Agent Carter Episode 203 Recap: Better Angels

Carter and Sousa push past the press to get into Wilkes’ house, following his unfortunate explosion. Hidden in the house, they find a Russian passport, plane tickets, cash, and a Russian gun. It is all the evidence needed to make Wilkes a Russian spy. Carter thinks he is being framed, but she is the only one. Back at the office, the pair find Jack waiting for them. He is in town “on business” and “fixed” Carter’s report to state simply that she was chasing down a Russian spy. Carter takes offense to this, and Jack points out that she wouldn’t want people thinking she is a Commie. Carter doesn’t care and won’t sign off on the dumbed-down report, so Jack does it for her. She leaves in a huff.. .so fast that she doesn’t notice a pen and a clip floating around her desk.

Stark is directing a Western based on a comic book (wink wink) with a cowboy that looks suspiciously like Woody from Toy Story (nudge nudge). He takes a break and Carter shows him the zero matter film. In return, Stark tells her that the A pin that she keeps finding is from the Arena Club, a men’s-only club started in 1906 filled with influential and wealthy men. They keep their ranks “male and pale,” and have been trying to recruit Stark for years. Carter wants to plant bugs throughout the Arena Club.

Stark goes on a tour of the club, pretending to finally be interested in joining the stuffy ranks of old guys. But Stark wants women there, so he opens up the doors and a flood of pretty wannabe starlets rush in. The only one who seems to mind is the stuffy man giving Stark the tour. Carter is part of this crowd, and she easily manages to slip down the hall. She plants a few bugs here and there, then slips into the library to do the same. The secret bookcase door opens and Cal and the rest of the council file out. Carter manages to sneak in, where she sees newspapers from tomorrow with suspicious headlines, referring to an elected official’s fall from grace. She hides under the desk when she hears footsteps. She plants a bug under the table, but it starts to make a high-pitched whine that doesn’t stop until she smashes it. Too late; a guy with a gun is checking out the room. She manages to slip out while he calls security.

Back at the office, Jack is watching the zero matter film. Vernon comes to see him, and Jack promises the report on Isodyne will be uncontroversial. But Vernon is really there to ask Jack to help him get back something that Wilkes stole. “You will know it when you see it,” he assures Jack.

Carter returns to the office to tell Jack about the bugs and the newspapers she saw. Jack, of course, isn’t too happy about this, because the bugs are illegal and she didn’t grab the newspapers. The two agents spar verbally, and Jack wants Carter to return to New York. Sousa doesn’t entirely disagree with Jack, and Carter admits she feels guilty about Wilkes. At her desk, they see her items floating.

Sousa and Carter go to Stark, who is fascinated by her new gravity, which seems to only affect metal objects. The temperature around Carter is also seven degrees cooler than the rest of the room. She worries that she is contaminated and will freeze to death like the Lady in the Lake, but Stark assures her there is just a disruption in the gravity field around her. Heading into Stark’s lab, he mixes up a chemical concoction that can make visible invisible light. She sprays the mix and Wilkes appears. He is not corporeal, and it requires another shot of the chemicals in the throat before he can speak. He’s not dead and has been shadowing Carter, hoping she would notice him. He tells the team that he was going for the zero matter sample and came across Whitney Frost, who said she knew more about it than he did. Wilkes begins to disappear. Additional sprays don’t bring him back, so Stark goes into manic-mode to come up with a way to keep Wilkes visible more permanently.

Frost is getting a little worried about the crack in her skin. She touches a drop of the black goo and it absorbs back into her finger. Cal comes in and assures her that their plot to frame Wilkes as a Russian spy was successful. Frost has been thinking about retiring, and Cal agrees – after the election.

Carter goes to the studio and officially introduces herself to Frost in her dressing room. She asks about the incident at Isodyne, which Frost claims she knows nothing about. Carter doesn’t believe her, but doesn’t stop Frost when she is called to set. That night, Frost tells Cal about her encounter with Carter and is mad that he doesn’t seem as upset by the whole thing. He intends to call the War Department in the morning; she wants him to call Mr. Hunt to take care of Carter. Cal can’t do that, and Frost starts crying, playing the scared little woman. This hits the right notes and Cal calls Hunt then and there. Hunt goes to the Stark compound, where Carter is beating on the punching bag beside the pool. He garrotes her; she fights back; they both end up in the pool. Jarvis responds to the noise, and Carter manages to get to her gun and fire. She doesn’t kill him, but she scares him off.

Jack gives the zero matter film to Vernon and assures he didn’t watch it. “You are doing a great service for the United States,” Vernon assures Jack. Jack looks uneasy about it. After, he stops by the office to ask Sousa out for a drink. Sousa declines, but before he leaves he sees Sousa checking out a file on someone from Oklahoma. Before leaving for New York, Vernon takes Jack to the Arena club and introduces him to Calvin. Jack is surprised to see him carrying a newspaper with the exact same headline Carter told him about.

Come morning, Carter is feeling better. Stark is headed to Peru to consult with a former professor on what they can do to return Wilkes to his corporeal state. Wilkes wants to leave too, fearing that he is the reason someone tried to kill Carter. Carter puts his fears aside by reminding him that if Frost is the expert on zero matter that she says she is, Wilkes is the best weapon they have.

Carter heads back into the office, eager to get back to work, while conveniently “missing” her flight back to New York. Sousa found something interesting in the Oklahoma file he was looking at last night. He found out about Agnes Cully, an inventor who was like the Midwest’s answer to Marie Curie. Agnes Cully is the real name of Whitney Frost. Frost is the brains of the whole operation.

The director goes to see Frost in her dressing room. The studio wanted to replace her, but they relented when the director said he would walk. She hugs him, and he holds her a little too close, a little too long. She tries to pull away and he goes to kiss her. He sees the crack in her forehead and freaks out. Frost grabs him, trying to calm him down, but he is absorbed by the zero matter and gets sucked into Frost’s body. Her cut gets a little bigger.

You can watch a preview for the next episode, titled “Smoke & Mirrors,” using the player below.