Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – BOOM Review

Things got a little crazy on this week’s Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and it all started with a bang, or should I say a "BOOM." The episode opened with a pretty big reveal. Coulson and Mack were in Spain looking for someone, but it wasn't clear who, until we saw her face. It was the face of Aida, but it definitely wasn’t the robot we’ve gotten to know this season. It was revealed that Aida’s appearance was copied from Radcliffe’s ex, Agnes. He left her after she found out she had an inoperable brain tumor, which is further proof that this guy is the worst. Mack and Coulson approached her hoping she would have an idea where to find him. This seemed a little far fetched to me. She was just minding her own business in Spain, how could she know he was on a submarine in the middle of nowhere? But of course she is able to lure him out of hiding to come meet her in Spain, because why not. Coulson and Mack tried to trap Radcliffe, but instead he managed to convince Agnes to come with him. He said he had created something called “the framework” where her mind could live forever even when her body died. Apparently this is the universe he created to keep May’s mind captive. He experimented with the Darkhold and found a way to make it just as realistic as the real world. That might sound all fine and cool, but it doesn’t seem like a real way to live to me. It might be nice to get away from what’s happening in the real world, but running away is not going to fix anything. Now for the literal BOOM. While Coulson and Mack were searching for May, the rest of the team were in for an explosive reveal. Somehow, Radcliffe got his hands on some Terrigen Crystals and decided to conduct a little experiment. Some Russian henchmen were sent with one of these crystals to Nadeer’s office. They were all convinced that because her brother was Inhuman, she must be too. So to test that theory they crushed one of the crystals in front of her. She was fine, but one of the Russians, not so much. He turned into an Inhuman shell and then blew up, killing everyone in the room, including Nadeer. I was pretty surprised that they killed her off so quickly and easily. She had been a villain all season and just like that she’s gone. It was surprising, but also pretty clever. The team, not being in the room where it happened, had no idea what went down. They assumed someone had sent a literal bomb, but Fitz and Simmons examined the scene and found the Terrigen shell and figured out that someone must have transformed and become a bomb of sorts, which was a discovery made just in time, as they already had Shockley (the new Inhuman) in custody after seeing a tape of him entering Nadeer’s office. He was the only one to survive the blast, so he had to be the Inhuman in question. They managed to push him into a containment pod before he blew himself up again, but they were forced to release the pod because it couldn’t withstand that kind of explosion. Shockley landed in the middle of nowhere and his body reformed, which were some pretty cool special effects. The team knew that he probably survived the explosion because he did it before, so they started to make a plan to contain him before he could cause more damage. They explained how this was a pretty perfect way to cause a huge amount of destruction. He’s, essentially, a suicide bomber who can’t die. Not great. They manage to get Shockley contained, but they had to sacrifice Director Mace to the rest of the Russian crew, who still believed him to be an Inhuman. Throughout the whole episode Director Mace was trying to figure out where he fit in the team and he finally figured out that he’s the blocker, but I thought he was more of a distraction. In the end Coulson and Mack weren’t much closer to finding May, but they do know she’s still alive because of a comment Radcliffe made. Radcliffe also managed to get Agnes hooking up to this framework/alternate reality, at the expensive of her losing her real life. I’m a little confused about that. Will her consciousness just live forever in this other world, not knowing it isn’t real? This is going to make things even more complicated. Aida also found out she was based on a real human and she seemed pretty set on completely becoming her, as proved by her stealing Agnes’ necklace. She just keeps getting creepier.

Final Thoughts:

- Overall it was a solid episode. I really liked the surprise of Nadeer dying in this totally unexpected way. - I’m still not a fan of this android storyline and now it is further complicated by this framework. Can we just get back to the real world? And when are we going to save May? - I feel like there were also so many jumps that didn’t make sense. They never explained how they found Agnes or even knew she existed. - They were also trying to get sympathy for Mace saying that he no longer has spot on the team anymore, but did we ever actually start liking him or even consider him a part of the team? The first half of the season we weren’t supposed to like him and now we should feel bad for him? There’s definitely some disconnect there. - I also felt that this episode didn’t have the normal amount of comic relief. It was a very serious episode, which is okay, but I did missed Mack’s one liners. - I hope they find the real May soon, but I guess we’ll have to wait at least another week to find out.