“Let’s not lose ourselves here,” Mack tells Yo-Yo, before they plan to rough up this Gunner character. With all of the space craziness happening in this season so far, it’s hard to forget that we haven’t had time for the characters to just unpack and talk about everything that’s happened to them as of late. Mack in particular has been the moral center and the heart of the show, and his journey from feeling guilt about any violence or death caused by them turns into anger and sadness over his ability to become a father, mostly sprung up by his experience in the Framework.

But for the most part, this episode felt like it was treading water. When you think about it, not a lot actually happened in this episode. The characters may have figured out some key pieces of information, but the episode as a whole felt like a transition into something more eventful and interesting. With Daisy, we find out that there’s a metaphorical ticking bomb, with Kasius planning to be rid of this little human society once he’s done. Coulson and crew discover that children are a commodity in this future (“and the vibe goes full dystopia”), manufactured out of the possibility that they may be Inhumans.

But otherwise, it’s same old, same old. Even though the ending of the previous episode promised some movement with the revelation of a transmission to Virgil, we didn’t get too much movement on that. The only extra piece we learned about it was the possibility that Deke’s father may be amongst those voices. Our snarky new character Deke wasn’t really one to trust (and he still isn’t), but we have less doubt about his intentions after learning about the hardships of his family and the burden that he now carries. His entire life is an embodiment of the constant and eternal fight to survive in this environment.

It’s that life of survival that our new telepathic Inhuman, Ben (who I’ve been calling “buff Darren Criss”), talks to Daisy about when pressed about why he is not willing to fight back against Casius and is Kree cronies. Like Abby in the previous episode, Ben does what he needs to do out of necessity for their family (which again, makes this episode feel all the more repetitive). But his actions in his debut episode show that he may be an important player in this game, throwing Daisy and Simmons a life preserver during a particularly tense interrogation scene. With Jemma’s inability to hear, the questioning from Kasius was a cleverly staged sequence.

But I struggle to continue writing about this episode, because so little actually happened. There was a neat fight sequence between May and Sinara, but for reasons unknown, the resolution of that was not made clear—where is May now? Will capturing her already mess up Daisy and Jemma’s alibi? Not much was learned from the visit to level 35, and Daisy’s plotline treaded old ground, except for the aforementioned revelation of Casius’s apparent intentions.

But my boy Fitz is back. And yes, I’m very, very happy. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., even during its most flawed episodes, knows how to provoke some crazy reactions from its audience. Perhaps this entire episode was just a distraction for us to forget about where Fitz may be, only to shock and awe us with the final minute. If that was the case, you did good, episode. You did good.

VERDICT

3 Silver Coins Out of 5. It feels a bit like a stop-gap filler episode at points, with nothing particularly new or intriguing. Well, except Fitz. Fitz Fitz Fitz.

ONE-SHOTS

  • I have to re-watch the episode, but are different characters pronouncing “Kasius” in different ways?
  • Speaking of Kasius, not only is he basically Jared Leto from Blade Runner, but he’s bit of a petty, not-fun Grandmaster in a way.
  • That 360 shot of Coulson, May and Deke as they discussed their plan was pretty damn irritating.
  • I feel like Sinara’s balls (lol) should be far more effective like that in combat, but hey, she still won.
  • Also, what happened to not splitting away? Y’all done goofed and lost May now.
  • I sure hope they can get food to Deke now that they freaking welded his door shut.
  • Wondering what Tess was up to; she was a no-show this episode.
  • I was watching this episode with my sister, and she theorizes that Fitz has been in the future for a while, possibly spreading the legends about S.H.I.E.L.D. Though I feel like Fitz should be much older if that were the case? Guess we’ll see next week.

By the way, I hope my reviews have been making sense so far—I’ve been at these at 1:00 in the morning every week so far. Very much enjoying the discussions in the comments.

I was going to request a break for next week’s episode—but seeing how it’s Fitz-centric, I have to- HAVE TO do that one, sleep be damned.