Agents of SHIELD – S2E11 – Aftershocks – Recap

aftershocks poster

And we’re back! Man, the hiatus since the last episode of Agents of SHIELD seemed longer than it actually was. Having Agent Carter around helped, but that show just didn’t have the same intensity that Agents of SHIELD has had since the middle of last season. In case you’ve forgotten what’s what and were we are, this episode starts with a previously, and I want it just be rocks floating around Skye. Seriously,nothing else matters. That said, I’m still sad about Trip’s death. RIP Trip. 🙁

We start in the past. There’s a boy who’s like Nightcrawler in X2. He’s in a room, just porting around the place uncontrollably. It’s 1982. The weird thing isn’t his porting. And it’s not even that he can’t port out of the room. It’s that he has no eyes. Skye’s mom walks in with an old dude. They let you know immediately that this is not Nightcrawler, for this is no mutant, “he passed through the mists,” *cough* Inhumans *cough* (besides, Nightcrawler has eyes…and is blue). Skye’s mom tries to talk some calm into Gordon, the eyeless wonder. Hmm, it’s interesting that they didn’t go with more established Inhumans like Gorgon, Blackbolt, Triton or Medusa. I wonder when we’ll see them?

Skye wakes up…with an iPhone armband strapped to her. I love running and I don’t sleep with my armband on. Coulson is there when wakes. Skye confirms Trip is dead. Man… 🙁
skye iphone armband
Skye and Coulson are in quarantine. Everyone else is going about their own business, trying to work through the grief of losing Trip. Simmons is documenting what’s in the tunnells with a team. Everyone on the team is wearing hazmat suits.
How much os this episode is going to be Coulson and Skye talking, Diner style? Skye is depressed. Coulson is angry. Cut to a meeting of what appears to be the heads of Hydra. One of them really, really looks andn sounds like Hilary Clinton. That can’t be not on purpose, right?
Something is in the tunnels, and it attacked one of Simmons’s men. Oh, that hand looks like Raina’s, all porcupine like. Simmons meets with her team in the catacombs. When she leaves, Raina attacks the team members, killing them. Raina is all claws and craziness. Simmons shoots her. She’s still able to run away, and gets to an elevator.
Bobbie meets with Skye. She tries to keep Skye’s spirits up. When Skye says she feels like a leper, Bobbie points out everything that happened to Skye and says Skye’s a rock star.
The Fitz and Mac show is still a thing. Anyone feel that The Rock was the first choice to play Mac? Mac and Fitz are going through similar issues. Mac was controlled by that gas and Fitz’s brain isn’t’ what it used to be. Both felt trapped in their own bodies.
Simmons gets in touch with Coulson and May. They’re hunting down Raina, not realizing she’s the porcupine monster.
Coulson calls a team meeting. Everyone starts arguing, stressing Skye out. The stress causes her to involuntarily shake the place. Amazingly, no one else notices. Seriously, I’ve been in arguments, but I think I’d notice the start of an earthquake happening at the same time.
Bakshi is in Coulson’s custody. Coulson facetimes with Talbot. They arrange a trade for Bakshi. Coulson and May are ambushed while transporting Bakshi. But abushed by whom? Hydra? Talbot with the double cross? In the ensuing firefight, May counts four hostiles left. She asks Coulson if he know what that means. He doens’t. It means May is going into BEAST MODE. While she’s taking out everyone, someone shoots her, and then Coulson. There is A LOT of blood. W. T. F. Still, Coulson yells “They’ll never take us alive,” which seems fishy. The masked shooter tells Bakshi to get in the SUV. Why do I think this is an elaborate Coulson ploy? Also, that masked guy…sounds like Talbot.
Bakshi’s masked savior is revealed. WHAT?!  It’s not Talbot! it’s Hunter. For a second, I think to myself that this isn’t a Coulson ploy and Hunter has gone over to Hydra. But I’m wrong. It is a Coulson plot. May makes fun of Coulson for saying they’ll never take us alive. Man, I love this show!
Hunter gets in Bakshi’s good graces by holding a gun to Bakshi’shead, and then allowing himself to get bought off by Bakshi.
As it turns out, Simmons did realize that porcupine lady was Raina. But they don’t realize Skye is a superhuman too. How is that possible? They analyzed Raina’s DNA without Raina being in custody, but not Skye’s?
Raina attacks Kyle MacLachlan. On a side note, it really bothers me that we don’t have a character name for Kyle MacLachlan other than Skye’s Dad or The Doctor. I’m going to keep referring to him as Kyle. Raina wants to know what the hell she has become. Me too. Is that even the same actress?! She wants to be normal again, “not some gnarled freak of nature covered in thorns.” Wow, she really is gnarled. How many hours does Ruth Negga need to spend in the makeup chair each shooting day for this? It is crazy that Skye just looks like Skye. Er, I mean Daisy. Sorry, Kyle. Totally meant Daisy. Back to Raina…whoa, Raina is seriously crazy. She blames Skye for what happened to her. Kyle and Raina are like in a competition for who can be crazier. It’s a dead heat. Wow, Raina unhooded looks like 0% Raina. She’s all bald and spikey. Seriously, this could be a different actress if it wasn’t for her voice. On another side note, when Kyle talks to himself, he sounds like a Batman 66 villain.
Hunter wants to find out Bobbie and Mac’s mutual secret. It turns out they’re in a support group for people who used to be in SHIELD, but were betrayed by Hydra. Wait, this wasn’t’ an excuse? It’s real? Huh, I thought Bobbie was being evasive at first.
Fitz meets with Skye. He’s the only one who realizes she survived the destruction only because she caused it. Why would you bring that up to the that person, Fitz?? Come on, Fitz! Skye makes the room shake. Things start exploding. Fitz runs. How did he not see that one coming?
skye explosion
Coulson delivers the news to Trip’s mom that Trip is dead. The audience gets to see a cool photo of the Howling Commandos hanging on the wall.
Bakshi and another guy in the head Hydra group set off an alert. The other Hydra heads are wearing watches that light up. They seem excited. What’s up? Bakshi decides to turn on Hunter. He has his men shoot the crap out of Hunter’s jeep. Unfortunately for those men, the jeep is bulletproof and has pop-out guns.  Not a standard feature, but totally worth the expense in this case.
Hilary Clinton is poisoned, and turns to ash, like so many others this season. Another Hydra dude meets the same fate. Pretty much everyone but Bakshi dies. Baskshi betrayed the group. Hunter and Bobbie take out Bakshi’s co-conspirator and take Bakshi in. This was all Coulson’s plan, to get the Hydra heads to betray each other so that his team wouldn’t have to go after them.
Skye is bleeding. May and Simmons want to know what’s up.Fitz takes the blame and seems to have doctored Skye’s DNA. He replaced it with a sample of her old DNA. Um…why? Seriously why. Fitz is afraid that Simmons will judge Skye too harshly. Fitz is the only one who knows the truth about Skye. That’s nice of you, Fitz, but how is Skye going to get the help she needs?
A SHIELD team finds Raina. They tell her she’s not there to hurt her, just take her in. Raina wants them to kill her. The blind teleporter ports in He’s all grown up and in control of his powers. He grabs Raina and ports out.
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In the final scene, a model of Lola activates something in Coulson’s desk. The team is meeting downstairs, drinking beer, reminiscing about Trip. Off to the side, Mac tells Bobbie he has visual confirmation, Fury’s blueprints are in Coulson’s office. Oh right, Mac made that little model. Oh wait, they’re not in any support group. What’s going on with these two, and who is Bobbie going to make contact with? Man, don’t be evil, Bobbie. You too, Mac…
No sign of Ward this episode. I wonder when we’ll see him again. Looking at the Art of Level 7 poster by Marcos Martin for next week’s episode, it looks like Sif will be returning to Agents of SHIELD. I can’t wait.
marcos martin shield sif
I am so happy Agents of SHIELD is back!

Agents of SHIELD – S2E2 – Heavy Is the Head – Recap

I completely did not realize that Lucy Lawless was the new agent who was introduced and killed off last episode. I vaguely remember hearing that she was going to be on SHIELD this season, but man, I totally did not realize that was her. Man, we’re far away from the days of Xena: Warrior Princess…

But on with the show. This episode starts off pretty much when were last week left off. Two of the new agents are dead. May saves the new British agent. His name is Brit until I’m told otherwise. Well, she doesn’t really saves him. She tries to free him from the flipped over jeep, but he tells her to go after Creel. May motorcycles after Creel, but does give Brit a laser torch so that he can cut his way out. Unfortunately, just as he cuts his way free, the army shows up.

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May chases Creel. Coulson is on the other end of her com and tells her not to engage. May questions his orders, but reluctantly pulls back. I really do love that the most bad-ass character on this show is a woman. May really is the Wolverine of the show. 

Back at the base, the Quinjet arrives with Skye and Triplett.  Am I the only one feeling a Trip-Skye-Ward love triangle? Last season, it looked like Trip was going to get between Fitz and Simmons, but this season, it looks like he’s good-Ward.

Coulson wants the Bus outfitted with the Quinjet’s cloaking hardware and tells Skye to put Mac on it. I’m assuming Mac is one of the new people? Skye tells Coulson that there were symbols on the McGuffin from last episode, and they match the symbols Coulson’s been drawing when he zones out.

Ah, Brit’s name is Lance Hunter. The solders that captured him drop him off in a field. Immediately after that, a helicopter lands and General Talbot gets out. That Talbot sure likes to make an entrance. He could have just as easily had his men just deliver Lance directly to him.

Skye is pissed at Simmons for bailing on Coulson’s team. Fitz shows up as she’s venting. Fitz is seriously out of it. He sounds like he’s on heavy duty painkillers. This scene just makes me think that man…I miss FitzSimmons.

Talbot wants Lance to sell out Coulson. It doesn’t look like he’s going to sell out, until he gets Talbot to agree to clear Harley (Harvey?) and give her a proper funeral. Harley is Lucy Lawless for those of you having an equally hard time of keeping track of the new characters names. So let me get this straight. Mercenary Lance is willing to sell out the living in order to help the dead…interesting.

Coulson is using one of those 3D computer monitor thingies where you swipe the air. He pulls up Agent Carter’s file and says “Hmmm,” as in “Hmmm, this could be a good spin off. Agent Carter coming in 2015 to ABC!” He sets a reminder to look out for the mystery weapon from last week the way I set reminders about where I parked my car.

Skye wants to head to the field. Coulson won’t let her go to the field. He’s worreid about Skye dying. She feels he’s being overprotective, but in his defense, between the end of last season and the start of this one, Coulson doesn’t have a great track record in keeping his people alive. Skye recommends that Coulson try yoga in order to relax. Coulson has his best line of the episode here, with  “I tried it, but I’m really not flexible.” So much subtext…

Fitz is still seeing imaginary Simmons. Amazingly, she’s still dressed like a prep school student. Why aren’t you imagining her in a bikini fitz?Imaginary Simmons points out that Absorbing Man’s DNA is just sitting there on the printer and tells him he should go check it out. Imaginary Simmons is like a very prim and proper devil sitting on Fitz’s shoulder.

Speaking of Creel, he’s in a diner. That weird metal from last week’s McGuffin messed up his powers. He keeps turning into that metal, but it looks pretty painful and cracks his skin. He’s rude to a waitress. I hope she isn’t expecting a tip from him. May is waiting outside for Creel. When she hears a scream, she rushes in. The waitress who touched Creel rots like Harley did last week, except it’s just her arm. Her whole body rots like she picked the wrong holy grail to drink from. Creel has kind of turned into the Grey Gargoyle. For those of you who don’t read comics, The Grey Gargoyle is a Hulk villain who can turn people to stone with a touch.

Coulson gets an alert. We cut to Triplett, who  meets up with Lance and take him to Coulson. Lance is not happy when Coulson blames Harley’s death on Harley. Lance tells Coulson he didn’t rat on him. I don’t exactly believe him. I don’t think Coulson does either.

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Fitz analyzes the data on Creel. Simmons makes some suggestions. I’m actually likeing that Fitz’s smarts are coming through imaginary Simmons.

Creel gets in a truck where he keeps different objects. Huh, that’s a gool idea. Why didn’t the Absorbing Man in the comics ever do this. His powers are acting all wonky. He can’t absorb anything past his forearm. He gets a phone call from a Hydra guy sitting around dead bodies…it’s the dead bodies of the people Creel has touched, I’m guessing. So is this Hydra guy in SHIELD? The army? Or just working on his own?

Oh hey, Raina, aka the girl in the flower dress, is back. She’s trying to recruit Creel for something. She presents him with a ring. It’s carbide, a rare form of carbon found in stardust. 3x harder than diamond. And it can store energy. She’ll trade it for the obelisk from last week. As Creel threatens Raina, his powers act up again. He snatches the carbide from Flower dress and hops in his truck. Raina calls Coulson. Raina reveals that she no longer works for Hydra.

Fitz is trying to figure out the secret to stopping Creel and keeps saying “I didn’t design this today.” Mac deciphers what Fitz’s “I didn’t design this today” means. Mac is like his…mentor?

Creel meets with his Hydra backer. May, Lance and Skye are spying on him. That’s when Lance turns on them, stunning Skye and May and radioing to Talbot. Trip has a sniper rifle on Creel. Lance temporarily takes him out. Creel yoga breathes his power troubles away. Lance shoots a slow mo bullet at Creel that bounces off his alloy head. Creel gives chase. The Hydra dude looks around for the package with the obelisk, but Raina has grabbed it and it strutting away.

Creel is about to hit Lance with a killing blow when Coulson shows up and zaps him with Fitz’s device. It makes him go wonky and he turns to stone.

We cut to Lucy Laweless’s funeral. Lance watches from a far. He gets in the passenger side of a car. Oh wait, he just broke into a car. He puts a chain on the mirror. I think it belonged to Harley. Coulson does his best Batman by showing up out of nowhere. Coulson wants to recruit Lance…to sell Coulson out? Oh Phil, you so crazy.

Mac is working with Fitz some more. He brings up Simmon’s leaving to Fitz. Fitz’s brain does not like that.

HENRY SIMMONS, IAIN DE CAESTECKER, ELIZABETH HENSTRIDGE

Raina and Coulson talk. She talks about Garrett carving weird symbols after he injected himself with the alien blood that brought Coulson back from the grave. You know, the same Garrett who thought he had a star inside his head. Coulson is intrigued 

Coulson and May meet. Coulson takes out a sheet and a knife, takes off his shoes and starts digging his weird shapes into the wall again. What is going on with you, Phil? May just watches and take photos. Before this, May points out that Coulson hasn’t zoned out and carved in a while. So he’s let her in this part of him. Interesting.

Kyle McLauchin is Rainia’s new boss. According to IMDB, he’s also Skye’s dad! WTF!!! He has Raina toouch the obelisk. She doesn’t want to, on account of it killing people. But she does touch it. The obelisk doesn’t kill her. It just ligths up. According to Kyle, it “let “her live. She wants to know how it works. Kyle want Raina to get him Skye.

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Coulson meets with Talbot. Talbot asks “Where’s Lance?” Coulson offers Talbot a deal. Talbot can have Creel wrapped in a stasis field bow. All Coulson wants is Talbot off his and his team’s back. Talbot decides instead that since Coulson is only one man, he can just arrest Coulson right now…except Coulson has the Bus back and it’s cloaked! And the Quinjet too! Coulson gets away. Oh man, Talbot, you just got Philled!

Agents of SHIELD S1E11 – The Magical Place – Recap

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The wait is over. Agents of SHIELD is back! SPOILERS ahead, so if you haven’t watched The Magical Place yet, you may want to do that before you continue. It’s cool, we’ll hold a chair for you.

This episode could have been called Answers, because that’s what we get. Coulson DID die in The Avengers.  From what we learn in this new episode, this Phil Coulson is not a LMD, but rather is the same Coulson brought back from the dead. How did they bring him back? It involved at least seven surgeries, and a crazy brain scanning/operating machine that looked like it was borrowed from The Matrix. I winced when that machine has its pincers in Coulson’s exposed brain. Exposed brain makes me wince too, by the way. And there is no Tahiti, at least not for Coulson. Tahiti was a mirage/hologram/implanted memory.

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Cut away! No, not cut away his brain! Cut away from this shot!

I was glad to see Firefly alum Ron Glass, aka Shepherd Book, aka Dr. Streiten, return. We haven’t seen Dr. Streiten since the pilot episode. When Streiten is confronted by Coulson, he fesses up immediately, and it very sorry that they brought Coulson back. On the operating table, Coulson kept saying “Let me die” and that he was in a lot of pain. Not wanting a whiny post-death Coulson on their hands, SHIELD messed with his brain to keep his pre-death personality intact. Looking at the preview for next week’s episode, it’s safe to say Coulson is not okay with having his brain mucked with. Expect to see the very “company man” Coulson travelling down the path mostly traveled by Skye.  If they messed with his brain to make him more like his old self, what else did they do while they were in there?

Skye shines this episode from the moment she’s booted from the plane by May. We all knew why May booted her right from the start, right? It amazed me that it took the rest of the team so long to catch on. If I was Victoria Hand, after hearing the way May answered whether or not Skye should stay, I think I would have confined Skye to her quarters.

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On her own, Skye unleashes her inner May, even going so far as to call herself Agent May when interrogating Rob Huebel. I was so happy that Rob Huebel was cast for this episode. I’ve loved the man since his Inconsiderate Cell Phone Man commercials, which are easily the best silence your phone spots ever! Human Giant? Awesome. His Twitter feed? Hilarious. Hollywood casting agents: More Rob Huebel!

There were some deaths and a resurrection (besides Coulson’s) to round out The Magical Place. Mike Peterson is killed off-screen at the beginning of the episode, only to shown alive (but missing a few body parts) at the very end of the episode. Po, the creepy dude freed from prison by Centipede, is killed through his phone when The Clairvoyant decides it’s time to promote Raina. We all agree Raina is the creepiest, right? Yes, she’s one of the bad guys, but she seems pretty cool until she gets all crazy-eyed when she talks about The Clairvoyant. I really liked that Coulson got an answer to the question everyone wanted to ask, but was afraid to, namely what’s with all the flower dresses?

Next week’s episode is called Seeds. I’m guessing it’s about Ward’s secret gardening habit or a wild sex party on the bus. We’ll find out if I’m right on Tuesday!