Danny Hale reviews the twentieth episode of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 5…
SPOILER WARNING FOR AVENGERS: INFINITY WAR
Talbot took centre stage this week as he brought his new powers to the Confederacy as Thanos begins his attack on Earth.
General Talbot wastes no time in confronting the Confederacy head-on, Coulson dragged along for the ride, and quickly creates a seat at the high table for himself by forcibly removing one of the organisation’s 6 voices. He does this by absorbing the supposedly wisest member of the council into the gravitonium. Has he just inherited all this alien’s knowledge and experience of the universe? Most intriguing though, we finally meet the father of Kasius, I knew he’d show up eventually. He seems to quickly get his claws in Graviton, easily manipulating him and in a surprising move, Thanos is name dropped repeatedly as we learn that his attack on Earth has begun. I said in an early review of this season that getting to see other characters and players from the greater universe really helps flesh out the MCU so to hear members of this confederacy warn of Thanos makes perfect sense and as someone who has unashamedly seen Infinity War three times now Thanos’ name carries an incredible weight in the MCU and to feel his presence in AoS this week was awesome. Far from being an unnecessary nod to its big blockbuster cousin it is the threat of Thanos that spurs Talbot to seek more power and drives him closer to madness. His abilities are already frighteningly powerful and enough to make Qovas and Coulson bend the knee so his plan to dig into the Earth’s full supply of gravitonium in order to best Thanos does not bode well.
While a lot of tensions have been building amongst our team members Daisy and Yo-Yo are the next to come to blows. Daisy returns from her and May’s side mission to Yo-Yo’s fury. Elena is angry that Daisy left them and wanting to know why uses her powers to snatch Daisy’s bag containing her mother’s remains. With everything going on between the two there was not a lot of stoking needed for this fire. The ensuing tussle was great and you really feel the baggage from this season start to spill out. The two needed to let out some of their frustrations and May smartly let them have their moment before breaking it up. She then made her motivations completely clear by shooting down Yo-Yo giving her the option of helping them save Coulson no matter what or leaving. With Yo-Yo under instructions from her future self to “let Coulson die” and her proven track record of making controversial calls we could be heading for an extremely bleak finale.
It was nice to see Hale back this week; it gave a bit more context to how she is feeling since losing Ruby and as to why she sold the team out. Her scene with Coulson showed she finally realised her mistake in raising Ruby. She carried out HYDRA’s plan all along and is now seeing how insignificant that all is; now that her daughter is dead, Thanos attacks the Earth and the Confederacy almost has control of the gravitonium it seems she ultimately just misses her daughter and regrets the decisions that have led her here. I really did believe for a second that she managed to calm Talbot by using his compliancy against him and while I did momentarily worry about what Hale might do with that power it was clear she had made a big mistake. It’s not too shocking to think that Talbot had broken free of his HYDRA conditioning so Hale’s attempt to subdue him backfired and resulted in him crushing her for her betrayal. It was a gruesome way to go but considering that last few weeks of this show, it fits.
In one of my favourite scenes from the episode Deke attempts to come clean about his feelings to Daisy. Luckily, he gets an opportunity to learn a bit more about Quake and her history allowing him to smartly keep his feelings to himself for now. Daisy tells him about Lincoln and how he died for her. While Lincoln was never a fan favourite on the show his death was an extremely powerful moment sold by Chloe Bennet’s amazing performance. Everything that happened after that point was spurred by this action; Daisy left the team, her guilt and insecurities about leading all came to the forefront and she put up a tough wall, pushing the others away. I’ve gotten so used to this hardened, defensive Daisy that I forgot where it all came from so to hear her talk about Lincoln and confess that she never really got over his death fits so damn perfectly. It adds even more weight to his last heroic act in season 3 and shows an attention and care in the handling of Quake’s character. No character beat is forgotten, no moment is erased or written over; this show has impeccable continuity and is going to be a sheer joy to re-watch.
With Simmons working on Jiaying’s remains to hopefully find a cure for Coulson, Talbot all kitted out in his Graviton costume and Yo-Yo left with a very difficult decision to make we head for the penultimate episode with a lot at stake. Mack and Fitz’s argument about the morality of taking a life raises a lot of interesting questions and with Yo-Yo on the verge of making another unpopular decision, I don’t think her and Mack’s relationship can survive the season. With a super-powered Graviton to contend with, a now kidnapped Daisy and a mad Titan waging war on Earth there has never been more at stake. Could we really close out the season with Thanos’ finger click? I swear if I have to watch any of the agents fade into nothingness I am done with Marvel. I just can’t take that.
Danny Hale
