Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 3, Episode 4, "Devils You Know" REVIEW (SPOILERS)

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This episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., “Devils You Know,” went very Inhumans-heavy, but at the same time succeeded in continuing and expanding the Hydra storyline. Overall I enjoyed everything in this episode, and for some reason it didn’t feel like too much. It’s not like there was any less going on in this episode, though the Fitz-and-Simmons plot was dialed back substantially to make room for Hydra. I wonder if the reason this doesn’t feel like too much while last week did is because the Fitz-and-Simmons subplot took a backseat and we got substantially more development from Hunter and May. Maybe they just found the right balance between the 2 main plots. Whatever it is, it worked pretty well this episode—but I still think the spinoff (taking a few characters and plots away to let this show focus in on just 1 or 2 plots) can’t happen soon enough.

The focus on the Inhumans starts right off the bat as a couple is preparing dinner at home. There’s a knock on the door, and Alisha (the “Ginger Ninjas”) is there to see them. She comes in, and not 5 minutes later Lash smashes his way through the door and attacks them. We don’t get to see much of the other two Inhumans’ powers—he seems to start floating and her arms seem to lengthen—as they get killed pretty quickly, along with Alisha, who turns out to be a clone; the original is on Zephyr One with Coulson. Later on we find out that Alisha approached S.H.I.E.L.D. because she was worried about her friends (perhaps because she saw Lincoln on the news), but they don’t explain if this is her first mission with S.H.I.E.L.D. or if she’s been working with them for a while now. They also don’t explain how feeling her clone get killed will affect her. When Lincoln shocked the original Alisha on the carrier, it knocked all the clones unconscious; when this clone was killed by Lash, the original Alisha felt it on the plane. I assume that in the coming episodes they will explain this further; you may remember that over the summer I talked about the possibility of Alisha joining the Secret Warriors and said I thought it was even money either way. Seeing her again makes that a little more of a possibility.

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One thing that strikes me all through this episode is the level of distrust between the A.T.C.U. and S.H.I.E.L.D. Coulson is willing to share information with them, but we haven’t seen very much information sharing the other way. I think it is very much in character for Daisy to demand to know how the Inhumans in A.T.C.U. custody are being treated (assuming there are any). The only information sharing we do see comes when S.H.I.E.L.D. and the A.T.C.U. find a virus on the Inhuman couple’s computer and Daisy traces it back to the source, a Social Security Administration worker. They jointly lock down the area and storm the building to find the man, Dwight Fry, huddled in the closet with a cocoon on the floor outside it. Evidently he is an Inhuman with the ability to sense the presence of other Inhumans (they give him a headache and a rash). The A.T.C.U. takes him into custody, and Coulson demands that Rosalind allow Daisy and Mack to see the facility where they keep the Inhumans they’ve found. En route, however, Lash attacks their truck and kills Fry, but leaves everyone else—Daisy included—alive. And when he’s walking away, Daisy watches him transform into a small, slight body. That’s definitely a departure from the comics, but I am very curious to see where this is going. My wife suspects that he is either Rosalind or Banks, but I don’t think so, since Lash attacked Daisy and Lincoln at the same time that Rosalind and Banks were holding Coulson and Hunter prisoner on the train in the season premiere. Regardless, I think it is almost certain that the A.T.C.U. is running him in some form or another, and that the A.T.C.U.’s arrangement with Coulson is the only reason Daisy was left alive. That would also explain how Lash knew where to find them and why he did it then: this prevented S.H.I.E.L.D. from finding and seeing the A.T.C.U.’s headquarters.

This main plot was really interesting and really well done. I hope they aren’t going to treat all newly-introduced Inhumans this way moving forward, though: we met 3 this episode, none of whom made it to the credits! I’m still not sure about Coulson’s decision to work with the A.T.C.U., and I still don’t trust the A.T.C.U. at all, and I’m glad to see that reflected in Daisy and Bobbi’s reactions to Coulson’s partnership with Rosalind.

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This week Hunter’s infiltration of Hydra became the secondary plot. Hunter letting the mission become personal—and May calling him on it—was a good move in that it acknowledged what we’ve known all along: Hunter’s going nuts because Ward almost killed Bobbi. May is worried that Hunter will get himself killed, and takes her concerns to Coulson, leading to an interesting conversation with Andrew at the Playground. I like how slowly they’ve explained just what happened between May and Andrew: last week we found out that he divorced her the first time, and this week we found out that he ran out on her in Hawaii (after she originally ran out on him the first time). What’s going to happen next with them? Possibly nothing, considering how the episode ended! Hunter gets shoved in a trunk and brought to Ward’s base, where he comes face-to-face with the man himself. Hunter manages to grab a rifle and take out a couple of the Hydra soldiers and get to cover, but Ward and Kebo survive the initial attack. Then, just when it looks like Hunter’s about to get killed, May surprises them, coming in and taking out another five soldiers. However, S.H.I.E.L.D. is still 20 minutes out, and there are still half a dozen Hydra soldiers left. And that’s when Ward plays his trump card: Werner von Strucker is in position to execute Andrew if he just gives the word, and May will get to watch via phone camera. May hesitates to put Andrew in danger, but Hunter attacks before she can make up her mind, chasing Ward from his headquarters and shooting him in the shoulder as he escapes.

The fight scene between May and Hunter and Hydra was really intense and fun to watch. May’s conflict between stopping Ward and saving Andrew was acted extremely well. And at the end when Werner blew up the convenience store after we saw someone’s legs surrounded by a pool of blood, we are definitely meant to believe that they killed Andrew. However, I’m not entirely convinced: we never saw the body’s face. It’s entirely possible that Andrew survived and Werner is all panicky because he escaped. Either way, that whole sequence was very well done in my opinion.

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The only other subplot in this episode involved Fitz and Simmons, with Bobbi as a third wheel. First, Bobbi gets on Fitz’ nerves for using the wrong color sample bag (“‘B’ is for ‘blue’ is for ‘biological’”). The scene of Simmons in counseling with Andrew was interesting, particularly with her vehemently denying being “one of his Inhuman patients” (“Methinks the lady doth protest too much”). It is clear that her time on the planet changed Simmons in some fundamental way, but in this episode the only indicator of how is that she gave up hope while there. After that, Fitz discovers a file Simmons has been working on to figure out how to reopen the portal, something Simmons has told Bobbi about, but which neither of them will tell Fitz. Of course, at the end of the episode Simmons finally does tell Fitz after he figures it out on his own from seeing the file. And not only does she want to go back, but she wants him to help her do it. This is of course setting up next week’s episode, which will explain what happened to her on the planet.

Overall I really enjoyed this episode. It included just enough from each of the three major plots to satisfy, and it offered a good balance between the top two. The Inhuman couple at the beginning didn’t get nearly enough development before their untimely demises, but what they did get was enough (barely) to empathize when Lash killed them. I wish we had learned more about Lash in this episode, but what we did learn was enough to keep my interest in him going. Thus far it seems as though they are rotating between these three plots (Inhumans/ATCU/Last, Hydra, and Simmons) on a roughly-weekly basis, with the “off episodes” setting up the next “on episode” for each plot. In the first 4 episodes this seems to be working pretty well, though this is the biggest episode Hydra has gotten so far, and the first time it has really tied in with the other plots.

Going forward I am very interested to see how Ward, Hydra, and Hunter will factor in, because at this point Hunter’s deep cover mission appears to be dead in the water. At this point the only consequences from that mission are Ward getting shot, Andrew possibly getting killed, and everyone involved getting angrier at each other. Other than that, Hunter is most likely right back with S.H.I.E.L.D. and Ward is right back in the wind. The key in the next few episodes will be to show that Hunter’s mission had consequences; otherwise, why spend all this time building that mission up?

What did you think of this episode? Who do you think Lash is? Why do you think Simmons has to return to the planet? Let me know in the comments!

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Edit:  I'm an idiot and got Werner von Strucker's name wrong.  Let the shaming commence.