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“The Dirty Half Dozen,”
the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. lead-in to Avengers: Age of Ultron
aired last night, and all I can say is “wow.”
I think this was my favorite episode yet for the incredible character
development we got thanks to Ward’s inclusion on the team (spoiler alert! But not much of one), the furthering of the
conflict between Coulson and Gonzales, and the incredible action scenes. That this episode was airing just three days
before the U.S. premiere of the biggest movie of the year was obvious all
through, but it did not feel distracting.
In fact, the lead-in which Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. provides
actually helps make me even more excited for Avengers: Age of Ultron—if
that’s even possible.
The episode begins and
ends with Raina and her visions. The
first one is of Gordon injured, Lincoln captured, Coulson and Ward together,
Skye rescuing Lincoln. The vision itself
actually drives much of the action on the Inhumans’ part: Skye and Raina use the vision to convince
Gordon to drop Skye off at the Bus so she can join Coulson’s mission to save
Deathlok and Lincoln. I find it
fascinating that this is the first time the two have been in the same place
together and actually cooperated in the entire series. Before now they’ve been adversaries to each other,
and at best uneasily cooperated. Here,
however, they are both working together.
I don’t know whether Raina was working with Skye to save Lincoln because
that’s what she really wanted or if she has another motivation. Cal’s conversation with Jiaying seemed to
imply that he suspect that she might have an ulterior motive. Raina might become the next enigma wrapped in
a mystery on this series, now that Ward may be moving on.
Deathlok and Lincoln
bonding in Hydra prison was an interesting scene to include. Lincoln is rather distrusting of Mike—but
then, the Inhumans are naturally distrusting of outsiders—while Mike tries to
befriend him. They both talk about
“their people”—Lincoln hopes that “his people” will not come to get him because
it would put them at risk; Mike knows “his people” are stupid enough to try
it. Their talk about trying to escape
together was a bit of a red herring. I
thought they were going to actually succeed in doing something together, but I
guess it was not meant to be in this episode.
I wonder if their bonding will become an important factor later on. If the two of them, Skye, Bobbi, and Hunter (maybe
throw in Kara, too) all go off together on a mission, I think that team will
become my new top option for an Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. spinoff series.
Coulson and Gonzales
actually had two different confrontations in this episode. In the first, Coulson made a deal with him to
let him take his people to rescue the prisoners. I think we are finally getting to know
Gonzales as a “villain” now. Throughout
his conversation with Coulson, Mike Peterson is a “thing” or “it.” He dehumanizes Mike, the same thing he does
with Skye. He views all enhanced people
as dangerous threats to be studied and feared first and foremost, not as potential
allies. I think that is going to be the
deciding factor between Coulson and Gonzales.
Gonzales does not treat enhanced people as humans; Coulson sees them as
people. And I think that Bobbi is
starting to recognize that aspect of Gonzales and become disillusioned with it. That Gonzales is willing to send in Coulson’s
team without her because he’s willing to risk their lives—and not hers—is only
one more nail in the coffin.
The main conflict of
the episode, at least the first part of the episode, is between the members of
Coulson’s team. Coulson and May argue
about Theta Protocol, leading Coulson to admit that he was going to Andrew for
counseling to cope with his alien writing.
Ward comes into conflict with everyone—and causes conflict between the
others over their opinions of Coulson’s decision to work with him. I like how this is testing the relationships
between the original team members since this is the first time we’ve seen them
all together since “Turn, Turn, Turn” (1x17).
Ward appears to be happy that the team is back together, while no one
else seems happy to see him; they all mention that they wish Skye had killed
him. Simmons in particular is getting a
little frightening with her obsession with trying to kill Ward. Ward’s comment after she made the attempt was
very fitting: she has changed a lot
since he dropped them in the ocean.
Again, this does not make her “Genocidal Simmons,” but it does make her
a little more suspect as far as her motivations are concerned.
Image Courtesy www.screenrant.com |
While Coulson’s team
is getting pulled apart by Ward’s reintegration, the others are starting to
make amends. After the way they parted,
I was wondering whether Hunter would ever make up with Mack and Bobbi; after
this it looks a lot more promising. I
think Hunter forgiving Mack for his part in everything is the first step toward
him also being able to forgive Bobbi for what she did as well. And if the two of them are going to be
involved in the spinoff together, I suppose a reconciliation between them is
inevitable. Bobbi talking to Kara was
another fascinating scene, especially in light of Ward’s decision to leave Kara
with S.H.I.E.L.D. in hopes that she will reintegrate in. I think Bobbi might be a little suspicious of
Kara—and especially of her dependence on Ward—but I like how this shows us
another side of Bobbi. She is willing to
give someone like Kara who was brainwashed into serving Hydra a second
chance. This whole S.H.I.E.L.D. vs.
S.H.I.E.L.D. plot has fleshed out Bobbi’s character quite a bit.
The whole second half
of the episode was full of action. I was
actually a little saddened when Hydra shot down the Bus and it exploded. They’ve rebuilt the Bus at least a couple
times before—generally after it took substantially less damage. However, I don’t think it’s getting rebuilt
after this. May’s ability to set the
quinjet down with minimal damage while still keeping up the appearance of being
nothing but debris was pretty awesome.
It was fun seeing Skye take out a pair of Hydra agents with her powers,
though her scene taking out at least a dozen Hydra agents to rescue Lincoln was
far more action-heavy—and I think the better of the two. She is turning into a very capable
agent—powers or no. It wasn’t very clear
exactly how Skye saved Lincoln’s life:
she either triggered his electric power which shocked his heart, or she
used her own powers to make his heart vibrate and start. Either way, it was a pretty cool scene. I didn’t really expect Lincoln to die, but
they’ve done crazier things on this show!
Image Courtesy www.screenrant.com |
I was actually a
little surprised that both Deathlok and Lincoln survived the ordeal. They never hinted that we would see a major
character death, but it just seemed like the kind of thing they would do: let one of them be killed by Hydra to drive
home how huge this threat is. Instead,
the major character who dies is Sunil Bakshi—at Simmons’ hands—driving home how
much she has changed since last season. Not
only is Simmons a more capable liar and field agent, but she is far more
willing to get her hands dirty and kill those whom she believes are threats to
her and those she cares about. What will
this mean for her character going forward?
I can’t wait to find out!
Ward’s confession that
he most regrets destroying the team with his actions is fascinating. I’m not sure whether he meant it, but he
certainly appears to mean it. I’m pretty
sure I’ve said this before, but I think Ward is the most interesting character
on the show. He’s not working for
Hydra. He’s not working for
S.H.I.E.L.D. He’s an “independent contractor
trying to make amends.” What is he
trying to make amends for, and why? That
is the biggest question still. Why is he
so focused on helping Kara? Was he being
serious when he said that he wanted Coulson to help Kara, or is this yet
another part of his plan? Either option
has its merits. But if he truly left
Kara with Coulson because he wants what’s best for her, then that would be a
huge step for his character. Up until
now he has had very little connection with other people; whatever connection there
was came from either what they had done for him or what they could do for
him. And yet Skye was different last
season, and Kara is different now. If he
actually cares for her—to the point of doing what’s best for her even though it
means he loses her—then that shows that he really can still love in spite of everything
he has been through.
Image Courtesy www.twitter.com/Marvel |
The episode ended with
a double lead-in/foreshadowing of Avengers: Age of Ultron. Between the two, easily my favorite was
Coulson’s confrontation with Gonzales.
He gave Gonzales the Toolbox—but only until Fury shows up to reclaim
it. The look of shock Gonzales gave him
after that revelation was awesome.
Clearly Gonzales did not expect to ever see Fury again. Does this mean we will get a cameo from Fury
before the end of the season? I suppose
after last year it wouldn’t be an Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season finale
without a Fury cameo! However, until
Fury returns to take back the Toolbox, Gonzales is going to have complete access
to it. Given his mistrust of enhanced
people—and given that the Toolbox includes information on (and the whereabouts
of) just about every enhanced person S.H.I.E.L.D. knows about—what might he do
with that information?
Following this
confrontation, Coulson took a call from Maria Hill and gave her some apparently
crucial information. He told her that
Hydra has Loki’s scepter and that Strucker has it in Sokovia, along with the
location. Then she asked about Theta
Protocol and he told her that it is ready, followed by “Time to bring in the
Avengers.” Are “Theta Protocol” and the
Avengers synonymous? I don’t think so;
that wouldn’t explain a lot of what Coulson was doing for Theta Protocol. I wonder if Theta Protocol involves Coulson
recruiting potential Avengers for Hill. The
other option is that the two are completely unrelated. In any event, this might have been the
(second-) coolest tie-in between the TV series and a movie that they’ve done
yet. This right here was the lead-in to Avengers:
Age of Ultron that I was hoping for:
Coulson calls Hill and tells her to send in the Avengers to take care of
business. We may not see that
conversation as a part of Age of Ultron, but that doesn’t make it any
less crucial to the movie. This explains
all of the information about the Twins which Hill is able to share with the
Avengers, as well as how she knows where to send them. Those who are not watching Agents of
S.H.I.E.L.D. can still see the movie and understand it, but those of us who
are watching AoS get to see all of the build-up which they can’t
include in the movie due to time constraints.
All of the previous tie-ins between a movie and the series have happened
after the fact: S.H.I.E.L.D. cleaning
up, characters from the movie dropping by, etc.
This time, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. actually set up the movie. The last time they did that was Captain
America: The Winter Soldier, though we didn’t realize it until after the
movie came out.
Image Courtesy www.twitter.com/AgentsofShield |
The other part of the Age
of Ultron lead-in—leading to the other part of the movie, Ultron—wasn’t as
great in my opinion. Raina went into
something like a trance while having visions of Loki’s scepter causing
destruction and metal men tearing apart their cities. To me that seemed a bit on the nose, though
her acting during the scene was actually pretty good, which made up for it
somewhat. However, the important part of
that scene was not the Age of Ultron foreshadowing in her vision; it was
her conversation with Jiaying before the vision started. Jiaying came to talk to her and said that she
needs to bring any visions to her first before anyone acts on them. However, Raina responded by telling Jiaying
that she thinks it is time for someone new to be making the decisions. Is this setting up a conflict between Jiaying
and Raina for control of Lai Shi? I
think Jiaying can come out on top of that challenge based on age—knowledge and
experience count for a lot. However,
Raina’s precognition along with Cal’s public revelation of his relationship
with Jiaying (and consequently the fact that Skye is Jiaying’s daughter) could
make Raina a formidable opponent for Jiaying.
This plot may be settled by the end of the season, but I think all of
the other things that need to be resolved will push this to the beginning of
season three. Of course, they’ve
surprised me in the past with their ability to resolve multiple plots in very
few episodes; they’ll probably do it again!
All in all, I thought
that this was one of the best—if not the best—episode of the show so far. “Turn, Turn, Turn” (1x17, the Captain
America: The Winter Soldier tie-in) may give this episode a run for its
money in terms of pure shock value for Ward’s betrayal. However, I thought that the character
development, conflict-building, and action sequences in this episode were some
of the best in the series so far. And
from the looks of it, next week and the two-part season finale will be even
better still.
What did you think of “The
Dirty Half Dozen?? Do you think Ward genuinely
regrets tearing the team apart and is really trying to make amends for that, or
do you think he’s got an ulterior motive?
What was your favorite Age of Ultron tie-in/lead-in moment from
the episode? How do you think Age of
Ultron will connect with Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (looking at the
other side of the equation)?
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Having major geekgasms for the movie this weekend. This episode only heightened them.
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