Duck Fox

All Credit to ABC.... No, seriously Coulson, ABC.... Stop looking at me like that, I'm not lying! Oh God, now May's doing it too!

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has all the pieces of a great, comic book action/espionage hybrid drama. Fun, witty characters, good stunt choreography and fight scenes, an intriguing premise, and an established universe that is perhaps the most popular property to come out of Hollywood since Star Wars. So why does it struggle to be the show one can’t wait to get home from work (or stop playing video games, because let’s face it, no one’s got a job anymore) to watch? Why do I find myself grudgingly cycling it up on my DVR the day after air rather than plopping down to watch it live every Tuesday? 

I’d argue there’s just one flaw with the series, but it is a major one: pacing. Consider the fact that the entire world waited with bated breath to discover the secret behind Coulson’s revival, only to find the answer, revealed in last year’s midseason finale, highly anticlimactic. Consider that at this point no one really cares about Skye’s father. And let’s not forget the show basically spun its wheels for 9 months while it awaited the release of Captain America: The Winter Soldier to finally breathe life into the premise. These kinds of missteps in pacing a season of television can be overlooked, if only because they were the larger building blocks for the series long storyline. When pacing really becomes problematic—as in “viewers are leaving in droves” problematic—is when the writers refuse to indulge in any degree of storytelling that is not completely predictable.

Upon seeing the previews for “Making Friends and Influencing People” last week, I immediately guessed more or less the trajectory of Simmons’ real world return. I imagine 90% of the world did. There is no way Simmons was going to be working for HYDRA as anything other than an undercover agent. I am at least thankful the episode didn’t try and pull off a last minute twist where we think she’s working for HYDRA of her own free will, only for the last act to see her reverse and help the team. But the corollary to Simmons remaining undercover means we’re not going to see an end to this rather predictable subplot. 

Of course, my frustrations with the pacing of the series don’t diminish the things it does very, very well. Namely, developing interesting characters, particularly the female characters. While Simmons is revealed to be an ace undercover operative trying to figure out HYDRA’s next move so she can feed the info to the rest of Coulson’s crew, Skye is continuing her training to become the most badass S.H.I.E.L.D. agent since Melinda May. The chemistry between these ladies is great, and their mentor/mentee relationship works so much better than Skye’s and Ward’s. Though, of course that relationship brought us the one well paced plot twist of S.H.I.E.L.D., so it wasn’t all bad. 

The mission of the week is to try and recruit Donald Gill, AKA, Blizzard (Dylan Minette) before HYDRA hooks him. Though the group has no idea of how far HYDRA is willing to go until Fitz confronts Ward. This Fitz and Ward scene is one of the real hallmarks of the episode, and gives Iain de Caestecker and Brett Dalton room to shine. Coulson has been hiding Ward’s imprisonment from Fitz, unsure if he can handle the stress of confronting the man who caused his brain damage. When Fitz finally investigates on his own and comes across the cell, he flips out and decides to show Ward exactly how terrible hypoxia is.

 Fitz doesn’t limit Ward’s oxygen because he genuinely wants to kill him, or even because he really wants to torture him so badly. He instead seems to just want to be able to understand how Ward could have done the same thing to him. For his part, Ward doesn’t seem to care too much about the idea of slowly suffocating—he instead is only worried about what the HYDRA operatives have already done to Donnie, and how that will affect the team’s mission. 

By the end of the episode, Ward has taken a few more steps towards his redemption, though Skye is, understandably, still unable to see him as anything other than a monster. There’s a tiny glimmer of hope in her eyes when she asks if maybe Ward was brainwashed like Gill. But Ward quickly squashes that notion (thankfully, as that would be a HUGE cop out on the show’s part). He then finally tells Skye about her father. Skye promptly ends their conversation, but the heart monitor she’d been using to forcibly control her adrenaline keeps rising. 

By the episode’s end, Donnie Gill has been shot by Skye and faded into the icy waters of the ocean, and Simmons has managed to maintain her cover. HYDRA’s Sunil Bakshi (Simon Kassianides) now wants to brainwash her, though, which could lead to plenty of delicious complications in the future. While there is no particular reason to expect the episode to have changed the status quo, it still feels like S.H.I.E.L.D. has taken a step back. The only reason to bring Gill back around was for the fanservice of having Blizzard, and to reveal HYDRA can brainwash people. While we got a bit of interesting character work revolving around Ward and the bridges he’s burned—bridges leading to his former love interest and closest friend—the majority of this episode felt like filler. The series will have to step it up in the coming weeks if it truly wants to influence people to keep tuning in.