Bad guys with superpowers turned out to be the least of Team Coulson — and our — concerns on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 2, episode 13.
Love hurts
Karla Faye Gideon is your average lady with razorblades grafted to her fingernails, until Skye’s dad Cal comes to recruit her to take down S.H.I.E.L.D. Then she becomes a super villain!
Back at S.H.I.E.L.D., Skye has been put on the Gifted Individuals Index. She accepts this, but thinks that if she controls her heart rate, she can get back to work soon.
Oy.
Simmons is still angry at Fitz for compromising scientific truth to lie to her, and doesn’t think their relationship will recover. Bobbi, meanwhile, arranges an extraction for Mack and Hunter – the latter of whom is handcuffed to the sink in a mysterious safe house, and the former of whom is just really annoyed at life.
May visits her ex-husband, Dr. Andrew Garner, who used to do psychiatric consultations for S.H.I.E.L.D. He agrees to analyze Skye, with conditions that prioritize her wellbeing and privacy.
“Like I said, it’s a different S.H.I.E.L.D.,” May says with no idea how literally right she is and agrees to the terms.
Fight on
Skye does not want to speak to a psychiatrist, but warms up to Garner slightly when he offers her details about Agent May. Skye admits that she shot herself with the ICER because she couldn’t control the tremors.
Cal and the Scream Team break into a psychiatric facility which secretly houses mentally unstable Index people for S.H.I.E.L.D. Coulson and Bobbi fly out to investigate; Coulson has noticed that Hunter is missing, but Bobbi says he must have been scared off by the offer of a permanent position.
Bobbi, seriously, you’re killing us right now.
At the mental institution, Coulson and Bobbi find one prisoner missing: David Angar, a man who — following an experimental cancer treatment — can induce catatonia with his voice. Angar, it so happens, is riding away in the Scream Team’s RV, still wearing his safety muzzle.
But Cal left a message for Coulson in his cell — the words “Fight on!” painted on the wall.
Volatile
When Fitz runs away from the bizarre sight of May being human with Garner, he and Simmons forget to hate each other for a second. The bonding is interrupted when Skye’s monitors go off and the Bus begins shaking – Skye has set off an earthquake in her sleep.
Meanwhile, Cal tells the Scream Team his tale of woe over breakfast. His little girl was stolen by Evil S.H.I.E.L.D., he couldn’t protect the people he loved, so he turned to chemistry to enhance himself. “The results were inconsistent,” he says. “Some volatility issues.”
But Cal insists that they expose S.H.I.E.L.D. for the criminals they really are and brings the Scream Team to a high school in Wisconsin. Coulson and Bobbi, after some heart-to-lies, follow… to Coulson’s home town.
“You need backup,” May says, when Coulson reports in.
“I need backup,” he agrees.
Crosshairs
Garner tells Skye that she needs to face and accept the pain of her fluctuating situation. Skye admits that she dreamt of aiming a rifle – and then finding herself at the other end.
It’s an admittedly unsophisticated metaphor, but Skye’s predicament and fear are un-enviable.
“I know S.H.I.E.L.D.’s policy for people on the Index,” she tells Garner. “I’ve executed that policy.”
The room begins to shake, but it isn’t Skye — it’s May, taking off to be Coulson’s backup. Garner is way pissed, but he and May unite when Skye says she wants to help Coulson. She says she won’t lose control, but is locking out her feelings as they speak.
“You put me on the Index,” Skye says. “How about we let my dad know?”
Call of the wild
The Scream Team removes Angar’s muzzle and Cal unleashes him on a high school football field in Coulson’s home town. Angar screams his heart out, mouth swelling like some primoridial beast; when he’s done, the field is littered with students, and birds fall like stones from the sky.
Cal lures Coulson out to the field, broadcasting out to the town from the announcers booth. (The students are… dead, apparently?) He continues to pretend he has the high ground, and says he wants the world to know how S.H.I.E.L.D. treats exceptional humans — and make sure they don’t do it to Skye.
The standoff gets more complicated when May leads Skye out at gunpoint. Cal gets really weird again and hands Angar the mic to scream out the entire town… but Gordon arrives out of nowhere and sweeps Cal away in a nexus of blue light that leaves everyone confused as hell for about five seconds.
Then the gloves come off. May sends Skye running with Garner while Coulson tackles Angar; May starts to battle Francis, the strongman. Bobbi fights Karla Faye, and eventually subdues her. Coulson brutally attacks Levi, and the ground starts to shake as Skye watches.
Skye focuses herself, and the trembling stops… but her hands erupt in bruises, and she passes out.
Breaking yourself
Skye wakes up on the Bus, bruised fingers peeking out through tight gloves. Simmons explains that Skye has hairline fractures throughout her body, and burst capillaries in her hands.
“You weren’t stopping your powers, Skye,” Garner says. “You were directing them inward.”
Garner recommends that Skye leave S.H.I.E.L.D. completely. May isn’t a fan of the idea, but he says that “After Bahrain, you of all people should know how badly this can end.”
Garner leaves, declining to consult for S.H.I.E.L.D. Nothing, he says, has changed at all.
Later, Simmons explains to Coulson that there are really two categories of people who qualify for the Index. “Enhanced,” as she calls people whose powers are man-made, and “Gifted” – people whose abilities are inborn.
Coulson tells Simmons they need to do further study — and learn how to stop them. He also gives her a gag order, which is just wonderful because really, Simmons wasn’t isolated enough.
Namesake
Mack and Hunter are extracted, and Mack gives Hunter the truth — he and Bobbi work for “an outlier that crawled out of the wreckage of what Fury left.”
And who the hell is that, exactly?
“S.H.I.E.L.D.,” Mack says. “The real S.H.I.E.L.D.”
Ha ha, Mack, you’re hilarious. Good joke. Why aren’t you laughing. Mack? You’re not serious… oh hell. Oh hell, he is totally serious.
Also serious is Gordon, who is appreciably pissed off at a tantruming Cal, and sends him off to talk to someone who will decide his fate.
We hope it hurts.