The Blitzkrieg Button

Well, I'm still generally finding Agent Carter to be fun. But I'm also starting to get tired of the formulaic way each episode is constructed. It's not unusual for new TV shows to essentially restate their "thesis" with every episode, in case new viewers are sampling -- but the truly great shows do it more skillfully. And in any case, Agent Carter's short run is now half over, which makes me feel like we should be past that point.

Every episode seems to have a checklist of scenes that must be included. The scene where Carter sneaks around at work, trying not to get caught. The scene where she interacts with someone in her personal life, lying about what she really does for a living. The scene where Carter faces sexism at work. The scene where Sousa shows us that discrimination in the 40s was hardly limited to women. The scene where Thompson interrogates a suspect using a method you hope isn't still used today. (At least this week, that scene didn't involve him beating up the suspect again.)

Because each episode so studiously checks all these boxes, very little comes as a surprise. But because Hayley Atwell remains a compelling lead actress, and because the characters are all rather well drawn, the show does still remain watchable overall. This week's episode was helped a lot by the presence of Dominic Cooper as Howard Stark, with a swaggering energy not regularly on the show. And I'm hoping that next week's episode will be helped by ways this week's plot might have jolted the ongoing story out of the formulaic rut. (Carter says she's not going to help Stark anymore. We'll see.)

But I'm starting to drift to the place where I want Agent Carter either to get better or get out, making way for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. to return. I give this episode a B-.