Agents of SHIELD Season 5 Episode 6 Review: Fun and Games

This Agents of SHIELD review contains spoilers.

Agents of SHIELD Season 5 Episode 6

There is a lot to cover this week on Agents of SHIELD as Marvel kicks off 2018 with a bang. This is the year Marvel will present Avengers: Infinity War, Black Panther, and Ant-Man and the Wasp in theaters; it’s the year that a number of Marvel shows return to Netflix, and it’s the year where Cloak and Dagger should be arriving on TV. But Agents of SHIELD stands as the old stalwart of the MCU, and the series gets off to a good start for 2018 this week as we must bid farewell to a few new characters and are introduced to an Inhuman straight out of the comics.

First, let’s talk about the arrival of Fitz to the future. Last week, we saw Fitz frozen in the past and thawed out in the future in order to save his team. This week, Fitz arrives disguised as a marauder and instantly starts ingratiating himself to Kasius and the Kree hoi polloi. Fitz does a great job playing an intergalactic skel and plans to buy Daisy from Kasius in order to save his pals. Fitz finds his beloved Simmons, all enslaved with her gold forehead, and even proposes to her! Now, SHIELD fans have been waiting seasons for Fitz to pop the question, and here we are in a dystopian future with Simmons enslaved by blue skinned aliens. But you know what? It is still romantic. Of course, Simmons is rendered deaf by Kasius, but hey, it is still a moment.

The focal point of the episode is the Inhumans Fight Club hosted by Kasius. It is revealed this week that Kasius is essentially an exile, sent by his father to run this Inhuman gladiator business. Kasius plans to sell Quake, the Destroyer of Worlds, and make his blue skinned papa proud. In Kasius’s space station, Inhumans are currency. He must create new Inhumans to keep the business going, so he exposes a young person to the terrigen mists which leads us to the introduction of Flint, a young, newly created Inhuman who has the power to control rocks. Flint is a great addition to the cast and I really wouldn’t mind to see Flint accompany our agents back home if and when the agents had back to present day Earth.

We also get to see some Inhuman fights this week as Ben, the Inhuman telepath that befriended Daisy a few weeks back, must fight a hobbled Melinda May. I must admit, it is a relief to see May because a few weeks ago, she was defeated by the ball wielding Sinara and hasn’t been seen since. Ben defeats May, and May is only spared by some great acting by the undercover Fitz who convinces Kasius to exile May to what’s left of the Earth. Of course, May and company want to head to Earth to find whoever is sending transitions from the Earth’s ruined surface, so May achieves a backhanded victory of sorts. Ben is not as lucky as Kasius executes the young telepath for hiding the fact that Daisy came to Kasius’s realm with more than just Simmons. Sadly, we never get to fully know the brave young Ben and he isn’t the only character that is dispatched this week.

The kindly Tess is also killed for helping to hide Flint as is the greedy and corpulent Grill, who is killed by Flint as the new Inhuman’s rock powers manifest. Tess and Grill have been some pretty important characters during SHIELD’s space adventure, and the fact that they have been removed from this mortal coil leads one to believe that the agents could be returning home very soon.

May versus Ben is the undercard for the main event, Daisy versus Sinara. I think we’ve all been waiting for Sinara to get her ass kicked, and Daisy certainly brings the fight to, as Daisy puts it, the “blue bitch.” Daisy toys with the ball wielding psychopath in order to give Fitz and Simmons an opportunity to stage an escape. And escape they do. Fitz goes town with his blaster and Simmons goes to work with a butter knife (oh, Simmons) and our agents finally get a break.

Meanwhile, Coulson, Yo Yo, and Mack team with Flint to get the heck out of dodge themselves. It’s kind of a shame that Tess is dispatched so simply. It feels like now that Flint is in the picture, there is no need for Tess. I’m sure there could have been something else to do with Tess as she represented the struggle the everyday person must face in this horrific future. I must say, Tess’ death seems lazy.

This is not to say that Flint isn’t awesome, the sequence of Flint being saved by Yo Yo is one of the highlights of the episode as is her sympathy for the confusion an Inhuman feels when first receiving the terrigen gifts. We are treated to Yo Yo telling the tale of her origin and it really brings to light the horror of first becoming an Inhuman. To be honest, Yo Yo’s story did more to bring the Inhuman drama to life than anything that happened on the Inhumans series (so much walking…so much walking).

And before we go. Remember when I said Fitz proposed to Simmons but she cannot hear him? Yeah, well after the escape, Simmons totes proposes to Fitz and the two kiss and I’m not crying, you’re crying. We all knew that one day we would experience this moment as the series progressed, but who knew that it would be in the future?

In space.

Surrounded by angry Kree.

Oh, how far Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD has come.

Marvel Moments

– Flint first appeared in Inhuman #3 (2014) and was created by Charles Soule and Joe Madureira. Flint is one of the modern day NuHumans that was created when the terrigen mists spread across the world. Flint lives in the modern day in the Marvel comic universe and has been a pretty constant presence in the world of the Inhumans since his creation.

In the comics, Flint has used his powers to surround himself with rocks and form a geo-battle suit. It’s pretty badass but the FX would be expensive if the show tried to pull this off.  Maybe some of that money SHIELD is saving not using Ghost Rider this season can be used for rock armor.

– This episode of Agents of SHIELD is directed by none other than Phil Coulson hisowndamnself Clark Gregg. Yes, that’s right the Director is the director. Boy, does that make my brain happy. Gregg does an awesome job and Marvel TV would do well to let Gregg have a crack at more episodes behind the camera. Hey, those 24 minute Iron Fist boardroom scenes ain’t going to direct themselves. We need a pro up in here. Oh, I’m just kidding, but Clark certainly does a great job with this episode.

– The Kree are chowing down on Xandarian snails. It’s always nice to hear the home world of the Nova Corps name dropped. We totally need some more Nova action in the MCU, but I guess for now, we have to settle for snails.