This is brilliant. Key point:
Switching back and forth between Captain America and Richard II may be rather odd, but I want to do it one more time point out two things that Richard has, that Bond and Captain America and Batman also have, that Peggy, however strong she is, cannot attain. They are very simple things, even more fundamental than “agency”.
1) Richard has the spotlight. However weak or distressed or passive he may be, he’s the main goddamn character.
2) Richard has huge range of other characters of his own gender around him, so that he never has to act as any kind of ambassador or representative for maleness. Even dethroned and imprisoned, he is free to be uniquely himself.
It’s rare enough for a female character to get the first, and even rarer for her to get the second.