Filler
Hmmm – I have to be honest I was really looking forward to this episode as unlike some other reviewers I really enjoyed last weeks one and Lady Sif is always badass and cool – however I have to be honest … I was somewhat disappointed as this episode felt like nothing more than a filler. I mean the whole “reveal” thing of Skye could have been done last week and while the Kree explanation was OK … it was also somewhat unnecessary I felt? I might be being too judgmental however, so lets go through the recap and see what we all feel like by the end.
Recap
We start with Lady Sif coming out of the surf in black leather looking for “kava” (I actually thought she said coffee the first time I heard it!) and it seems she’s lost her memory. From this we see May (Ming-Na Wen) and Skye (Chloe Bennet) doing some hard core fighting at HQ but Skye is holding back … while May thinks it has something to do with Tripp’s death, we all know that in reality she’s worried about what might happen if she loses control. Fitz appears to further reinforce this to us and you can see that May is wondering a little bit about what is going on.
Hunter and Bobbi are having some “relaxation” time together and Hunter tells Bobbi that Coulson has offered him a permanent position on the team. Coulson meanwhile also offers Mac a more robust (field) role where he can better utilize his strengths. Mac states that he is not a huge fan of violence, but it seems Coulson is able to persuade him.
The team travel to Portugal where Lady Sif is waiting for Kava. However Coulson informs her that he isn’t Kava but rather a friend that can help. (There are some cute sequences where they play upon Lady Sif’s memory loss – i.e. May mentions Thor and Sif smiles, “but doesn’t know the reason why” and her education in regards to things she learnt as a child, knowledge which she still retains.) She is suffering from amnesia so Coulson gets out his digital photos of all the good times they had together, ever the fanboy. She trusts him even though he is not kava but he is going to help her figure this out. Skye finds a video on Twitter of Lady Sif in a pretty epic boardwalk brawl with a man who is able to hold his own against her. He is wielding some sort of small hammer like tool and he uses this to zap her in the chest. She strikes him with her sword and some liquid shoots out along with sparks before he throws her into the water. If she travelled across the universe to find this guy he must be dangerous.
We then jump to the strange man who managed to beat Lady Sif and see him in a hospital demanding access to their supplies. When the nurse tries to dissuade him, he zaps her also with the device and turns blue. The team meanwhile make their way to the pier where the fight took place and with some investigation manage to track him down to the hospital where Bobbi and Skye confront him. Bobbi fights against him but is beaten quite soundly, leaving Skye on her own. As she holds a gun on him, the whole room starts to shake and the gun literally falls apart in her hands (quite cool how this happens I have to say) but before anything else happens a shelf falls on her knocking her out and the man escapes.
The team then all gather back together and determine that the man is a Kree. Lady Sif states that a Kree on Earth is up to no good. Skye and Fitz meet to discuss what happened and she indicates that she wants to tell Coulson, but Fitz tells her to wait till they know more. Hunter walks in on their private conversation but its not clear how much he’s actually heard. Talking about secret conversations, Bobbi and Mac are having their own conversation too where they’re discussing bringing Hunter onboard with their secret plans, but Mac is adamant that doing so is not an option. It’s very much stated that while their plans aren’t meant to harm SHIELD they also have nothing to do with HYDRA and that “after they pull the trigger” they hope to be friends with SHIELD again. It’s all a little bit too cloak and dagger and feels forced to be honest.
The team realize that the Kree is in a town in Portugal called Chaves (keys in English) and this is where Whitehall first found the obelisk in 1944. Skye states that she’d prefer to sit out the fight and while her stated reason is that she feels “banged up” after her previous encounter, both Sif and May look a little suspicious and wonder what is really going on.
The team manage to capture the Kree with an electronic net and take him back to the bus where they interrogate him. He informs them that he’s actually there to help and his name is Vin-Tak and his truncheon can also restore memories. He manages to get his hands on it and immediately restores Sif’s memories and then explains that the Kree used terrigenesis on a multitude of planets to obtain soldiers in a war that they were losing. While it didn’t work on most planets, on Earth it did and created abominations. When Vin-Tak saw that the program had started again he came to Earth to immediately put a stop to it as the current Kree empire would start the program again, enslaving humans to do their bidding. When the team looks at the crate that Vin-Tak had removed from the cave they see that there are enough diviners to create an army and while we know one has been destroyed, there are five remaining.
Vin-Tak says we have to find the diviners and destroy the abominations that were created immediately. They talk about the event that changed Raina and when Vin-Tak and Sif learn that Skye witnessed it they are suspicious. Scared Skye starts to rumble the room a bit and again nobody notices which is really odd I’d like to think someone would at least take note that the room was starting to tremble again. The drama escalates and Skye goes full on quake, the enter HQ shakes and Coulson turns to her and says, “Skye..what is doing this?” He knows the answer and the look on his face was torturous sadness he knows how badly this is going to turn out for her. Skye tells him it is her and she shatters the windows behind her but May and Coulson are immediately at her side, guns pointed at Lady Sif and VinTak.
Sif and Vin-Tak immediately want to take Skye away, but the team manage to distract them long enough to allow Skye to escape. Fitz manages to knock down Vin-Tak with a big gun and Bobbi then uses his own truncheon on him to erase his memory neutralizing him. Meanwhile Lady Sif has managed to break into the cell where Skye is hiding but she shoots herself with one of the icers making Sif realize that she isn’t evil. Coulson finds them and explains that Skye would rather harm herself than bring harm to any of them and that she can be trusted with her powers.
Lady Sif and Vin-Tak are transported back to Asgard and its assumed Vin-Tak will be returned to his home world sans memory (quite a pity as he was only trying to do the right thing, but now he will not only not know that, he won’t remember anything else either!). Lady Sif explains to Coulson that Asgard is significantly more advanced than Earth in terms of Science (glad how they state its science and not magic) and sometimes there are some things you just can’t control. Coulson makes the point of stating that the city is underwater so even though there are more diviners out there, they can’t be used (why can’t they be used under water?)
At HQ everyone is cleaning up and they all attack Fitz for not telling them. Mac states that they need to be protected from Skye which she overhears. Skye then proceeds to lock herself in the bus and resigns herself to isolation for the moment. Later we see Mac working on something when Hunter confronts him about the whole secret with Bobbi thing. Mac manages to get him into a choke hold and knocks him out.
Review & Questions
This episode was all about revelations; but beyond Lady Sif and Skye, the team is also coming to terms with finding out who ‘each other’ are. Sure there’s fears about what Skye really is; but there is also continuing discord between Fitz and Simmons. We also have the whole Mac/Bobbi/Hunter love triangle really coming to the fore in this episode.
- Vin-Tak doesn’t seem based on a specific comic book Kree, but his name follows general Kree naming conventions (i.e. Mar-Vell, Yon-Rogg, et al) and the idea that Kree would have violent subfactions is well established. Vinny’s weapon is also reminiscent of Ronan’s Universal Weapon (that hammer-thing from the GotG movie) but his seek-out-and-capture mission makes him seem like a Pursuer (unlike Ronan, who is an Accuser).
- When Sif initially says she’s looking for ‘Carva’, some could have thought this meant Carva Tessara, a brief Centaurian character in the comics. Of course we learn in the episode that “Carva” is actually the Kree word for “Keys”, which then bring us to “Chaves” which is the Portuguese/Old Spanish word for “Keys”.
- The stunning icer guns are back; but this time Simmons has increased the concentration of Dendrotoxins, which could be very dangerous and unhealthy for the targets. Sadly, Simmons sees this as necessary for the Inhumans.
- Showing Skye’s powers shatter a gun help to show that Skye’s powers aren’t geomancy or power over earthquake; but rather shockwaves and vibrations themselves.
- Despite not knowing who Thor is, Lady Sif still smiles at the mention of his name. This is a reference to their occasional romance in the comics as well as the romance fans have been wanting in the films as well.
- When Lady Sif warned Coulson ‘There are tides in the universe that you cannot swim against”, you might have remembered the Season One group “The Rising Tide” for whom Skye used to work for. Could this group see an actual return or was this just a simple Easter Egg of Skye’s past in reference to her future?
- How do you slow down a Kree? Simple, use Coulson’s Destroyer Gun
- This episode also marks our first confirmation on the Kree’s home world of Hala
OK so if you’ve stayed with me till now – what do you think? Was there anything earth shattering presented in this episode or was it a simple filler as I’ve stated at the start? I really don’t think we learnt anything new or at least nothing of significance and while it seems like lots happened, it all revolved around a revelation that could have been done in the previous episode.