Written by Christopher Markus, Stan Lee, and Jack Kirby
Directed by Metin Huseyin

This second season of Agent Carter delivered a good cliffhanger with the previous episode, Monsters. Ana Jarvis (Lotte Verbeek) was shot by Whitney Frost (Wynn Everett) during the kidnapping of Jason Wilkes (Reggie Austin) and was taken to the hospital. Dottie Underwood (Bridget Regan) has disappeared.

This episode opens with a flashback to a year before when Jarvis (James D’Arcy) was first working with Peggy (Hayley Atwell) to exonerate Howard Stark (Dominic Cooper). There’s a good conversation between the two that sets the tone for a year later when Jarvis is sitting by Ana’s bedside. Peggy is in tune with what he needs as his frustration and guilt begin to boil over. When Ana wakes up, Jarvis learns that she will never be able to have children due to the damage from the bullet.

Jason Wilkes, meanwhile, wakes up in a warehouse as Whitney Frost’s prisoner. She thinks he will phase out of existence again, but wants to compare notes so they can both understand the zero matter better. Jason tries to buy time, and Whitney wants to work together instead.

Daniel Sousa (Enver Gjokaj) arrives at the Stark Mansion and sees the blood. Peggy arrives to bring some things to Jarvis at the hospital. The two of them head to Joe Manfredi’s (Ken Marino) restaurant to try to find where Whitney is holding Jason. They want him to deliver a message to her that they will give her the uranium rods she needs in exchange for Jason. Jarvis arrives at the mansion and wants to go along with Peggy and Daniel, but Peggy is hesitant.

Mr. Stark sends them the specifications to build a machine that will fire a pulse and eliminate zero matter. Daniel puts Samberly (Matt Braunger) on the job. Meanwhile, Jack Thompson (Chad Michael Murray) drops by and threatens Peggy with the information he has about her activities during the War unless she drops the case and goes back to New York. Peggy is not intimidated.

The attempt to rescue Jason nearly goes awry when Whitney Frost figures out that the uranium rods are fake. Peggy, Jarvis, and Daniel escape with Jason, only to find out he’s switched sides. He threatens to kill Peggy unless Daniel tells him where the real uranium rods are. Jack is at SSR headquarters with Vernon Masters (Kurtwood Smith) when Whitney calls and tells Masters where the uranium rods are.

This is another primarily character-driven episode. There is fallout from events in the previous episode that threaten to sideline Jarvis from the team. Up until now, for him, it’s been a lot of fun and games with the edge of danger. Now the danger has been brought to the forefront and in a very personal way. It gives James D’Arcy a lot more range than what he’s been doing up until now. He’s distraught and feeling guilty, and also has an edge where the audience doesn’t necessarily know what he’s going to do. It would seem that Peggy and Daniel pick up on this, but also feel like they owe it to him to let him accompany them when it might not be such a good idea. D’Arcy does a terrific job with the character, from his moments at his wife’s bedside feeling helpless, to taking action the only way he knows how, which is completely out of character for the Jarvis we’ve grown to know. However, D’Arcy delivers it all well and really adds a lot to the role.

There’s some action involving the “rescue” of Jason Wilkes, but the real action happens near the end of the episode when Jason and Whitney trigger the development of more zero matter in the desert. Daniel and Peggy find out that Howard’s weapon does work, but not exactly as planned. Just when it seems that the season might be on the verge of winding down, Peggy and Jarvis find themselves captured. It’s another cliffhanger!

Peggy’s attempts to reason why Jason switched sides (she blames the zero matter inside him) fall on deaf ears with the rest of the group. She doesn’t want to admit she was wrong about him. However, at the beginning of the season, he was shown to be very happy colluding with Whitney until Peggy took an interest in him. Which one is the true Jason Wilkes? I don’t see how Peggy could ever believe in him again, but we shall see.

I also liked the developments with Jack Thompson. It was shown last season that he was ambitious, and this season he seemed to be willing to do just about anything Vernon Masters asked of him in his efforts to rise in the ranks. For the first time here he starts questioning some of what’s going on and once again becomes an ally of Peggy and Daniel. They are wary to trust him again, as I would be. Is he truly on their side or spying for Masters? It would seem like the former, but that’s a bit more that we’re going to have to see where it goes in the final two episodes.

The Edge of Mystery does a great job of giving us more details about the characters we’ve grown to know over this season and the previous one. They have a lot more depth to them and it propels the story along. There’s enough action to keep viewers interested, but the moments between aren’t just filler; they are important moments for the characters. I’m enjoying this series so much that I wish it had gone on longer than two seasons.

Previous episode of the series (link): Agent Carter: Monsters