2x05 What If... Captain Carter Fought the Hydra Stomper?

[7.5/10] At first I thought this was basically going to be a remix of Captain America: Winter Soldier, and it kind of is! The notion of redoing that film, except with Peggy as Cap, Steve as the Winter Soldier, and Bucky as...Secretary Pierce for some reason, is cool.

For one thing, it gives us more of the Peggy/Natasha friendship a la the Steve/Natasha friendship, and the two women work as well as a pair, if not better. For another, it lets us put the shoe on the other foot in terms of Peggy missing Steve, something we got to see intermittently in the Agent Carter spin-off. And it also puts Peggy in Cap’s role vis-a-vis a lost comrade, defying official reprimands and orders to save a friend. All of it adds up, and makes me look forward to the probably third part of this parallel trilogy when we get her squaring off with Iron Man.

And if that's all this episode had done, it would have been plenty. But I love that the writers chose to do something original and mash up Captain Carters misadventures with a spin on the events of the Black Widow movie as well.

For one thing, the Potemkin Village meant to represent the idealized 1950s America as a training ground for Red Room spies makes for a brilliant setting. It not only evokes cold war iconography, but the general Stepford vibe of the place is suitably creepy, and the robots are good cannon fodder for our heroes.

The ensuing fights are good. There is juice from a knock-down drag out brawl between Natasha and Melina, albeit one that only really has import if you’ve seen Black Widow. And Captain Carter fighting a re-brainwashed Hydra Stomper is a nice alt-universe reflection of Steve fighting Bucky in Winter Soldier. The fact that she, like this universe’s Bucky is able to get through to Steve, is a nice beat. And the fact that he pulls an Iron Giant to take down the Red Room makes for a cool climax.

Overall, I appreciate how original What If goes with this one once it gets past the explicit Winter Soldier homages, and the reimagined Peggy/Steve relationship remains a highlight.

(On a personal note, after having watched the excellent Harley Quinn show, it’s hard to hear Lake Bell’s voice coming out of Black Widow and not think of her take on Poison Ivy!)

as someone who made captain america:the winter soldier their entire personality in middle school this episode was written for me specifically. i was pleasantly surprised by peggy and being my favourite part of the episod. those two just click so well. and i cannot ignore the yearning i saw in nat for peggy in some of those scenes. but hey it wouldn't be catws without gay vibes.steve and peggy were also sweet but i think the episode didn't have the runtime to fully hit the emotional impact of the heel turn and the sacrifice the way catws did.

On a side note feel deeply vindicated by this catws analogue merging plot poits with Black Widow because that movie fully ripped off so much form catws and I don't feel like we talk about that enough. and if we're comparing those two this episode does that movies plot much better than the movie does. Melina here is a much more interesting antagonist than whatever that movie was going for.

so this episode left me with a lot to chew on. the captain carter world is easily my favourite of all these what ifs and i am interested in more. But i will go ballistic if the third one of these is a civil war thing though.