'Penny Dreadful: City of Angels' Episode 8: Peter Craft stands up to Elsa, fans are glad he 'isn't a wuss'
Spoilers for 'Penny Dreadful: City of Angels' Season 1 Episode 8 'Hide and Seek'
Peter Craft (Rory Kinnear) has been wound around Elsa's (Natalie Dormer) finger from the beginning, as she manipulates her way into his home. Now that she's made her way into his life, she has become more demanding than ever — a picture-perfect parody of the nagging wife, with a boatload of racism thrown in. And in this episode, Peter has had enough.
From the moment she moved in, Elsa's sweet and gentle nature was abandoned for a more domineering role. "You would think that Elsa was Craft’s wife..... she’s running the house like it’s hers," notes a fan online, early in the episode. Now operating from a position of security and power, her manipulations of Peter's sentiments grew a lot more direct and her racism a lot more overt. She pointedly agrees with Hitler's anti-Semitic idealogies and berates Peter for not sharing them. In a fury, he stops the car on the drive home and reveals that his name is not Peter Craft, but Peter Krupp and that his family has a legacy of war and destruction that he wants nothing to do with.
It's at home, however, that he really puts his foot down. While Elsa tries to get Maria Vega (Adriana Barraza) fired, demanding Peter to do away with the one threat to Magda's plans, he lets her know just who's in charge in his household as he gives Maria a raise, instead. "Ha! Screw you Elsa!!! Mama Vega is here to stay!!!" exclaims a fan on Twitter. "Peter was like this is my house. You don’t run me! Linda tried to warn you, Elsa," writes another. "Peter is not the wuss she needed him to be," quips this viewer. "Peter defending Maria? Good man. Don't be Elsa's b***h for life," notes a tweet.
Peter wasn't the only one pushing back, however, as his wife, Linda Craft (Piper Perabo) is none too happy about being institutionalized and she's coming for Peter. "As for the episode, please give us more like this one. Love that Linda isn't going to put up with Dr Kraft's crap and that Dr Kraft isn't going to put up with Elsa’s. Magda has made a real miscalculation regarding her ability to manipulate Peter. This has been a pattern with her, even though she can influence people, she can't force them to do anything they don’t want to do. Frank is a real bastard, lol. It’s easier to scare little kids, so glad Maria is there to protect them. Love that she got a raise," writes a fan online. Fans haven't entirely forgotten that Krupp is a Nazi, though, even if they support his backbone. "Good deal Peter... way to not be a ***ch... still don't like your Nazi bulls**t but respect for manning up," writes this viewer.
The next episode of 'Penny Dreadful: City of Angels' airs on June 21 on Showtime.