So Many Threads Put In Play Define "All The Comforts Of Home"

The Good: Decent performances, Good direction
The Bad: Storytelling/character issues, Obvious reversal, Packs a lot of disparate pieces in without a good sense of flow
The Basics: Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. returns with "All The Comforts Of Home," which has the team - and Deke - returned to their native time in an episode that sets up a lot of future plot events without being a particularly impressive episode on its own.


It is hard to sit down to the episode of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D., "All The Comforts Of Home," without a sense of "how are the writers and producers going to screw this up now?" "All The Comforts Of Home" puts Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. in a tremendously weird narrative position. The show is now at the start of the tangent timeline that was explored in the first ten episodes of the season and the season is progressing toward a point where it will, by necessity of being a part of the larger Marvel Cinematic Universe, undo itself. But the obvious time travel story is complicated by aspects that one has to wonder if the writers have actually considered, life for example there are now two Fitz's on Earth. Fitz has just returned from the future, but because he was left behind (took the long way around to get to the future) there is a version of Fitz native to the timeline who will be captured by the military. So, while one of the people who captured Fitz was set up to be the villain for the second half of the season, it seems like a stretch that she wouldn't be weirded out by the fact that Fitz is both captured and running around with the Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D..

"All The Comforts Of Home" follows "Past Life" (reviewed here!), which had the Agents in the room with the portal that was there to return them to the past. Yo-Yo also learned that Coulson is dying and hinted that the attempt to save him was, at least in part, what led to the destruction of the Earth.

Opening with Hale, the officer who has Fitz in custody, reprimanding her daughter, Ruby, Hale is given hard questions about her nature. The S.H.I.E.L.D. agents return to the past, where videos of General Stone detail exactly what The Lighthouse is. In the basement of The Lighthouse, the Agents discover three Monoliths and they are greeted by Noah, another Chronocom. When the light that foretold the destruction of Earth appears in Milwaukee, the team - less Daisy - go to investigate it. But, while they are out, Deke appears from the future. Deke visits a bar, where he experiences the joys of Zima and hamburgers, but is frustrated when he is asked to pay and is too drunk to run away from his problem.

Fitz determines that the light is actually being sent from Earth and it is the same frequency as the beacon Hive used to lure the Kree to Earth! After the team finds their cloaked Zephyr, Rodriguez is thrown by her experiences in the future. When Deke sets off an alert Johnson has set up, Johnson feels like she must rescue him. At the facility in Milwaukee, the Agents find Agent Piper trying to disarm the beacon. The beacon is deactivated, but when that happens, Piper turns on the team and a heavily-armed kill squad arrives. Their leader, a masked woman, uses a vicious thrown weapon to slice off Yo-Yo's arms. And, despite the paperwork, Daisy is able to liberate Deke and help get the Zephyr to a safe house.

"All The Comforts Of Home" introduces a new Chronocom, which is cool, but when Deke arrives and Johnson finds out, it is a mystery as to how. Given that Johnson has no reasonable belief that Deke could show up from the future, how the alert would include him seems impossible. That sense of impossibility is increased by the fact that Johnson has a picture of Deke that is brought up as part of her alert - she did not have any pictures that could have been matched by the terms of her alert. But the solution to her problem, Deke being in play in the past and getting arrested, shows a troublesome resolution. Rather than Johnson going into the field, she could have sent the Enoch who would be native to this time. In other words, there is no reason for Johnson to go somewhere she might be recognized when there is someone who is not affiliated with S.H.I.E.L.D. who could run the errand for her.

The acting and direction in "All The Comforts Of Home" are fine, but the episode is pretty mediocre. Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. does not belabor the mystery of the masked woman, which is refreshing, but given how there were only two new characters (essentially) introduced in "All The Comforts Of Home," her identity is hardly a surprise. As predicted, General Hale is the season's new Big Bad, but "All The Comforts Of Home" has her motivations muddied by as plotline that includes her assembling a team of super-villains.

"All The Comforts Of Home" continues to hint at Coulson's medical issues without revealing it to the team, which is made frustrating given that Simmons makes a reasonable request when she asks to give all of the members of a team physicals. Beyond that, "All The Comforts Of Home" seems only to serve to give an ironic payoff to the future Rodriguez's line about holding onto Mack while she can. That payoff is momentarily amusing, but it increases the suspension of disbelief that Yo-Yo would not reveal what she knows about Coulson now to ridiculously high levels and the resolution to her current ailment can pretty easily be reasoned out given the scenes that showed her future self during the fall of Earth.

While Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. has had a way of pulling out its seasons and the extraordinary plots in interesting ways, if "All The Comforts Of Home" is any indication, it might be harder this season to do!

3.5/10

For other elements of the MCU, please check out my Marvel Cinematic Universe Review Index Page for a comprehensive listing!

© 2018 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. And Ghost Rider Go Into "Lockup" For An Unremarkable Episode!

The Good: Performances are fine, A few moments of banter, Special effects
The Bad: Dull plot, Mediocre characters/light on character development
The Basics: "Lockup" is much more familiar Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. than it is anything new and audacious.


Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. has had a rough time establishing itself in its fourth season. To be fair, there has not been a season of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. thus far that has had to work so hard to incorporate or lead into the next big Marvel Cinematic Universe blockbuster like the fourth season of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. has had to do. As the Marvel Cinematic Universe prepares for Doctor Strange, Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. has softened the audience up by infusing the show with supernatural elements. The first few episodes of the fourth season of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. have been so unremarkable that before each new episode, I have to go back and read my reviews of the prior episode in order to remember what happened.

"Let Me Stand Next To Your Fire" (reviewed here!) led into "Lockup" by introducing Robbie Reyes's uncle, who knows about the Darkhold. It also restored Daisy to Coulson's team and had Robbie Reyes more or less joining the team. "Lockup" also continued the b-plot that involves Aida and Simmons having to lie about it. "Lockup" is what one gets when someone conceives a mash-up between Ghostbusters and Prison Break and, in many ways, it is a traditional haunted house thriller once it finally gets underway.

Opening in the past with Lucy and Joe Bauer discovering the Darkhold, the book that contains the spells that supposedly turned them into "ghosts." When they open the book, though, they are horrified to discover that it is reading them; translating itself into English and German. Now, Coulson and Mack interrogate Joe, who has come out of his coma long enough to reveal where he hid the book, before he dies. Lucy has indeed found the Darkhold, but she - in her ghost form - is no longer able to read it. While Simmons fears her impending lie detector test, Coulson asks May about her death experience. But checking May into the prison where Elias Morrow is kept, the pair discovers that Lucy Bauer has already arrived and she has had an effect upon the humans in the prison.

While Lucy and her ghosts search for Morrow, Mack leads a team that includes Reyes and Daisy to try to beat them to the goal. Simmons, mid-lie detector test is called out by Director Mace, while Daisy extracts Coulson and May, to pick her brain for facts and figures to help him with a live debate on the Inhuman War On Humans. As Daisy fights the anti-Inhuman Watchdogs at the prison, Mack and Reyes find Morrow. Mace comes out publicly and when Reyes makes a detour to try to learn something about his past, Morrow falls into Lucy's hands!

"Lockup" was established with a very complicated problem with a stupidly easy solution. In prior episodes of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. have alluded to the Darkhold and claimed that it was so very lost to the world that the Red Skull and Nick Fury never found it. But, well before the end of the teaser to "Lockup," the Darkhold has been found twice!

Mack is pretty awesome in "Lockup" and it is nice to see Henry Simmons used well. He is not simply a physical presence with awesome armament in "Lockup," he is an efficient team leader as Mack infiltrates the infected prison. When he, predictably, gets infected, Simmons is able to do an awesome badass move of injecting himself to the brainstem with the antidote!

"Lockup" has Coulson, Daisy and May figuring out how the Watchdogs have been recruiting and there is something instantly ridiculous about the Watchdogs in prison recognizing S.H.I.E.L.D. agents right away. Why they would be able to make that assumption is unclear and the duality of being that perceptive, but not noticing Daisy's gauntlets to leap to the conclusion that she is the Inhuman is silly.

Director Mace is finally fleshed out in "Lockup," thanks to the live debate that he has to improvise during. Mace is the new Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. and he has not been given the chance to show much in the show thus far to put him on par with Director Fury, Director Coulson or, frankly, even faux-Director Gonzales. "Lockup" finally puts him in a place where he has to illustrate a measure of integrity and accomplishment to rise to the occasion and Jason O'Mara plays him with an appropriate level of gravitas for the part.

Unfortunately, Gabriel Luna is not able to show viewers anything truly new as Robbie Reyes in "Lockup." Luna's character is based on the actor's ability to play angry and in the prior episodes since Reyes was introduced (the special effect for Ghost Rider does not require any performance ability from Luna!) Luna has played that consistently. Luna gives Reyes a slow burn in "Lockup" with a c-plot story that has Reyes encountering a criminal in prison related to his backstory. But the character's direction, that where Ghost Rider will manifest and deliver vengeance, is obvious and Luna telegraphs the character's direction with his performance.

"Lockup" is another episode of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. that suffers because of the scattershot method of storytelling the series has been employing as it has expanded its cast over the years. Unfortunately for fans of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D., the changing specifics do not negate the painfully familiar general elements of the story and characters. Morrow being captured by Lucy is presented exactly the same way as Dr. Radcliffe being captured by Hive last season. The parallels are uncanny and as Daisy whines her way through "Lockup," it only serves to remind the viewer how overplayed the relationship between Daisy and Lincoln Campbell has become in retrospect. The two barely had a relationship and Daisy reacting as she has this entire season to Campbell's death makes no character sense when compared to how quickly Daisy bounced back from having her long-lost family reunited and taken from her before that.

Mashed together with unremarkable plot and character elements are pretty awesome special effects. Ghost Rider looks cool and it is always awesome to see Phil Coulson use his shield. But the flash of the few seconds worth of special effects cannot hide the unremarkable nature of the rest of "Lockup."

For other works with Maximilian Osinski, please check out my reviews of:
"Repairs" - Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.
In Time
Love And Other Drugs

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. - The Complete Fourth Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the fourth season here!
Thanks!]

4/10

For other reviews of elements of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, please check out my Marvel Cinematic Universe Review Index Page for a listing of all those reviews!

© 2016 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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End The ATCU: "Closure" Advances HYDRA Impressively!

The Good: Good use of ensemble cast and characters, Wonderful plot advancement, Sufficiently weighty
The Bad: Very much a set-up episode (does not actually live up to its title), Still a little busy
The Basics: "Closure" pits Ward and Coulson against one another as HYDRA reasserts its importance in Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.!


Midseason finale time is upon us and I'm psyched that Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. is nearing its finale with "Closure." I'm particularly excited about Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. getting closer to its midseason finale because my week off from the show was packed by reviewing the entire thirteen episode run of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's new addition, Jessica Jones (reviewed here!). With "Closure," hope rose in me that the dull Grant Ward HYDRA plotline might finally come to an end.

That hope was not at all met. Instead, HYDRA becomes a credible and impressive antagonist to S.H.I.E.L.D. once again. No longer a ragtag batch of lame enemies who were motivated by ridiculous ambition or picked off by Grant Ward, Gideon Malick's HYDRA explodes with relevance in "Closure."

"Closure" follows on the heels of "Many Heads, One Tale" (reviewed here!), which set up the possibility that the HYDRA arc might actually end. Ward's plotline has been convoluted and boring for the past season and a quarter, since his mentor was killed in "Beginning Of The End" (reviewed here!); in "Many Heads, One Tale," Gideon Malick's character became instantly more interesting by being able to tell Ward the origins of HYDRA and its purpose. Ward's on-again, off-again status with HYDRA, as opposed to being a rogue who doesn't care about HYDRA's ideology or plans, has become tiresome by "Closure" and with a title like "Closure," it is hard not to get one's hopes up.

Opening with Coulson and Price having dinner together at her home, Price reveals what she has learned about Malick and HYDRA. Price plans to go into the ATCU the next day, as if everything was normal, before she is shot and killed by a sniper rifle's bullet. Ward is the sniper and he calls to taunt Coulson before his goons break in and attempt to kill his former boss. Rescued by Mack, Coulson returns to base to break down and plan his revenge. Coulson interrogates May, Simmons, Fitz and Daisy about their relationships with Ward in order to try to find Ward's weakness. Mack brings Banks into the headquarters to try to learn more about Malick and the NASA Distant Star program HYDRA funded for the obelisk.

Morse, Hunter, and Coulson head off to deal with Ward, leaving Mack as Acting Director of S.H.I.E.L.D. Banks, Fitz and Simmons are attacked by Malick's people while searching the Distant Star facility. Malick has Fitz and Simmons interrogated, while Coulson and his team kidna Ward's younger brother. Thrown off balance by Coulson and his brother, Ward strikes a deal with Fitz while Malick and HYDRA prepare to open a portal back to the distant world to recover the evil creature there. Mack brings Gutierrez and Campbell onto a team to try to rescue Fitz and Simmons from HYDRA before it is too late.

There is something very charming about Coulson and Price having take-out for their first real date. The shock comes from the bullet in the window is an engaging opening to "Closure" and a return to excitement for Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Constance Zimmer and Clark Gregg are given just enough time to establish genuine on-screen chemistry before Zimmer disappears from the episode. One hopes that if Zimmer is not returning, Gregg gets the chance to work with Amy Acker again.

"Closure" has one of the most gruesome openings of all episodes of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Unless Coulson is a bad shot, there are seven people killed in the first seven minutes of the episode. The episode has a seriously high body count and between people getting shot in the head and neck, "Closure" is fairly brutal. As the episode progresses, the quick deaths are replaced by long torture sequences that are unpleasant to watch on every level. They generally only increase the sense of Ward's villainy.

As Ward is characterized again by his former teammates, he appears on-screen as an actual Agent Of HYDRA. Gideon Malick has used Ward to get all five of the terrigen stones and Ward seems ready to end Coulson. Brett Dalton's performance is somewhat monolithic for the bulk of the episode. The best moments for Dalton's performance come as he shows some slight bit of vulnerability while Ward talks to his estranged younger brother.

Throughout "Closure," there is a Fitz and Simmons subplot. Fitz continues to grow closer Simmons and she seems split between Fitz and rescuing Will. Fitz, for his part, is committed to rescuing Will. Ward quickly realizes that the greatest torture for either of them begins with having them separated and the manipulation from Ward is appropriately villainous. Beyond that, Fitz reveals the depth of his feelings by making a gesture for Simmons that leads to a heartbreaking sense of emotional climax to the episode.

Throughout the third season of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. up until this point, a big problem with the show has been finding the right balance of characters with the (now) rather large cast. "Closure" has the right balance; the dichotomy between Coulson and Ward suddenly becomes engaging again. Coulson is obsessed and Ward is brutal. With the on-screen appearance of Ward's younger brother, "Closure" calls back to "The Well" (reviewed here!) and "The Things We Bury" (reviewed here!) to definitively remind viewers there is no ambiguity about his nature.

Coulson's focus and obsession allow Morse a brief, wonderful moment in "Closure" where she has some real chance of growth. "Closure" also has a fairly decent sense of writing to it. Brent Fletcher seems to know how ineffective torture is; neither Fitz, nor Simmons breaks and Fitz's sacrifice is characterized as more selfless than manipulated.

Leading into the mid-season finale, Ward and Malick are established as the definitive villains for Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Malick finally grows into the real commander role that viewers have been waiting for. His ideology and goals make Malick a credible adversary. The combination of elements make "Closure" one of the best episodes of Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. yet!

For other works with Andrew Howard, please visit my reviews of:
The Hangover, Part II
Limitless
Transformers: Revenge Of The Fallen

[Knowing that single episodes are an inefficient way to get episodes, it's worth looking into Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. - The Complete Third Season on DVD or Blu-Ray, which is also a better economical choice than buying individual episodes. Read my review of the third season here!
Thanks!]

8/10

For other Marvel movie, television season and episode reviews, please check out my Marvel Cinematic Universe Review Index Page for a listing of those reviews!

© 2015 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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