Episode 1 – What if… Captain Carter were the First Avenger?

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Peggy Carter, or Captain Carter? Steve Rogers is set to become the first super solider, or is he?

A last second explosion from a spy halts the project as he tries to steal the serum. Steve Rogers is severely injured and cannot go through the super soldier process. Not to fear, Peggy is here to save the day. Peggy kills the spy, hops in the chamber, and becomes super peggy! Or, Captain Peggy, or Captain Carter?

This is great and all, but they don’t want a woman as their combat leader. If they did, they would have gotten one in the first place. Flynn at first doesn’t let Peggy go on any combat missions. Peggy quickly disproves this fallacy as she goes on her own mission, and takes the tesseract from Hydra, proving her worth.

Flynn ultimately lets her embark in combat missions and gives her the role of “Captain Carter”. Now…what about Steve? He of course is still involved, as Stark creates a super robotic suit for him known as the “Hydra Stomper”.

Carter and Steve are a fantastic duo, going on fighting missions together. That is, until Rogers and the Hydra Stomper get stopped by an explosion on a train mission. Who’s behind all of this? No other than Red Skull, who takes the tesseract from the stomper and uses it to summon an interdimensional creature. This creature ultimately backfires and kills Red Skull. The only person able to stop the creature? Captain Carter.

Captain Carter fights off this creature and sends it back into the Tesseract portal, closing the portal behind her. This portal ultimately leads her 70 years in the future, where she meets Clint Barton and Nick Fury.

Thoughts and Final Rating

Rating: 3 out of 5.

Overall a very solid episode. I am not a huge fan of Peggy Carter but I thought this episode brought out an interesting take on her as Captain America (Captain Carter). We are introduced to the multiverse concept again, and the all seeing “Watcher”. I thought keeping Steve Rogers along as a “side-kick” superhero was pretty neat as well, and the Hydra Stomper was an extremely cool addition. Looking forward to other episodes.

Episode 2 – What if…T’Challa Became a Star-Lord

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

T’Challa aka Black Panther in our universe becomes a star lord. This one is an interesting what if episode because I can actually see T’Challa being an extraordinary Star Lord, which he is in this episode.

This all happens because of the Ravagers, lead by Yondu, were sent on a mission to pick up Ego’s son, Peter. Instead of Peter, they pick up T’Challa, who admittedly doesn’t look anything like Peter, but they keep him anyway (Yondu convinces T’Challa that Wakanda was destroyed). T’Challa trains with the Ravagers and eventually becomes the Star Lord.

The new Star Lord goes on a quest to obtain the Embers of Genesis; a powerful artifact that is currently in the possession of the Collector, who we’ve seen as recently as Infinity War. This journey is accompanied by familiar faces such as the Ravagers, Nebula, and Thanos. This is also around the same time where T’Challa ends up finding a stolen Wakandan ship, that has a message from his father about his lost son, and that Wakanda was not actually destroyed.

T’Challa and the team end up defeating the Collector and obtaining the Embers, as well as returning home to Wakanda to his original family. Elsewhere on Earth; we see Peter Quill as a Dairy Queen worker, who is approached by his father, Ego.

Thoughts and Ratings

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Admittedly I am a huge fan of the Guardians of the Galaxy series AND Black Panther, so this was a good combination of characters for me. T’Challa does a great job as a Star Lord and this timeline is very interesting to me. Strong writing and performances by all involved. Thanos’ character was also extremely entertaining as well.

What if… Episode 3 – the World Lost Its Mightiest Heroes?

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

This Episode follows Nick Fury’s campaign to start the Avengers. The first Avenger they try to recruit, Iron Man, is mysteriously killed by Natasha during interrogation. The second one, Thor, is mysteriously shot and killed by Hawkeye. Hawkeye, despite being detained in isolation, is killed mysteriously. What’s going on?

Fury and Natasha figure out that someone has accessed the Avengers Initiative file and is killing off all potential prospects. The next being Bruce Banner, who mysteriously explodes when he’s in his Hulk form.

Loki, Thor’s brother, decides to show up and avenge Thor’s death by finding out who killed him. Fury assures that it was none of his guys, and he wants to partner with Loki to help stop whoever is doing this.

Natasha, now a prison escapee, is searching for clues, and right before she’s killed, calls Fury and lets him know the killer is related to “Hope”. She was referring to hope van dyke, who died on a mission previously.

Hank Pym, the killer, is confronted by “Fury” (who turns out to be Loki), and loses a battle with him, and is captured. At the end of the episode Fury reveals the Captain America shield, and is also met by Carol Danvers, or “Captain Marvel”.

Final Thoughts and Rating

Rating: 3.5 out of 5.

Another solid episode. This is an episode I had thought about as a movie, something along the lines of “what if everything went wrong for the Avengers”, so it was really interesting to see this playout in a short episode. I think Marvel does a super good job when things don’t always go the heroes way, which is what made infinity war so good in my opinion.