REVIEW: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. "Laws of Nature"
We’ve returned to Agents of SHIELD after one massive scale of a season. This week’s episode promises to take it up a notch after the reintroduction of Terrigen to the world of potent Inhumans. Not to mention wondering where do we go from here? Fear not, we’ve got a lot of answers, maybe too much.
I really shouldn’t need to recap this part since they so graciously released it five days earlier. It hasn’t changed. Newcomer Joey took a wrong set of fish oil pills and came out his apartment melting metal and causing cars to explode. The ATCU come in guns blazing and helicopters wailing (they have to work on that) to take him in dead or alive. Before things get worse, the SHIELD team, or what’s left of it, comes to his rescue, thanks to Daisy blasting away the soldiers and one police car. They hurry him into a white version of the TARDIS to their newest form of avian transportation, a large helicarrier known as the Zephyr. And if that isn’t the most badass entry into a new season not to mention a female superhero, we all watching a different show.
We’re filled in on the minor details both obvious and non-obvious. Joey’s handling his change and asking the adequate questions while we’re filled in on SHIELD’s process. Apparently, they’ve been privvy to the fish-oil thing but have been about five people behind when finding new Inhumans or the woman in charge. The ATCU, meanwhile, have skipped to the examining dead carcasses part of the opposing side. I’m not a fan of the characters taking us step-by-step on things we’ve known for months, but at least they try to balance it out with new stuff.
For instance, Bobbi has graduated to base doctor thanks to her only comics-mentioned degree in biology. In two minutes, I already like Joey more than a decent percentage of the main characters. The guys research the mysterious woman as Daisy (hey, even Coulson messes up sometimes) drops the proverbial can’t-go-back bomb. That’s understandable, but it still sucks. Much like Simmons still being gone and Fitz still searching in Morrocco…apparently.
I will never understand when Fitz turned into Indiana Jones, but I will never question it. There needs to be more action in this episode, even Bobbi’s begging for it. Unfortunately, there’s more exposition as to why he’s in Morrocco. I really do need to know these things, but I also notice that this episode still has thirty minutes to go. Then Fitz makes his escape, and I almost apologized. Then Daisy and Mack go to find Lincoln, and Coulson and Hunter try to find the mystery woman only to get caught. We can’t win them all even in the season opener.
Coulson speaks with Rosalind (I guess that’s her name) one-on-one surrounded by guns. Who says this show’s getting too filled with superpowers? In addition to that, when did Lincoln get a backbone of a personality? I mean, yay, the guy’s a doctor, but where did his totally justifiable attitude come from and where was it last season? I still don’t care from him, but this is a decent step. Another decent step is Rosalind revealing that someone else has been killing people via energy blasts, and if you’ve been keeping track of the promotion, you can probably guess who that is.
Daisy, Mack, and Lincoln go after Lash at the hospital, alerting Coulson and Rosalind to the emergency. Coulson and Hunter escape via the TARDIS, and Daisy and Mack escape right when things were starting to get interesting. I don’t know where Lincoln’s going, but as a main character, he’s bound to show up somewhere. On the lighter side of things, Bobbi and Hunter are officially patching things up via wedding rings and wanting to kill Ward, which I can’t deny.
On the worse side, with SHIELD there’s always one, the government represented by President Ellis from Iron Man 3 officially comes out against alien and superpowered forces revealing the ATCU to be a special task force. Also, Fitz’s search turns up only one Hebrew word: Death. Now I know Simmons is destined to returned, but their devastated looks, the reminder that May still hasn’t come back, and Fitz’s screaming at the monolith does not help this gradual process.
On the one hand, every supporting character has lived to the end of this episode which already exceeds my expectations as well as my newfound hopes that Joey will be okay. On the other hand, the research has gathered that the world may be exposed to Terrigen within 17 months or by the time Infinity War should begin, whichever comes first. On the other other hand, WHERE THE HELL IS JEMMA SIMMONS? They really just wanted to top the finale’s weirdness with that rock. You hear that sound? It’s the sound of dozen of SHIELD fans losing bets as to where she went, except for this one. Alien portal. I called it last week.
All in all, this opener had its moments and hit all the expositional beats it needed to start this season. It’s needed to hit the ground running, but it can’t help but feel a bit slow especially when the two-hour finale felt faster. But I do have to give credit where credit is due to the special effects to the point where we can see a new giant helicarrier and superpowers in every other scene. Is this the unofficial start of Phase 3? Because it feels like it.
