After making the franchise leap from the Marvel to Mission: Impossible, British actress Hayley Atwell opened up about her experience as Peggy Carter in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) expressing disappointment with her last appearance in 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
Hayley Atwell made her MCU debut as Peggy Carter in 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger. She would later reprise her role in Avengers: Age of Ultron before expanding on Peggy’s story in two seasons of 2015’s Agent Carter series. She then returned to the character in Avengers: Endgame.
Following her return in Endgame, the British actress voiced the multiverse variant Captain Carter in the first episode of 2021’s What If…? She then returned to live action playing Captain Carter in a brief cameo in 2022’s Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness where Captain Carter was killed by Scarlet Witch.
Atwell expressed her frustration towards the brief cameo in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness on the latest episode of Josh Horowitz’s Happy Sad Confused podcast.
She confessed, “I get a lot of, so much [flack.] I’m like [her death] wasn’t my choice! When [Captain Carter] was like, ‘I could do this all day’ and then followed by she’s immediately cut in half by a frisbee. And then the audience being like, ‘She can’t do it all day. Apparently you can’t, so, egg on your face.’ And I’m like, ‘Oh, that doesn’t really serve Peggy very well.”
The Mission: Impossible — Dead Reckoning Part One star had a more positive experience voice acting the alternative version of the supersoldier Captain Carter on Marvel’s animated show What If…? compared to her live-action cameo in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness.
“I felt like I had much more to do in the What If…? animation series,” she revealed. “I mean, any actor will tell you, to be able to go into a booth in effectively your pajamas and do an animation is great fun because you’re focused on the voice as the instrument and it’s your main, sort of, performative tool. And I love that in that they’ve been able to give her just more to do as Captain Carter, Captain Britain.”
Atwell continued, “So it felt like a frustrating moment in Strange because you are like–” Horowitz then jumped in, “Here we go, this is it.” Atwell then concluded, “No, we don’t. … She had less to do than what she did before, before she had the shield.”
Atwell did note she enjoyed performing the stunt work on Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, “But what was really great was the, you know, coming in and doing even those stunt things, you know, when she does that kind of very quick run, but then sliding on my knees and like agoing over backwards.”
She elaborated, “And I had come straight off the first time I was wrapped for [Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One] because I was wrapped nine times. And so I went straight from the set of Mission to the airport to LA then put the outfit on, did one costume fitting, and then straight in. And they were like, ‘Okay, this is the fight.’ And because I had been so like maintaining that level of physicality, I was able to just to go like, ‘I want to do it all. Let me have a go at this and sliding on my knees was just great fun.'”
What do you make of Hayley Atwell’s criticism of how Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness depicted Captain Carter?