Valediction

Well, Agent Carter didn't quite go out on the "bang" I was looking for. But it still ended on a fairly solid note.

I do feel the writers did an excellent of splitting the difference between "hoping for a season two" and "tying things up in a decent conclusion." They left Dottie out and about to one day return and kick butt, but they caught Ivchenko and basically tied up his story line. The post-credits tease showed him meeting Zola, from the Captain America movies, in prison -- but I think that cuts either way. If the show returns (unlikely, from what I've heard of the ratings), they could pursue the storyline of "how Hydra infiltrates the emerging S.H.I.E.L.D. organization from the beginning." If they don't return, well, we know Hydra did, we saw the eventual end of that on Marvel's other series, and we can all simply fill in the rest in our own imaginations.

The episode did deliver us a lot of moments that had been promised/expected for several weeks now. We got the all-out fight between Carter and Dottie. We got the return of Howard Stark. We got the moment where Carter was finally recognized by her peers. Those moments in turn led to a few other nice scenes I wasn't necessarily expecting. Jarvis' emotional dilemma of having to go after Stark was fairly effective. Thompson still swooping in to steal Carter's credit with the senator felt appropriate -- he's still looking out for himself, after all.

But I think my hesitation to love this last episode stems from the fact that these two villains -- Dottie and Ivchenko -- were wearing out their welcome with me. Just as the first three episodes of the series were a repetition of "Carter gets no respect, Carter hides her double agent activities from the SSR, Carter hides her true job in her personal life," the last three episodes became a repetition of "I'm just a girl... THWAP!" and "I vant you to foooocus." So. Much. Focusing. Perhaps because these two villains were only meant to last to the end of an eight-episode story arc, they, well, weren't built to last. Each had one tool in the toolbox, and they used it for everything. I think it all ended right on time; one more episode, and I would have been sick of them.

I'd give this final episode of Agent Carter a B+. Which is roughly where I'd put the season as a whole: maybe a B. It was a fun distraction, preferable to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. reruns. But I'm now thoroughly ready for that show's return.