This week we got to see some of Peggy’s childhood and pre-SSR days as well as Whitney Frost’s childhood as the episode was interspersed with flashbacks. We see that Peggy has always wanted to save people and that she was engaged to someone before she served in the war while Whitney had to suffer having an intellect “beyond categorization” in a man’s world.
(Fun fact: In the comics, Broxton, OK, where Whitney grew up, is where the floating city of Asgard is located after they had to relocate. Yes, you read that right, the floating city of Asgard is located just about Oklahoma. Welcome to the world of comics.)
Back in the present, well, 1947 anyway, Peggy and Jarvis are trying to find Whitney. Instead they find Hunt, the man that attacked them last week. They quickly form a plan to kidnap Hunt which works until Sousa shows up at their house unannounced. He figures out what they’ve done but he’s not as upset that they’ve committed a felony as much as he is upset that they didn’t let him in on it. Together, they interrogate Hunt, but he doesn’t break until Peggy injects him with what she claims is the Malaria disease, but in reality, is a fast acting version of the common cold.
The threat of death is enough for Hunt to start naming names and spilling secrets of the Arena Club giving the SSR enough evidence to request a search warrant. As they wait for the warrant and plan their attack, the FBI shows up led by Vernon Masters (who we learned last week is a member of the club). He stops the pending attack in its tracks by calling an audit on all of the SSR’s cases. He tries to intimidate and manipulate Peggy into giving him the name of their informant, but she won’t be so easily swayed.
Instead, she and Sousa trick Hunt into thinking they’re letting him go while placing a recording device on him. As expected, he heads to Chadwick and Whitney’s house to figure out their next steps.
Throughout the episode, Wilkes and Jarvis have been trying to figure out a way to reverse Wilkes’ state of being. They aren’t getting anywhere and Wilkes begins seeing something in the space in front of him that is calling him to give in to it.
Whitney spends the entire episode trying to understand what has happened to her and how to control it. Like a good scientist, she starts off using rats, but by the end of the episode, she has enough control over her new power that, when Hunt shows up unexpectedly, confesses to naming names and threatens to expose the two of them to the Council of Nine, Whitney uses her power to absorb him like she did with her director last week.
We’re halfway through the season and things continue to unravel, for Peggy, for the SSR, even for Chadwick and Whitney. What have you thought of the season so far?