Between the super-powered brawl that opens the episode, an assault on SHIELD by the primitive Inhumans, a last-ditch attempt to stop Hive's master plan and the death of a series regular, you'd be forgiven for thinking that "Ascension", the third season finale of Agents of SHIELD, runs the risk of feeling rushed. It's not like Agents of SHIELD hasn't produced it's fair share of episodes that are overstuffed, after all - even the first half of this season suffered thanks to how much it tried to do in just ten episodes, a focus on telling the story quickly over telling it well that robbed the show of it's ability to properly dramatise it's most important moments.
Fortunately, "Ascension" understands the difference between story elements that can be dealt with quickly and story elements that need some real time devoted to them, and in doing so offers us what may well be the most emotionally engaging episode of the show to date. Individual moments are given plenty of time in order to allow us to really feel them rather than just see them, an aspect of "Ascension" that also helps highlight how good the writing and performances are here.
My biggest fear going into the third season finale of Agents of SHIELD was that it would constantly be passing YoYo's cross between characters in order to keep us on our toes about who is going to die. Character death can make for excellent television when done well (hell, just see the latest episode of Game of Thrones for proof of that), but by having the advertising for the finale lean heavily on the fact that someone would die, I began to worry that Agents of SHIELD had nothing else to offer beyond that. It felt cheap, an easy way to raise the stakes without doing any of the legwork required to make it actually matter.
Thankfully, Agents of SHIELD has proven me wrong. Although there is an element of "Who's it going to be?!?" here, I'm glad to see that it isn't even close to being to focus of the episode. Instead, "Absolution" is content to simply let the SHIELD vs Hive story that the show has been building to since the mid-season finale play out, and in that respect it doesn't disappoint.
Now that's more like it. After last weeks "Failed Experiments" disappointed in a big way thanks to it's status as filler, this weeks "Emancipation" chooses to make up for that in a tight, important episode that smartly acknowledges the events of Captain America: Civil War before quickly getting on with what the show has been building up to for some time instead.
This week sees Coulson trying to convince General Talbot that the Secret Warriors need to remain a secret in the wake of the Sokovia Accords (which apparently included a clause on the registration of enhanced people - new to anyone who saw Captain America: Civil War), while Hive continues his experiments to turn regular people into Inhumans. But the main plot has Daisy hacking into SHIELD and talking to Lincoln, who is still cooped up inside his own little quarantine and getting more frustrated with his situation by the minute.
Opening with a brief flashback that shows us how Hive was first created by the Kree, the main plot of "Failed Experiments" sees SHIELD on a mission to try and kill Hive, or at least find out if they even can. At the same time, Fitzsimmons continue their work on an antidote for his ability to control Inhumans, while Hive starts work on a process that will turn regular humans into Inhumans.
I've got to say, I find myself quite disappointed with "Failed Experiments". Last weeks "The Singularity" was a surprisingly good episode of Agents of SHIELD that went to some interesting places while dealing with the consequences of "The Team". "Failed Experiments" seems to want to do the same, the problem being that it ends up hitting many of the same character beats as last weeks episode without really adding anything new. Again, we see Daisy threaten someone we know she cares for deeply thanks to Hive's influence; again we see the lengths Lincoln is willing to go to in order to help Daisy. It's repetition for no reason, something that even the first season of Agents of SHIELD managed to avoid.
It's no secret that the best part of Agents of SHIELD is and always has been the duo of Leopold Fitz and Jemma Simmons, collectively and affectionately known as Fitzsimmons. Their semi-romantic, will-they-won't-they friendship has been an important part of the show since the first season, and people genuinely care about them; something well-known by the shows writers, who take every opportunity they can to tear them apart, test their friendship, and break them in every way they know how. Fitzsimmons have been through a lot over the course of the last two seasons, so when an episode finally gives them the break that they deserve it feels both hugely satisfying and totally earned.
It is that which makes "The Singularity" such a good episode of Agents of SHIELD. The main story sees SHIELD dealing with the fallout left from last weeks "The Team" while also trying to get to various Inhumans that they know about before Hive can, but it is the side-plot that sees Fitzsimmons searching for someone who might have created a cure for Hive's mind control that really held my interest throughout.
Last week I said that I was disappointed with "Paradise Lost" thanks to how varied the quality was throughout. Although the main story of the episode was interesting, the other two side-plots only really existed to set up storylines for later on, and the episodes overall slower pace killed a lot of the momentum that the season had been building. I said at the time that it is now up to this weeks episode to not only be a significantly better episode, but also to provide a satisfying continuation of the story left unresolved by "Paradise Lost" - and "The Team" manages to do just that.
Picking up where we left off in "Paradise Lost", "The Team" opens up with Daisy and Lincoln forming the Secret Warriors in earnest before heading to the location where Coulson and Co (now fighting off wave after wave of Hydra goons) were redirected to by Giyera. But the main thrust of the episode takes place after the opening rescue mission, and deals with the paranoia experienced by SHIELD when they find out that Ward-thing (now officially referred to as Hive) may be controlling one or more of the Secret Warriors.
"Paradise Lost" is one of the most uneven episodes of Agents of SHIELD in a long time. It's a clear attempt to return the shows focus to the season-wide plot that made the first half of Agents of SHIELD third season feel so fresh, something I've been clamouring for since the mid-season finale - but "Paradise Lost" fails to really balance all three of the plots that it deals with, resulting in an episode that varies wildly from genuinely interesting to... well, a bit boring, frankly.
Now that SHIELD have learned that Ward has somehow returned from Maveth, "Paradise Lost" sees Coulson sending Daisy and Lincoln to find out more information about ancient Inhumans from someone Lincoln used to know, while the rest of SHIELD investigate a facility owned by the company Gideon Malick's version of Hydra took over last week. Meanwhile, Gideon begins to realise that he may have bitten off more than he can chew with Hive, and we get to learn more about Gideon's past in a series of flashbacks.
I've been criticising Agents of SHIELD since it's return from it's mid-season break for one very frustrating reason - for the most part, it has felt as if the season wide plot established by the seasons first half has been dropped in favour of the "monster of the week" type structure that defined the shows first season. But I'm beginning to feel like I may have been just a little short-sighted.
Without noticing it, Agents of SHIELD has been subtly progressing the season wide plot each episode, making fairly significant changes to the position of both SHIELD and Hydra within the show while focusing on smaller stories each week. We certainly aren't in the same place now as we were when the show returned after it's mid-season break, but the way that Agents of SHIELD has chosen to show those changes has made it feel very natural, to the point where it's been difficult to really notice that some fairly important shifts have taken place.
There has been a problem with Agents of SHIELD that has gone unaddressed for a long time now. It's never been a huge problem, just a minor frustration from time to time, but it's been there ever since the start of the second season and has shown up in a variety of ways in various episodes. And it all boils down into one, very simple question.
"Exactly how big is SHIELD now?"
It's not an unfair question. Between the enormous "garage" we see from time to time, the many extras that have appeared over the course of the last few seasons, the large scope of Coulson's SHIELD and the fact that they actually had a freaking Helicarrier in storage at one point, it seems safe to assume that they are fairly large - at which you point you have to ask how they have managed to stay underground given the hundreds of employees they have, the large areas of land they must use and the cost of all that military grade equipment. There is an inconsistency there, one not helped when "Watchdogs" has Coulson call Mack into work on his time off thanks to resource issues caused by the loss of Bobbi and Hunter.
It's rare that something setting up spin-offs actually works. Films like Iron Man 2, The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and even Avengers: Age of Ultron to some degree have suffered by trying to set-up other films, bending over backwards to include unnecessary scenes that simply don't matter to the story at hand. It almost always feels cheap, a decision made by studio executives that reduces the quality of the thing you are watching in order to squeeze more money out of the next thing they have planned - so it's refreshing to see Agents of SHIELD do it well, especially when the show itself has been much-maligned by people because of its status as a spin-off in the first place.
After stowing away on Gideon Malick's plane at the end of last weeks "The Inside Man", "Parting Shows" opens up by showing us that Bobbi has been arrested before flashing back to explain how that happened. It's an episode focused almost entirely on setting up the upcoming Most Wanted spin-off show, but the reason that "Parting Shot" works is that it isn't trying to fit this set-up into an episode with something else going on. "Parting Shot" is very much Bobbi and Hunter's episode, putting them in the spotlight and (most importantly) giving them a proper send off, a satisfying ending even if you were to never watch Most Wanted. It sounds simple because it is, but you'd be surprised how often things trying to set other things up fail to do this.
Following on from last weeks reveal that General Talbot is now in charge of the ATCU, "The Inside Man" sees Director Coulson and General Talbot attend a meeting of world leaders in order to discuss the Inhuman outbreak. However, Coulson believes that Hydra leader Gideon Malick may have an inside man at the meeting, and as such he brings along Hunter, May and Bobbi in order to find out who that might be.
The biggest issue I have with "The Inside Man" is the exact same issue I have with the show as a whole - as usual, I have no idea if the film side of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is ever going to pay any mind to the TV side of things. That was OK when Agents of SHIELD was operating in the shadows of the larger universe, but the scale of the Inhuman outbreak and the response to it means that it should have had pretty big ramifications on the rest of the universe by now. But the fact is, it is really unlikely that Captain America: Civil War will in any way reference the fact that there are many more super-powered people in the world now, which (given the focus on ensuring powered people are responsible for their actions) only helps make Agents of SHIELD feel even less relevant to the world it inhabits.
Opening up with a brief "3 months from now" teaser that seems to be hinting at big things for the finale of Agents of SHIELD's third season, "Bouncing Back" is an episode that despite being forced to do a lot of set up for future episodes (a common problem when a show comes back from any kind of break) still manages to entertain in a big way thanks to a compelling story and a greater understanding of what people have always wanted from this show.
The main plot sees SHIELD travelling to Colombia in order to deal with an incident that they believe is related to the Inhuman breakout. A shipment of guns has been stolen from the police, but it soon transpires that not everything is as clear cut as it may seem. Meanwhile, Director Coulson (and his new hand) restarts the search for Gideon Malick after being given the go ahead by President Ellis, first introduced in Iron Man 3.
In a lot of ways I feel sorry for those who jumped ship during the first season of Agents of SHIELD. In fairness, I don't think anyone was really happy with the superhero-lite crime procedural that Agents of SHIELD was when it started, but those that stuck with it have since been rewarded with a rich and interesting show that isn't afraid to change based on fan feedback. Are things too episodic and self-contained for you? Well here's a Captain America: The Winter Soldier related twist and a move to a more long-form type of story telling. Not enough super-powers? Well here's the introduction of the Inhumans. Things still moving a little slow for you? Here's a vastly quicker pace and a much more eventful show.
My point is that in doing this, Agents of SHIELD has gone from being an OK show to a good show to a great show, and the mid-season finale "Maveth" only further confirms that Agents of SHIELD knows what people want to see from it. Picking up from where we left off in "Closure", "Maveth" follows Coulson, Ward and Fitz on the alien planet as they search for revenge and the ancient Inhuman respectively, while the rest of SHIELD prepare to assault the Hydra-fortified castle where the portal is located - one half of the team trying to gain control over the portal room, the other on a mission to find and rescue Simmons.
Opening up with a scene that I'm sure will pretty much kill portions of the Agents of SHIELD fandom as well as reminding us why we all love Director Coulson, "Closure" offers anything but what the title of the episode would indicate, its position in the season meaning that it has a lot of set up to do as it attempts to ensure that all the characters are in the right place for next weeks mid-season finale "Maveth".
It's a fairly straight forward episode in a lot of ways, using SHIELDs hatred for ex-agent Grant Ward and the reveal of Hydra as a significantly older organisation than we previously thought in order to get everyone in roughly the same place by the end of the episode. As far as side plots go, there really aren't any - with the entire team taking part in the new Kill Ward mission, it is full steam ahead, and one of the unfortunate problems this creates is that "Closure" feels rushed in it's back half.
Do you remember that point in Agents of SHIELD when you pretty much gave up on the show actually mattering to the films? I do. It was part way through the first season of the show, just as Thor: The Dark World was coming out, and we had the crossover episode "The Well" which in no way actually crossed-over with Thor: The Dark World. Set entirely after the events of Thor: The Dark World and having literally almost nothing to do with it, I realised that the events of the show were effectively meaningless to the film, and that thanks to the way Marvel Studios were working it was likely to stay that way forever.
Since then, Agents of SHIELD has done a complete turn around, reacting to the events of Captain America: The Winter Soldier in a big way before introduced Inhumans to the world and setting up the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron. Now, "Many Heads, One Tale" has given us new and vitally important information about Hydra, shining a new light onto the history of the organisation and their ultimate goal while also bringing together all the seasons plots so far under one roof in what may be the best episode of the show so far.
That #ItsAllConnected hashtag doesn't seem so silly now, does it?
I don't think I'll ever not be impressed with the speed at which Agents of SHIELD is progressing in its third season. I was so sure that the show would choose to slow down a little bit here and take a look at where May's true loyalties lie - but instead, Agents of SHIELD plays its hand straight away, doing more in this one episode than we would have seen in up to half a season of Agents of SHIELD in the past.
Putting several of the seasons sub-plots to the side for now (while tying others into the main story of the episode in a really organic way), "Chaos Theory" is predominantly focused on dealing with the 'Andrew is Lash' revelation of last week. For the most part we follow May, who wastes no time at all in confronting Andrew after doing some basic fact checking to ensure that the theory given to her by Werner von Strucker is at least plausible.
As great as last weeks "4,722 Hours" was, I imagine that some people were a little disappointed that we had another full week to wait until the cliffhanger ending of "Devils We Know" was resolved - I know that I was, despite the change in pace and overall quality of "4,722 Hours" offered viewers. Fortunately, "Among Us Hide..." simply isn't messing around when it comes to story progression, continuing the strong sense of direction that has defined season three of Agents of SHIELD so far.
Dealing with the aftermath of "Devils We Know", "Among Us Hide..." follows May and Bobbi as they are officially assigned to the "Kill Grant Ward" mission, with Hunter benched after choosing his revenge on Ward over an innocent persons life. Frustrated by this, Hunter instead joins Mack and Daisy as they try to figure out who Lash really is, while Coulson finally manages to organise a date with Rosalind a tour around the ATCU facility.
After Agents of SHIELD dropped the monster-of-the-week style structure in the wake of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, it pretty much settled into a certain way of presenting itself that hasn't changed much since. Each episode splits the main characters up into different groups and follows them as they do their own thing, the episode cutting between the various plot lines (often three an episode, I've noticed) until the episode is over. It's an effective way of keeping an episode moving for sure, but it was never going to set the world on fire either, so seeing Agents of SHIELD break that pattern and fully devote an entire episode to just one story certainly makes for an interesting change of pace - one that pays off in droves.
"4,722 Hours" details Simmons' stay on the alien planet that she was rescued from in "Purpose of the Machine", as well as explaining her somewhat strange behaviour since she was rescued and her urge to return to the planet. And that's it, for the whole episode, a significantly different title card letting audiences know that this episode of Agents of SHIELD isn't going to be like the others.
I've got to say, I'm more than a little impressed with the speed that the third season of Agents of SHIELD is developing. I've mentioned it before now, but "Devils You Know" proves beyond reasonable doubt that the show is done spinning it's wheels - we are only four episodes in, but "Devils You Know" feels more like a mid-season finale than just the fourth episode in a twenty-two episode season. It would seem that critics of the shows tendency to drag things out no longer have a leg to stand on, and that can only be a good thing - maybe the general discussion surrounding Agents of SHIELD can finally get past "Trust me, it got better".
Starting with a fairly routine recruitment mission gone wrong, "Devils You Know" has Daisy, Mack and (later) the ACTU attempt to track down Lash and the people who may be helping him, while Hunter and May continue their mission to find and kill Ward, whose version of Hydra is slowly but surely growing in size and power - in part thanks to Hunter, who seems to be willing to put innocent people in danger as long as he can get his revenge. Elsewhere, Simmons is still investigating the portal in order to try to reopen it.
Despite being a fan of the show, I do still have my concerns about Agents of SHIELD. The quality of the first half of the first season still looms over any discussion around the show, and I've often find myself becoming overly defensive about Agents of SHIELD which, if we are being totally honest, could still be a lot better than it is. One common criticism is the shows tendency to spin it's wheels and drag things out for too long, which I talked about a little last week - but the other is it's habit of not being all that original at times. One of my main concerns with season three so far has actually been the appearance of the Advanced Threat Containment Unit (ACTU) - as competent as the SHIELD versus Real SHIELD storyline was in the second season of the show, I didn't want to see it repeated here with a different agency.
"I'm done fighting with people over who gets to fight the real fight. It's a colossal waste of time and resources".
That's Director Coulson speaking, in reference to Rosalind Price and the ATCU. Consider me relieved.
