With the show gaining a full series on its network, what can Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. bring to the table to keep us watching in the latest episode; titled “Eye-Spy”. So let us take a look at some of the references and I will share with you some of my own thoughts and opinions. Warning for those of you that haven’t caught the episode yet there will be some spoilers ahead.
Review
Much like these articles I have been writing, the show itself has made a shift in its focus; from its more light-hearted and reference heavy early episodes to a more focus path. With this latest episode, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has settled itself into its promise of a character based show where ordinary people have to deal with an extraordinary world.
This was a Coulson focused episode through and through, and with that its main story hit more of a serious tone that that of the previous episodes; if only because Clark Gregg’s character demanded it. However, this serious nature, though welcomed, was in stark contrast to time spent with some of the secondary characters with me, for the first time, finding Fitz-Simmons to be more of an annoyance than Skye. The childish nature of those supporting cast is at least self-referenced in this episode with Skye’s character commenting “Mum and Dad fighting” in reference to Agent May and Coulson having words, but the transition to these light-hearted moments became quite jarring.
The “threat of the week” stayed much the same course as Mike Peterson and Franklin Hall with Akela Amadour being a good person put in a bad place by bad people but having much more of a personal, and tragic, history with Coulson gave her much more of a place within the episode. The show itself found more time to finally put its over-arching storylines into the focus which all in all makes this the best episode yet by far.
MCUbuilding
Calling back to the first episode, it appears Vanchete(?) had previous run-ins with S.H.I.E.L.D. before trying to get hold of Chitauri tech.
The shows big bad, the mysterious group with access to things they shouldn’t have, are not the only ones with Alien tech or in this case alien equations. With people making superhumans with tech and formulas, and governments/corporations meddling with alien science who knows what will come up in future episodes.
With several references to Coulson not being who he used to be we seem to be getting more pieces to the puzzle of his resurrection. Just a shame no one got those x-ray specs on Coulson!
Did you guy notice anything I missed? Let me know in the comments below.
Read the analysis of previous episodes:
Pilot episode
Episode 2 “0-8-4”
Episode 3 “The Asset”