No, no, no … this is not good. Just finished watching this one (I know a bit late … sorry about that, was out of town) and I’ve got a hole in my stomach. Basically, everything that could go wrong has gone wrong and while I managed to get to Avengers prior to watching this – so that the Theta protocol reference actually made sense – and was all pumped up for it … now … I’m completely bummed out. 🙁
I know that last week I made the point that the thing I hated most about that episode was its references to the events of the upcoming Avengers Age of Ultron. This week they basically covered that point in the first thirty seconds of the show and while there were some references to the events that occurred in the Movie scattered throughout the episode, it almost feels like it never happened. After much thought I realized why I didn’t like what happened last week – it made the show feel like nothing more than a sales tool for Marvel and in all honesty over the past two years I’ve spent more time with Coulson and team than I have with Captain America or Iron Man and while I enjoy the Avengers, I really care about Shield and I didn’t like the feeling that they were being sold out.
This week though, its almost worse … while I’m glad they didn’t belabor the point and make the whole episode about the movie, you can’t just gloss over it like they did. There was no reference to H.Y.D.R.A and the events that took place there, they talked about the Helicarrier of-course but what about Vision? What about Wakanda and the Hulk? How about Veronica and the epic battle? There are so many things that anyone involved – even peripherally – would have mentioned and its really disappointing that this didn’t happen here. Fitz especially is such a huge geek and fan of all things powered, he’d definitely have been gobstruck and then of course there’s Coulson himself with his complete awe of the Captain – how could he have not said something, even in passing reference? Maybe it would have helped to actually see Fury meeting with Coulson, on top of Sam Koenig (awesome Star Wars sheets aside)?
All that aside though – that’s probably not the thing that’s put a hole in my stomach … what’s really got me here is the stupidity of things. I mean how/why would Skye leave her mother with Gonzalez for the conference? She had to wonder what the underlying motivation/thoughts were when Coulson didn’t attend but he did. It’s really annoying having the show/directors try to throw you off the scent with one scene only to have it mean something completely different in another – the whole thing with Gonzalez and the “package” which turned out to be totally innocuous … why? I know we were meant to think that he had another “secret weapon” to use against the Inhumans, but seriously – he’s not an idiot … nothing we’d seen till now would have led us to believe that he would have gone by himself into the base of a potential enemy and then threaten them while under their control.
Jiaying … don’t even get me started on her. While she might have a reason to distrust those that are attempting to “index” people with power, she has lived a long time … in hiding! The reason that she lived in hiding was that it was safer for her and her people … committing them to a war is just stupid and again all indications have been that she is anything but stupid. While she might have been caught and cut up by H.Y.D.R.A she’s also been alive for much longer than we know and she’s managed to keep the secret of her people safe throughout that time.
What did work?
I know I’ve probably belabored the negative myself here so apologies for that, there were some things that absolutely did work though. Namely the May/Agent 33 vs. Bobby fight in the quinjet. While the outcome of the battle was never really in doubt it was still quite a good little rumble and good to see. I have to be honest if there is one thing that S.H.I.E.L.D has managed to get right almost from day one, its the ability for women to kick ass in some pretty awesome fight sequences. I’m not going to disagree with Dave and some of his comments in regards to Whedon and Coulson that you’ll see in a couple of posts on this site … I think those are more generic to women in general … in terms of fight sequences though … well there they are doing a great job! That being said … why would Bobby walk out of the quinjet into an open field that has landed in the middle of nowhere? That really doesn’t make sense to me? Wouldn’t you get the plane back into the air and get back to the mission that you’re supposed to be on? It’s almost like watching someone in a horror movie go into a room that you know the killer is in. It was just dumb!
Ward – well we knew that he wasn’t going away didn’t we? His return while again somewhat anticlimactic was still quite cool. I really don’t know what they are going to do with him … he’s one of those characters you love to hate (but at the same time still secretly love!). I’d really hate it if they kill him off, but there is also absolutely no way they can rehabilitate him and have him still be Ward … they could empower him I guess and make him a villain in the MCU? That would be an interesting way of keeping him around somehow.
Raina – cold and manipulative definitely don’t do her justice. Her power play too was not unexpected and I’m very curious to see how this all plays out as she might actually end up in control once the truth about Jiaying finally comes out.
Inhumans – We had Fitz’s little comment earlier, but now it’s actually what these guys are calling themselves, with nothing coy about it. It makes me even more curious how these events could and should have at least some impact down the line in the Inhumans movie, even in terms of referencing past encounters between the Inhumans and S.H.I.E.L.D.
Overall Verdict
Gripes aside it was still a good episode. There was some definite forward momentum on a bunch of different storylines and with the news that S.H.I.E.L.D has been renewed for a third year now public (oh yeah, Agent Carter has also been renewed – YAY!!) I am comfortable knowing that all of the open stories will get resolved – while in typical Marvel fashion, many new mysteries will be revealed!