Recap and Review of Agents of SHIELD Episode 215: One Door Closes

After last week’s reveal of…another SHIELD, what happens in this week’s Agents of SHIELD Episode 215: One Door Closes, assuming the two organizations come to a head to head clash?

Spoilers follow.

[divider]Recap of Agents of SHIELD Episode 215: One Door Closes[/divider]

This episode goes back and forth from present day to flashbacks of the day when SHIELD fell, as you may remember from Captain America: Winter Soldier final scenes.  We open in a flashback with Mac refusing to give information to Hydra, then watching one of his fellow agents be killed as a result. Just when Mac is about to break, Agent Bobbi Morse shows up and cleans house. (Adrian Palecki really does crush action scenes.)  She says that Nick Fury left them orders: Save SHIELD.

In present time, we see Bobbi sabotaging various things at Coulson’s SHIELD base.  Mac and Coulson are having a conversation over Lola, his super equipped red convertible.  Bobbi comes in, says she is sorry about Hunter and leaves, just in time for Coulson to tell Mac that he is on to him. Mac inadvertently gives away that Morse is his accomplice, which Coulson quickly relays to Agent May.  May tracks Bobbi down and there is a little bit of chatter before Morse escapes with Agent May firing bullets at her.

In the midst of that fight, Mac gets away, setting off some kind of EMP.  Fitz reveals that he has figured out that the flying car was looking for traces of Vibranium.

We get our second flashback, where we see the object of Agent Morse’s raid: Agent Gonzalez, who we have seen before, as part of the leadership of the New SHIELD. They rescue him. And then we get a quick flashforward, where we see Morse telling them that they have Nick Fury’s toolbox and they reveal they want Skye.

Skye is at The Retreat, which we later learn was built by Bruce Banner AKA The Hulk; we see this both because it is told to us but also because Skye discovers a metal wall behind the wood, with a giant HULK SMASH print.

Skye is in the cabin, chatting with Simmons, who is encouraging her to try the arm bands Simmons made for her.  Later on, Skye puts them on, but Gordon, the blind Inhuman teleporter shows up. He is able to do a really nice exposition dump. Quickly:

• The “Mist” changes everyone differently.
• He thrived only because he had a mentor.
• Skye can come with him whenever she decides it is time.
• Skye’s powers revolve around controlling vibrations, which are all around her and in all things.

Gordon leaves by saying when he first got his power, his mentor embraced him, and he will find her when she is ready. After he leaves, she eventually takes the arm bracelets off and is seen controlling water from a sink with her powers.

Meanwhile, before the attack on Coulson SHIELD HQ, Morse stumbles into Simmons, who tricks her and gets her to hold two things that knock her out.  Fitz was figuring out what was wrong with the computers when Mac comes upon him.  They debate for a minute before Mac realizes a bomb is about to go off and he covers Fitz from the blast. In walk the new SHIELD team, wearing gas masks.

Pretty much everyone goes down, except for May, who discovered Morse’s gas mask in a hidden compartment in Morse’s locker.

We get another flashback to the day SHIELD fell, where we learn Gonzalez is really hurt.  They put his leg in place, sort of, when Morse gives Izzy Hartley (agent who is killed early this season) her wedding ring to give back to Hunter. She reveals part one of the mission was save to Gonzalez, part two being to sink the ship because it has some heavy duty cargo that can’t get into the wrong hands.  It happens later in the episode but it reaches a point where they have to decide to follow Fury’s orders and sink the boat or to go against Fury and recapture the ship.  There is some discussion here about the need for a more democratized leadership structure and they overrule Fury to eventually take back the boat from Hydra.

Gonzalez questions Coulson about his alien blood and about Fury having been too much a rogue monarch. He is making some fair points when May shows up, shoots him with an icer gun and gets Coulson into an escape tunnel, because she has already warned Skye that they are coming for her.

Skye is running and after taking down a SHIELD agent in normal hand to hand, we get a moment where one of the team is shooting at Skye.  This brings an epic slow motion of her reflexively pushing the bullet away. And a tree, Morse, Agent Caulderon and several acres behind them.  Clearly, Skye is freaked out, and she calls for Gordon, who shows up and teleports her away.

The last scene is Coulson at a beach cabana, meeting up with Hunter and they talk in vague terms about what they are going to do until Hunter writes his signature on a napkin, telling Coulson it is his full time contract.

[divider]Thoughts on Agents of SHIELD Episode 215[/divider]

• Oh. Vibranium.  An interesting thing to be looking for. Especially since most of it in the Marvel comic book world is in Wakanda, the kingdom of the Black Panther, who is scheduled to have a movie out soon. It will be interesting to see how that plays out.
• Does Coulson go find Ward?  He needs some back-up and Hunter’s signing up was awesome, but it won’t be enough.  Does he go index hunting?
• It has to stink to be Jamie Harris, who plays Gordon. Agent: “Good news, bad news here Jamie.  The good: You are going to be on the hit television show Agents of SHIELD. The bad news: you will have a disfigured face and be completely unrecognizable”
• Will we start to see some of the working of the Inhumans? And please, please let there be Lockjaw! (But with Gordon’s powers, Lockjaw seems less important.)
• What is on that ship that was so valuable that Fury wanted it sunk?  Because they are still riding around on it like it is no big deal. I don’t think Fury would waste an agent like Morse if it was just conventional stuff.
  Who stays loyal to Coulson by the end of the season? Which SHIELD is a better choice for a new era: Coulson’s clear command or the committee approach?
• Bruce Banner’s cabin at least showed up. I still want him to coach Skye on emotion management.  And it was a 100% miss not to have the Wendigo show up.  I mean, Canadian forest and cannibalism curse.  It would be epic.