"Agent Carter" season one discussion and spoilers

[Christopher]

Heck, Arthur Conan Doyle never wrote "Sherlock Holmes Begins."

Well, the trio of "The Gloria Scott", "The Musgrave Ritual" and "A Study in Scarlet" come pretty close...

Although we had to wait for Chris Columbus and Barry Levinson to give us Young Sherlock Holmes. (Which, of course, is out of continuity because it has Holmes and Watson meeting before ASIS.)

I don't doubt that there have been badass women in every time, but how many of them have been upper-crust Brits like Carter?

That's the point -- since they've been overlooked by history, we can't know for sure how many there were. But every bell curve has its outliers, so I'd say there's a reasonable chance that the number is above zero.

After all, how many WWII American soldiers were skinny nobodies turned into supersoldiers by Vita-Rays (TM)? Adventure fiction rarely focuses on typical individuals.

Anyhow, moving on, I don't mean to demand an origin story for her or anything, but I do stand by my point that we still know next to nothing about her as a character, and that she could therefore use some more depth next season, much as May and Skye have gotten.

Sure -- definitely there's room for deepening her and the other characters. But I resist the idea that she needs to have her skills explained and justified, as if she were some kind of anomaly. The point of the show is that there's no reason why she shouldn't be able to function on the same level as her male colleagues, if not more so because of her years working with the elite Howling Commandos to battle Hydra. It's not like women have undergone some fundamental evolutionary change in the past 80 years. Women like Peggy have always been around; they just haven't always gotten the credit that an equally capable man would've gotten. That's what the show dramatizes. So I feel that if the show turned around and started acting like it had to justify how a woman like Peggy could exist in that era, it would undermine the message of the series.

 

[Karzak]

Anyhow, moving on, I don't mean to demand an origin story for her or anything, but I do stand by my point that we still know next to nothing about her as a character, and that she could therefore use some more depth next season, much as May and Skye have gotten.

Sure -- definitely there's room for deepening her and the other characters. But I resist the idea that she needs to have her skills explained and justified, as if she were some kind of anomaly. The point of the show is that there's no reason why she shouldn't be able to function on the same level as her male colleagues, if not more so because of her years working with the elite Howling Commandos to battle Hydra. It's not like women have undergone some fundamental evolutionary change in the past 80 years. Women like Peggy have always been around; they just haven't always gotten the credit that an equally capable man would've gotten. That's what the show dramatizes. So I feel that if the show turned around and started acting like it had to justify how a woman like Peggy could exist in that era, it would undermine the message of the series.

You know, I don't often agree with your walls of text but today, I agree with you 1000%. Well said.

 

[JD]

I've just assumed Peggy learned to fight when she joined the military. I honestly never really gave it any thought. She's a spy, so at this point it's pretty much a given that she would be able to kick ass.

 

[Christopher]

Indeed, part of the background here is that during WWII, the usual gender roles were eroded, because the Allies needed every able body they could get, and because the young men were off fighting and dying so women were needed to fill their usual jobs. So if Peggy had shown herself to have an aptitude for combat and intelligence work, the military wouldn't have turned her away, since they couldn't afford to. That's exactly why peacetime is such a culture shock for Peggy -- because the old sexist assumptions are reasserting themselves and women are expected to revert to within their prewar limits.

 

[The Old Mixer]

Add Deborah Sampson to the list of unsung real-life action heroes.

Or did he just do his reading the night before and go in to test for his degree?

No need. He wrote it.

Let's split the difference and say that instead of answering the questions, he rewrote the test for them.

 

[DWF]

The more pertinent question is, how many upper-class English women growing up in the 1920s/30s learned how to brawl well enough to take on several guys? (Or did she learn fighting with the Commandos?) She's obviously upper-class because it's highly unlikely she would've become a British military officer otherwise given their class system at the time, especially as a woman.

And my point in asking isn't to heckle, but to observe that there could be an interesting and unique story as to how she learned to be a badass. AC S1, however, gave us no hints about it; we literally know more about Jarvis' unseen wife's past than hers.

Uh, Peggy is not upper class. Her accent and what I recall of her background is that of a decidedly middle class grammar school girl.

Accents don't deterime the classes, the Manchester born Michael Caine raised himself to high class status. Really outside of a dead grandmother we know very little about Carter's family. Since she as an officer during the war it's fairly certainly to guess that her family has connections.

 

[Nerys Myk]

The more pertinent question is, how many upper-class English women growing up in the 1920s/30s learned how to brawl well enough to take on several guys? (Or did she learn fighting with the Commandos?) She's obviously upper-class because it's highly unlikely she would've become a British military officer otherwise given their class system at the time, especially as a woman.

And my point in asking isn't to heckle, but to observe that there could be an interesting and unique story as to how she learned to be a badass. AC S1, however, gave us no hints about it; we literally know more about Jarvis' unseen wife's past than hers.

Uh, Peggy is not upper class. Her accent and what I recall of her background is that of a decidedly middle class grammar school girl.

Accents don't deterime the classes, the Manchester born Michael Caine raised himself to high class status. Really outside of a dead grandmother we know very little about Carter's family. Since she as an officer during the war it's fairly certainly to guess that her family has connections.

They can indicate class origin though. Caine comes from a lower class background. His accent reflects that. All his money doesn't change that.

Is Peggy an officer? Or even in the military? Yes, she wears a uniform but the only insignia on it is an SSR pin. It wasn't unheard of for civilians working alongside the military or even observing them to wear uniforms

 

[theenglish]

Where did Tony Stark go to engineering school?

I get what you're going for with your post, and I agree with you, but...he went to MIT.

Cause every MIT grade goes out and makes an Iron Man suit.

In the comics, Tony's smarts is also treated like a super-power.

These shows and movies are meant to be about extraordinary people, whether they are just really competent humans or gods--that is why they are heroes.

Peggy is the proto-SHIELD agent and comes with (at least when we meet her) an array of associated skills--just like May, Coulson, Fitz, Ward, and Simmons when we meet them.

 

[Turtletrekker]

In CA:TFA General Phillips mentioned that he "took a chance" with Peggy. She must've done something to impress him.

 

[DWF]

We're learn more about Carter's backround next season more than likely. If they still intend on telling that storyline.

In January 2015, Fazekas and Butters confirmed that the series was not intended to be a miniseries, that a second season was possible, and that it would not necessarily be limited to eight episodes.[30] After the first season concluded, Markus and McFeely revealed they "had a really nice story about who Peggy is and where she came from" that did not make it into the first season, but would hope to explore in a potential second season with the idea of "What makes Peggy, Peggy?"[31] Fazekas and Butters also revealed there had been a story about Peggy having "a night out with the girls" (Angie and Dottie) to explore Peggy's personal life and more material for Angie, having her act as Peggy's window to a normal life for the first season; though they noted both potential plot lines "would be easier in a second season" to tell.[32] On a second season, Fazekas said, "We’ve certainly been talking about what a second season would look like, and there’s a lot of different ideas... what’s great about the structure of this show is, you can tell so many different stories and go so many different directions."[33]

 

[Sci]

So the existence of women like Peggy Carter in the past isn't unrealistic -- just underreported.

I don't doubt that there have been badass women in every time, but how many of them have been upper-crust Brits like Carter?

Erm, that seems like circular logic. "Peggy must be upper-class because no one from the middle or working classes would have been allowed to serve in the security services. *hears several examples of women who held dangerous jobs pre-WW2* Yes, but how many of them were upper-class?"

Granted, I have only seen the first episode of Agent Carter. But I don't really get the impression we have enough data to make reasonable inferences about Peggy's socioeconomic class growing up.

It is also worth noting that the MCU already has another example of competent historical heroes who defied oppressive social conventions of the era: The Howling Commandos are a multi-racial unit, in spite of the fact that the U.S. Army did not end segregation until the Korean War. To be fair, it is possible that the Howling Commandos were a unit of the SSR, a joint U.S./U.K. agency, rather than being U.S. Army specifically, but this is unclear. And the propaganda movies Steve did before rescuing the POWs from Hydra featured integrated U.S. Army units, too.

So either the WW2-era U.S. Army in the MCU did not practice segregation, or the Howling Commandos were treated as a special case. In which case, Peggy also being a special case, especially given her connection to the Commandos, makes some sense.

Side-note: Did Agent Carter Season One ever establish whether Peggy might have started out in another service? The Captain America: First Vengeance MCU tie-in comic establishes that she was an MI-6 agent before transferring to the SSR, but I don't know if that's "canon."

 

[RJDiogenes]

Add Deborah Sampson to the list of unsung real-life action heroes.

Or did he just do his reading the night before and go in to test for his degree?

No need. He wrote it.

Let's split the difference and say that instead of answering the questions, he rewrote the test for them.

While eating an apple?

 

[USS KG5]

Accents don't deterime the classes, the Manchester born Michael Caine raised himself to high class status. Really outside of a dead grandmother we know very little about Carter's family. Since she as an officer during the war it's fairly certainly to guess that her family has connections.

In the British class system of the 1940s they sure did, at the time we still had a very rigidly defined social structure. Sure the "new rich" fitted in, but by obeying the upper class rules, not by just making good as they were.

Peggy doesn't have an unusual accent for a Brit of the 1940s, bearing in mind she will need to add a bit of extra RP for a US audience, as others have said she would have that accent as an educated member of the middle class.

She wasn't born to a chip shop owner in Liverpool, that's for sure though.

Ironically change came quickly when it did. Our first female Prime Minister was the daughter of a shopkeeper.

 

[Reverend]

The more pertinent question is, how many upper-class English women growing up in the 1920s/30s learned how to brawl well enough to take on several guys? (Or did she learn fighting with the Commandos?) She's obviously upper-class because it's highly unlikely she would've become a British military officer otherwise given their class system at the time, especially as a woman.

And my point in asking isn't to heckle, but to observe that there could be an interesting and unique story as to how she learned to be a badass. AC S1, however, gave us no hints about it; we literally know more about Jarvis' unseen wife's past than hers.

Uh, Peggy is not upper class. Her accent and what I recall of her background is that of a decidedly middle class grammar school girl.

Accents don't deterime the classes, the Manchester born Michael Caine raised himself to high class status. Really outside of a dead grandmother we know very little about Carter's family. Since she as an officer during the war it's fairly certainly to guess that her family has connections.

Clearly, you have no idea what you're talking about mate.
I know this may be difficult for a non-Brit to grasp, but Michael Caine is working class. The bank balance, the fame, even the knighthood, none of it can change that. It's not about where you are, it's about where you're from. It's not about how much money you have, it's about how much money your ancestors had. It's heritage and it's cultural. You can up or downgrade you standing in society, but it doesn't change your class.

In Britain in the 1940's, '50's and even into the 60's, your accent said everything about you. It said where you're from, what your background is and whether you were born into poverty, comfortably well off or with a silver spoon in every available orifice.

An accent can be a badge of pride or a mark of shame depending on which circles one aspired to. People would (and still do in some cases) try to suppress their accent if they don't want to let on they're from poverty. All those snooty English butlers you see in movie and TV? Most of them are put on. For the knobs, it's not the done thing to have a servant with a common accent in front of guests. Remember how Parker in Thunderbirds would have the snooty accent when addressing Lady Penelope, but would slip into cockney the second he spoke to one of his old mates? True to life, believe it or not.

To give you an idea on the level of stigma that could be attached to it; Until the late 60's/early 70's you'd almost never expect to hear a regional accent on TV or radio outside of a broad caricature.

As for her Rank: that's something she would have earned through her education and proven aptitude. The most educated woman in those days (and mostly these days too if I'm honest) are middle class woman. Working class women generally had to work young and couldn't afford to go to school and the upper class for the most part didn't bother because they didn't have to.

For further reading on the British class system, I refer you to The Two Ronnies.

Whatever background they decide to make up for Peggy after the fact, Hayley Atwell is quite clearly playing her as a very middle class, grammar school girl.
And yes, Jarvis is almost certainly middle class too.

 

[USS KG5]

^^^ Great post

 

[Christopher]

Remember how Parker in Thunderbirds would have the snooty accent when addressing Lady Penelope, but would slip into cockney the second he spoke to one of his old mates? True to life, believe it or not.

I'm not too familiar with the show, but it didn't seem that way to me in the two Thunderbirds movies (Thunderbirds Are Go and Thunderbird 6) that Turner Classic Movies showed earlier this month. In them, Parker consistently used the same Eliza Doolittle-style caricature of a Cockney accent, defined by a formulaic inversion of the initial H sound (e.g. "Ere, ave an happle" or "E seems to have ad an haccident"), heven though -- err, even though he spent nearly the entirety of both movies in Lady Penelope's company. I really did not get the impression that David Graham's characterization of Parker's speech was in any way true to life. (I know that Graham was one of the original Dalek voices and all, so this may border on blasphemy, but man, he was a terrible actor. I couldn't figure out what the hell that accent was that he used for Brains.)

 

[Reverend]

Remember how Parker in Thunderbirds would have the snooty accent when addressing Lady Penelope, but would slip into cockney the second he spoke to one of his old mates? True to life, believe it or not.

I'm not too familiar with the show, but it didn't seem that way to me in the two Thunderbirds movies (Thunderbirds Are Go and Thunderbird 6) that Turner Classic Movies showed earlier this month. In them, Parker consistently used the same Eliza Doolittle-style caricature of a Cockney accent, defined by a formulaic inversion of the initial H sound (e.g. "Ere, ave an happle" or "E seems to have ad an haccident"), heven though -- err, even though he spent nearly the entirety of both movies in Lady Penelope's company. I really did not get the impression that David Graham's characterization of Parker's speech was in any way true to life. (I know that Graham was one of the original Dalek voices and all, so this may border on blasphemy, but man, he was a terrible actor. I couldn't figure out what the hell that accent was that he used for Brains.)

What I meant was the reversion from once accent to the other based on company was true to life, not the accent itself which yes, was very much a caricature of Cockney. Again though, as I also pointed out that was still very much the norm as late as the 60's when Thunderbirds was made.
The point being that Parker is a working class character, effecting something of a posh accent. I say something because while it's not the done thing to have servants "speaking common amidst their betters" it'd be even worse if they were to forget their station and start outright imitating them. It was a broad caricature (in keeping with the rest of the show) but that particular aspect was truthful in it's intent.

 

[The Old Mixer]

This conversation reminds me of something that John Lennon said...think it was in a 1980 interview. He felt that even after all of their success, the Beatles had always been looked down upon to some extent in England because they were from Liverpool, and that it was probably still true at the time.

(Whereas in America, the Beatles had made people from Liverpool the COOLEST THING EVER!!! )

 

[DWF]

Uh, Peggy is not upper class. Her accent and what I recall of her background is that of a decidedly middle class grammar school girl.

Accents don't deterime the classes, the Manchester born Michael Caine raised himself to high class status. Really outside of a dead grandmother we know very little about Carter's family. Since she as an officer during the war it's fairly certainly to guess that her family has connections.

Clearly, you have no idea what you're talking about mate.
I know this may be difficult for a non-Brit to grasp, but Michael Caine is working class. The bank balance, the fame, even the knighthood, none of it can change that. It's not about where you are, it's about where you're from. It's not about how much money you have, it's about how much money your ancestors had. It's heritage and it's cultural. You can up or downgrade you standing in society, but it doesn't change your class.

In Britain in the 1940's, '50's and even into the 60's, your accent said everything about you. It said where you're from, what your background is and whether you were born into poverty, comfortably well off or with a silver spoon in every available orifice.

An accent can be a badge of pride or a mark of shame depending on which circles one aspired to. People would (and still do in some cases) try to suppress their accent if they don't want to let on they're from poverty. All those snooty English butlers you see in movie and TV? Most of them are put on. For the knobs, it's not the done thing to have a servant with a common accent in front of guests. Remember how Parker in Thunderbirds would have the snooty accent when addressing Lady Penelope, but would slip into cockney the second he spoke to one of his old mates? True to life, believe it or not.

To give you an idea on the level of stigma that could be attached to it; Until the late 60's/early 70's you'd almost never expect to hear a regional accent on TV or radio outside of a broad caricature.

As for her Rank: that's something she would have earned through her education and proven aptitude. The most educated woman in those days (and mostly these days too if I'm honest) are middle class woman. Working class women generally had to work young and couldn't afford to go to school and the upper class for the most part didn't bother because they didn't have to.

For further reading on the British class system, I refer you to The Two Ronnies.

Whatever background they decide to make up for Peggy after the fact, Hayley Atwell is quite clearly playing her as a very middle class, grammar school girl.
And yes, Jarvis is almost certainly middle class too.

Yeah like a sitcom is a great place to understand anything the country it's filmed in. Peggy to me is too polished to be a middle class girl, if anything she's the black sheep of a high class familty. But I'm willing to wait and see what they come up with fr her.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Accents don't deterime the classes, the Manchester born Michael Caine raised himself to high class status. Really outside of a dead grandmother we know very little about Carter's family. Since she as an officer during the war it's fairly certainly to guess that her family has connections.

Clearly, you have no idea what you're talking about mate.
I know this may be difficult for a non-Brit to grasp, but Michael Caine is working class. The bank balance, the fame, even the knighthood, none of it can change that. It's not about where you are, it's about where you're from. It's not about how much money you have, it's about how much money your ancestors had. It's heritage and it's cultural. You can up or downgrade you standing in society, but it doesn't change your class.

In Britain in the 1940's, '50's and even into the 60's, your accent said everything about you. It said where you're from, what your background is and whether you were born into poverty, comfortably well off or with a silver spoon in every available orifice.

An accent can be a badge of pride or a mark of shame depending on which circles one aspired to. People would (and still do in some cases) try to suppress their accent if they don't want to let on they're from poverty. All those snooty English butlers you see in movie and TV? Most of them are put on. For the knobs, it's not the done thing to have a servant with a common accent in front of guests. Remember how Parker in Thunderbirds would have the snooty accent when addressing Lady Penelope, but would slip into cockney the second he spoke to one of his old mates? True to life, believe it or not.

To give you an idea on the level of stigma that could be attached to it; Until the late 60's/early 70's you'd almost never expect to hear a regional accent on TV or radio outside of a broad caricature.

As for her Rank: that's something she would have earned through her education and proven aptitude. The most educated woman in those days (and mostly these days too if I'm honest) are middle class woman. Working class women generally had to work young and couldn't afford to go to school and the upper class for the most part didn't bother because they didn't have to.

For further reading on the British class system, I refer you to The Two Ronnies.

Whatever background they decide to make up for Peggy after the fact, Hayley Atwell is quite clearly playing her as a very middle class, grammar school girl.
And yes, Jarvis is almost certainly middle class too.

Yeah like a sitcom is a great place to understand anything the country it's filmed in. Peggy to me is too polished to be a middle class girl, if anything she's the black sheep of a high class familty. But I'm willing to wait and see what they come up with fr her.

You did notice that Reverend's from the UK right? So he might be going on more than a sitcom ( mentioned in jest) and know more than someone from Columbus, Ohio.