Saturday, 16 December 2017

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Review: “A Life Earned”

You spin me right round
(This review contains spoilers!)

          S.H.I.E.L.D prides itself on the ways it can surprise and shock viewers. This is one of the only shows where no matter how safe you feel, something crazy can always come out of left field to both take you by surprise and leave you excited for what comes next.

          This episode was no different. With Daisy now imprisoned by Kasius (Kassius? Casius? I’ll learn the proper spelling eventually, I promise) and the rest of the team still stuck in various situations, the possibility of escape now seems slimmer than ever. But a glimmer of hope arrives at literally the last moment that might spell rescue for our heroes.

          Now that random big scary guy from last week has been dropped off and eaten alive, the slave driver guy has hired Mack as his replacement. His first mission is to find a mysterious illegal package someone is hiding, which turns out to be a baby. Cue daddy issues from a literal daddy.

          In all seriousness, it’s a really good little subplot. Mack was one of the agents that the Framework hit the hardest what with Hope returning and subsequently dying again. Now that he’s back, it’s nice to finally explore some of the fallout of his experiences in there.

          Meanwhile, Coulson and May are investigating the mysterious message coming from the surface of the Earth. They bump into Deke, and they figure out that he’s responsible for Daisy’s disappearance. Deke explains that his father is the one sending the message from the Earth, but Coulson replies by locking him in a room and welding the door shut to keep him from messing with them anymore. Cool.

          What’s really interesting here is May’s last scene in the episode. She and Coulson come across the baby Mack is looking for, but are met with a Kree squad. While Coulson evacuates the baby, May stays and fights, until finally she meets up with the Kree girl that uses the metal balls of doom. The Kree girl owns May, but we don’t get to see the ending of the fight. She just reports back to Kasius, saying that it was taken care of. Hmm…

          Last but not least, there’s Daisy’s story. There’s not too much to see this week here. Daisy is brought to Kasius, who wants to sell her for a high price so he can finally leave the station. On the way there she meets up with an inhuman who can read minds as well as project his thoughts onto others. He helps her out by sending Simmons a message for her, and he’s set up for next week.

          I do have one problem with this episode: the camera refused to stay still. While it wasn’t a constant issue, it was frequent enough to take notice. There’s a scene where Coulson and May are interrogating Deke in a hallway. For whatever reason, the camera spins around and around them for the entire scene, making me feel like I was watching it while riding a carousel. The fight scenes weren’t shot great either. Everything seemed to be taking place on the far left or right of the shot, making it hard to see what was going on.

          But, of course, everyone’s talking about the big ending. Daisy is presented to a group of alien factions to be sold as an ultimate world-killer weapon. One of the aliens steps forth, takes off his mask, and…it’s Fitz! How’d he get there? Why is he with the aliens? And why does he want to see Daisy in a deathmatch? I’m guessing all these questions and more will be answered in next week’s Fitz-centered episode.

          This was a really solid episode. Mack’s storyline was heartfelt and gave fans of Season 4 some much-desired closure, as well as further development for his character. Coulson and May had a lot of fun stuff to do, especially with how the episode ended with May’s fate in question (and since next week looks to be 99% Fitz we might not get an answer until after the one week they’re taking off for the holidays), and while Daisy had the least interesting story of the three, the ending with Fitz was an awesome surprise. I definitely could’ve done without the spinny-cam. I don’t like to feel motion sick while I watch TV. The real question for me here is what comes next?

FINAL SCORE
8/10

Great

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