S02.E09: What If...Strange Supreme Intervened?

[formerlyfreedom]

Quote

When Captain Carter teams up with an old friend to hunt down vicious Universe Killers terrorizing the Multiverse, she finds the greatest threat to all existence may be closer to her than she realizes.

Dropping Saturday, December 30, 2023.

[Spartan Girl]

So this was basically a redo of Multiverse of Madness. Don’t get me wrong, I’d have preferred Strange Supreme as the villain of the movie instead of Wanda getting all her character development thrown out the window, but still.

Although they pretty much gave Strange Supreme the same treatment, acting like he didn’t learn jack shit from his past fuckup and actually claiming The Watcher never intervenes with anything when the whole reason he met Peggy in the first place was because The Watcher intervened and formed the Guardians of the Multiverse to save everyone from Ultron. Feige and his writers, I swear to God…🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Other than the Hela episode, I really didn’t like this season. It would be nice if the MCU spent half as much time propping up Sam’s Captain America that they’re propping up Captain Mary Sue Carter.

And oh God, PLEASE don’t shoehorn her into Loki’s ending. JFC

Edited December 30, 2023 by Spartan Girl

[Brn2bwild]

3 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

So this was basically a redo of Multiverse of Madness. Don’t get me wrong, I’d have preferred Strange Supreme as the villain of the movie instead of Wanda getting all her character development thrown out the window, but still.

Although they pretty much gave Strange Supreme the same treatment, acting like he didn’t learn jack shit from his past fuckup and actually claiming The Watcher never intervenes with anything when the whole reason he met Peggy in the first place was because The Watcher intervened and formed the Guardians of the Multiverse to save everyone from Ultron. Feige and his writers, I swear to God…🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️

Other than the Hela episode, I really didn’t like this season. It would be nice if the MCU spent half as much time propping up Sam’s Captain America that they’re propping up Captain Mary Sue Carter.

And oh God, PLEASE don’t shoehorn her into Loki’s ending. JFC

I've liked the episodes generally, but it bugged me that they spoiled Kahhori's triumphant episode in order to make her Peggy's sidekick in the final episode. 

[Spartan Girl]

2 hours ago, Brn2bwild said:

I've liked the episodes generally, but it bugged me that they spoiled Kahhori's triumphant episode in order to make her Peggy's sidekick in the final episode. 

Ugh, yeah, that made it even worse. The show turned Peggy into a paragon of White Savior Feminism. Like, does the MCU even remember that she already had her own show where she was a hero with her own agency until Endgame blew it all out of canon? She wasn’t an MCU character that ever lacked for screen time, and now they’re using this show as an excuse to Mary Sueify her even more.

[arc]

I've liked this season a lot, but this episode actually suffered from a way too long final boss fight despite being a 30 minute episode. Actually, it's two things: the fight was too long and way too much of it was energy bolts. Peggy throwing her shield through portals to redirect it: cool. Time manipulation: cool. Strange, Peggy, and Kahhori firing generic energy bolts: blech! Actually, Peggy literally punching the grief demon out of Strange was also good, in the so-stupid-it-rules sort of way. But still, this is the kind of boring pointless stuff that's been making the mainline MCU disappointing lately.

The show deserves the tiniest possible credit for making the Forge a ground portal of doom instead of a sky portal of doom, but that's about it.

Also, kind of a bummer to undo the redemption arc Strange Supreme had at the end of s1 all for the sake of having him heel turn for the same reason he had in his first appearance.

[Cobalt Stargazer]

13 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

 Like, does the MCU even remember that she already had her own show where she was a hero with her own agency until Endgame blew it all out of canon?

There is the argument that this is an apology to the character, if that makes sense. By screwing up Peggy's story in Endgame, they reduced her to a trophy for Steve, his 'reward' when she had already moved on with her life without him in it. The time to remember that Margaret Carter had agency and was her own person was five years ago, not (necessarily) in an animated feature long after the fact. I don't disagree with your main point, and yet.

[thuganomics85]

Supreme Strange was the final baddie worked enough I guess (even if it made him regress from learning his harsh lessons last season), but a little disappointed that instead of a team-up like last season, it was only Captain Carter and Kahhori that faced off against him.  Would have like to have seen others like Nebula, "Hulk Hogan", or the 80s Avengers involved as well.  In particular, it does feel like this season was mainly about making Captain Carter an even bigger character than before.  Makes me suspect they are planting seeds to get her into the actual live action MCU (besides her brief cameo in Multiverse of Madness.)

Didn't hate it, but this season didn't quite shine like last season did for me.  The only episodes that really stuck out where Kahhori's and the Hela/Wenwu ones.  The returning characters were fine and the actors did good jobs as always, but I wish we got some of the newer blood here like Shang-Chi, Moon Knight, Kamala, Kate Bishop, or Yelena.  Even the humor didn't quite land this go around.  Not sure what happened.

[arc]

1 hour ago, thuganomics85 said:

I wish we got some of the newer blood here like Shang-Chi, Moon Knight, Kamala, Kate Bishop, or Yelena. 

Well, in the upcoming Marvel Zombies animated show that may be a spin-off of the What If s1 zombie episode (or may just be thematically related, not sharing alt universe canon)

Spoiler

reports are Kamala Khan will be a main character there.

 

[Spartan Girl]

11 hours ago, Cobalt Stargazer said:

There is the argument that this is an apology to the character, if that makes sense. By screwing up Peggy's story in Endgame, they reduced her to a trophy for Steve, his 'reward' when she had already moved on with her life without him in it. The time to remember that Margaret Carter had agency and was her own person was five years ago, not (necessarily) in an animated feature long after the fact. I don't disagree with your main point, and yet.

Making her an AU superhero doesn’t make up for the Endgame bullshit, and there have been other female characters in the MCU that were screwed over in far worse ways that deserved better than the shitty writing they got. What about Maria Hill? What about Sharon? 

 

8 hours ago, thuganomics85 said:

In particular, it does feel like this season was mainly about making Captain Carter an even bigger character than before.  Makes me suspect they are planting seeds to get her into the actual live action MCU (besides her brief cameo in Multiverse of Madness.)

So they really have zero faith in Sam being Captain America, they’re focusing all their energy into propping up a Mary Sue that wasn’t even a huge part of the 616 comics? It really is starting to feel that Hayley Atwell has something on Feige to keep hogging the limelight like this.

And I call BULLSHIT that’s she’s somehow able to hold the Infinity Stones without any damage! Those things killed Tony, crippled Thanos and the Hulk, and even Quill couldn’t handle them without the other Guardians helping him, but Peggy can handle it unscathed?! BULLSHIT!

Edited December 31, 2023 by Spartan Girl

[PurpleTentacle]

I don't like that Strange turned evil again. He had a satisfying arc last season. So this tinged this episode in a bad way for me right from the beginning.

What is weird is that very few of the episodes seemed to connect to the end this season. Hella this episode could have easily been the one we followed in the 10 rings episode, but she wasn't and neither was the 10 rings guy. It almost seems like that was planned to be her, but something went wrong in the production schedule and they didn't have time to do it right, so they went with a generic Hella.  Same goes for Quill, Happy and Iron Man. No connection there. I'm not exactly mad at some episodes just being random, but the first season kinda established a precedent that the connection would happen at the end and now it just doesn't? Things get further confused by the fact that there is a throughline with Carter, but just for some episodes, far from all.

The infinity stones really have been devalued, haven't they? If you have all of them you should just be able to snap anything out of existence, including strange. Well maybe they only work right in their universes, since they are tied to that universe's creation. I guess I can fanwank that.

Carter fighting strange while falling down the pit was very Gandalf fighting the Balrog. I wonder if that was intentional.

Overall a solid season, but the only real highlight for me was the Hella episode and that didn't even connect to the end.

[Enigma X]

59 minutes ago, PurpleTentacle said:

I don't like that Strange turned evil again. He had a satisfying arc last season. So this tinged this episode in a bad way for me right from the beginning.

This bothered me, too. While I get they were going for grief can consume you, I just thought Strange was past trying to resurrect Christine.

In season one, Strange's episode was my favorite. This season, his episode is my least favorite. 1602 is my favorite episode of season 2 overall, but I absolutely loved all the other episodes except for the final one.

I have no problem with Peggy being the running theme for the season. What I did not care for was how easy it was, and without a sweat (scratch, bump, some fatigue), everything came for Peggy.

[tkc]

I enjoyed this episode for what it was, but it seemed like K.E.V.I.N. was the one who came up with the story… antagonist fakeout followed by former ally heel turn, followed by big pew-pew, grunt, urgh, aaahhhhh!!! climax. Could have included a Wilhelm scream for Strange at the end!

What If… is better when it explores personalities and possibilities, rather than when it seems to be trying to resolve those Reddit threads that ask “what would happen if character A ‘versed’ character B…”

Edited January 3 by tkc

[tennisgurl]

I am pretty disappointed by Strange apparently totally forgetting all the lessons he learned last season and just going back to doing the exact same thing. I would have preferred another villain with a big team up, so sadly this season on a bit of a low note for me. It was also yet another "Captain Carter is the most awesome hero ever!" episode, which is frustrating when you have the opportunity to use basically any character you can dream up plus the endless amount of underused MCU characters they could feature instead of using the same character who is doing the same things. 

I did like seeing more of Kahhori, even if she got stuck as Peggy's sidekick mostly shooting out generic energy beams in the too long fight scene. I love how she and Peggy could apparently easily pick up and use Thor's Hammer, Hela's helmet, the Infinity Glove, and basically every other super powerful McGuffin like its no big deal at all. Sure it took entire movies of character development for anyone else to use those, but if you have the power of being the super awesome special protag, you can do anything! I might not have been so over Peggy by the end of this if everything didn't come so easily for her. 

I really liked the glimpses we got of other variations of other heroes and villains during the big brawl, but overall I didn't love this one, especially compared to last seasons finale. I was really hoping this season would focus more on new characters, especially as the greater MCU is trying to pivot towards the next generation. Overall I thought that this season on stronger individual episodes than the first season, with the Hela, Ego, and Kahhori episodes, but a weaker story overall. 

Edited January 4 by tennisgurl

[Megras]

With regards to Strange's backsliding are we discounting the influence of the Darkhold on him. I get the impression that he had absorbed it, or its power so it must be having a greater effect than it would have had on the main MCU Strange or Wanda.

[arc]

So here's AC Bradley on Strange Supreme: (I also posted this link in the Media thread)

Quote

“When we were talking about bringing back Peggy, there was also about Strange Supreme and where would his story go?” Bradley details. “I was very adamant that we wouldn’t redeem him because he's made his choices. And he's a tragic character; the Shakespearean definition of tragedy is that they never learn to make a different choice. They repeat the same mistake over and over again, which is what I wanted for Strange Supreme.”

That stands in juxtaposition with Captain Carter, who will always make a choice that she thinks is for the greater good. “She'll always make the choice, even if it's at her own expense, which is why she's the hero,” Bradley says. “And why she is the one who had to go up against Strange Supreme.”

I kinda get what she's talking about, but Strange Supreme destroyed his entire universe and I think that's something that might shock even the most hardened tragic villain out of their loop.

[Kel Varnsen]

On 12/31/2023 at 9:46 AM, PurpleTentacle said:

The infinity stones really have been devalued, haven't they? If you have all of them you should just be able to snap anything out of existence, including strange.

That was the weirdest thing for me. If you are able to wield the stones why not use them to dust strange? She is a soldier so killing someone super powered trying to kill you shouldn't  be a big deal.

Overall I think What If works better as crazy one off stories. The continuing storyline didn't really work for me, plus it was really hard for me to remember what went down last season.

[Sandman]

I find I agree that linking the stories into a continuing narrative wasn't as effective in this season. And, while I can see the argument, at least to some extent, that Peggy's become a little too perfect, I find the character, and Hayley Atwell's performance, so appealing that I can't summon much outrage about it. (Agent Carter remains one of my favourite pieces in the Marvel Universe output, partly for its light touch.)

I also found Strange Supreme's heel-face-hell (heh) pivoting a little hard to follow -- or care much about, since Marvel seems to be making a habit of reversing character growth for plot-related reasons, in ways that I find mostly cheap. (:: side-eyes Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Blame The Woman ::)

Edited January 22 by Sandman
Edited to add: Lightness of tone wasn’t quite right.