 | * AscendedExtra: In the comics, Peggy Carter was little more than a SatelliteLoveInterest to Captain America. Then she gained a major role in ''Captain America: The First Avenger'', and now the star of her own series. Adding to that, the same could said about the one shot; it was solely created to bridge what happened to Peggy after the war, but the fanbase loved the one shot so much they wanted to see more about Peggy Carter and her involvement in the creation of S.H.I.E.L.D. |
| 56 | * AsLongAsItSoundsForeign: [[http://far-eviler.deviantart.com/art/That-awkward-moment-2mins-into-Agent-Carter-S01E03-507866026 The symbols in the book]] Peggy reads in Episode 3, ''Cryptology Semiotics'', don't correspond to any real life runes. Instead [[http://far-eviler.deviantart.com/art/Tattoo-Runes-I-89820280 they're actually fake ones]] made for ''Literature/TheMortalInstruments''. |
| 57 | * AssholeVictim: In order to get a vantage point for sniping, [[spoiler:Dottie]] goes to a dentist's office under the pretext of a job interview. The Dentist is a sleazy creep who seems to have been planning to [[CastingCouch persuade her to have sex with him in order to get the job]] and perhaps would have outright tried to assault her, given that the "interview" was being conducted in an empty office at the end of the day. [[spoiler:Dottie]] was definitely planning on killing him from the outset, but his behavior may have played a role in the [[CruelAndUnusualDeath manner in which she killed him]]. |
| 58 | * BadassInANiceSuit: |
| 59 | ** Every SSR agent, and Leviathan Agents as well. It's the uniform. |
| 60 | ** Peggy herself usually counts too, whether it's a pants suit or something else. |
| 61 | * BatmanGambit: Sousa's [[spoiler:use of earplugs before fighting Fennhoff. It gives the bad doctor the impression that he can use his hypnotism, which allows Sousa to get close enough to punch him out.]] |
| 62 | * BattleButler: |
| 63 | ** Jarvis is well and truly capable of assisting Mr.Stark when it comes to mixing drinks as well as underworld dealings and investigation. Howard loans him to Peggy in the pilot. The second season reveals that he's studied boxing, judo and fencing, apparently in hopes of being useful in another adventure. He's certainly not as hardened or skilled in a fight as most examples of this trope, but he does come through when it counts. |
| 64 | ** Even one of the telephone switchboard girls of the SSR is shown to have a pistol hidden under her desk. |
| 65 | * BavarianFireDrill: Peggy poses as a New York Health Inspector to investigate the dairy factory for the truck with the explosives. |
| 66 | * BeenThereShapedHistory: The Council of Nine in season 2 organized the Wall Street crash of 1929, triggering TheGreatDepression, and it's implied they're behind a lot of other historical events. |
| 67 | * BerserkButton: Manfredi will beat you to death with his bare hands if you say something even unintentionally disparaging about his true love, Whitney Frost. |
| 68 | * BigBad: |
| 69 | ** Season 1: [[spoiler:Dr. Ivchenko, real name Johann Fennhoff]], a Leviathan agent who orchestrated the theft of Howard Stark’s inventions. |
| 70 | ** Season 2: Whitney Frost, the genius wife of one of the members of the secret society known as the Council of Nine. [[spoiler:She gains powers after becoming corrupted by Zero Matter and overthrows them, planning to create a rift that would allow more Zero Matter to invade our reality]]. |
| 71 | * BitchSlap: Jarvis and Peggy have to question Howard Stark's ex-girlfriends, who don't hold back at expressing their outrage over TheCasanova who loved and left them. Cue Jarvis getting repeatedly slapped in the face as a handy surrogate for his boss. When Peggy intercepts one slap, he gets kicked in the shin instead. Averted when Peggy herself gets angry at Howard; she flat-out punches him. |
| 72 | * BlackAndGrayMorality: Other than Carter herself, the SSR folks are by-and-large chauvinistic {{Inspector Javert}}s who will often use [[JackBauerInterrogationTechnique ethically questionable]] tactics when questioning witnesses; meanwhile, Howard Stark and Jarvis will often keep secrets from others, including Peggy. On the other hand, the Leviathan organization is clearly, unambiguously evil (or at least [[DirtyCommunist the worst possible depiction of a Soviet agency]]), but its leader turns out to have moralistic motives behind their murders. |
| 73 | * BlackDudeDiesFirst: Spider Raymond is the first corpse in the pilot episode. |
| 74 | * BondOneLiner: After Spider Raymond forcefully kisses Peggy and is knocked out instantly by her poisoned lipstick: |
| 75 | -->'''Peggy:''' Well, that was a bit premature. |
| 76 | * BreadEggsMilkSquick: When Angie introduces Peggy to the residents of the Griffith: |
| 77 | -->'''Angie:''' That's Mary; She's a legal secretary at Goodman, Kurtzberg, and Holliway. |
| 78 | -->'''Angie:''' Evelyn is a lounge singer at a club in midtown. |
| 79 | -->'''Angie:''' That's Sarah. She's a slut. |
| 80 | * BreakoutCharacter: Peggy Carter. From SatelliteLoveInterest in the comics, to the first female lead in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. |
| 81 | * BrickJoke: |
| 82 | ** It's an open secret that Krzeminski cheats on his wife, and when he tries to get a night off to take "[his] girl" to a movie, Carter asks if he's taking his wife or his girlfriend. When he's killed, Chief Dooley goes to call his wife. Thompson says he'll call his girlfriend. |
| 83 | ** In the Season 1 finale, after a long string of incorrect guesses, [[spoiler:Howard finally remembers that "Dottie" was calling herself "Ida" during their one-night stand]]... well after that information was worth anything. |
| 84 | * BriefAccentImitation: |
| 85 | ** Peggy adopts [[FakeAmerican an American accent]] whenever she goes "undercover". |
| 86 | ** Jarvis has a much more inept go at this when calling in the tip to SSR, to keep them from recognizing his voice. |
| 87 | ** [[spoiler:Dottie]] uses a fake American accent in her undercover identity. |
| 88 | * BringTheAnchorAlong: In the second episode, Peggy defeats an accomplice of a Leviathan agent but knocked him out cold before he could be interrogated. She ties him to a chair and leaves, and he's found later by the SSR fleeing out in the road with the chair still tied to him. Chief Dooley, after arresting him, snarks at the guy trying to play it casual. |
| 89 | -->'''Dooley:''' Yeah, I know. I used to go for walks at night with a chair strapped to my ass too. |
| 90 | * ButForMeItWasTuesday: A heroic version: By the second season, Howard Stark can't remember who [[spoiler:Dottie Underwood]] is. When Peggy and Jarvis remind him that she's the girl who ''kidnapped him at gunpoint'', it still doesn't ring a bell. |
| 91 | * CacophonyCoverUp: Peggy turns up her radio so that she can safely hammer a hole into the wall to hide [[spoiler:the vial of Steve's blood.]] |
| 92 | * CallForward: |
| 93 | ** In "Time and Tide", Jarvis mentions an incident in [[Film/TheAvengers2012 Budapest]]. |
| 94 | ** There are two references to ''Film/IronMan2''. In the first episode Howard Stark is HauledBeforeASenateSubcommittee regarding his weapons. In the last one he attends a press conference where he's praised as a hero by a government official who hates his guts. |
| 95 | ** Jarvis says he has no desire to spend the rest of his life as a disembodied voice, foreshadowing J.A.R.V.I.S. from the ''Iron Man'' films. |
| 96 | ** Dottie says she [[MasterOfDisguise might become an SSR agent next]]. This is a reference to ComicBook/BlackWidow doing the same. She also seduces Howard Stark for information like Black Widow did to Tony Stark in the comics. |
| 97 | ** Sousa strikes upon a method of dealing with Dr. Ivchenko's CompellingVoice, by plugging his ears and pretending to be under his control, would be copied [[Series/JessicaJones2015 70 years]] later by Trish Walker. |
| 98 | * CampfireCharacterExploration: The fifth episode has the Howling Commandos, Peggy, and the other SSR agents hold a campfire and share war stories before their mission. Thompson, up until now depicted only as a bully, also shares the story of how he got his WWII medal, though he's not entirely truthful about it, having found out later that the enemy soldiers he had "saved" his troops from were actually surrendering. |
| 99 | * CardboardBoxOfUnemployment: Invoked and then downplayed. Peggy is told to pack her things after the SSR catches wind of her vigilante investigation and fires her. However, she was given so few responsibilities from her sexist coworkers that there isn't much to pack. |
| 100 | * CassandraTruth: Initially people don't listen to Peggy because she's a woman. Then they don't listen to her because she's been undermining the agency, conducting an independent and unauthorized investigation, for which she's been arrested. However, she does manage to convince them that she's serious when she says she spotted a [[TheMole mole]] in the organization, and go to investigate. |
| 101 | * CastingGag: |
| 102 | ** In the Japanese dub, it's not the first time Creator/MieSonozaki (Peggy Carter) has played a [[VideoGame/StreetFighterIV secret agent]] before. |
| 103 | ** Both Dominic Cooper and James D'Arcy have played ''Franchise/JamesBond'' author Ian Fleming. |
| 104 | * CharacterDeath: |
| 105 | ** Agent Krzeminski is murdered in [[Recap/AgentCarterS1E3TimeAndTide "Time and Tide"]] by a Leviathan assassin. |
| 106 | ** {{Red Shirt}}s Agent Li and Junior Juniper in [[Recap/AgentCarterS1E5TheIronCeiling "The Iron Ceiling"]] and Agent Yauch in [[Recap/AgentCarterS1E6ASinToErr "A Sin to Err"]]. |
| 107 | ** [[spoiler:Chief Dooley as a SacrificialLion]] at the end of "SNAFU", after [[spoiler:Ivchenko forces him to put on an explosively malfunctioning vest of Stark's design in the middle of the SSR offices]]. |
| 108 | * ChekhovsBoomerang: The SSR photgraphs Peggy while she's disguised as a blonde at ''La Martinque'', and she spends part of the second episode trying to steal the photos before learning that they're all from the back. Unfortunately, though, they still provide evidence in later episodes when [[spoiler:Sousa is informed the woman in the photo actually has brown hair, and then sees scars on Peggy's shoulder that match those on the picture.]] |
| 109 | * ChekhovsGun: |
| 110 | ** In the ContrastMontage that opens the series, we're shown a close-up of two bullet scars in Peggy's shoulder. This proves significant for the ChekhovsBoomerang above. |
| 111 | ** When escaping from the Roxxon refinery, the bumper of Jarvis's car is ripped off. [[spoiler:It's later found again in the debris clump, leading the SSR to track down its license plate.]] |
| 112 | * {{Chickification}}: InUniverse example. In the ''[[ShowWithinAShow Captain America Adventure Hour]]'', Peggy is turned into Betty Carver, a triage nurse and generic DamselInDistress. |
| 113 | * ChildrenAreInnocent: Peggy is a firm believer of this, even stopping Dum Dum from killing a child with a hand grenade, even after said child is shown to be a cold-blooded assassin who killed one of the Howling Commandos and later shoots one of the SSR agents in the back. Then again, a grenade would have alerted every single guard in the base to their presence. |
| 114 | * ClearTheirName: Peggy embarks on a mission to prove Howard is not a traitor. |
| 115 | * ClothFu: Peggy uses a piece of white cloth when fighting against [[spoiler:Dottie]] in the finale, to tangle her arms and keep her from using her knife. |
| 116 | * CombatPragmatist: Peggy will use whatever is at hand to take down opponents, many of whom are much larger than she is. She takes down one goon with a stapler and it apparently takes a while before doctors can remove all the staples she put into the guy's face. |
| 117 | * ComicBookMoviesDontUseCodeNames: |
| 118 | ** Although the advertising for the episode called the Russian ChildSoldier group "the Black Widow program", it is never referred to as such in the episode itself. |
| 119 | ** Averted with the Howling Commandos. Ramirez excitedly calls them that, though Sawyer hates the name, despite fellow teammate Pinky thinking it up. Each member of the Commandos has their own codename, including "Dum Dum", "Happy", "Pinky", and "Junior". Dugan even offers to give Peggy her own codename, "Miss Union Jack". |
| 120 | ** In real life, Peggy never refers to Steve as Captain America but her fictionalized counterpart, in the ShowWithinAShow, Betty, only ever refers to Cap as "Captain America." |
| 121 | ** [[spoiler:Johann Fennhoff goes by his real name or Dr. Ivchenko, never "Doctor Faustus".]] |
| 122 | * CompromisingCall: While Peggy is investigating the Roxxon factory, Mr. Jarvis calls her on his walkie-talkie. This alerts the workers to her presence, which ultimately leads to a truck of [[MadeOfExplodium Nitramine]] escaping and to the implosion of the factory. |
| 123 | * ContinuityNod: Has [[ContinuityNod/AgentCarter its own page]]. |
| 124 | * ContinuitySnarl: The flashback of Agent Carter action scenes at the beginning of the first episode includes some scenes from the [[Film/MarvelOneShots Agent Carter Marvel One-Shot]]. However, the One Shot has been said to take place after this series, which would mean its clips Peggy flashbacked to were from the future... |
| 125 | ** It should also be noted that season 2 is said to take place in 1947 and shows that Peggy is still working for the SSR. However, the one-shot is said to take place a year after the events of ''The First Avenger'' (1946) and shows Peggy leaving the SSR to start up S.H.I.E.L.D. along with Howard Stark. |
| 126 | * ContrastMontage: Peggy's MorningRoutine in peacetime is contrasted with her kicking ass and taking names during UsefulNotes/WorldWarII. |
| 127 | * TheCoronerDothProtestTooMuch: At the beginning of the second episode, we see an obituary stating a woman "died suddenly in her bed". Those who saw the first episode know she did die in her bed all right, and it was sudden... but it involved a bullet in the middle of her forehead. |
| 128 | * CostumePorn: 40's style. |
| 129 | -->'''[[https://twitter.com/HayleyAtwell/status/509389208604389376 Hayley Atwell]]:''' Handmade hats and buttons imported from UsefulNotes/{{Paris}}. 1946 tailored dresses and suits. So elegant. |
| 130 | * CovertGroupWithMundaneFront: |
| 131 | ** As far as all of Peggy's civilian acquaintances are concerned, she works for the Bell Phone Company, which host the SSR New York Office. |
| 132 | ** The Auberbach Theatrical Agency serves as front for the SSR LA Office. |
| 133 | ** The Arena Club is a male only social club for wealthy individuals and serves as front for the meetings of [[spoiler:the Council of Nine]]. |
| 134 | * CreatorCameo: At the end of "The Blitzkrieg Bomb", Jarvis sits down next to Howard Stark at a shoeshine booth. The person at the other end? Creator/StanLee. |
| 135 | * CrocodileTears: Angie uses these on [[spoiler:the SSR when helping Peggy escape.]] |
| 136 | * CurbStompBattle: [[spoiler:Dottie]] kills [[spoiler:Mr. Mink]] by snapping his neck before he even has time to fire his gun. |
| 137 | * CutShort: In the wake of the show's {{Cancellation}}, several plot threads are left at least partially unresolved, including [[spoiler:who shot Jack, why, and if he survived]]; the full potential and implications of Zero Matter; [[spoiler:Dottie]] still at large; the mystery of the Arena Club pin; if [[spoiler:Daniel Sousa]] is in fact Peggy's future husband; what was in [[spoiler:the M. Carter file (and which Carter it referred to)]]; and perhaps most importantly of all, the actual founding of S.H.I.E.L.D. |
| 138 | * CyanidePill: Dooley offers Colonel Mueller this if he gives info about what happened in the Battle of Finow. [[spoiler:It turns out to be a breath mint.]] |
| 139 | * DarkActionGirl: [[spoiler:Dottie.]] Unlike Peggy, an SSR agent, [[spoiler:Dottie is a professional assassin and graduate of the Black Widow program.]] |
| 140 | * DarkerAndEdgier: |
| 141 | ** The blatant sexism present in ''The First Avenger'' to a much less obvious extent receives a dramatic increase for the series. |
| 142 | ** The show's visual style is also darker. ''First Avenger'' had a very warm look, with lots of golden lighting and soft focus to make things look friendly and heroic. In ''Agent Carter'' the lighting is cooler and the lens sharper, throwing everything into contrast. |
| 143 | ** Several events in the series up to the penultimate episode are darker than anything to go down in the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse ''in its entirety'', with possibly the most disturbing thing yet being [[spoiler:the brief glimpses of the horrific murder-orgy that followed Item 17 being deployed in a theater room.]] |
| 144 | * DeathBySecretIdentity: The guard at the ''Heartbreak'' who Agent Carter beat up is hauled away by Agent Kreminski, but just when he's about to go into detail about the dark-haired British woman who attacked him, [[spoiler:they're both assassinated by Black Widow.]] |
| 145 | * DeathGlare: Peggy gives a lot of these, such as her long DeathGlare at the radio playing "The Captain America Adventure Hour" at the beginning of the second episode. |
| 146 | * DeathSeeker: Jarvis implies that Peggy has a death wish and this is why she takes so many risks and refuses any and all effort at help or association. |
| 147 | * DeliberateValuesDissonance: |
| 148 | ** While ''First Avenger'' had some brief cases of period racism and sexism, they were generally downplayed in favor of a nostalgic past. Here, though, it's made clear that the 40s had plenty of backwards ethics. |
| 149 | ** Casual sexism abounds, especially at Peggy's and Angie's workplaces. Highlighted in the second episode in the contrast between Peggy's asskicking and the recurring radio soap about the adventures of Captain America, where "Betty Carver" is a nurse and generic DamselInDistress. |
| 150 | ** SSR agents have absolutely no problem [[JackBauerInterrogationTechnique beating the crap out of a suspect when he won't cooperate]]. |
| 151 | ** Jarvis once risked jail time and a charge of treason for helping a Jewish woman (his future wife, Anna, in fact) escape Europe. It involved illegal forgery of official government papers. |
| 152 | ** "The Blitzkrieg Button": |
| 153 | *** Howard Stark points out that he grew up in a world filled with economic, class, religious, and gender discrimination. |
| 154 | *** Thompson straight up asks Peggy why she stays with the SSR, because [[DudeWheresMyRespect no man will ever see her as an equal]]. He even tells her that she's upsetting the natural order of things. He's not entirely wrong, but pretty darn close. |
| 155 | ** "The Iron Ceiling": Peggy butts heads to get on the mission to Russia, explaining her fluency in everything Russian (both tactically and linguistically) because she lived through it for three years during the war, and she receives nothing but complaints and condescension until the chief lets her go on the mission. The men on the SSR field team, including Thompson, finally begin changing their tune when Dum Dum Dugan -- who they regard with awe for his service alongside Captain America in WWII -- and the other Howling Commandos readily defer to Peggy's decisions, with Dugan pointing out that she served with Cap longer than any of them. |
| 156 | ** Season 2 breaks the ice on racism with Dr. Jason Wilkes, a self-made black physicist who grew up in a poor family of Southern California farm workers and had trouble finding a job after the war since scientific laboratories were unwilling to hire a black man. Detective Henry calls him "the janitor" after their first meeting, and at one point, when he and Peggy go into a diner to use a telephone, the proprietor assumes [[ScaryBlackMan she's in danger]] and calls Wilkes "boy". Wilkes makes it clear this isn't the first time it's happened: |
| 157 | ---> '''Carter:''' A quick jab to the right eye will adjust his attitude tremendously.\ |
| 158 | '''Wilkes:''' Won't get us anywhere. Besides, it's not like he's a rare specimen. [[ValuesDissonance You gonna punch all of L.A.?]] |
| 159 | ** Sousa also refers to black people as "colored", but it's pure semantics, since Sousa is one of the [[NiceGuy nicest]] and most progressive characters in the show. Colored was actually the polite way to refer to black people in TheForties, but by modern standards is considered racist or at least archaic. |
| 160 | * DeskJockey: Samberly accuses field agents of [[DudeWheresMyRespect looking down on support staff like him]]. They do, but he's also a bit of an obnoxious person as well. |
| 161 | * DestinationDefenestration: Peggy throws Green Suit out of her apartment window when fighting him after he followed her to her apartment. |
| 162 | * DiegeticSwitch: |
| 163 | ** Toward the end of the third episode, the automat radio is playing "Someone to Watch Over Me." As the scene fades, that becomes the background music. |
| 164 | ** "It's a Good Day" is playing faintly in the background in the automat during "A Sin to Err". It then gets much louder once a fight breaks out. |
| 165 | * DirtyCommunists: In contrast to the [[ThoseWackyNazis Nazi-born]] HYDRA from ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger'', the villains this time around are from the Soviet Union. [[spoiler:Though we eventually find out their motivation is less one-dimensional than typical examples of this trope.]] |
| 166 | * DoesThisRemindYouOfAnything: Peggy is on the phone to Jarvis, but has to wait impatiently while he attends to something else. While she's on hold, music is playing because Jarvis has placed the telephone receiver next to the radio. Brannis was right: she's not going to like the future. |
| 167 | * DownerEnding: |
| 168 | ** [[AssholeVictim Agent Krzeminski]] and a captive {{mook|s}} being abruptly shot by [[spoiler:"Dottie"]] at the end of [[Recap/AgentCarterS1E3TimeAndTide "Time and Tide"]], followed by the SSR agents mourning the loss of their colleague. |
| 169 | ** While [[spoiler:"Dottie"]] is narrowly stopped from killing Peggy at the end of [[Recap/AgentCarterS1E6ASinToErr "A Sin to Err"]], Peggy is still arrested and faces interrogation by the SSR. |
| 170 | ** By the end of "SNAFU", [[spoiler:Dooley is dead after barely [[HeroicSacrifice sparing the rest of the SSR]] from an explosive vest, "Dottie" gets away ''[[KarmaHoudini yet again]]'', [[TheMole Ivchenko]] has [[KarmaHoudini waltzed right out of custody]] with a dangerous MacGuffin, and both Leviathan agents have just field-tested said MacGuffin on a movie theatre full of innocent bystanders, who promptly turned on and killed each other in an orgy of murderous rage]]. |
| 171 | * TheDragon: [[spoiler:Dottie is a product of Dr. Fennhoff's Black Widow program and his chief minion.]] |
| 172 | * DruggedLipstick: The "Sweet Dreams" lipstick, which causes temporary unconsciousness to anyone who's kissed by it. Peggy uses it while disguised to knock Spider Raymond, [[spoiler:and later Dottie steals it and uses it on Peggy before attempting to kill her.]] |
| 173 | * DudeWheresMyRespect: |
| 174 | ** Peggy was a highly talented field agent for the SSR, and had been since before she ever met Steve Rogers, and yet one year after the war is over, most of her coworkers treat her like a secretary who only got into the SSR by being Captain America's girlfriend. Worse, some even speculate that [[SlutShaming it wasn't just Cap]] she was sleeping with for her position. |
| 175 | ** She finally gets her respect in the fifth episode from Thompson and the SSR when she shows her skills in the field and how much the Howling Commandos respect her, leading to her colleagues finally accepting her as one of their own. This is also when Sousa [[spoiler:realizes that she's the mysterious blonde woman he's been chasing]]. |
| 176 | ** Howard Stark was one of the key figures in the SSR during the war, and was partially responsible for the creation of Captain America in the first place, and yet Peggy is the only person in the SSR who appears to even be considering the possibility that he might not be a traitor. |
| 177 | ** Samberly repeatedly accuses field agents of not giving [[DeskJockey lab techs]] like him the respect they deserve. He has a point, at first, but his protests become so petty that it eventually becomes clear that he's just a complainer. |
| 178 | [[/folder]] |
| 179 | |
| 180 | [[folder:E-L]] |
| 181 | * EmbarrassingNickname: Happy Sam Sawyer thinks that "Howling Commandos" is a pretty stupid nickname. Peggy isn't too thrilled with Dum Dum's suggestion of "Miss Union Jack", either. |
| 182 | * EnfantTerrible: |
| 183 | ** The lone child Peggy and the Howling Commandos find at the Russian facility is one, easily killing Junior and Agent Li, and would likely have killed Dum Dum with a knife if not for his body armor stopping the blade. |
| 184 | ** [[spoiler:Dottie]] and the other girls in 1937 at the same facility were shown to be trained to be this, even killing each other if ordered to do so. |
| 185 | * EntertaininglyWrong: Between their blatant biases (such as about Stark's guilt and Peggy's competence) and just not having all the facts, the SSR often jumps to the wrong conclusions. Combined with the parts they get right and their rather effective following of the leads they do have, this winds up causing a lot of trouble for Peggy. |
| 186 | * EqualOpportunityEvil: Isodyne Energy is a villainous organization that was nonetheless the only company to agree to hire a black physicist and a woman. It's eventually revealed that [[spoiler:the company only employed them and other minorities because they'd be too reliant on their jobs to complain about all of the dastardly work going on there]]. |
| 187 | * EvilCounterpart: |
| 188 | ** In season one, [[spoiler:Dottie]] is this for Peggy. Both are experienced ActionGirl secret agents who use other people's underestimations of their skill to their advantage. Peggy does this by exploiting her coworkers' sexist assumptions about her abilities while [[spoiler:Dottie]] does this by ObfuscatingStupidity and acting like a ditzy CountryMouse. Both are also capable of flawless UsefulNotes/AmericanAccents when undercover and OnlyKnownByTheirNickname. However, they use different fighting styles, with [[spoiler:Dottie]] relying on SheFu acrobatics whereas Peggy relies on her fists, {{Improvised Weapon}}s, and brute force. Additionally, Peggy chose to become a secret agent, while [[spoiler:Dottie]] was {{brainwashed}} into becoming a ChildSoldier at a young age by her Russian trainers. |
| 189 | ** In season two, Whitney Frost. Like Peggy, Whitney's mother discouraged her unladylike talents and people don't take her seriously due to her gender, which she sometimes takes advantage of to manipulate them. While Peggy is a physical fighter, Whitney is a scientist and uses hired thugs. Whitney also recognizes Peggy as being very similar to her, insisting she be targeted before she creates too many problems for them. |
| 190 | * ExactWords: Dooley calls "everyone" to the briefing room, telling Peggy to "cover the phones." Peg promptly calls the switchboard and has all calls forwarded to the briefing room, and with the phones thus covered, heads in for the briefing. |
| 191 | * EyeScream: |
| 192 | ** [[spoiler:Dottie]] kills a man by putting his own dentist’s drill through his eye. |
| 193 | ** Midnight Oil is stated to usually lead to that. We see at least one case during the theater test, thumbs to the face style. It seems to be a common action under its effects, as [[spoiler:Dr. Fennhoff, a survivor of the Finow massacre, said he found his brother's body with his eyes gouged out]]. |
| 194 | * FakeGuestStar: |
| 195 | ** Both Creator/LyndsyFonseca (Angie) and Creator/BridgetRegan (Dottie) only missed two episodes in the first season, yet they weren't included in the main cast list. |
| 196 | ** The second season goes even farther, with the official main cast being limited to returning people. The new ones are all considered "Recurring" at best, even though a few of them ([[spoiler:Wynn Everett as Whitney Frost and Reggie Austin as Jason Wilkes]]) appear in every single episode, making them more prominent than "Main" Creator/ChadMichaelMurray (Jack Thompson). |
| 197 | * FakingTheDead: What the SSR think both Sasha Demidov and Leet Brannis did, as both were members of the Red Army who were listed as KIA during World War II in the Battle of Finow. Adding to the mystery is that Colonel Mueller said that the Nazis didn't participate in the Battle of Finow, since the Russian forces had already been massacred by the time the Germans got there. |
| 198 | * FantasticNuke: Nitramene, it has a blast radius of 500 yards after which it creates a vacuum that causes an implosion as matter rushes to fill the void that it has created. Zero Matter, discovered by accident in the backstory to the second season, does much the same thing except it's sucking things into an interdimensional void. |
| 199 | * {{Fauxshadow}}: The second half of the second season spends a lot of time foreshadowing [[spoiler:the death of Jarvis thanks to his ThrillSeeker status making him throw himself into Peggy's work]]. Instead, the season ends with [[spoiler:his wife, Ana, having been severely injured and no longer able to have children]]. |
| 200 | * FeministFantasy: It's the first MCU production with a female lead, and makes a point of the era's sexism. One of the commercials even advertised it as another entry in ABC's tradition of Strong Female Characters like [[Series/{{Alias}} Sidney Bristow]] and [[Series/{{Scandal}} Olivia Pope]]. This is perhaps best represented by it passing just about [[http://xmenthefanficseries.tumblr.com/post/107462136511/10-things-agent-carter-did-right every major test]] involving portraying female characters in a positive way ''in the first episode''. |
| 201 | * FinishHim: [[spoiler:A woman gives a young Dottie this as a signal to snap her fellow student's neck.]] |
| 202 | * FirstLove: Whoever "the husband" turns out to be, this show makes it painfully clear that a part of Peggy's heart will always belong to Steve Rogers. |
| 203 | * FoeRomanceSubtext: Over the course of the series, Dottie becomes quite obsessed with Peggy; in the season two premiere Dottie has gone so far to dye her hair brown and copy Peggy's red hat and blue jack look, she's very ''excited'' at the prospect of being interrogated by Peggy, spends the short-lived session looking at and speaking to her in a flirtatious manner, and is visibly crushed when Jack takes over. |
| 204 | * ForegoneConclusion: Thanks to ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'', a few fortunate and not-so-fortunate events are inevitable, including Peggy and Stark's survival past the 40s, and [[spoiler:HYDRA infiltrating S.H.I.E.L.D. from its very inception]]. Stark will eventually marry a woman named Maria and father Tony, the future Iron Man, before dying along with his wife in an "automobile accident" [[spoiler:actually set up by HYDRA]]. Likewise, Dr. Anton Vanko -- who we meet in the first episode, as a friend of Jarvis's -- will ultimately be deported by Stark after attempting to profit from one of their inventions, leading to the events of ''Film/IronMan2'' where his son Ivan will go on a RoaringRampageOfRevenge against Stark's son. And regardless of Leviathan's fate, [[spoiler:its Black Widow program will continue for at least several more decades (and possibly even still in the present day MCU), eventually giving rise to Natasha Romanoff among its alumni.]] |
| 205 | * {{Foreshadowing}}: [[spoiler:Dottie]] killed Mink by combining MurderousThighs with NeckSnap and landed with a ThreePointLanding. All are Natasha Romanoff aka Black Widow's favourite moves. [[spoiler:Episode 5 confirmed her identity as the one of the first Black Widows.]] |
| 206 | * TheForties: The season is set post-WWII in 1946. The writers describe it as an ambiguous period before the UsefulNotes/ColdWar officially took off. |
| 207 | -->'''[[http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=55174 McFeely]]:''' We have a tendency to think of history as this fixed thing. "Oh, that's right. Good guys won, 1945. Then it was the 50s." It's just not the case. Everything was up for grabs for quite a while, and murky. We didn't know we really won. |
| 208 | * FreudianTrio |
| 209 | ** Howard Stark is the Id, constantly preoccupied with women, technology, and using his technology to woo women. |
| 210 | ** Edwin Jarvis is the Ego, doing damage control for Howard and maintaining his estates while Howard is away, but assisting Peggy in her missions. |
| 211 | ** Peggy Carter is the Superego, attempting to rein in Howard's impulsiveness and Jarvis' nerves, while remaining in complete control in the field. |
| 212 | * AFriendInNeed: In "A Sin to Err", Angie keeps [[spoiler:Peggy from being caught by the SSR]]. Particularly remarkable since she had no idea what was happening, just that her friend was in trouble, so she did not even hesitate to help. |
| 213 | * TheFriendNobodyLikes: The SSR has ''two''. There's Thompson, the misogynistic NumberTwo to the Chief, and Krzeminski, an even ''more'' misogynistic FatBastard adulterer that even Thompson doesn't like. |
| 214 | * GeneralRipper: The [[PosthumousCharacter late]] General John [=McGinnis=], whose morally heinous actions led to the main conflict of the first season. |
| 215 | * TheGhost: Jarvis' wife doesn't appear until the Season 2 premiere. |
| 216 | * GilliganCut: A version of it - in a flashback to Peggy's childhood, we see her mother admonishing her to behave. Cut to adult Peggy... |
| 217 | -->'''Mrs. Carter:''' One of these days, you're going to have to start behaving like a lady.\ |
| 218 | (cut to 1947, where Peggy is eating a sandwich in Howard's lab)\ |
| 219 | '''Dr. Wilkes:''' ''(muttering)'' Four...\ |
| 220 | (A glob of mayonnaise [[{{Intangibility}} falls though Dr. Wilkes' hand]] and splatters onto the page)\ |
| 221 | '''Peggy:''' ''(with her mouth full)'' Oh, sorry! I'm ''starved.'' |
| 222 | * GoodCopBadCop: After a crooked Roxxon employee is nabbed, Agents Dooley and Thompson interrogate him and take on the respective roles. Dooley shows the crook [[LiteralMetaphor a carrot and a stick]], and offers him the lighter "carrot" deal where the crook spills the name of his boss and thus gets off easy. When the crook refuses, Dooley takes the carrot and leaves... and Thompson takes over, makes the crook bite down on the stick, and promptly starts beating him black and blue to confess, breaking the stick in half in the process. One of the other agents quips that he'd hate to see [[NoodleImplements what would've happened if Dooley had left the carrot]]. |
| 223 | * GoodOldFisticuffs: Peggy uses straightforward punches and {{Improvised Weapon}}s, in contrast to [[spoiler:Dottie's acrobatic martial arts.]] |
| 224 | * GoryDiscretionShot: Thankfully, we don't see much of how [[spoiler:the theatre full of movie-goers met their ends at each other's hands after being [[HatePlague dosed with the "Midnight Oil" gas from Item 17]].]] Judging by the reactions of the people who were lucky enough to arrive late to the aftermath, however, it was particularly horrific. |
| 225 | ** We switch scenes before we can see [[spoiler:Dottie]] take a dentist drill to a man's eye. |
| 226 | * GretzkyHasTheBall: The male agents are poring over some photographs from a nightclub and ask Carter if a man in the background of one of them is legendary baseball player Joe [=DiMaggio=]. Carter says she can't tell -- she doesn't follow boxing. This ends up settling a wager over whether or not she knows anything about sports. |
| 227 | * HatePlague: The elusive "Item 017" turns out to be [[spoiler:canisters of gas that can cause an extreme version of this, where people kill each other in fits of homicidal rage. Once the villains get their hands on this they deploy it in a theater to test its effectiveness, as it has been in storage for a while.]] |
| 228 | * HaveAGayOldTime: Season 2 introduces some antiquated [[TheForties Forties]] lingo. Sousa calls Detective Henry a "homicide dick" (slang for detective) and also refers to black people as "colored", the politically-correct [[DeliberateValuesDissonance term for the day]]. |
| 229 | * HiddenDepths: Krzeminski and Thompson are both sexist {{Jerkass}}es, but Krzeminski apparently kept both a wife and girlfriend happy and Thompson is haunted by killing enemy soldiers despite being lauded for it. Depth doesn't have to make them likable. |
| 230 | * HoistByHisOwnPetard: In "A Sin to Err", [[spoiler:Peggy is taken down by a female secret agent in disguise whom she underestimated, with a kiss from her own drugged lipstick. Just like she did to a bad guy in an earlier episode.]] |
| 231 | * HollywoodEncryption: Peggy is able to decipher a message encrypted via a one-time pad ''near instantly'' just by deducing that the original message was in Russian. In real life, a one-time pad message is based on a random cipher and thus is ''mathematically impossible'' to decode if one doesn't have its specific cipher.[[note]]There was a historical case of the NSA cracking some one-time pads, but the VENONA project was only possible because the Soviets got sloppy and reused the same set of pads to encrypt multiple messages during WWII, and even then only succeeded in decrypting maybe 1% of all messages sent with those pads despite 40 years of cryptanalysis. And even if that message had been sent using one of the VENONA pads, it seems highly implausible that Carter had memorized the 35,000 reused one-time pads which the Soviets were rapidly phasing out of use in 1946.[[/note]] The cipher being there with the message is unlikely, since the guy initially hired to hack spent hours with no results trying to crack the code and presumably would have recognized a Cyrillic alphabet cipher even if he didn't understand the words. |
| 232 | * HollywoodHealing: Peggy gets impaled in "The Atomic Job". In the following episode, which starts the next day, she can barely walk. In the episode after that, which only takes place a few days later, she's perfectly fine. |
| 233 | * HopeSpot: |
| 234 | ** "The Iron Ceiling" has Peggy finally go on a mission, get to hang out with friends, and finally get some respect from her fellow coworkers as she deserves. [[spoiler:Then Sousa discovers evidence that she's a double agent, and in the next episode she's hunted and branded as a traitor.]] |
| 235 | ** "A Sin to Err": Angie magnificently distracts the SSR agents looking for Peggy by using their own sexism (and helplessness in the face of women crying) against them, and it seems like Peggy is in the clear. Then, [[spoiler:she runs into Dottie in the hallway, who uses Peggy's own knockout lipstick against her. The SSR agents interrupt her before she can kill Peggy, but it allows them to capture Peggy and Dottie to get away scot free]]. |
| 236 | ** Also in "A Sin to Err", Sousa interrupts [[spoiler:Fennhoff's first attempt to hypnotize Dooley]] into being his unwilling puppet. [[spoiler:The very next episode, Fennhoff succeeds perfectly, and in the process steals a dangerous MacGuffin from the SSR labs, strolls away a free man, and leaves Dooley to die from an exploding vest.]] |
| 237 | * HypnoPendulum: [[spoiler:Fennhoff's ring seems to serve as one. He uses it to hypnotize anyone who hears him speak to them too long.]] |
| 238 | * HypocriticalHumor: |
| 239 | ** Jarvis threatens to shoot Leet Brannis -- who’s driving the milk truck Peggy is fighting on top of -- if he doesn’t pull over. Seconds later Peggy uses her attacker’s gun to shoot down into the truck, nearly clipping Jarvis. |
| 240 | ---> '''Jarvis:''' (shouting up to the roof) ''For God’s sake will you please stop shooting things?!'' |
| 241 | ** As Peggy steals food at lunch to give to Howard, she sees Angie approaching and tries to hide her stolen food. Angie doesn't notice, but then she and the other girls immediately start boasting about all the ways they know to steal food, even difficult to hide entrees like a whole chicken or gravy. When they offer to help Peggy take some, Peggy denies that she has any interest in stealing. |
| 242 | * IdiotBall: |
| 243 | ** In Episode 4, Howard Stark himself admits he had no good reason to lie about [[spoiler:Steve Rogers' blood]], blaming it on his own pathological tendencies formed from clawing his way to the top. |
| 244 | ** In Episode 6, the SSR has returned from a Russian facility that brainwashes little girls with a psychiatrist from said facility. Do they consider that he might be [[TheMole a mole]] and take security measures? No, they give him full run of their headquarters (albeit while supervised). |
| 245 | ** In Episode 7, Dooley is warned that [[spoiler:Dr. Ivchenko]] shouldn't be trusted and decides to take that advice. Pretty smart. Not so smart is still staying alone with the guy in his office, raised suspicion or not... |
| 246 | ** Also from Episode 7, we have highly trained agent Sousa forgetting that an enemy can see your shadow if you stand in front of a light source. Though to be fair, Dottie did too, only a scene or two before he did. |
| 247 | ** Episode 8 has several examples: |
| 248 | *** Sousa again, while investigating the theater's crime scene pointed the hate gas canister directly to his face and got hit with a dose of it. |
| 249 | *** To be fair, neither Sousa or the other agents ''know'' about the hate gas. At this point of the story, no SSR agent in the field knows exactly what item 17 is, or even that it comes in a canister. If the low lighting in the theatre kept Sousa from seeing the 'Stark Industries' logo, he might even have thought it was a WWII style water bottle. |
| 250 | *** Peggy completely squanders getting the drop on [[spoiler:Fennhoff and Dottie]] with a shotgun, telling them to surrender rather than just shooting them before they even know she's there, presumably not to risk blasting the radio they were standing right next to. |
| 251 | *** Whoever made the decision to lock up a Soviet spy with a CompellingVoice with a Nazi MadScientist isn't very intelligent. |
| 252 | * ImproperlyPlacedFirearms: Carter identifies the weapon used to kill Krzeminski as a Soviet Korovin TK pistol. Dottie (who's implied to have been the assassin) only uses a Walther PPK. Though it would make sense to dispose of a weapon used to kill a US government agent. |
| 253 | * ImprovisedWeapon: Carter uses these a lot. At one point, Carter uses a stapler to beat up a crook. Later, she uses a suitcase to make a suspect on the run trip, and even later, she uses part of a crate to beat up a {{Mook|s}}. |
| 254 | * INeedAFreakingDrink: After defusing the first nitromene bomb ''in her bathroom,'' Peggy hastily grabs the bottle of whiskey she'd brought in (one of the ingredients in the neutralization formula) and pours herself a glass. Shame she never gets to drink it. |
| 255 | * InstantlyProvenWrong: After Peggy and Jarvis kidnap Mr. Hunt, a Mook who'd made an attempt on their lives, they return to the Stark estate, with Hunt in the trunk, to find Chief Sousa waiting for them. Since this was an unauthorized (and very illegal) mission, she tries to keep him from finding out, even when knocking from the inside of the trunk starts. |
| 256 | --> '''Peggy:''' We...caught a possum on this property earlier this morning. Vicious little creature. |
| 257 | --> '''Hunt:''' (from the trunk) Let me outta here! |
| 258 | --> '''Peggy:''' Or I have a man stashed in the boot. |
| 259 | * InterrogationMontage: In "SNAFU", three SSR agents interrogate Peggy Carter separately, each using a different approach -- Sousa ([[ThisIsUnforgivable betrayed colleague]]), Thompson ([[FireForgedFriends Fire-Forged Friend]]), Dooley (WorthyOpponent). Carter's answers are cut between the three of them, but form a single dialogue. |
| 260 | * {{Interquel}}: The show takes place between ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger'' and (besides the rest of the movies) ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier''. However, this is also a {{Prequel}} to the Agent Carter one-shot. |
| 261 | * {{Irony}}: |
| 262 | ** A crook working with the bad guys turns out to be a fan of "The Captain America Adventure Hour". A moment later Peggy bursts in and promptly starts beating the tar out of him, while her radio counterpart [[DamselInDistress "Betty Carver"]] cheers on Captain America as he beats up Nazis. |
| 263 | ** "A Sin to Err" ends with [[spoiler:Peggy's colleagues ''finally'' not treating her any differently because she's a woman, just like she's wanted the whole series... after she's been arrested and they're about to interrogate her for working with Stark.]] |
| 264 | * IWorkAlone: Peggy's attitude at the beginning of the series, especially after [[spoiler:her roommate Colleen]] is killed. Luckily, Jarvis talks her out of this mentality. |
| 265 | * KarmicDeath: The Leviathan Agent "Green Suit" who killed Peggy's roommate had a love of nailing people's hands to tables with a knife; Peggy kills him by nailing his hand to ''a truck filled with explosives'' with a knife. |
| 266 | * KarmaHoudini: In spite of murdering several people, Manfredi's only punishment is [[spoiler:seeing Whitney Frost go crazy]]. |
| 267 | * KickingAssInAllHerFinery: Basically all the time, save for the episode "The Iron Ceiling" when she dons combat gear, as Peggy is often wearing narrow skirts and high heels on missions, but especially in ''Now is Not the End'', in which she fights a couple of mooks while wearing a long dress. |
| 268 | * KungFoley: {{Lampshaded}} with in-universe foley effects. Peggy beats up a crook while the Captain America radio show is playing, and her punches are intercut with shots of the radio show's foley artists making sound effects by hitting slabs of meat and crushing lobsters. |
| 269 | * LargeHam: Angie, natch, since she's an aspiring actress. Her hamminess comes in handy when [[spoiler:she distracts the agents with her CrocodileTears and helps Peggy evade the SSR]]. |
| 270 | * LastNameBasis: Peggy and Jarvis always address each other as "Mr. Jarvis" and "Miss Carter." Jarvis is also on a last name basis with just about everyone. In company, he and his wife refer to each other as "Mr. Jarvis" and "Mrs. Jarvis." |
| 271 | * LeParkour: Sousa has a YouHaveGotToBeKiddingMe expression when an [[ActionGirl agent of the Black Widow program]] escapes down a stairwell by leaping down the balcony rails. |
| 272 | -->'''Sousa:''' She's...she's coming down the stairs and she's coming fast! |
| 273 | * LeftHanging: The show was cancelled with several plot points left unresolved: |
| 274 | ** [[spoiler:Season Two ended with Thompson being shot by some mysterious person who promptly takes the file on "M. Carter" he had in his possession. It's unknown whether he survives, let alone whodunnit.]] |
| 275 | ** [[spoiler:We don't even get to find out whether the file was about Margaret (Peggy) or Michael Carter.]] |
| 276 | ** [[spoiler:Dottie Underwood escaped and heaven knows if Peggy ever found her again.]] |
| 277 | * LegacyCharacter: |
| 278 | ** [[http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=55575 Edwin Jarvis]], Howard Stark's butler whom Tony's AI aide J.A.R.V.I.S. will be named after. |
| 279 | ** [[spoiler:Dottie]] [[http://www.ign.com/articles/2015/01/28/marvels-agent-carter-dottie-black-widow is effectively]] a [[spoiler:previous ComicBook/BlackWidow]], and "The Iron Ceiling" gives some backstory on [[spoiler:the Black Widow program that eventually gives rise to Natasha Romanoff decades later]]. |
| 280 | * LighterAndSofter: ''Agent Carter'' has its dark moments, but in general it's the most lighthearted of the MCU's TV shows. It's no coincidence that the scenery and outfits are much brighter and more colorful here than in the other shows. |
| 281 | * LiteralMetaphor: A man being interrogated by the SSR is literally shown a carrot and a stick. After he refuses the plea deal, Dolley takes away the carrot. |
| 282 | * LivingOutAChildhoodDream: In the FlashbackEpisode "Smoke & Mirrors," young Peggy Carter dreamed of adventure and saving people, but was discouraged by her mother's wanting her to be a lady. By the time she was 19, Peggy had become a code breaker engaged to a man in her office and given up her dreams. She even initially turns down the offer to join the SOE as a field agent because it wouldn't be proper for her, despite her older brother Michael's encouragement. It isn't until she gets news of Michael's death in the war that she decides to realize her dream and take the position that would lead her to become Agent Carter. |
| 283 | * TheLostLenore: Steve is this to Peggy (even though the audience knows he's not really dead but merely frozen). |
| 284 | [[/folder]] |
| 285 | |
| 286 | [[folder:M-R]] |
| 287 | * MacGyvering: Jarvis tells Carter that in order to defuse a nitromene explosive, it has to be sprayed with a compound made from a variety of chemicals, but he doesn't know how she's going to find them on short notice in the middle of the night. She figures out that the chemicals are all ingredients of various things she has at home, and so is able to make the necessary compound from the contents of her makeup cabinet, some cleaning supplies, and a bottle of whiskey. |
| 288 | * MadeOfExplodium: Molecular Nitramine, one of Howard Stark's "bad babies" that is compared in power to the A-bomb. One grenade's worth of Nitramine (coupled with a storage of a few dozen more such grenades) is enough to blow up an entire refinery in an enormous explosion, then implode it into a ball about three feet in radius. So just think what a full-size bomb's worth would do. |
| 289 | * MadonnaWhoreComplex: |
| 290 | ** Seems to be a dominant mindset, to varying degrees, amongst Peggy's sexist colleagues at the SSR. |
| 291 | ** Even extends to the Griffith's owner-operator, [[FemaleMisogynist Miriam Fry]], who sees young women's "purity" as paramount, to the point of publicly SlutShaming and [[YouHaveFailedMe evicting]] any tenants who dare to have men as guests. |
| 292 | * TheMafia: Joseph Manfredi in Los Angeles is an Italian-American mobster who cooks pasta with his mother when he's not beating people to death. |
| 293 | * MarriedToTheJob: Peggy claims she is this when asked if she has a man. |
| 294 | * MayIBorrowACupOfSugar: When recommending an apartment to Peggy, Angie says she'd be right next door if she needed to borrow a cup of sugar. |
| 295 | * MeaningfulName: Punny version. In "Lady in the Lake" a woman's body is found impossibly frozen. The medical examiner assigned to the case is named "Meltzer".[[note]]Pronounced "melts 'er".[[/note]] |
| 296 | * TheMole: [[spoiler:Ivchenko. He pretends to be the SSR's information source on Leviathan while secretly working for Leviathan and with Dottie.]] |
| 297 | * MoodWhiplash: |
| 298 | ** Peggy walks in on a bunch of SSR agents arguing over which angle they should view the nightclub photos (a couple of which show her carrying out one of her unsanctioned missions) from. Just as she worries that she's about to be busted, they call her over... to ask whether she thinks that an unrelated man in the photo is star baseball player Joe [=DiMaggio=]. |
| 299 | ** During a tense scene in which Peggy is trying to open the drawer those photos are kept in without being noticed, the phone startles her and she bangs her head on the table. |
| 300 | ** While [[spoiler:Ivchenko]] is running free at the SSR and planning something sinister with Chief Dooley, Peggy and Jarvis are locked in the interrogation room and comedically bickering over how to smash a mirror to effect their escape. |
| 301 | --->'''Jarvis:''' Wait. What if there are people behind this mirror that we're breaking?\ |
| 302 | '''Peggy:''' Then they may get hurt, there'll be a spray of glass.\ |
| 303 | '''Jarvis:''' I see. One... Two... Wait! What if those hypothetical people behind the mirror have guns?\ |
| 304 | '''Peggy:''' Then ''we'' may get hurt, there'll be a spray of bullets. |
| 305 | * MookHorrorShow: The fourth episode starts off in the POV of the {{Mooks}} who have [[spoiler:Howard Stark]] held captive. One of their fellow {{Mooks}} is knocked out by some killer in the shadows, and when they try and find out who did this to him, they only end up being knocked out by the same killer, who, of course, is none other than Peggy. The scene is complete with spooky background music, too! |
| 306 | * MurderousThighs: How [[spoiler:Dottie]] disposes of Mr. Mink. |
| 307 | * MusicalEpisode: The opening of "A Little Song and Dance" lives up to its title. |
| 308 | * MythologyGag: Has [[MythologyGag/AgentCarter its own page]]. |
| 309 | * NeverASelfMadeWoman: Played with. Peggy is absolutely a self-made woman. The problem is, this trope is so enforced in the minds of her superiors and coworkers that they all assume she got her job with the SSR by virtue of her relationship with Captain America; their relationship never got any farther than planning a first date before [[Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger Cap crashed Schmidt's plane into the ice]]. The truth, as Jarvis points out, is much closer to being the opposite: Cap got the opportunity to prove himself ''because of Peggy'', and he depended on Peggy for support and guidance. |
| 310 | * NiceJobBreakingItHero: |
| 311 | ** The SSR commits a blunder that will have repercussions decades down the line when they decide to [[spoiler:put Dr. Fennhoff in the same cell with ''Dr. Arnim Zola'']]. |
| 312 | ** Basically all of Howard's inventions that we see are ones created to do good that end up doing [[GoneHorriblyWrong something horrible]] instead. |
| 313 | * NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: |
| 314 | ** Howard Stark, an expy of Howard Hughes, is hauled in front of a post-war Congressional committee and grilled about accusations that he worked against the American government, in much the same way that Hughes himself was in 1947. |
| 315 | ** Howard Stark also goes through women like tissue paper, as Hughes did, and he dabbles in motion picture production and direction, as Hughes did. So far Howard Stark has not shown the extreme OCD and germophobia that were characteristic of Hughes. |
| 316 | ** Whitney Frost, a major Hollywood star. And also a positively ''brilliant'' scientist in her own right. The parallels to Creator/HedyLamarr, who was active during the same time period, are quite clear (though obviously Lamarr was not the murderous villain Frost became). |
| 317 | * NoodleIncident: Carter apparently spent a week in New York City's sewers in 1942. She tells Jarvis she'll tell him the whole story about it some other time. |
| 318 | * NoOffButton: Howard Stark invented a heated jacket for use in subzero temperatures. Unfortunately, it is powered by a chemical reaction that is very hard to stop. Even worse, once the jacket operates for a few minutes, the clasps holding it shut start fusing together which makes it impossible to remove the jacket before the reaction reaches a critical point and the entire apparatus explodes. Howard abandoned the project but kept the prototype in storage. When the bad guys steal it, they use it as a bomb. |
| 319 | * NoPeriodsPeriod: An AvertedTrope in an invoked example. Knowing how sexist her coworkers are, Peggy uses "ladies' things" as an excuse to have a sick day from work. This does allow her to leave without her boss questioning what would probably be suspicious activity. |
| 320 | * NoSmoking: Despite taking place in the 1940's, nobody is seen smoking. |
| 321 | * NotInFrontOfTheKid: When Thompson beats up a crook for information, Dooley recommends that Peggy step out to avert her lady eyes. This word of caution hardly makes sense, considering she just saw someone ''shot dead'' two nights before, not to mention she's been in a war. |
| 322 | * TheNotLoveInterest: |
| 323 | ** Angie fulfills several of the roles typical of the love interest in action, spy, and superhero films. She gets annoyed when the hero's double-life keeps them from spending time together, provides Peggy with emotional support after [[spoiler:Ray is killed]], and helps Peggy [[spoiler:escape from the SSR agents hunting her without ever questioning her innocence]]. |
| 324 | ** Also, the relationship between Carter and Jarvis is such that one could easily imagine them becoming a BattleCouple... Except that Jarvis is HappilyMarried, and no romantic potential between the two is ever hinted. |
| 325 | * NotWhatItLooksLike: Averted. After getting easily flipped by Peggy, Jarvis reverses her hand of assistance, trips her and ends up on top, only for Jarvis's wife Ana to appear. However, being HappilyMarried and knowing Jarvis so well, Ana immediately realises what has happened. |
| 326 | * ObfuscatingStupidity: Peggy 'accidentally' reveals that Dooley is lying about not having the missing car report that Javis filed, to stop him cracking and confessing all. This is PlayedForDrama because she's been trying to prove her worth, only to end up reinforcing Dooley's belief that a woman can't make a good SSR agent. Dottie Underwood plays the trope straight by acting TheDitz. |
| 327 | * OppositesAttract: When Peggy finally meets Jarvis's wife, she is surprised to find out that she is quite lively, colorful and even kind of loud, as opposed to the stiff, proper Jarvis. Regardless, they seem to be a very happy couple. |
| 328 | * OriginStory: |
| 329 | ** Set before S.H.I.E.L.D. was officially formed. |
| 330 | ** [[spoiler:We see the origins of Black Widow as well. Turns out Russia had a training program for girls as young as '''nine''' to turn them into agents/assassins as far back as the 1930s.]] |
| 331 | * OutrunTheFireball: Carter and Jarvis at the Roxxon refinery explosion/implosion. |
| 332 | * OutsideRide: |
| 333 | ** In the first episode, when running out of a factory about to explode, instead of having Jarvis stop the car to let her get inside, Peggy jumps on top of it. |
| 334 | ** In the second episode, Green Suit jumps on top of the truck that Peggy, Jarvis, and Leet Brannis are in. |
| 335 | * ParentheticalSwearing: |
| 336 | ** When Thompson tells Carter to file some reports because [[DamnedByFaintPraise she's much better at that kind of thing than he is]], Peggy responds, "What kind of thing is that, Agent Thompson, the alphabet? I could teach you. Let's start with words that begin with 'A'." |
| 337 | ** At her diner, Angie is yelled by a rude customer who is apparently a regular. She tells Peggy that during her work hours, she's not allowed to say exactly what she'd like to call him. |
| 338 | * PlayingDoctor: Seeking a disguise, Peggy chooses a stethoscope with LabcoatOfScienceAndMedicine from the closet in Stark's boudoir. |
| 339 | -->'''Peggy Carter:''' Oh, this could be useful... ''[off Jarvis' expression]'' Oh, don't be lewd! |
| 340 | * PlatonicLifePartners: Peggy is one of the few women Howard Stark doesn't actively hit on and their dialogue indicates that he firmly considers her to be a friend. Although she claims he tried to kiss her on V-E Day and she made their boundaries clear by throwing him into the River Thames, she told that story to Agent Sousa to convince him that Howard doesn't like boats, knowing quite well he made his getaway on a boat. Given how she clearly still feels about Steve, it's clear her willingness to risk being charged with treason to help Howard is an indication of this trope on her part, and given [[PresentAbsence how Steve felt about her]], we can guess [[TheBroCode Howard's intentions as well]]. |
| 341 | * PoisonRing: Played with and ultimately subverted. Agent Dooley goes to Nuremberg to interrogate a German officer who is facing imminent execution by hanging. He pops open his watch to reveal that it is a fake watch that holds three cyanide tablets. He offers one to the German officer, who then talks. As he's leaving, Dooley pops the watch open again in the presence of a guard and offers the guard a breath mint. |
| 342 | * PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: The Arena Club is a racist, sexist, and classist cabal of rich white (mostly) old men. They want to recruit Howard Stark into the fold, but seeing that he's none of the three politically incorrect qualifiers (except the middle one to some degree), he knows he's an ill fit. |
| 343 | * PowerGlows: All the dangerous tech stolen from Stark's vault seems to glow in one color or another. For example, the Nitramine glows orange and the Constrictor glows a bright green. |
| 344 | * PreMortemOneLiner: Peggy delivers one to Green Suit just after pinning his hand down to the truck full of explosive Nitramene with a knife, and just before leaping off of the truck. |
| 345 | -->'''Peggy:''' This is where I get off. |
| 346 | * PresentDayPast: The periodic table in the Los Angeles SSR office lab is very up-to-date, including atomic elements that had not even been discovered (much less named, as Copernicium, symbol Cn, wasn't named until 2009) in the 1940s setting of the series. |
| 347 | * PrettyLittleHeadshots: The preferred execution method used by Leviathan agents. |
| 348 | * ProductPlacement: In-universe, ''The Captain America Adventure Hour'' manages to squeeze a mention of the brand and model of sewing machine "Betty Carver" uses right in the middle of the action. (This was the standard method of advertising used by old-time live radio shows, as prerecorded commercials did not yet exist.) |
| 349 | * ProtagonistTitle: Not a hard guess who the main character is. |
| 350 | * RaceLift: Happy Sam Sawyer is African-American, in contrast to the comics, where he is a white man. |
| 351 | %%** Jason Wilkes in S2. Also an AgeLift and a complete AdaptationPersonalityChange. |
| 352 | * RealityIsUnrealistic: The show's depiction of sexism seems over-the-top by today's standards, but ''Agent Carter'' takes place well before the women's liberation movement and at a time when traditionalist attitudes toward a woman's "place" actually were that common. As happened to Colleen in the first episode, the prevailing attitude was that the ladies did their part while the men were at war, but once the war was over, they were expected to go back to their proper "sphere" as wives and mothers, as though the war never happened. And most women Peggy's age, if they weren't stay-at-home wives and mothers, were either secretaries, teachers, waitresses or nurses. |
| 353 | * TheReasonYouSuckSpeech: |
| 354 | ** Peggy delivers a pretty effective one to her colleagues in episode seven, "SNAFU", saying, basically, that she had to conduct her own investigation because everyone thought she was worthless and that she was able to do so because everyone, as a result, ignored her. Sousa, who had some respect for her from the beginning, and Thompson, who learned to respect her in Europe, both look distinctly uncomfortable. |
| 355 | ** And to Howard Stark in "The Blitzkrieg Button". It causes Howard to risk coming out of hiding to prove otherwise. |
| 356 | * RememberTheNewGuy: |
| 357 | ** Overlaps with RedShirt. If a new SSR agent appears, he's dead by the end of the episode. |
| 358 | ** The Howling Commandos has had a roster change, with "Dum-Dum" Dugan being the only original member. |
| 359 | * ReplacedWithReplica: Peggy Carter is told by Stark to steal a superweapon called "The Blitzkrieg Button" from a lab and replace it with a fake, before the scientists examining it activate it by accident. [[spoiler:However, it turns out the real one was not a weapon either, but a container for something more valuable that Stark wants back without anyone knowing.]] |
| 360 | * RoguesGalleryTransplant: As Peggy doesn't have much of a RoguesGallery in the comics, most of non-CanonForeigner villains are from other Marvel franchises. |
| 361 | ** [[spoiler:Doctor Faustus]], for instance, is best known as a Captain America villain. |
| 362 | ** Madame Masque, the BigBad of Season 2, is best known as an Comicbook/IronMan and ComicBook/{{Hawkeye}} villain. |
| 363 | * RuleOfThree: Peggy and Jarvis confront three of Howard's exes in "A Sin to Err." The first two slap Jarvis; the third is blocked by Peggy so she kicks Jarvis in the shins instead. |
| 364 | * RunningGag: |
| 365 | ** Carter accidentally knocking out men she wants to interrogate. |
| 366 | ** In the second episode, ''“The Captain America Adventure Hour”'' seems to be played everywhere Peggy goes, much to her annoyance. |
| 367 | ** In S2, the aspiring artists that keep walking in to the fake talent agency that serves as front for the LA office of the SSR, which include tap dancing twins and a sad clown. |
| 368 | ** S2: Jarvis' ongoing battle with Bernard the flamingo, who he refers to as 'the devil in pink'. |
| 369 | [[/folder]] |
| 370 | |
| 371 | [[folder:S-Y]] |
| 372 | * SacrificialLamb: [[spoiler:Peggy's first roommate]] is killed in just her second scene to demonstrate how ruthless Leviathan agents are. |
| 373 | * SacrificialLion: [[spoiler:Agent Krzeminski]] bites it after only three episodes, followed by [[spoiler:Chief Dooley]] in the penultimate episode. |
| 374 | * SchmuckBait: Invoked by Jarvis when he has to get rid of a car. He leaves it somewhere in Hoboken with the keys in the ignition, counting on someone to come by and steal it. |
| 375 | * SecondLove: One thread running through the series is Peggy's slow movement towards finding this after Steve's death in ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger''. She spends much of Season 1 learning to let go of him, and Season 2 places a few love interests in her way. Turns out her second love is [[spoiler:Daniel Sousa]]. |
| 376 | * SelfMadeMan: Howard claims his parents were working class people from the Lower East Side of NYC, so he had to fight his way to the top and his millions. |
| 377 | * SheFu: |
| 378 | ** Averted with Peggy, whose fighting style is devoid of fancy acrobatics or thigh-crushing. Instead, she relies on good old-fashioned punches, kicks, and [[ImprovFu anything around her]]. Consequently, her battles with crooks look extremely brutal. |
| 379 | ** Played straight with [[spoiler:Dottie]], courtesy of [[spoiler:being a Black Widow.]] |
| 380 | * ShoutOut: |
| 381 | ** Angie performs a brief monologue from ''Theatre/ADollsHouse'' in "A Sin To Err". Dooley also name drops ''Film/{{King Kong|1933}}''. |
| 382 | ** In the first season, the name of the dairy company that Peggy Carter investigates at one point is "Daisy Clover", from the 1965 film ''Film/InsideDaisyClover'' with Creator/NatalieWood and Creator/RobertRedford. |
| 383 | ** [[invoked]]WordOfGod says that Ovechkin, the Russian private seen in the flashback in "SNAFU", is a reference to hockey player Alexander Ovechkin. Interestingly enough, [[spoiler:with the knowledge that "Ivchenko" is actually an alias, Dr. Fennhoff may have intentionally chosen it as an anagram for the soldier's name.]] |
| 384 | ** Howard Stark and Whitney Frost [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed are nods to Howard Hughes and Hedy Lamarr]], respectively. |
| 385 | ** At one point, Dooley tells Jarvis that the truth is [[Series/BabylonFive a three edged sword, your side, their side, and the facts]]. |
| 386 | * ShownTheirWork: |
| 387 | ** Peggy being a 40s ActionGirl follows the example of [[http://www.themarysue.com/real-women-history-marvel-peggy-carter/ many real life female WWII agents]], as does them having their jobs being taken after the war as the male veterans came home. |
| 388 | ** Much of the slang is period appropriate. For instance, Fazekas noted in an interview that she avoided adding the term "smart ass" since it didn't come about until the 60s but she did include "yanking your chain", finding it dated back to the mining era. |
| 389 | ** While a retro diner is a classic setting for the 40s and 50s, this show mixes it up a little by showing an [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Automat automat]] instead. |
| 390 | ** Peggy's lock-picking-watch [[http://www.andmagazine.com/us/13996.html is a possibility for a real life spy gadget]], as it could be based on a magnetic autodialer. |
| 391 | ** When sneaking into the Roxxon refinery, Peggy demonstrates the correct way to scale an electric fence: jumping onto it, climbing over, then jumping off; never touching the ground and the fence at the same time. |
| 392 | ** "Green Suit"'s typewriter that can be used to communicate with his superiors appears to be based on [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teleprinter a teleprinter]]. |
| 393 | ** The Captain America radio show has elements of real 40s ones, including in-character commercials and using meat slabs and lobsters for sound effects. |
| 394 | ** The Griffith Hotel, where Peggy stays, is based on the [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbizon_63 Barbizon Hotel]]. Like the Griffith it was a hotel exclusively for women (until 1981) and allowed no men above the first floor. The Griffith even occupies the same address, 63rd Street & Lexington Ave. |
| 395 | ** Jarvis pays a pair of goons in $50,000 in $1000 dollar bills, with the crook expressing disbelief that they really exist. [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Large_denominations_of_United_States_currency $1000 bills were real]], but rare because they ceased being printed after 1945. |
| 396 | ** While the extent of the hypnosis is exaggerated (as far as we know, a real hypnotist cannot entrance an unwilling person nor get them to kill themselves), [[spoiler:Dr. Fennhoff's/"Ivchenko"'s]] methods are actually fairly plausible. As shown by [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsxEutwS8X8 this video]], his tactics mirror real methods to keep up a trance, including befriending the subject, keeping them in a good mood, and not demanding that they do something they show reluctance to. Him making them imagine an illusionary memory is also a real trick; a talented hypnotist can make the subject relive memories or even imagine a bedroom is an island out in the ocean. The entranced subjects also show mild signs of awareness and occasionally discomfort, which also reflect real life subjects who can override orders that feel out of character. |
| 397 | * ShowWithinAShow: An in-universe Captain America pulp radio show is popular at the time of the series, and Peggy runs into it people listening to it a few times. [[StylisticSuck It's about as cheesy as radio dramas got back then]], and features [[OtherMeAnnoysMe a heavily insulting version of Peggy herself]] (named [[NoCelebritiesWereHarmed "Betty Carver"]]) as a helpless DamselInDistress who never shuts up about how manly Captain America is. Peggy can be seen giving a radio playing it an intense DeathGlare at the start of the second episode. |
| 398 | * SignatureHeadgear: |
| 399 | ** Carter wears a bright red Stetson Aviatrix at the start of the first episode. It's prominently featured on the posters, and is pretty much a required component of any Peggy Carter cosplay. During the first season finale, she sports a blue version during Howard's hallucination of her holding Steve's shield. |
| 400 | --->'''Rose:''' Love the hat. |
| 401 | ** Invoked in the second season premiere when we see a woman in a red hat and blue pantsuit walking with purpose. We assume it's Peggy, only to find out it's her ArchEnemy Dottie Underwood robbing a bank. |
| 402 | * SignatureMove: [[spoiler:Dottie]] pretending to surrender and then roundhouse-kicking someone's gun away. |
| 403 | * SingleIssueLandlord: Miriam is obsessed about protecting the virtue of her tenants, and will not shut up about her no-men rule, the importance of her keeping it, and all the ways that various former tenants of hers have tried and failed to break it. |
| 404 | * SlutShaming: |
| 405 | ** Peggy's landlady takes her "no male visitors" rule ''very'' seriously. When a tenant violates it, she evicts her in front of all the other residents at breakfast. |
| 406 | ** When interviewing Howard Stark's exes, one of them exclaims that any woman [[ReallyGetsAround who sleeps around as much as he does]] [[DoubleStandard would be called a floozy]]. |
| 407 | ** When the SSR finds out that Peggy has been working with Howard, Dooley, Thompson and Sousa assume it's because Peggy was sleeping with him. Jarvis anticipates that assumption and uses it in his fake confession letter. This goes back to NeverASelfMadeWoman -- the SSR never even considers the idea that Peggy was investigating on her own because she believes Howard, her friend from the war, is innocent, or even that, for example, he promised her money to help him. The ''only'' possible reason they can come up with for a woman taking the kind of initiative Peggy does is to please the man she's sleeping with. |
| 408 | * SnarkToSnarkCombat: |
| 409 | ** [[DeadpanSnarker Peggy]] and [[ServileSnarker Jarvis]] engage in this almost constantly when they're on screen together. |
| 410 | ** Thompson vs. Carter, when they're forced to work together on the Russia mission. |
| 411 | * SoftGlass: Averted in "SNAFU". [[spoiler:When Dooley performs his HeroicSacrifice while wearing the vest that is about to explode, he uses a borrowed gun to shoot out the office window to allow him to jump through them, exploding in the street.]] |
| 412 | * SoundtrackDissonance: In "A Sin to Err," Peggy beats up the SSR agents sent to isolate her in the automat while the very upbeat "It's a Good Day" plays in the background. |
| 413 | * SpannerInTheWorks: Leviathan’s plan to steal all the dangerous tech in Stark’s vault would’ve worked flawlessly if Leet Brannis hadn’t decided to keep it all for himself and sell it to the highest bidder. |
| 414 | * TheSpeechless: Leviathan agents get their voice boxes surgically cut out. [[spoiler:This was to counteract the suffocation effect of the "Midnight Oil" gas released when they were in the Battle of Finow.]] |
| 415 | * SpeedSex: Peggy seems quite fond of puns based on this topic. |
| 416 | -->'''Jarvis:''' [''Sighs''] I--it's just that with Mr. Stark's tendency to, um...\ |
| 417 | '''Peggy:''' Prematurely evacuate? |
| 418 | * SplashOfColor: In the pilot episode, Peggy wears a bright blue jacket and a bright red hat while most of the men wear dull colored suits. [[http://abc.go.com/shows/marvels-agent-carter/news/agent-carter-fashion/010615-pilot-bridge-and-tunnel?linkId=11611376 According to costume designer Giovanna Ottobre-Melton, this was very deliberate:]] |
| 419 | --> ''Her trademark look is the red custom ladies Stetson Stratoliner hat, a burst of color in a sea of grey fedoras. Working in man’s world she needed to stand out, and she did that using color in her wardrobe.'' |
| 420 | * {{Squick}}: In-universe, Peggy's male colleagues react with horror to mention of "ladies' matters," a fact she exploits to keep them from asking too many questions about why she's requested a sick day. |
| 421 | * StarterVillain: Leet Brannis and [[TheVoiceless Green Suit]] compete for the role of antagonist in the first 2 episodes. They both die in the climax of Episode 2, leading to [[spoiler:Dottie Underwood and Dr. Fennhoff]] becoming the true big bads of the season. |
| 422 | * StealthPun: Beginning in Season 2, when Sousa was promoted from the SSR's New York office to the chief of the Los Angeles bureau, he kept a Brooklyn Dodgers cap in his office. The Dodgers themselves would move to Los Angeles prior to the 1958 Major League Baseball season. |
| 423 | * StiffUpperLip: Peggy and Jarvis can maintain a high level of politeness even when they are about to be blown up. |
| 424 | * TheStinger: In the season 1 finale stinger, we find out that [[spoiler:Dr. Fennhoff's cellmate is Arnim Zola, Red Skull's HYDRA scientist from World War II and the one who got the organization into S.H.I.E.L.D.]] |
| 425 | ** In the season 2 finale stinger, [[spoiler:Thompson is shot by an unknown assailant who retrieves his folders before leaving.]] |
| 426 | * StockFootage: The first episode includes footage from ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger'', as Peggy remembers her last conversation with Steve Rogers. |
| 427 | * StockSchtick: Lampshaded by Sousa. "So I walk into this diner...this isn't a joke..." |
| 428 | * StrawMisogynist: |
| 429 | ** Among the men, there's only really Howard, Jarvis, Sousa and Jason Wilkes who don't fit this description. |
| 430 | ** Played with when Thompson actually points out in "The Blitzkrieg Button" that men won't respect Peggy because she's a woman. He's not entirely wrong, but pretty close, given the era. He's even slightly sympathetic toward her -- he agrees that she's treated unfairly, but he points out she's upsetting the natural order of things by ''expecting'' equal treatment. |
| 431 | ** Also played with in that it's not just men but [[FemaleMisogynist women too]] that sometimes treat independent women with scorn, such as Miriam Fry, who subscribes to the philosophy of "young women are delicate flowers to be shielded from temptation". |
| 432 | * StrictlyFormula: Averted. Unlike ''Series/AgentsOfSHIELD'', which initially relied on the MonsterOfTheWeek formula, ''Agent Carter'' avoids a weekly routine in favor of constantly changing the status quo. At first the show appeared to be going in the direction of "Howard Stark's deadly invention of the week", but then it resolved the weapons subplot in the third episode to focus more on the pursuit of Leviathan itself. |
| 433 | -->'''[[http://tvline.com/2015/01/27/marvels-agent-carter-preview-peggy-stark-jarvis-sousa-finale/ Fazekas]]:''' One of the things I believe came from ABC was they didn’t want an episodic show, they didn’t want it to be Gadget of the Week or Bad Guy of the Week, which is such a nice change from five years ago. I think that because of the influence of cable and DVR and binge-watching, they’re not afraid of continuing storylines. |
| 434 | * StuffBlowingUp: Thanks to Howard's Stark's stolen invention Nitramine, best described as a hand grenade nuke. A single one blows up an entire Roxxon refinery and a truck full of one later blows all the water out of a lake. |
| 435 | -->'''Howard Stark:''' [One handful] would level a city block. I'm not talking the short ones. ''Avenues.'' |
| 436 | * StylisticSuck: The Captain America Adventure Hour radio serial is so over the top and ridiculous it comes across as [[PlayedForLaughs comical]] with its cheesy melodrama and exaggerated portrayal of "Betty Carver" as a hapless DamselInDistress. |
| 437 | * SubliminalSeduction: The "Black Widow" trainees are shown learning to speak English from watching ''WesternAnimation/SnowWhiteAndTheSevenDwarfs''. When Peggy Carter finds the training room, she runs a few frames through the projector and finds the words INSTILL FEAR. |
| 438 | * SuccessThroughSexAccusation: Peggy is mocked for being Captain America's "liaison" even though they were barely planning their first date when he "died", and some of her coworkers are convinced that she was [[SleepingTheirWayToTheTop sleeping around with other men for her position]]. Worth noting here that Peggy was in a position of authority with the SSR ''before'' Steve finally got himself enlisted (she was his instructor in Basic Training), and there's absolutely no evidence she got there through any means other than her own merit. The men of the SSR simply can't imagine any way for a woman to succeed ''unless'' [[NeverASelfMadeWoman it's on a man's coattails]]. |
| 439 | * SunshineNoir: Season 2 has Peggy Carter go to Los Angeles, where it's way sunnier than in New York City but where dark threats loom all the same. |
| 440 | * TastesLikeFriendship: Subverted with Dottie Underwood. In a flashback to her childhood [[spoiler:in the Black Widow program, she shares some bread with a fellow inmate in their OrphanageOfFear, only to NeckSnap her [[DeadlyGraduation during training]].]] |
| 441 | * TeamPowerWalk: in "The Atomic Job" to the tune of "Pistol Packin' Mama". It's all very heroic until Jarvis brushes some lint from his lapel, Samberly stumbles, and Peggy asks where the car is, to which Jarvis apologizes and runs off to get it while the others stand around and look variously pained. |
| 442 | --> '''Jarvis:''' Oh! Sorry. I had to park around the corner -- street cleaning. Back in a jiffy. |
| 443 | * ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill: Peggy apparently believes that using a hand grenade to kill [[spoiler:a ten-year old girl]] is overkill, but Dugan clearly disagrees. |
| 444 | * TitleDrop: One that was used quite a bit in in the advertising. |
| 445 | --> '''Hugh Jones:''' What's your name, darling?\ |
| 446 | '''Peggy:''' ''Agent''. |
| 447 | * TimTaylorTechnology: A recurring design flaw in all the dangerous tech Howard kept in his secret vault was being ridiculously overpowered for its intended purpose, becoming dangerously unstable as a result. The Nitramine, the Constrictor and the Heating Vest all qualify. |
| 448 | * {{Tykebomb}}: We are introduced to a Soviet program to create these in "The Iron Ceiling". [[spoiler:Dottie is a graduate.]] |
| 449 | * TookALevelInJerkass: [[spoiler:Howard tells Peggy that one of his confiscated weapons could black out a city for years, and only he can disarm it. It's actually a vial of Steve's blood (the last in existence) disguised in a sphere. Peggy is '''furious''' when she finds out Howard lied to her.]] |
| 450 | * TragicIntangibility: In Season 2, Jason Wilkes is rendered both intangible and invisible by a Zero Matter explosion early on. While Howard Stark creates a spray that can make him visible in short bursts, any time else he literally [[AndIMustScream cannot even speak due to having intangible vocal chords]]. He spends much of his arc trying to figure out if and how he can get back to normal and be with Peggy. |
| 451 | * TragicKeepsake: PlayedForDrama with [[spoiler:the vial of Steve Roger's blood; it has great potential scientific benefit, yet Peggy is understandably reluctant to hand it over so Howard Stark can exploit it for profit.]] |
| 452 | * UncertainDoom: In the Season 2 finale, [[spoiler:Jack Thompson is shot in the chest. With the show's cancellation, we may never know if he survived or not.]] |
| 453 | * UnderestimatingBadassery: Peggy's coworkers and superiors are all genuinely convinced that behind her bluster she's just another fragile EnglishRose who needs to be protected because she hasn't "grown up" and "learned her place" as a woman. As Peggy points out in the penultimate episode everyone ignores her unless she has coffee or reports because they all think of her as a "stray kitten" in need of shelter or a "secretary turned damsel" in need of protection. Thompson himself only realizes that Peggy is quite the badass when he finally sees her pick up a machine gun and start shooting people alongside her war buddies the Howling Commandos. |
| 454 | * UptownGirl: Angie briefly freezes out Peggy when the latter turns down her invitation to move in next to her, and then climbs into an expensive car driven by Jarvis, assuming she's motivated by snobbery. |
| 455 | * VaguenessIsComing: In the first episode, the NebulousEvilOrganisation is introduced in suitably ominous terms. |
| 456 | -->'''Leet Brannis:''' Leviathan is coming. |
| 457 | -->'''Peggy Carter:''' Who? |
| 458 | -->'''Leet Brannis:''' They'll tell you themselves soon enough. [[CrapsackWorld You're not going to like the future; such as it is.]] |
| 459 | * WaifFu: |
| 460 | ** While not exactly a "waif" Carter is remarkably good at tossing around men twice her size, though she struggles sometimes. At one point, she even tosses a man out a window. In a less common example of the trope, her fighting style is much less about fancy acrobatics, and much more about repeatedly hitting people until they fall down. |
| 461 | ** A more straight example are [[spoiler:Dottie and the other girls from the Black Widow program]]. |
| 462 | * WeddingRingRemoval: In an episode that has flashbacks of Peggy's younger years in England, she was engaged to be married, turning down an opportunity to take work in the field undercover, which her brother had recommended her for. After word comes that her brother has been killed in action, she packs her bags and leaves, taking the letter offering the position and leaving her engagement ring in its place. |
| 463 | * WhamEpisode: |
| 464 | ** "The Iron Ceiling", in which Carter and the Howling Commandos from ''The First Avenger'' uncover [[spoiler:the Black Widow training facility]], culminating in the most action packed and tense climax thus far in the series, Agent Thompson's HiddenDepths are revealed, and the full extent of [[spoiler:Dottie's]] backstory, badassery and psychopathy are revealed. |
| 465 | ** "A Sin to Err," in which the entire SSR [[spoiler:turn against Peggy]], [[spoiler:Ivchenko]] is revealed to be [[spoiler:TheMole]], [[spoiler:Dottie]] starts making attempts [[spoiler:on Peggy's life]], and [[spoiler:Dottie]] is revealed to be the hidden killer. |
| 466 | * WhamShot: [[spoiler:Dr. Arnim Zola, former minion to the Red Skull and future founder of the new HYDRA,]] showing up in [[spoiler:Dr. Fennhoff's prison cell]] in the season 1 finale. |
| 467 | * WhatTheHellHero: Pretty much everyone calls Peggy out on [[spoiler:breaking Dottie Underwood out of prison]] in "Life of the Party". Herself included. |
| 468 | * WhereDoesHeGetAllThoseWonderfulToys: Peggy has a variety of spy gadgets to help her, such as a lockpick watch or tranquilizer lipstick. In Season 2 it is revealed that at least some of them are the work of Dr. Samberly, the SSR's resident GadgeteerGenius, although that still doesn't account for the provenance of all her toys. |
| 469 | * WigDressAccent: Peggy's disguise to infiltrate the club in the pilot is this: blonde wig, silver dress, American accent. Her disguise to infiltrate the dairy factory and check for a truck full of explosives consists of a change of hairstyle, a white labcoat from Howard Stark's closet, and a [[UsefulNotes/AmericanAccents Noo Yawk]] accent. |
| 470 | * WomenAreDelicate: |
| 471 | ** Part of the sexism of the time period that prevents Peggy from getting ahead - all her male coworkers are genuinely, legitimately convinced that she must be weak and helpless and unsuitable for field work simply because she's a woman. Even some ''women'' of the time period believe this, such as the land lady who runs the building Peggy ends up staying at. |
| 472 | ** This is how [[spoiler:Dottie]] continually gets the jump on even trained agents: they just don't think she's capable of overpowering them. |
| 473 | * WorldOfSnark: Practically everyone has some sarcasm to deliver. There's Peggy, who turned up her snark after ''The First Avenger'', [[ServileSnarker Jarvis, Angie]], [[InsufferableGenius Howard]], [[DisabledSnarker Sousa]]... |
| 474 | * WoundedGazelleGambit: [[spoiler:Dottie]] delivers one to [[spoiler:the SSR]] just after giving a KissOfDeath to [[spoiler:Peggy]]. |
| 475 | * WunzaPlot: She's a badass secret agent and WWII veteran. He's a domestic butler. Together they clear Howard Stark's name and fight Leviathan! |
| 476 | * YouGetMeCoffee: Most of the SSR thinks Peggy is only good for getting them coffee, and reports. |
| 477 | * YouTalkTooMuch: Implied when Dooley finally gives Peggy an assignment and her response is StunnedSilence. |
| 478 | -->'''Dooley:''' Well look at that. You really can keep your mouth shut when you try. |
| 479 | [[/folder]] |
| 480 |
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