Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Season 2, Episodes 21-22: S.O.S. Parts One and Two
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. really committed to this finale with their awesome two part episode that picked up in the exact spot where last week left off. The first thing that happens is the wonderful treat of May versus Skye. May, of course, whips her a** in hand to hand combat, so Skye resorts to beating her with powers. Kind of cheating, but when lives are allegedly on the line, that’s kind of necessary.
There’s so much that happened in this two hour finale! I’m going to have to do my best to keep it brief. EVERYONE had an arc. May reconciled with Andrew and even took some leave time. Bobbi took a bullet for Hunter and things look like they’re on the rise for that couple. Fitz and Simmons are finally going to give each other a shot, even though Simmons was sucked in by that weird solid-liquid rock thing that hasn’t been explained at all. Mack decided to stay and is now willing to follow Coulson and Ward… Ward is definitely going to be a serious threat moving forward. Apparently, he’s now the leader of Hydra and he hates S.H.I.E.L.D. and likely May and Coulson in particular more than ever for tricking him into killing Kara.
So the big plot involves Jiaying and her destructive lies. Skye was torn between her parents and her chosen family the whole time and had to see some hard truths before she made up her mind. I expected to see certain characters die here (especially Gordon), but I certainly didn’t expect Raina to sacrifice herself for her former enemy. No one believed her, but it turns out that everything she spoke since entering Afterlife was true. She died to protect her people. Which is fair because they were torturing me by not letting me see Ruth Negga’s gorgeous face anymore, plus she has another project that I hope gets a few seasons coming up. *cough cough* PREACHER! *cough cough*
We saw Cal go into full on Mr. Hyde mode after overdosing on his concoction, but we also learned that he did everything he did because Jiaying manipulated him through love. Whoever expected her to be a life-force vampire can raise your hand right now…. I’ll wait… Good, so no one! His killer her made the most sense, especially the way he did it, so his daughter didn’t have to live with that guilt. Fortunately neither will he, since the T.A.H.I.T.I. program wiped him so clean that he doesn’t recognize the daughter he dedicated his life to anymore. He actually got the happiest ever after out of anyone.
It was awesome to see all of those powers flying around on the small screen. It was definitely a finale of a much larger magnitude than last season and I’m glad I stuck with it. Having so many episodes per season brings the dangers of filler and plot coasting, but things counted when they mattered this season in a big way. It’s also interesting to see that Marvel is really dedicated to the whole everyone loses a hand Empire Strikes Back homage thing. Coulson of all people! That’s just another one of those beautiful situations that will bring long term consequences to the show. Who knows, we might even see Coulson get a new hand from Tony Stark next season.
Jonathan Thomas Jones is a speculative fiction author and founder of geekhavenreviews.com. He has been passionate about all things geek for his entire life. See more about him at jonathanthomasjones.com and follow him on twitter @jtgloryjones.
