Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Review: “Emancipation”

Lashing out

(This review contains spoilers for this episode and for Captain America: Civil War!)

          The penultimate episode of Season 3 has arrived, and with it comes a Civil War tie in. With the Sokovia Accords now law, Talbot’s arrived at the Shield base and is trying to get the Inhumans registered.

          At the same time, everything seems to be going off the rails, as Lincoln is supposedly trying to escape, Daisy is giving up blood to help Hive, and a small team of Watchdogs have been turned into weird, primitive human type things.

          I gotta say, I’m not a fan of how those primitive humans look. I like the idea behind them, but they look more like a rubber mask you’d find at the party store than a real threat.

          As much as I liked the big twist involving Lincoln’s escape, it’s sad that his character’s gotten so predictable that we would fully believe he’d try to escape from Shield to get to Daisy, and for no other reason than that. When watching the episode, I was like “oh okay, he’s doing this now” instead of wondering if it wasn’t what it seemed.

          But the reveal that Lash had been sent instead of Lincoln was one of the best. We got an amazing fight scene between him and Hive, and he cured Daisy of her mind-control. That being said, it’s kind of bittersweet to see him get killed off. He was a great villain, and he really went out in style. Still, I can’t help but feel that there was a bit more with him they could’ve done.

          With the reveal that Hive is prepping a warhead that will turn a significant part of the world into Inhumans, the 2-hour season 3 finale is set up to be action packed, with the promise that someone is going to die. My money was on it being Mack coming into this episode, but as it stands right now I feel like it’s a bit too obvious to be him. We’ll just have to wait and see.

FINAL SCORE

8/10

Great

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Review: “Failed Experiments”

In case of emergency, call Kree headquarters

(This review contains spoilers!)

          As we make our approach to the two hour season finale on the 17^th, the stakes grow higher and higher for the crew. This week was no exception, as we got our first Marvel TV appearance of the Kree! At least, I think it was. Daisy mentioned fighting a Kree before, but I can’t remember when that happened for the life of me.

          Nevertheless, the Kree Reapers were easily the high point of this episode, and the fight scenes with Daisy and Hive were very fast paced and well done. It’s always nice when the larger Marvel Universe beyond just Hydra and the Inhumans comes to play, and this was no exception.

          I also liked the opening sequence, discovering where Hive came from and how we was turned into the Inhuman we know him as today. We got to see him as a tribesman in what I can only assume was Africa (Wakanda, maybe?) thousands of years ago, being turned into this monster.

          What I didn’t like was how everyone’s brains seemed to check out for an episode. Bad decision making was the norm this week, as everyone seemed to be getting themselves into trouble. There’s Mack throwing away his weapon as he faced off with one of the strongest Inhumans, Lincoln almost killing himself trying to create a vaccine that Fitz and Simmons warned against, and, my personal favourite, May and her team thinking they can kill Hive with bullets.

          Speaking of May’s team, is anyone else surprised that those two new agents survived the episodes? They felt like real red-shirt material to me, but they made it home safe and even got a few lines each to boot.

          There was also the problem that the majority of the episode took place in boring laboratories, with people talking about science and vaccines and stuff like that for far too long. I’ll admit, I got disinterested pretty fast.

          We ended off with the revelation that, since Coulson used Kree blood to save Daisy’s life after she’d been shot in Season 1, Hive can use her blood to make more Inhumans. A bit of a deus ex machina, but it makes sense, considering it was established a few years ago.

          Despite its shortcomings, this was still a really good episode for Shield, and I’m expecting things to really get going next week as we get closer to the end of the “Fallen Agent” storyline and past Civil War.

FINAL SCORE

8/10

Great

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Review: "The Singularity"

The Shield of S.H.I.E.L.D

(This review contains spoilers!)

          The original 6 cast members took the spotlight on this week’s Shield, going on missions that, to be perfectly honest, weren’t that interesting.

          If that clever teaser poster is any indication, this is Part 2 of a crazy 4 part finale the showrunners have planned. If that’s the case, then this is absolutely the setup episode while the other 2 will do all the heavy lifting.

          First things first, Fitz and Simmons. Now that the two of them are a couple, there was lots of discussion tonight on where their relationship would go. That’s all fine and dandy, especially with characters we’ve been waiting on to pair up since Season 1, but it reminded me a lot of why I disliked Bobbi and Hunter so much. They talked so much about their relationship troubles that the overall mission got lost in all the chit-chat.

          The episode ended on a strange note, with Fitz and Simmons getting together and presumably going to have sex. Yay? I mean, it’s good that they’re furthering the relationship, but that’s the big end for this week? It didn’t help that it was really uncomfortable to look at.

          Over on the B-plot side of things, Coulson and May were chasing after Hive and Daisy, generally being the much more interesting storyline that gave way to a lot of excellent moments. We had that excellent fight scene with Lincoln and that girl who can duplicate herself, Coulson finally admitting he sees Daisy as the daughter he never had, and of course who could forget the Director of Shield’s shield?

          It all wrapped up with the huge revelation that Talbot’s been working behind the scenes locating all the secret Hydra bases, and it seems Hydra’s been defeated once and for all. As great as it was to finally have this huge enemy be taken down so swiftly, I can’t help but remember the words of Arnim Zola: Cut off one head, two more will take its place. So while Hydra may take a bit of a break, I wouldn’t rule out their return.

          So all in all, a decent episode for Shield, albeit a tad bit too much setup and not enough actually getting stuff done in my opinion. Here’s to next week!

FINAL SCORE

7/10

Good

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Review: “The Team”

Shaking Things Up

(This review contains spoilers!)

One could argue that this whole season’s been leading up to this very episode. With the introduction of the Secret Warriors being such a huge plot point, it was inevitable we were going to get a big introduction for them.

The show opens with Daisy, Lincoln, Joey, and Yo-Yo (I can’t remember her real name for the life of me) storming the Hydra base, rescuing Coulson and the crew and even capturing Malick in the first few minutes! It never fails to amaze me how much this show always gets done in such little time.

Speaking of Malick, it felt fitting that his story ended here. We’ve known since last week he was going to be killed off, and when he lost his daughter I figured it was going to only be a matter of time. Still, he went out really well, and the show pulled the rug out from under us yet again with the reveal that while he was technically killed by Hive as predicted, it wasn’t done in person.

And now to address the elephant in the room: Evil Daisy. I can honestly say I didn’t see it coming, and I’m really excited to see how this plays out. The final few shots of her quaking up the base and trapping Coulson and the other inside were extremely well done, thanks to the visual effects and the fantastic performance of Chloe Bennett.

It’s funny to think how packed to the brim this episode was, especially compared to the lackluster “game-changing” episode from two weeks ago. In just 45 minutes, we got the Secret Warriors finally teaming up, then disbanding, as well as killing Malick, Fitz and Simmons getting together (at long long last!), Mack and Yo-yo’s relationship changing, and Lincoln being framed for being Hive’s spy. Since its kind of obvious now who the real spy is now though, I can imagine he’ll be back in action before too long.

I doubt this will be the last we’ve seen of the Secret Warriors, despite their apparent disbanding, but still, I was a little disappointed that all we got were less than 15 minutes of them working as a team on a mission. It would’ve been much more interesting to see them work together before this, and demonstrate how well they partner up, raising the stakes for when it all came crashing down in this episode.

But still, I’m happy with what we got. I’m still not sure if Shield will be able to top the epic two-parter Winter Finale we got this season, but if this episode is any indication, they sure will try.

FINAL SCORE

9/10

Amazing