How do I unpack this box of ‘holy shit’ without devolving into hyperactive marking-out so let’s take one point at a time, shall we?

The collapse of the Framework, a seemingly spiteful act on AIDA’s part, gives us a truly heartbreaking scene and I have to give kudos to both Henry Simmons and Natalia Cordova-Buckley as Mack and Yo-Yo because it got me on a deeper level than I thought it could. Seeing the strong man-mountain suffer a horrendous emotional breakdown alongside the woman who needed it to happen to get him back is awful but utterly compelling to watch.

On the opposite end of the emotional spectrum, we had the rest of the team thwarting AIDA’s plans through snark and shady bullshit, which I loved! Between the sleight of hand with Jemma’s own LMD dying in her place or Coulson acquiring the Spirit of Vengeance! Oh shit! That’s both incredibly awesome and incredibly dangerous and the after-effects of Coulson’s ‘deal’ with it will probably be the focus of next season but from even my cursory knowledge of the Ghost Rider mythos, I can tell that it’s going to be bad news.

Then there’s Robbie and Daisy teaming up in a fantastic fight with The Superior (and some other jobber who has multiple LMDs despite us not knowing who he is) and performing a manoeuvre that should really have a name but I can’t think of one off the top of my head.

We finish out the arc on Radcliffe, the man who arguably started all this, as he sits upon a beach as the sun literally sets on the Framework. He muses about how his ambition and his hubris ultimately lead to his current fate, alone within a dying world of his own creation. He doesn’t get to finish his thought before disappearing in one of the most beautifully poignant shots of the show.

The team’s ultimate fate however is much less definitive as they are kidnapped during their meal (paralysed by a device very similar to the Sonic Taser that Obadiah Stane used in the original Iron Man movie) and taken away to parts unknown but we get a glimpse of where that is in the stinger.

Oh. OH. OHHHHHHHHHH BALLS. That’s not good, is it? Because unless next season will be called Agents of S.W.O.R.D. (and part of me really, really hopes that it will) that’s bad news for Coulson and, presumably, the rest of the team.

As a whole, Season 4 has been a rollercoaster of a season thanks to brilliant writing, amazing character development and expanding the MCU in a way that doesn’t feel forced and uninteresting. Multiple arcs with an overarching narrative seems to be the way to go for this show and I hope this continues. We won’t be seeing the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. until 2018, most likely allowing the Inhumans TV show room to breathe and will no doubt take that show’s place after it’s eight episode run in a mid-season premiere.

Would you guys be down for some Inhumans coverage? Let me know in the comments and I’ll see you all next year!

As opposed to The Flash this week, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. remains on form with an emotionally powerful episode with action, drama and emotional investment.

In the fallout of escaping the Framework, we see most of the cast in some form of emotional turmoil or another. Except Coulson and May, who are half-flirting, half-catching up on events while fighting Robo-Russians. Because Iain De Caestecker and Mallory Jansen can carry the traumatic emotions no problem. We also see Yo-Yo’s reaction to Mack staying in the Framework and she’s PISSED. So much so that the fiery latina fucks herself by diving into the Framework and awaking strapped to a gurney in a fiery room. Good job!

But yeah, the main focus of the episode is with Fitz and Ophelia/AIDA because they’re both fucked up! Fitz is struggling with dealing with all the bad stuff he did in the Framework as well as Ophelia being a super-creeper who can’t control her emotions and it’s just not his day when Simmons nails him with an Icer. Poor sod can’t catch a break but you feel for him every step of the way and that’s a testament to good writing and a good actor.

Ophelia/AIDA is also killing it; figuratively and literally. From playing an emotionless Life Model Decoy for most of the season, we get to see Mallory Jansen practically explode with emotion, running from delightfully happy, frightened beyond logic, a pretty cool Big-Damn-Hero moment and then seething with rage. It’s a fantastic showcase for her acting ability and for the freshly Inhuman Ophelia. She showcases teleportation, lightning generation and healing so I have to wonder what other tricks she has up her sleeves heading into next week’s finale.

With an enemy that powerful, as well as a possible army of Robo-Russians, the Team is on the backfoot with little to no back-up but miracles come from the most unexpected places and, within the demolished SHIELD base, the Darkhold portal ignites and Ghost Rider returns. Fuck. Yes.

Come back next week for what promises to be an explosive finale as magic, technology and superpowers collide in World’s End!

We’re racing toward the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season four finale and what better way to build up some momentum than to have our primary antagonist achieve her goals and lose some of our main cast along the way?

Farewell, Cruel World! sees the end of the Framework arc, and while it’s been immensely enjoyable to watch, we needed to get back to the real world eventually and we finally get going on that plan. Daisy, Coulson, May, Simmons and Mack head off in search of Radcliffe’s backdoor (phrasing) and have to deal with a lot of emotional turmoil along the way.

But first, since this may well be the last time we get BJ Britt, we have some hilarious moments with him that really drives home that we’re missing a hilarious and sincere character in the main cast. Trip has some fantastic scenes with Daisy and Mack and is taking the whole idea of the world being wrong in stride, though he is disappointed that his other-world counterpart apparently has no game whatsoever.

It’s good to see there’s still something between Coulson and May as he encourages her to take a leap of faith and is rewarded on the other side with May admitting he’s cute. Awwww!

Less cute is Mack’s… departure? Is that what you’d class this as? It’s certainly emotional and understandable and while Mack staying in the Framework with his daughter is unsurprising, it’s a little hokey from a logistical standpoint. I mean, how long does he expect them to just leave him in there? Does he really think Yo-Yo is just going to let him stay there? Who would look after him and keep the Framework going? I guess they’ll explain it in the following episodes but Henry Simmon’s supposed final appearance is bittersweet to say the least.

As usual, Iain De Caestecker is killing it as both a cold-hearted HYDRA head and as the repentant real-world Fitz. This guy can act rings around everyone! Without Simmons there to support him, and Coulson not being that effective, his fragile mental state is easy prey for the now human AIDA/Ophelia who tearful reunites with him and TELEPORTS AWAY. The fuck!? When? How? What? Is her new body Inhuman? Is that tech-based? WHAT.

Questions need answers and we can only hope we get them when we return next week with… The Return.

Oh boy, I don’t know how much of All The Madame’s Men subtext was conceived as a response to the current socio-political climate but it’s hard not to draw comparisons. We even have our own Bill O’Reilly (topical!) in the form of Sunil Bakshi! Simon Kassianides makes his first appearance in the show since his real-world death in The Dirty Half Dozen two seasons ago! If nothing else, this arc is great for bringing back long dead characters who have amazing screen presence.

Speaking of; Trip continues to be awesome and supportive and why did they kill him off again? Same with Brett Dalton, who is killing it as a kind and compassionate Grant Ward and despite how inherently wrong that feels, he makes me root for him. If only there was some kind of magical McGuffey that could make all these digital avatars of dead cool guys into flesh and blood…

Wait a minute! Project: Looking Glass! From what I can gleam from the explanation in the episode, the machine is designed to make machines human but I imagine it’s more along the lines of implanting archived memories and personalities into flesh and blood bodies. In a clever bit of  narrative sleight of hand, we discover that while Fitz has been finalising the design in the Framework, the Superior is constructing the actual one in the real world.

All of which could mean we’ll see not only Mace return but also Good-Ward and Trip! Hell, even Radcliffe and Agnes! Or even Hope, Mack’s fictional daughter! The possibilities are endless.

The episode opened with a cool gunfight, culminating in Madame Hydra getting quaked out of a window! That momentum carries us through the episode as the body cam footage May had is used to undermine the HYDRA regime and ends with Coulson declaring himself an Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D.

This entire arc has been really interesting and very entertaining but all goof things must come to an end so join us next week when Madame Hydra’s plan goes into action, the team scramble to stop her and we say Farewell, Cruel World!

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. continues to be amazing at both giving what the audience wants but dicking with them along the way. Last week we had Fitz go full HYDRA and this week we have a Trip-le bill of shocking developments!

First up, we see why Fitz is the way he is. Like Radcliffe says, it only takes a sentence to change someone’s world but what if there was a whole other person there? Having Fitz be raised by his father instead of his dear old mum has a huge impact as we see them share time. David O’Hara, an accomplished actor who is so Scottish it looks like it hurts him, plays a harsh Alistair Fitz; a man who subscribes to that BS mentality that men should be taught respect through beatings and Fitz is visibly uncomfortable around him. Despite the new reality shaping his personality, even he can see that the way he was raised was wrong on some level.

But in some ways, it’s so, so right because here come dat boi; oh shit, it’s Antoine Triplet! Hashtag Trip Lives! It’s truly astonishing to see BJ Britt return to the show after such a long absence and this kinda shoots my theory that this world won’t last long because you can’t bring back Trip and then go back to the real world next episode! That’s not fair!

What’s also not fair is while one cast member returns, one leaves us as Jeffrey Mace goes out like a big damn hero! At the very least, we got a beast of a fight scene between a temporarily super-powered May and Mace before he sacrifices himself to save the team, Coulson’s students and even May herself. It’s bittersweet to see Jason O’Mara leave the show but he got a badass out, even with the switch to reality as AIDA switches off his life support.

In the wake of Mace’s sacrifice and the revelation that HYDRA authorised a building full of children to be demolished, May turns face and gives Daisy exactly what she needs to escape and bring the Triskelion down on her way out. It’s good to see the two friends reunite in what promises to be a knock-down drag-out fight to survive next episode!

No Regrets offers exactly that with an emotionally engaging and high action episode that ramps up the momentum as we head towards the season finale but for now, we’ll see next week how Madame Hydra deals with this betrayal as she calls All The Madame’s Men.

This alternate universe is boned and I kind of want the show to stay here. It’s really interesting but I bet we’re only going to get two more episodes before we’re back to the real world.

But for now we get to enjoy the family dynamic of the Mackenzie family! Ol’ Mack-Daddy is everything I imagined it would be. He has a fantastic arc this episode, when he reluctantly sells out Daisy to HYDRA-May and turns to the resistance to help. Now, I might be projecting a bit here but does Hope, Mack daughter, remind anyone of the Inhuman super-genius Moon Girl? Maybe it’s just the hair and technical prowess but that’d be an interesting way of including the character!

Speaking of Inhumans, we get to see more of the Nazi-esque checking of papers and see the cramped conditions that the rescued Inhumans suffer in the Resistance base, led by Mace! I have to wonder if Mace is actually Inhuman in this world and if there are other active Inhumans. They need some serious firepower if they’re going to take on HYDRA.

In the HYDRA camp, the almost mind-rapey manipulation by Madame Hydra continues as we see the depths of her infatuation with Fitz. It’s so cringe-worthy, having shades of Hive-Ward controlling Daisy. It’s like she made this bizarre fan fiction world just to be with Fitz and she’s probably treating him the worst out of everyone.

Then again, Jemma always gets a kick to the quad when Fitz proves her entire emotional speech to Ward wrong by straight up murdering Holden Radcliffe’s ex-girlfriend. It’s a horrible scene to see Fitz go dark but even worse when you think about what that’ll mean when he’s freed from the Framework. In the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. comic book, Fitz is actually a HYDRA double-agent so maybe this is the first step towards having him turn heel!

With the stage still being set, we can only wonder what this wicked world will reveal next and we’ll just have to wait until next week and hope we have No Regrets.

Man, it feels like an ice age since I last covered this show… So much so that I actually needed that recap to remind me where we were with the current arc. Hell, I even forgot who Vijay Nadeer was until I looked it up after the show finished.

But yeah! It’s a brand new world where HYDRA rules and Inhumans are persona non gratis and all the character we know and love are assholes! Yaaaaay! The episode title What If… comes from a series of Marvel books that explore alternate Earths where the stories you know didn’t turn out like the should, hence we have this alternate Earth where HYDRA revealed itself early and became the world’s security task force. Should make for some interesting scenarios!

Did I say interesting? I meant awkward as fuck! Brett Dalton returns as Grant Ward and I hate his stupid, handsome face already because in a total reverse of the real world, this Ward is the GOOD GUY! Still, at least Daisy’s awkward love life isn’t as bad as Jemma being buried alive! Tough break, Simmons.

Hell, Simmons probably gets it the worst this episode. She has to dig herself out of her own grave, is on the run from HYDRA, fails at persuading Coulson he’s in a simulation and, while not currently aware of it, lost Fitz to Madame Hydra aka AIDA! The girl just can’t catch a break.

While we don’t see everyone, we do get the majority and some interesting lore about this world, like the Cambridge Incident, where the Inhuman girl May saved killed a bunch of people and lead to the rise of HYDRA. I wonder what this Alt-Earth’s version of the Avengers is like…

We end the episode with Daisy confronting Coulson and breaking through the programming enough that Coulson knows her name. That’s a good start to a really interesting plot line and we’ll be seeing more next time when we analyze Identity and Change.

(Quick note to Flash Facts readers; the review for Abra Kadabra will be up later this week, don’t worry!)

Seriously, after having gone through the threat establishment of the LMD’s we finally see how dangerous they can be as SHIELD is manipulated into hunting two of their own in an intense and gripping bottle episode.

For those that don’t know, bottle episodes are mainly set in one central location (SHIELD base), starring as few non-regular as they can get away with (most of the characters onscreen are regular cast) and using mostly dialogue. That part is up for debate because there is a ton of action and dialogue and both are incredibly strong!

The episode follows the same formula of paranoia, distrust and dread as John Carpenter’s The Thing but accelerates the timeline as the LMD’s go on the offensive and it’s up to Daisy and Simmons to undermine and ultimately triumph. Oh? Did I say Daisy isn’t an LMD? Well you know what that means!

Someone pick up that phone because I FUCKING CALLED IT! Fitz is revealed to be an LMD in one of the most powerful, emotionally-charged scenes of the episode, if not the season, because Iain De Caestecker is an acting demigod. His performance during the tense standoff between him and Simmons further highlights this guy’s acting chops. Elizabeth Henstridge also delivers a strong perfermance but she isn’t switching from terror, anger, love, and affectlessness on the fly like Iain. It’s brilliant.

Daisy gets to show more of her combat chops by going up against the Mace-LMD and doing a pretty effective job though just taking one out is enough to knacker her out and resort to quaking Mac to pieces. It’s a fun running fist fight through the lab with some great camera work.

AIDA also continues her descent into full-on villain by turning The Superior into a Frankestein’s Monster of an LMD and killing Radcliffe before stuffing him into the framework. She’s like Ultron but actually threatening.

Ming-Na Wen has a pretty badass display of character for the May LMD this episode too! She has more May in her than Radcliffe probably intended, selflessly stalling the other LMDs from hurting her team with a pile of explosive barrels! She might not be human, but she’s still May. Right ’til the end.

We end the episode with Daisy and Jemma sneaking into the Framework to free their friends and we get a glimpse of what that perfect world looks like and boy is it bleak. Coulson is a racist teacher, Simmons is dead, May works for HYDRA and, most chilling of all…

SON OF A BITCH! I know good villains don’t die but jaysus, lads… Still, it’ll be good to see Brett Dalton back to being an openly evil bastard because he and Daisy have to be working for HYDRA too, right?

Self Control is my favourite episode of the season so far but that may soon change as when we come back to Agents of SHIELD in April, we’ll be dipping our toes into the alternate universe of the Framework and asking What If…

You know that feeling when things can’t possibly get any worse? That’s where we are after The Man Behind the Shield. This is the worst case scenario but wasn’t it fun getting here?

Having a flashback to babby Coulson and May was a fun c-plot to the episode, showing the rarely seen playful side of May and a Coulson a little more akin to what we saw in the early days of the MCU. It’s a refreshing change of pace and something I wish we saw more of.

I love the direction (pun intended) that they’ve taken Mace in. Jason O’Mara has been on form since his reveal and he’s become the team’s purest cinnamon roll. He’s out of power, deep in enemy territory and all but sure that he’ll die but he’s taken Coulson’s ‘fake it til you make it’ advice to heart and acts like a stone cold badass while simultaneously shitting himself every second he’s onscreen.

Daisy and the Superior get a pretty decent brawl going that isn’t purely Inhuman powers versus human resolve. Daisy fights relatively fair but like she says; the game ahs changed and leaves Ivanov buried under rubble.

The huge-ass shocker twist of the episode is the revelation that four of SHIELD’s most experienced operatives have been replaced with LMDs! Am I the only figuring this is a red herring?  I mean, yeah, there’s a noticeable amount of time missing where someone could have gotten got but Coulson, Mack, Daisy AND Mace?  Seems a bit of a stretch to me… Though Coulson bringing LMD-May back online seems to support it. Spoiler: the promo for the next episode confirms that at least Coulson and Mace are LMDs but there are FOUR active within SHIELD so… my money is still on Fitz being one of them.

With the hint of a John Carpenter’s The Thing-style bottle episode on the cards, next week should be a doozy but I really liked this episode too and I hope the LMD arc continues to be as interesting and intense when we come back next week with a little more Self Control.

I was all ready to write this off as kind of a filler episode but I genuinely enjoyed BOOM, mostly because of John Pyper-Ferguson, Mallory Jansen and Jason O’Mara.

Jeffrey Mace has gone from powerhouse to house cat and this episode really plays with that as he’s blocked at every avenue to be more of a player in SHIELD. Jason plays Mace as likeable at the best of times but playing him as a kicked puppy makes you really feel for him and he gets his shot to be the hero… Only to be captured by The Superior. Should make for an interesting conversation in the next episode.

Speaking of interesting, we meet AIDA’s inspiration; Agnes Kitsworth. Mallory Jansen gets to unclench and use her natural Aussie accent for a change. It’s subtle but distinct enough from AIDA’s monotone non-descript accent that makes Agnes feel unique. Her backstory is tragic and she doesn’t last the episode but it was cool to see Mallory emote for a change (like when Brent Spiner got to emote as Data on TNG).

We also see Senator Nadeer bow out after a cunning(?) plan by the Russians to see if she’s Inhuman which results in Head Watchdog, Terrance Shockley (I think this is the first time we’ve heard his name, right?), becoming an Inhuman bomb. Kind of reminds me of Nitro in a way, which is ironic since Nadeer’s office is within the Stamford Wing, thus alluding to the comic book Civil War. John Pyper-Ferguson gets to do something other than glower in the background. Hell, I think he’s pretty cool when he’s getting used to his powers.

We finish the episode as Agnes dies within Radcliffe’s new ‘Framework’ world as May is visibly distressed. Is she adapting to the new world already? I guess we’ll have to find out next time!

BOOM is a solid and entertaining episode that kept good pace and didn’t stick with one plot for too long, giving a lot of the supporting cast room to breath. Next week we go on a mission to rescue The Man Behind the Shield.