Tag:

HYDRA

AGENTS OF SHIELD: THE THINGS WE BURY (S2E08)

by hutchm September 27, 2015

written by hutchm

Opening:

Last episode was one of revelations. We found out what the map is to (sort of) and we get a hint of fugitive Ward’s next move (with his brother). Season 2 has been excellent in general, so I was anticipating this episode eagerly, especially since it hinted that we’d get to see some more of Agent Carter in the mix (for a peek at her upcoming series, go here). So, what kind of ep will we get? Let’s see:

Summary:

We start in Austria 1945, Werner Reinhardt (Whitehall these days) is working on unraveling the secrets of the Obelisk. In doing so, he discovers a Chinese woman who it doesn’t kill. But upon hearing of the Red Skull’s death, Whitehall decides he’ll have her dissected later. As it turns out, much, much later.

Present day. Skye’s dad, behaving quite affably, tells Whitehall the ‘Diviner’ is much more than a weapon and suggests if one of the ‘special’ people take the Obelisk to a certain ‘place’ something very ‘cool’ will happen.

Meanwhile Coulson, Skye, Fitz, and Trip are en route in the bus to Oahu on a mission to locate the alien city. Bobbi is interrogating Bakshi back at the Playground and learns from a slip of his there may be an important Whitehall/Red Skull connection.

Then we have Ward and his brother Christian. This is the hardest part of the episode to watch. Ward kidnaps Christian and makes him dig up the well he made Ward push their younger brother in. Besides the revelation that Christian did it because their mother was cruel to them, we don’t learn anything otherwise. Really, it’s ugly and manipulative.

Back to the episode’s main mission: It involves the seemingly absurdist delivery of a watch, a button and a task for Fitz to complete – put together a transceiver in less than 6 minutes, hard when you only have one good hand.

Meanwhile, Bobbi continues to press Bakshi. Through a search of several of the Playgrounds various SSR vaults we learn that somehow old Reinhardt discovered the fountain of youth before becoming Whitehall. So… how??

To learn how, its back to 1945 at an SSR base called ‘The Rat’ where Agent Carter get to tell him he’ll be buried and forgotten there, even though he has info on the Obelisk and can tell her all about a meteor that crashed in China and the ‘blue angels’ that came with it to conquer Earth. However, after a nifty 44 year time-lapse montage, Reinhardt gets rescued by HYDRA agents who reveal they found ‘the woman’.

It turns out she hasn’t aged a day. So, old Reinhardt makes up for lost time and dissects her to earn himself a second chance (main theme of this episode, explored somewhat perversely, not that that’s a bad thing). I also think this was the exact situation Whitehall was talking about when he threatened Raina. And it’s about as horrific as he suggested.

Armed with all they’ve learned about Whitehall, Bobbi takes this info in a final attempt to break Bakshi, claiming Shield will leak the info and credit it to him. Bakshi, however, prefers death to dishonor and goes the old cyanide capsule in the cheek bone route.

Oh, you actually wanted some action this episode? Really? Okay…

The Bus flies to the Australian Outback and Coulson explains what’s actually going on. Once the radioactive button and watch get close enough for critical mass, a magnetic pulse will take down the government a satellite control facility in Oahu. While that station is down, they will use the less secure Australia Outback station to use the gov’t satellites to locate the alien city. In an awesomely underplayed scene, Fitz suggests that he won’t be able to build the transmitter in time, freaking out Coulson for a minute, then adds… with his bad hand. Fitz is officially back!

However, HYDRA, or Skye’s dad anyway, is already there. And while treating Trip for a severe GSW, he clips one of Trip’s arteries to buy time, then gushes about his coming reunion with his daughter, before leaving Coulson with the necessary medicine to save Trip’s life. Awesome exchange between Skye’s surrogate dad and her real one. I’m looking forwards to round 2. And… mission success! Shield now knows where the alien city is.

The wrap up:

Ward shows up to talk with Whitehall about rejoining HYDRA to fight Shield, you know, as a second chance. Ah, Ward, he’s good, you almost believe him. But then, psycho that he is – he’s has just murdered his own family and framed Christian for it. Ah, the things we bury…

Skye’s dad is brought in later and is introduced by to Ward by a beaming Whitehall. It’s a beautiful scene with the knowing glances and visceral subtext. So, so good.

On that theme of second chances, Hunter accuses Bobbi of pushing Bakshi so hard because she was afraid he’d reveal her own dirty secrets. Frustrated her ex’s paranoia Bobbi asks, “will you never trust me?” He confesses that he won’t, but he will never stop trying. I guess this is as close to a confession of undying love a spy can expect since it leads to… hot makeup sex!

And one sort of final twist, but actually a confirmation of what I’d already guessed. We get one more trip in time, 25 years, where we find Skye’s dad comes across his wife’s eviscerated body and declares he will do the same to Whitehall and tear him apart. And yes, his wife was the immortal Chinese woman – Skye’s mom.

Final Thoughts:

This episode was at times hard viewing, at least the first time around, but highly rewarding the second time (so… second chances). The twists at the end weren’t entirely unexpected, but thrilling nonetheless, given how they reinforce the character development we’ve been witnessing with a whole raft of subtext. Kyle MacLachlan, wow! He has been a revelation in the part, both super dark, yet engaging and a scene stealer as Skye’s dad. So… not easy to watch, but well worth it. Watch this episode twice!

September 27, 2015 1 comment

Aftershocks

by hutchm September 9, 2015

written by hutchm

And we’re back! Marvels Agents of Shield returned with the bang yesterday to our screens and our hearts and while I for one was a definite fan of Agent Peggy Carter, Jarvis, Sousa and the gang at the SSR, I’m so very happy to have my favorite crime fighting/mystery solving group back on TV! Please note that if you’ve not watched the most recent episode, I’d probably recommend that you give this review a miss as there quite a few spoilers in the text below.

With the shocking mid-season finale and the death of Tripp plus the transformation of Skye and Raina in the terrigen mists there were many questions and many unanswered fan theories and suppositions left outstanding and in the air. Some of these were definitively answered but as with all good TV we’re probably left with just as many questions at the end of this episode as we started with – if not more.

I guess really quickly we should talk about the fact that Skye has become the Inhuman known as Quake after passing through the terrigen mists & in addition to her, Raina has definitely been transformed into something new also. There were questions about Tripps possible survival which I think I have been pretty conclusively put to bed (although who really knows … we’ve seen hero’s and villains come back from the dead many times before, Coulson of course being a prime example) and quite a few different outstanding questions about what Raina becomes as her transformation seems to be quite a bit more physical in nature then Skye’s.

We do see that Simmons has a very negative reaction to to the potential transformation as she speaks quite negatively about all of the other people with power in the universe and the impact that they have had on normal humans. We also see that Fitz is still struggling with his mental incapacity after Ward’s incarceration of them when he truly turned to the dark side and HYDRA. The other members of the team are all somewhat shattered with the death of Tripp and they all deal with Tripp’s death in a manner suited to their characters and May (as expected) really lets her frustrations out.

One thing I really liked in this episode is that they didn’t gloss over Tripps death – they addressed it head on and they also addressed the impact that losing a loved partner, friend and colleague has on the survivors too. It was very nice to see them hold a mini wake for him at the end of the episode where they all acknowledge the fact that Tripp was the laughter in their lives and while Coulson uses this as a motivation for the team, is this any different to what Fury did in the Avengers when Coulson himself died? Another thing I guess that really did strike me is the change in Raina herself – I mean as a person who took such care in her appearance it was quite ironic what they did to her and I guess as a transformations goes it was extremely drastic and I’m very curious to see who she actually ends up being.

Who is Raina now?

Unfortunately as we didn’t get a specific answer as to who she could be there is still much speculation, but some possible candidates that exist are the Inhuman character known as Naja who has appeared in several Inhuman comic books.

Naja is one of the new Inhumans who underwent terrigenis after Black Bolt released the terrigenisis bomb in Infinity. There are some distinctive body changes that could absolutely support this but I’m very curious if the transformation takes into account the character of an individual (similar to the sorting hat from Harry Potter) when it impacts the person or if their eventual change is completely random?

Another possibility is the character known as Quills – however as she is a mutant and quite possibly already on the Fox list of proscribed characters they probably cannot use her & I would give this the least likelihood of success. If we do go by looks alone though I have to say that there is much there to match and she looks very similar.

Another character that she could possibly be although in this case he is now a Male is the character known as Jolen – Jolen developed a special affinity with plants after passing through the terrigen mists and became able to cultivate them and grow them by linking to them.

We already know that Raina has a great love flowers as she has indicated over the course of the previous two seasons and in fact with her new look which is very “thorny” this personally has a significant likelyhood of coming to pass, although they would obviously have to change it from a male to female character.

However this does presuppose that a person’s likes/dislikes impact their powers which might be completely bogus.

So long story short I guess we still don’t really know who she is for sure (which is somewhat frustrating) and while they’ve also introduced us to a couple of other Inhumans – Skye’s mom again and the eyeless man that we all thought was Reader, but seems to be a nightcrawler clone of some sort – I think we can safely say that Tigra is not one of the options and I’m very curious to see who she actually ends up being.

One thing I do have to state though in terms of the actual look she struck me very much as the character (Jabe the Tree) from the second episode of the resurgent Dr. Who when Christopher Eccleston takes Rose Tyler on her first excursion to watch the explosion of the Sun and the destruction of the Earth.

On this observation space station all of humanities children return for a literal once in a lifetime event and one of the key characters is a human/plant hybrid … in terms of the overall look, she bears quite a few similarities to Raina and the plant correlation in my mind really provides even more weight to the possible Jolen hypothesis.

With Skye/Daisy Johnson as a modified human also we get a very brief glimpse of her powers and also an understanding of the fear that she herself feels for the changes that have impacted her. Now this is possibly something that I might be on my own about (they’ve definitely taken a more humane view of things) but if I had all of a sudden got superpowers AND was a secret agent with a team that liked and trusted me I probably would have been a bit more upfront with them as I would think that they would all recognize the potential benefit that someone with powers could bring to the group. I mean over the course of just a couple of seasons, we’ve seen the Absorbing Man, Siff and Deathlok and now Raina’s transformation too so who knows what else is out there. I would think having an ace in the hole like Skye would be an obvious benefit and something that would be extremely positive. However I realize that I’m probably being a bit to black & white as they’ve taken on the view about the transformation itself and the impact it would have on Skye as a person which I’m probably discounting unfairly.

What didn’t work?

One thing I probably wasn’t too keen on was the obvious stupidity exhibited by Bakshi. I mean the whole SHIELD sting operation was an obvious ploy and his immediately speaking to the other HYDRA leaders who turn on each other that wasn’t really what I would’ve expected from a group so devious and cutthroat. They hid literally in plain sight for decades and were cut down in one episode?? I did like the fact that they definitely were not taking prisoners when they took the shot and Coulson’s actions while somewhat vindictive were I think valid. One point I probably should state though is that these actions shouldn’t be because of Tripps dead but rather they should be the standard operating procedures when dealing with HYDRA as otherwise SHIELD will never win. I know its a bit harsh, but I think we’ve seen in the new MCU, they aren’t afraid to make those hard decisions and while I’m not in any way advocating collateral damage, I think targeted eliminations make perfect sense.

Another thing I didn’t really like was Skye’s mom … her death in the previous episodes was somewhat touching and heartfelt. However seeing her as the trainer for Inhumans leaves a couple of major questions in my mind …

How was she captured? If she’s trained all these Inhumans as its implied, shouldn’t she be protected? She obviously cares for her charges and they seem to return her affection? Gordon appears in the opening scene as a young man that has recently undergone Terrigenesis and is struggling with his new Nightcrawler-esque teleportation powers … as we learn from the conversation between Skye’s mother (Jiaying) and the village elder, she has managed to train many others due to her longevity
Where is the secret base she did the training in and why wasn’t she there vs. the “village” that she was taken from?

I’m assuming that she was exiled from the Inhumans for some reason – perhaps her love for Kyle McLaughlin … Skye’s dad? – and as such no longer had access to her students and resources? I think its an unnecessary detail that doesn’t really add anything to the story though, but perhaps that’s just me.

Overall thoughts

It’s always good to get some AOS happening and while I definitely miss Peggy Carter and her shenanigans (and I have to admit the overall look/feel of that universe), I’m extremely happy to see what’s going on with Coulson and the gang and how that ties into the larger MCU. I do agree that AOS is a lot “greyer” than the vibrant colours in Agent Carter and other shows like Arrow and Flash, but to some extent I think that’s very much a sign of the times – my wife says my wardrobe consists exclusively of blue’s, blacks and grey’s and I expect that I’m not an exception in this!

Talking about the transformations themselves, how Skye and Raina looked and coped with each of them was somewhat eye opening. Skye unfortunately looked like she was acting, which was a pity … perhaps if she’d not dealt with it as such a negative it would have been better, but Raina … wow … you could feel her pain and anguish and see why she wanted to commit suicide to escape. Raina truly has become Inhuman, her former beauty has been wiped away, replaced by leathery skin, exaggerated facial features, and thorns all over her body. Her insides feel like gravel and she cuts herself every time she moves.

Was it a perfect episode … No, I guess it wasn’t … it was pretty good though and one of the better ones for sure. I expect that it was positively colored by my wanting to see the show and this definitely had an impact on how I perceived it but they addressed quite a few things and I was very glad to see that they weren’t afraid to raise the stakes when engaging with HYDRA.

September 9, 2015 2 comments

Agents of Shield

AGENTS OF SHIELD: A FRACTURED HOUSE (S2E06)

by hutchm August 8, 2015

written by hutchm

Opening:

Last episode’s excitement ended with the team all back together +1. Skye’s dad also made a portentous offer to ally himself with HYDRA. Oh, and that +1, she happens to be both Mockingbird, Hunter’s ‘psycho’ ex-wife. So, are the sparks going to continue to fly this ep? Oh yeah…

Summary:

We start this episode with Talbot at the UN, badmouthing Shield. In response to his speech, a group of armed men show up, disintegrate the Italian ambassador and throw the meeting into panic. The armed men wear Shield badges, but we all know they are HYDRA.

Back at the Playground Skye and Simmons watch Ward exercising in his cell. May arrives back with news of the HYDRA attack and the team is in action. Bobbi recognizes Marcus Scarlotti (the actual Whiplash, not that other one) as the leader of the attack, and identifies the inventor of the weapon used in the attack. Off go her, May and… Hunter to Okinawa.

Elsewhere, an angry senator has a meeting with Talbot, who somehow avoided being disintegrated. Talk turns to Senator Christian Ward’s brother. Guess who that might be? Senator Ward goes on to propose a worldwide witch-hunt against Shield, which, oddly enough, only a Belgium Foreign Minister appears to be against.

On the Quinnjet to Okinawa, Bobbi and Hunter start bickering, and the frustrated Mockingbird earns a pair of raised eyebrows from May, who clearly knows better than to talk to her ex. This mirrors Fitz and Simmons as they work on the hard drive Bobbi grabbed last episode. Bitterness = sad.

Sky talks with Ward about his brother. Turns out, Ward is freaked out that Christian might find out where he is, and warns that his brother can’t be trusted. Talk turns to her dad, of course, and that’s where Coulson cuts it off.

In Okinawa, Bobbi goes in undercover as the HYDRA agent she was, to charm and flatter the info on the ‘Splinter Bombs’ that were used at the UN. She learns they’re on their way to Belgium, and that they were derived from the Obelisk. While watching Hunter attempts to curry some sympathy from May re: Bobbi’s ‘talent at deception’. May’s not biting. The moment a message comes through that blows Bobbi’s cover he’s off to save her, not that Bobbi is appreciative. Then it’s off to Belgium. Hmm…

In continuing the rough adjustments for former couples, Fitz can’t hold in his simmering resentment over Simmons’ leaving when he needed her. Later, though, it becomes clear that having Simmons around to remind him what he used to be may have been Fitz’s real problem all along.

Meanwhile, Coulson shows up at Christian’s office advising him that HYDRA was behind the UN attack, then appears to offer up Ward, as an ‘I’ll scratch your back, you scratch mine’ thing. Ward, I think, has good reason to be freaked.

Cut with that meeting, Skye chat’s with Ward, persuading him to tell her everything he knows about her parents: HYDRA tried to kill both her and her mother, then her father lost it and killed them all, but did it out of love. Ward again offers to help Skye find her father. Seemingly accepting this, Skye tells him its time they let cut him loose.

The moment Ward gives her a hopeful look, though, she drops the hammer. He’s being handed over to Christian, but not before Coulson comes by takes the time to remind Ward that there is no redemption for him. Nope, none at all. Never.

Meanwhile, Simmons returns to the lab to discover that Fitz as found a new partner in Mack, and they have found the Splinter Bombs were invented in the 1940’s by a HYDRA scientist named… Beckers. Same name as that Belgian Minister. Uh-oh.

Yes, grandson Minister Becker is a HYDRA agent, and the whole Belgian safe haven is a well-conceived trap. But, now clued in, our agents show they have reached the point where they can match HYDRA play for play. Hunter distracts Scarlotti and his team, allowing May and Bobbi to stage a surprise attack. Sadly, brave agent Noelle Walters was disintegrated before they got there. You win one, you lose six (agents).

On the plus side we are gifted with, hands down, two of the best fight scenes yet on shown on AOS. May gets to take on Scarlotti and his chain-whip. And Hunter and Bobbie (in excellent Mr. & Mrs. Smith fashion, showing they are a well-oiled fighting machine. Awesome. And since Shield isn’t same Shield that tore them apart, maybe some future reconciliation is possible…

To top this all off, we get a near perfect montage wrap up, played out to Senator Ward’s re-written and pro-Shield speech: And it is brilliant, starting with the worried Grant being handed over to the military, facing his former team members as he is lead away. This is followed by Talbot shaking hands with May, empathizing over her lost agents.

Christian winds up his fantastic speech with a claim that his younger brother will pay for his crimes, adding an ominous warning for the world re: HYDRA. This man is going to get re-elected for sure. Then again, as I watched Ward pull off his escape, I considered, maybe not.

Then there’s the end tag: a stranger walks into a tattoo shop looking to complete his full torso tattoo, which looks awfully familiar. Yep, he’s a human canvas for the alien map. Now that’s a punch line.

Final Thoughts:

This is the fourth excellent episode of this season. Not bad, considering it’s the sixth. How so? By being a masterfully written weave between character and action, where relationships take center stage, thus raising the personal stakes in the storyline without taking away from the episode plot one iota. In fact they all contribute to both character and season arcs brilliantly. And despite it’s only taken a few episodes for Shield to get back into the good graces of the world, it still feels well earned. Great performances, beautiful writing. AOS is firing on all cylinders.

August 8, 2015 0 comments

Agents of Shield

AGENTS OF SHIELD: WHAT THEY BECOME (S2E10)

by hutchm July 31, 2015

written by hutchm

Its hard to believe that after last weeks episode, they will be able to keep the momentum going in Agents of Shield … but they’ve succeeded admirably! While there are a few “wobbles” along the way, the mid-season finale ended with an appropriate cliffhanger and is an episode that will definitely keep me coming back to find out what happens next … not to mention the number of things that it actually did reveal – Daisy Johnson & The Inhumans plus enough death and destruction to even keep the Hulk happy!

As a really quick recap from the last episode, Ward has captured Skye and Raina and is taking them to Whitehall. Whitehall has told Agent 33 to shoot down the Bus & Mack has been killed/transformed by the underground city.

Episode Recap

OK, lets start with the Quinjets attacking the Bus shall we? May knows that despite Wards promise, HYDRA will not let them survive so as soon as Ward takes Raina and Skye off, she runs to the cockpit to get the Bus out of harms way. Diving to the cloud deck (by the way, funny scene with the twins (triplets??) here) May and Tripp manage to evade the HYDRA forces by ejecting some camouflage debris which their missiles impact with.

[note: this is one of the wobbles I mentioned earlier … why was Tripp screaming as he pressed some buttons to engage the cloak? seems a bit over the top? also, why would HYDRA not search harder for the team – lets be honest 4 smoke clouds floating in the sky, hardly amount to much debris for a plane the size of the Bus?!]

City

At the city, Tripp and Fitz/Simmons are emplacing mechanical detonators to destroy the city. Once again Howling Commando tech (big promotion in this for the upcoming Agent Carter series of course!) saves the day, as this old school tech won’t be impacted by any electromagnetic interactions that the city might be throwing off. The team is obviously somewhat concerned with whats happened to Mack and speculate that he might not be dead, but instead he might have been converted by the city – something like a zombie ant – and the city is now controlling him!

Skye

Ward has taken Skye to her dad & what can you say? While Kyle MacLachlan has only had a handful of appearances on the show, he’s easily a standout performer and one that emotes the roles to a greater degree than almost anyone else. He is as crazy as they come, but at the same time he can make you empathize with him and his pain … of course a minute later you are scared spitless when he reverts back into a homicidal maniac!

Skye and her dad talk and while he admits to being a monster, he tries to explain and justify it but while doing so, he starts to lose control and scares Skye. He explains that while he is here in the HYDRA base, he’s not actually working for HYDRA but is using them to find Skye and now that they have, he can kill Whitehall (not sure if you remember, but last weeks episode, we saw Whitehall torture and kill an immortal women – turns out this was Skye’s mother and Cal knows that Whitehall had her killed). Skye’s dad says he’s sorry and goes out to kill Whitehall.

But

…

Whitehall knows that Cal is Skye’s dad and questions Ward on why he brought her also when his mission to the Bus was to capture Raina. Realizing that Skye too can touch the Diviner, Whitehall tells Skye that he will enjoy finding out how she is able to do what she does & knocks out Skye’s dad. He also tells Ward that he will enjoy making him “comply”.

When Skye’s dad wakes up, he finds that Whitehall has implanted a transmitter on him that knocks him down but before Whitehall can continue threatening Skye, Coulson and May appear and start to attack the HYDRA forces. Skye’s dad manages to get the transmitter off his neck and kills the guard holding Ward and Skye captive, before he once again leaves to kill Whitehall. Unfortunately before he is able to get his hands on Whitehall … Coulson appears and shoots him dead!

OK – officially at the 1/2 way point now … like I said lots already happened but no where near the real earth shattering stuff still to come!

[note: is Whitehall really dead? Considering he was the “big bad” of the season, he seemed to go awful quick? Potential here for a clone or LMD or something like that?? Would be curious to see if he’s really out of the picture]

On to the 2nd 1/2

OK now that Coulson has killed the big bad, Skye’s dad has a major freak out on Coulson and starts to pound on him … hard. Meanwhile, Ward has managed to escape his bonds and frees Skye. As he’s scouting the lay of the land … Skye … shoots him!!

Bloody hell, that one actually really did take me by surprise. I wasn’t expecting that at all and sad to say … I’m glad she did it. It actually shows that she’s living up to her words and while I’m curious to see what happens in the future, this was well done.

While Ward is bleeding in the hallway, Skye rush’s to Coulson’s defense and manages to get her dad away from him. Skye’s dad says he’s sorry and leaves and tells her that she will come to him in the future after telling Skye her real name is Daisy.

[note: this is the first real confirmation that Skye is actually Daisy Johnson the Inhuman known as Quake and her father is the supervillian Mister Hyde]

Syye says she will go to find the obelisk, but it turns out that Raina has managed to carry it into the tunnels where she meets Mack, who’s obviously not dead. Telling him to take her to “the place” she heads out into the darkness. Skye quickly realizing what Raina has done, goes into the city looking for followed fairly shortly thereafter by Coulson.

When May tells Trip, Fitz and Simmons that Skye and Coulson are now in city, Tripp quickly goes back in and disarms all of the bombs he’d just finished arming and follows Skye into the chamber where she has managed to track down and confront Raina.

When Raina places the Diviner on the obelisk, it opens up and is all crystalline inside (looks a lot like Superman’s fortress of solitude to be honest!). Activating, the Diviner encases both Skye and Raina in some sort of chrysalis, but Tripp looks unharmed. Unfortunately when the crystal shards on the Diviner shatter Tripp is hit by one and is immediately turned to stone.

Tripp is dead. … I’m not sure how I feel about this to be honest. He’s not one of the main characters and I’m still not really invested in him, but he’s been around for a while and I really thought that Mack had bought it, but with the bait-and-switch they’ve pulled, it looks like Mack is going to be here for at least a little while longer. The way he died though … kind of lame to be honest … would have been better if he’d gone in the episode where they were searching for the lost city. This one, he was just following Skye around and was kind of incidental.

Skye however breaks out of her chrysalis and sees Tripp crumbling to dust in front of her. She seems … powerful. Everything is shaking and Skye looks like a hero come to Earth. Raina however … while we know she was encased, we don’t really know what has happened to her – there was a small flash of something that looked like porcupine quills but I could have been mistaken. I guess we’ll need to wait till March to find out more!

…

or will we?

Like all good cliffhangers, we can’t be left with just one … it seems that after all this time, there is another Obelisk & there’s someone new … A Man with no eyes … he seems to know all about the Obelisks though as he picks up the phone and tells someone else that there is now “another”.

Closing

It looks like instead of Agents of SHIELD being an also ran and addendum to the movies, its now taking the lead with the introduction of the Inhumans. While no-one specifically mentions them by name Marvel Comics long ago introduced the concept of the blue crystals brought to the Earth by the Kree that transformed Neanderthal man into something more by encasing them in cocoons.

This means that SHIELD is finally doing what I wanted them to do in the first place (I’ll take full credit for this by the way) & is helping to drive the Marvel Universe forward instead of just reacting to things. Not only are they now leading the way, they have also with this episode opened up the possibility of a whole host of super powered beings being introduced and hopefully appearing in future episodes of SHIELD.

July 31, 2015 5 comments

Agents of Shield

AGENTS OF SHIELD: MAKING FRIENDS AND INFLUENCING PEOPLE (S2E03)

by hutchm July 26, 2015

written by hutchm

Opening:

The first two episodes of Season 2 have shown how far Agents of Shield had come over since the start of Season 1. They offered up a well told complete story while opening intriguing teases of what we are going to expect from the season, and that is, so far, high hopes. This ep promises to delve deeper into the new world of Shield vs. HYDRA battle for assets.

Summary:

This episode opens with a creepy Clockwork Orange style scene where Whitehall and Bakshi are preparing former Shield Agent 33 for a future of compliance to HYDRA orders (a key word for HYDRA given its effect on the Absorbing man last ep) The creepiness continues with Simmons(!) waking to God Help the Girl by Belle and Sebastian. Guess what, she’s now working for HYDRA! We next move on to May offering some shooting lessons to Skye, and introduces her to a sniper rife. Pay attention viewer, this is all foreshadowing. It’s a little more obvious than we’re used to, but done with panache.

Back to Simmons. As with last episode spending time concentrating on Hunter, this ep centers around her and her new life as an agent of HYDRA. Note: It doesn’t get any less creepy. After a disturbing discussion with her boss in the lab, Simmons realizes she’s been researching former friend Donnie Gill (who we met last year on his way to becoming Blizzard). Getting home, and paranoid enough to pull her gun, she finds Coulson has shown up to cook her dinner and debrief her (not as kinky as that might sound). Oh, of course, she’s a mole. Over dinner he discusses the requirements of being a successful undercover agent, i.e., its all about making friends. After that there is a debriefing of the team – they need to get a hold of Donnie before HYDRA does.

However, HYDRA, as usual is several steps ahead and has already found Donnie, who has been hiding out in Marrakesh. Paranoid Donnie freezes his current employer, then one of the HYDRA agents come to recruit him. He then heads off to port to pro-actively deal with the problem, starting with icing up a freighter in Marakesh. You’d think someone would notice.

We get another interview between Sky and Ward, again Silence of the Lambs style. Things veer dangerously personal, before Skye brings it back to HYDRA. Ward advises that HYDRA has already won, because they don’t consider right or wrong in what they do. Back at HYDRA, Simmons gets a scare when she’s called up to the 25^th floor and has an interview with Bakshi regarding her Shield past, her connection to Donnie and her loyalty to HYDRA. This is mirrored by Whitehall chatting amiably about individuality and equality as only a Nazi can while he continues to have Agent 33 brainwashed. Simmons soon finds herself brought in to recruit Donnie. However Donnie has had enough of working for HYDRA, and intends on taking out any HYDRA agent coming after him. Yes, then tension and the body count is ratcheting up.

Angry and paranoid Fitz, back at base, has figured out that someone is being kept downstairs, sees it’s Ward and uses the opportunity for some healthy expression of his continuing rage (if you consider cutting Ward’s air supply healthY, that is). Again, this offers more evidence that his current state is now primarily psychologically driven. Thankfully, Coulson takes what Fitz did as well as could be expected.

Despite Coulson’s advice Simmons handle the re-recruitment of Donnie badly, to the point that Bakshi has her begin the compliance mantra that he used on Creel. Tension is amped up further as Coulson learns from Ward through Fitz, what we’ve guessed: HYDRA has already made quality use of Donnie – he helped them take the Sandbox.

Luckily for Simmons, May spots she is the one talking to Donnie and shoots Hunter before he takes out Simmons, and so preserves her cover. Bakshi orders Donnie to ice the ship, but HYDRA is thwarted of using him as a weapon in the future by a sniper shot from, yes, Skye. So maybe Ward is wrong about HYDRA having the upper hand over Shield re: morality.

Note: All through this episode Skye’s solidity as a field agent has be through repeatedly checking her heartbeat reader on her wrist, and for the most part she keeps it low, at least until Ward mentions her dad, and that he’s looking for her. Then it skyrockets.

Overall, a clear win for Shield, acknowledged by Bakshi and Whitehall, although they have only limited knowledge yet of what they are dealing with, including who’s running it. And, hey, it looks like Simmons’s getting a promotion, but just to remind us what a promotion can end up as, we get a brief visit to the top HYDRA pair from the now, ‘compliant’ Agent 33.

Final Thoughts

A bit of a weaker story compared to previous two, not having either the intensity or pace of the opening, nor the deeper reflection shown in ep 2. We get a chance to see more of how both Skye and Simmons have grown and changed, and we got a Fitz breakthrough, so things are still moving forward, which is always a good thing. If the episode has any major narrative faults, it that the heavy foreshadowing ensured this was a fairly predictable ep, as well as one that spends much of its narrative foreshadowing what is to come. Still, above average.

July 26, 2015 0 comments

Agents of Shield

AGENTS OF SHIELD – RAGTAG (S1E21)

by hutchm July 1, 2015

written by hutchm

OK, I know that in the beginning I wasn’t a huge fan – I mean lets be honest, it didn’t really seem to be going anywhere did it? – and there were parts in the middle where it seemed to lag also and was full of filler and fluff, but after the big Hydra reveal, I’ve been forced to take back everything bad I’ve ever thought, mentioned or stated about Agents of Shield.

I admit it, I was wrong – this series is awesome and I can only hope that they not only end Season 1 appropriately (I have faith Joss) but that they are able to keep up the momentum in Season 2 (I’m assuming that there is a Season 2 here) and not have a repeat of the debacle that Heroes was!

While Ward’s grand reveal as a HYDRA agent was several weeks ago now, this episode really focused in on him and more specifically on the relationship between him and Garrett. Stuffed full of flashbacks, this episode still had enough twists and turns to definitely satisfy but still left you wanting more.

Astonishing Tales #25 (Aug. 1974). Cover art by Rich Buckler and Klaus Janson. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Before we get into the recap of the episode, lets talk really quickly about all of the super cool gadgets and toys … I know that they showed the Corvette flying in the first episode (still the coolest part of that episode) and last week they utilized it further in effecting Skye’s escape from the clutches of Deathlok & Ward, however, this week it was all about the Howling Commando’s and their bag of tricks. You had the laser cigarette (a really funny scene with May and Fitz), the joy buzzer EMP and a whole suitcase full of gadgets that still need to get used – I can’t wait!

Recap

Starting with our first flashback of the episode, Garrett approaches a young Ward currently incarcerated in a juvenile facility. If you recall from last weeks episode, Ward told Skye how his brother had tortured him over the years, well it looks like the young Ward had decided to get revenge as he’d escaped from military school, stolen a car and then set fire to his own home with this brother inside it! Ward is now about to be charged as an adult for the attempted murder of his brother (by the way, I wonder if his brother is going to appear in any future issues?) but Garrett see’s something in his young apprentice and offers him a way out if he’ll join up. When Ward says yes, Garrett breaks him out of jail and starts his training with actions more reminiscent of the Spartans than what one would expect from a spy agency.

Coulson and the Scooby gang meanwhile are still holed up in their motel trying to understand why Deathlok has killed a HYDRA affiliated drug lord, and, in fact, killed him in such a spectacular fashion! Realizing that the only way they can get Skye’s magic USB stick loaded onto the HYDRA network is by finding a HYDRA computer, they decide to infiltrate Cybertek – the evil corporation with links to the Deathlok project. Coulson and May poses as a scientists with the assistance of Fitz and Simmons via walkie-talkie (leading to some really funny moments) while Skye and the rest of the team try to determine where the computers are stored in Cybertek. Surprise, surprise … there are no computers and Cybertek stores everything the old fashioned way (not sure if this makes too much sense unless this building is just a front for another location) on good old paper. Breaking into the filing room, Coulson and May discover that the Deathlok program goes all the way back to 1990 and Garrett was the first Deathlok – which explains the metal plate shown on his stomach a few episodes ago!

Flipping back to the baddies, Garrett has had Raina continue the research on the GH325 serum as he confesses to Ward that he’s actually dying. While the Deathlok components are functional his body is failing and right now the only thing keeping him alive is the Centipede serum. Coulson and team realize the same facts pretty quickly by reviewing the Cybertek files and pursue Garrett and Ward to Cuba where they suspect Garrett is holed up. While Fitz and Simmons are left at the airport, Coulson and the rest of the gang head out to where they think Garrett is, but, unfortunately, he’s already left and is in fact at the airport too. Fitz and Simmons are quickly captured by Ward, but Fitz manages to set off the hand held EMP device from Triplett’s grandfather’s Howling Commando bag of goodies, short-circuiting Garrett’s Deathlok components.

Garrett almost dead now orders Ward to kill Fitz and Simmons and while he’s gone to do that, has himself injected with the repurposed serum that Raina had managed to compile. Ward while obviously torn (flashback to his having to kill his own dog, but him not being able to do it) about the order, does comply and ejects Fitz and Simmons from the plane and into the ocean. Once Garrett has been injected with the serum he has a violent reaction but seems to recover and when Ward asks him what he’s feeling he responds – “The Universe”.

Ian Quinn now rehabilitated with Shield’s downfall is meeting with some generals in the USA and is offering them the chance to own their own “Super Soldiers” … Quinn’s playing up of Deathlok’s splashy drug lord murder, the existence of HYDRA and the downfall of Shield makes them seriously consider it.

While all of this is going on, Coulson and the rest of the gang not aware of what has happened to Fitz and Simmons have finally located a HYDRA computer … unfortunately just as Skye is about to plug in her USB key, they are confronted with a host of Caterpillar enhanced super soldiers as well as someone holding one of the Asgardian battle sticks …

I really can’t wait for the next episode!

July 1, 2015 3 comments

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