Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. - Recap: Hand Me Down

Credit: ABC

This week we meet Victoria Hand (Saffron Burrows), a shadowy S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who continues to bark the company line about "trusting the system," something Coulson repeats to Skye when she shows major misgivings about Fitz and Ward's operation in Russia. The two men have been recruited to retrieve an "Overkill device" from a separatist group that plans to declare independence from Russia and Georgia. The device essentially sets off enemy weaponry, making it a particularly volatile instrument if it lands in the wrong hands. Fitz is clearly terrified to be heading into combat, and Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge) is equally scared for him, but since Fitz is the only person who would be able to identify the Overkill device by sight, he must accompany Ward.

Credit: ABC

While I like the somewhat random pairing of Ward and Fitz, as this show really should explore different combinations more frequently, the mission itself is among the least interesting in the series' run so far. The two men spend much of the mission in captivity, held by the separatist group when their cover goes belly up. Luckily, Ward is able to shoot their way out by blowing up some kegs of alcohol, providing a distraction that allows for the duo to escape. They make it to the separatist stronghold where the device is being held, and it becomes quickly apparent to Ward that no extraction is forthcoming. Back at The Hub, the secret headquarters of S.H.I.E.L.D. where nearly every mission is hidden behind Level 8 classification, Skye hacks into Agent Sitwell's (Maximiliano Hernández) computer and discovers that there are no extraction plans. Coulson catches her flouting the rules and chides her for not trusting in the system, but she confronts him with the information that Ward and Fitz are being abandoned in Russia to die.

Credit: ABC/Ron Tom

When Coulson gets confirmation from Hand, he launches into a tirade about how she's overstepping her boundaries. Hand argues that Hawkeye and Black Widow never have extraction plans, but Coulson counters that they always know as much ahead of time. Of course, Hand has somewhat solid rationale, explaining that if she'd revealed there were no plans for extraction ahead of time, Fitz would have been psychologically compromised. But for Coulson, this still doesn't excuse the deception, and he asks May (Ming-Na Wen) if he's been wrong to trust the system all these years. Faced with little recourse, Skye and Simmons spring into action to mount a rescue mission of their own, knocking out Agent Sitwell with the Night-Night Gun and pairing up with Coulson to get Fitz and Ward out of Russia.

Credit: ABC/Justin Lubin

This all builds to what turns out to be a pretty exciting climax, all things considered: Fitz gets control of the Overkill device and uses it to neutralize the separatists’ weapons while Ward fights the remaining soldiers as a S.H.I.E.L.D. team attacks the compound. Ward and Fitz escape outside and find themselves in the midst of an all-out war between the separatists and S.H.I.E.L.D. soldiers. However, despite the pure chaos around them, both Ward and Fitz are able to escape once Coulson and the others arrive for the extraction. It's essentially Fitz's first successful field mission, and he feels vindicated over what he perceives to be his failure last week to be the one to save Simmons. Ward asserts that nobody thinks Fitz is a coward just because he wasn't the one to jump out of the airplane to save Simmons, but until the climactic action setpiece here, Fitz had a hard time actually believing it. Yet now Fitz is reunited with Simmons, and Skye is back to giving Ward a hard time. It works out every bit as neatly as you'd expect for an action show that relies a bit less on serialized storytelling than one might expect.

Credit: ABC/Justin Lubin

Of course, this isn't to say that the episode lacks serialization altogether. In addition to the continued characterization between FitzSimmons, Skye/Ward, and Coulson/May, we learn a bit more about Skye's parents. Coulson goes to bat for Skye and obtains her redacted file. The file isn't about Skye directly, but rather the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who dropped her off at the orphanage two decades earlier. Coulson explains it was an unidentified, female S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who may have been her mother, or may have just been the person who found her and took her to safety. He tells a shocked Skye that he put in a request for further information, and in an outburst of gratitude, she embraces him. However, Coulson looks conflicted the entire time. As he explains to May, he can’t tell Skye why a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent dropped her off at the orphanage, saying that some things were meant to remain secret. Yet Coulson has concerns of his own, and asks for May's help in discovering the truth of what really happened, and we see a photo on the computer of a dead body. “Poor girl,” May says, as if to imply that Skye's mother is already dead, and perhaps at the hands of the unidentified S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. It's a complete guessing game right now not only for the audience, but for Coulson, who discovers, in the post-credits scene, he's been denied access to the information about the case since he lacks the necessary clearance. What could the case possibly entail if it's so classified even Coulson can't access it? This is an interesting question, nearly as interesting as Coulson's reaction to being denied -- he simply gives up, and opts not to challenge the ruling. Maybe he suspects the truth and simply doesn't want to know?

Credit: ABC

"The Hub" is more satisfying on a thematic level than it is in terms of straight-up story, but Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is clearly getting the hang of its storytelling, and its high production value action setpieces. Next week's episode continues the story of Thor: The Dark World, and it looks like it could be the most ambitious episode yet. Color me excited.