Back aboard the Bus, Coulson is beating himself up over Chan’s death.  Ward tries to cheer him up, saying that you “can’t save someone from themselves.”  Coulson disagrees, telling Ward, “You can if you get to them early enough.”  Coulson offers Miles a box, and a choice between taking what’s inside or being put inside a bigger box of his own.  He opens it to find a silver bracelet, which Coulson forces on his wrist.  It will do whatever SHIELD tells it to do, presumably monitoring Miles and controlling him if need be.  Oh, and it will also interfere with electronic devices for a while, putting him out of commission as far as the Rising Tide is concerned.  Coulson then kicks him out in Hong Kong, despite Miles being from Texas, and informs him that his million dollar paycheck has been donated to agent Quan’s family.  Miles shares a last moment with Skye, telling her that she’s changed, which Skye says is good.  It’s clear from her attitude that she wants nothing to do with him anymore.

Coulson calls Skye to his office, and on the way she interrupts May and Ward sharing a drink.  (“Make it a double.” “Is there any other kind?”)  She asks Ward to go with her, as her Supervising Officer, but he’s not interested.  She starts to apologize again to Coulson, and to offer an explanation for her behavior, but Coulson yells at her to stop lying.  He says that she’s been lying to everyone since she joined the team, and gives her one chance to confess whatever secret she’s been hiding.  After a moment’s consideration, she reaches into her shirt and pulls out the hidden memory card, explaining that on it is everything about her.

She joined SHIELD in part as a way to try to track down her parents, about whom she knows nothing.  In all of her searching, the only trace of them she’s been able to find is a single document from SHIELD, with the entire text redacted.  Coulson softens just a bit, telling her she may not like what she finds, but she says that it “can’t be worse than what I imagined.”  He tells her that maybe he can help, giving her a small box as he leaves the office.  Inside is a bracelet just like the one he forced on Miles, but clearly he’s leaving the choice up to her.  She has to pay the consequences of her actions, and either choose to shoulder that responsibility or choose to leave.  With a bit of determination in her eye, she fastens it around her wrist.

After the credits, we get an intriguing scene that presents us with more questions than answers.  Raina and an unknown man speak over a telephone while separated by glass.  It appears that the man is in some sort of prison, but Raina is reporting to him.  She says that the doctor is dead, but that they’re ready to proceed to stage two of the plan.  She suggests that he touch base with the “clairvoyant” to check on stage three.  He says that the clairvoyant doesn’t like to be touched, but she says it’s necessary if they ever want to unleash their “toy soldiers”.  She goes to leave, but not before he tells her that he likes her dress.

So tonight’s episode gave us some good character drama with Skye’s divided loyalty, a big expansion of the dealings of Centipede, and another glimpse at a character with superpowers.  I think “Girl in the Flower Dress” was a big step forward for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and a good episode to give us before a brief, one-week hiatus.  I’m interested to see how all of this shapes up in the weeks to come.

  S.H.I.E.L.D. Thoughts

Some people online have been complaining about the show being too “quippy” or too funny.  Obviously, each person is entitled to their own tastes, but I feel like the show is very much in tune with the tone of the Marvel Cinematic Universe films, especially The Avengers.  It’s also in keeping with the style of Joss Whedon’s other shows.  I completely understand people’s complaints, and the argument that government agents wouldn’t be making jokes while under attack from a guy who can throw fireballs is a fair one.  But SHIELD was never presented as a drama about people with superpowers, but instead as a fun, exciting show set in this well known universe.  I think the show we’ve been given aligns very closely with my expectations for it, though I obviously can only speak for myself.

How I hope that J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof watched tonight’s episode for a good lesson in how to give the audience eye candy without objectifying the actors involved.  After the debacle that was Carol Marcus in her underwear in Star Trek Into Darkness, it’s nice to see two characters in a sexy situation without the camera ogling the woman and ignoring the man.  Skye and Miles both got equal screen time in equally scant amounts of clothing, which is how it should be.  It may have been a small thing, but I felt like it was a big improvement over the way sex is marketed to “geek” audiences.

It was nice to get some more emotion from Fitz and Simmons, even if it wasn’t much.  I liked their differing reactions to Skye’s betrayal of SHIELD.  It gives us a bit more of a glimpse into their characters to see Fitz struggling to deal with the situation and Simmons being the more understanding one.  I hope as things progress we’ll get to see more of a differentiation between the two.

Excitingly (it’s hard to come up with something new each week to start these paragraphs with the correct letter!), we got our first true super villain this week, with a name and everything.  And while Scorch may not strike fear into the hearts of men, it was still nice to see and was done very well.  The performance by Louis Ozawa Changchien really helped sell the character.  It’s a tough thing to make you care about a character, watch him turn into a villain through really no fault of his own, and watch him be defeated in one episode, all while trying to make the audience feel sorry for him but happy for SHIELD for stopping him.  Interestingly, they suggested that his powers might have come from exposure to radiation from a nuclear power plant, though they were very careful not to call him a “mutant”, as ABC can’t conflict with FOX’s ownership of the X-Men rights and the mutants involved in those stories.

Looking forward to the next episode (in 2 weeks), we’ve got the return of Titus Welliver (the Man in Black from Lost) as Agent Black, who previously appeared in the Marvel One-Shot “Item 47”, about what happens when a couple comes across one of the Chitauri weapons following the events of The Avengers.  We also have some dead bodies floating in the air, and what seems like an entity that is possessing people.  That was a creepy shot of Simmons looking like she had a demon inside her.

Do you think that the man seemingly in the prison is behind Centipede, or just a tool in the organization’s belt?  I think he obviously has some higher up connection than someone that Centipede is using, but given that Raina was giving him orders about the clairvoyant, it doesn’t sound like he’s in charge.  Who do you think the clairvoyant is?  Is Centipede the only thing that this group is working on, or just a single operation within a larger organization?  And who/what are the “tin toys” that Raina mentioned?  Some sort of Extremis-infused machines?

What did you think of “Girl in the Flower Dress”?  Do you think it was a big step forward for the show to delve more into the larger threats that SHIELD is facing?  What’d you think of the reveal that Skye is trying to solve the mystery of her parents?  Was it a relief to get another superpowered individual on the show?  What will you watch next week with no new episode?  (Might I suggest this enlightening interview with producer Jeph Loeb?)  Let me know in the comments!