Wild Pikachu

Wow. Just wow.

First off, loved Cal. Kyle MacLachlan nailed it to the end. And got the send-off he deserved.

Secret Avengers! Not that I know anything about the comics, but I've heard this title come up. Skye/Quake to start with, and I'm betting we'll see more of Lincoln in the future.

I think they wrote this as much as a potential series finale as a season finale, just in case... Probably the very last scene with Simmons was grafted on at the end when it was clear they were going to be renewed. (Not that there was really much doubt about that—with both AoS and AC, their place in the MCU—speaking commercially, not creatively—means their lifespans will mostly be determined by factors other than ratings.)

Ward as the new head of HYDRA! I had a feeling they would go that route—he's not redeemed, and they can keep him around for at least another season or two.

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I think my only nit to pick with the final scene is, if the Kree artifact could bust out of its box and snatch anybody up any time it wanted, why Simmons and why then? Is there something special about her that it sensed?

And BTW, does anybody remember that Quinn and his gravitonium and the guy embedded in the gravitonium are still out there somewhere? Maybe Quinn will end up being the new funding source for Ward and HYDRA.

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Oh, and also BTW, nice impending global crisis there. I actually wonder if we just saw the real laying of the foundation for the Inhumans film: The mist leaks out in liquid form (guess nobody ever broke a crystal underwater), becomes part of the ecosystem and gets ingested by people in very, very diluted quantities, and then eventually (say, sometime around 2019 or so) people all over will have started manifesting Inhuman qualities...

It always amuses me when you say this, because I personally loved Julian McMahon in Charmed. Cole was one of my favorite characters. Unless you're talking about him in Nip/Tuck. I never watched that, so I can't say how he was.

rpmaluki

^^^I think it's Secret Warriors not Secret Avengers.

They seriously need to get rid of Ward. He's literally useless.

Mazza d'Evill

Where do I even start..!? (<- think that one is fitting)

Okay, let's split it up in pieces, and let's start at the back.

- Simmons. Damn. I must say, the box wasn't locked that well if Fitz could just accidentally open it with his pinky. But that's besides the point. First season finale, Fitz confesses his love, they're blown out of a box and Fitz almost dies. Second season finale, Simmons sort of almost confesses some sort of feeling, and she gets suckes into a box. That's some very bad luck. Seriously, what will become of her? What is that thing? We only know it's a threat to Inhumans, and therefore they want it, but what does it do? Will Simmons become an assassin of Inhumans or something, controlled by that thing? Argh, can't wait all summer!

- Ward. Yep, I'm happy he's a badass villain now. Now they can finally give him some room to develop. They didn't really sell me on the whole Ward-Kara-love-thing, and I'm still not sure if it were truly some kind of love, or just Ward with another agenda and a puppy to help. Like he always seems to do. Now we finally have a villain in the third season we've already knows for two seasons, as a guy who seems 'perfect' at the start, a total wildcard in the second season, and a villain in the third. That could give us some awesome dynamics.

- Skye and her worst biological family in the world. Okay, her father isn't even that bad. I love how much room they gave him this episode to truly come to the surface. The storyline with Jiaying was maybe a bit rushed in the last couple of episodes, from caring mother to sociopath that tries to suck the life out of her daughter. But still it was very emotional and well done. Especially when Cal killed Jiaying to save his daughter from having to go through that experience. Loving father of the year.
Will Lincoln stay with SHIELD or something? I like Lincoln, and I'm starting to like the dynamics between him and Skye.
And wow, they put Cal through the TAHITI program. He deserves it. Well, he also kinda killed a lot of people, and maybe I'm a hypocrite for thinking that (drawing lines between Cal and Ward and stuff...), but still. At least Skye deserves to see her father like this. Maybe that's the difference.
And Skye and Coulson's secret mission. Sounds a bit like the welcome wagon in season 1? Arghh, can't wait for season 3.

- Coulson's arm Will we see like an awesome bionic arm or something like that in season 3?
Good call from Mack, I wouldn't have survived if they had killed off Coulson.

I'm probably forgetting loads of stuff, but I'm still jumpy and I realy really really have to work.

Withdrawel. Symptoms. Already. Setting. In.
Must. Watch. Episodes.

Humbugged1814

Yep its Secret Warriors .

That was Daisy's thing in the books .Fury(who Coulson has replaced in the series as her mentor - Daisy recruited Phil by the way) and her set up a team of 2nd generation superpowered people like herself with her in charge .

It was called Project Caterpillars - and the file that Phil handed to her when they were leaning on Lola had Caterpillars written on it




http://marvel.wikia.com/Caterpillars_%28Earth-616%29

Wild Pikachu

Ah, yes, I saw that in some of the reviews. Like I said, I don't know anything about the comics. The producers did say that those things were a nod to the comics, which I guess means that they'll be borrowing from them but not following them faithfully.

DR76

There is already a HYDRA villain in the horizon who is a lot more dangerous. Ward is a waste of time. And if Mutant Enemy wanted Ward to maintain his HYDRA ties that badly, they should have done this earlier in the season and not waste our time with his family hangups and being so inconsistently written.

If Ward is to be next season's "Big Bad", I hope this means they will finally kill him off.



Perhaps I had missed something. What exactly was in that box?



I am a major fan of Julian McMahon. I've been a fan since I saw him in "PROFILER", "CHARMED" and "NIP/TUCK". And to see Brett Dalton doing some second-rate impersonation of him in order to convey "bad ass villainy" is just pathetic to me.

LysCat

Personally, I think Brett has done wonderful with the material he was given. Like someone above stated: We went from seeing him as a good guy (for the most part) in season one to a wild card in season 2. I don't know how I feel about him being THE big bad Hydra guy, but I am very interested to see where he'll take Ward's character as the bad guy. And given his past with the team, I think there's a lot to work with there and I can't wait to see it. I still think he's a psychopath, but I couldn't help but feel for him, being the one who killed Kara, the one person that could have possibly dragged him from the edge.

Last night's episode was much better than I had anticipated it would be. I don't know why I was so concerned with the earlier episodes, I knew I should have trusted Joss to take the show into a great place.

Someone above stated that they thought Jiaying's storyline was rushed, and I didn't find it rushed at all. I think she would have slowly revealed everything to Skye (if things hadn't progressed the way they had)...and I mean about life sucking aspect of her character. The jig was already up when Skye saw her kill Raina, so she had nothing to lose in revealing her true self to Skye.

I'm really happy with the way that things worked out for Cal, and it leaves room for him to return should the writers decide to take things in that route in the future.

Mack is forgiven for his previous bigotry (at least for me). Because if it wasn't for him, the Inhumans would have won.

I think the only thing I'm disappointed with is the Fitzsimmons relationship. A whole year after it was first mentioned, they finally make mention of it and Simmons gets sucked up by...tar? I assume that when she returns (however that happens) she's going to be much different. And then we'll have another year of will they/wont they where Fitzsimmons is concerned.

I'm excited for the Caterpillar program to begin, and I hope that Lincoln returns and will be part of the team. And hey, maybe when Simmons comes back (I'm assuming she'll be inhuman) she can join the team too?

Raonaild

Now that I've calmed down a bit ...

I'm certainly glad that they've set Ward up as the head villain rather than trying to redeem him with the team. And there's something to be said for a Big Bad that has a personal connection with the other characters, rather than a random bad guy like Whitehall or List.

I'm also glad the Kara thing is now resolved. Honestly, I thought that was the least interesting arc of this season, and the bit where she was looking for "closure" with Bobbi felt a bit tacked on.

I really enjoyed Kyle MacLachlan's appearances this year, and I liked the arc of the character and the way it was resolved. But I'm also glad the arc with Skye and her parents is finished now, I think it was taking up too much time on the show and I'd like to see some other characters get more focus.

Oh, and the difference between Cal and Ward going through TAHITI is that, with Cal, they did it to give him a happy ending and write the character out of the series. If they applied TAHITI to Ward, they would probably be doing it to reintegrate him into SHIELD and use it as a clunky way to keep him around.

Coulson did say that he was already looking into options, I'm sure he won't be like this for long. We know the tech already exists in this universe, Deathlok is one example. Maybe Coulson could even get an arm with embedded rockets.

Mack, in general, was awesome in the finale. It was nice to see all the SHIELD folk working together at last, particularly that final stand in the HVAC room.

LysCat

[QUOTEI]'m also glad the Kara thing is now resolved. Honestly, I thought that was the least interesting arc of this season, and the bit where she was looking for "closure" with Bobbi felt a bit tacked on. [/QUOTE]

I didn't like her at all, but I figured it was just because I was/am still trying to resolve my feelings that Skyeward will never happen.

Butterfly85

That's what I'm saying, he is LITERALLY USELESS. I don't get why they keep trying to find ways to keep him around. That was my main negative, why wouldn't Hunter or May try to kill him? I know they had to help Bobbi but still. When May said she was going to kill Ward I was like "I wish but he will get away in another stupid attempt to keep him around next season." I loved Bobbi's fight with Ward and Kara. I wasn't expecting her to attack that hypocrite with the needles. That fight had me so hyped, I was like "get him girl, get him!" I can't remember the last time I talked out loud during an episode of something. She fought well even when she got double teamed. I didn't watch Angel but I did see when Fred changed into some blue person. I do think Simmons will come out looking different. Anyway, the finale was so good. That is how Scandal used to make me feel before it became boring, dull, and predictable, great season and finale.

Raonaild

I don't care at all about SkyeWard or Ward in general, so that wasn't why I didn't care for her. She just didn't have much personality on her own, and I couldn't really feel bad for her given the way she ended up siding with Ward.

The arc with Ward and Kara in the second half seemed like such a side show, not really having anything to do with SHIELD 2.0 or the Inhuman story, you could have written them out completely and it wouldn't have changed much in the way the season played out.

Mazza d'Evill

I read somewhere that Bret Dalton has a contract until at least 2016? Could be why they can't kill him off
But I like the idea of him being a real villain. I've given up on SkyeWard officially now, and I'm really okay with that (they really aren't a good fit anymore, there's not much chemistry left, and I think that's a good thing for now. For me it means Skye has grown a lot). I've already seen there are people really angry with the writers for making him the real bad guy now, but I'm happy most of us here seem to be on the same page.
I agree the Kara-Ward stuff has been the least interesting arc of season 2(b) (but okay, I can forgive the writers for that, given the rest of the awesome season. ). And AGAIN Ward can blame someone else for his own stupid stupid STUPID actions. As a super spy, he totally should've seen it was a trap and it wasn't May, so he has (almost) no one to blame but himself. Stupid stupid stupid.

And indeed, I guess Coulson meant some Deathlock-like stuff when he mentioned he had been looking into some options.

After watching the episode a second time, I really started to notice how Fitz has grown from a student-like boy in the first season into quite a wise and grown man over the course of the second season. Despite, or maybe (partly) because of, his head injury, he has grown the most of all main characters (though Skye follows closely after that!). Gotta love the writing on that part I'm not necessarily a FitzSimmons fan (I mean, for them to get involved romantically), but I felt like I could start to appreciate it this episode. And then.. Simmons gets sucked into a box. Feels very Wedonesque. I love it but I hate it, but I also love it, and I hate it. Argh. Torture.

Karri

Great episode. I'm going to miss Cal. At least they left open the possibility he could return at some point. I'm glad Ward is a full-fledged bad guy now. The ambiguity with his character was getting annoying. For the first time all season, I'm actually interested in his storyline and now he has a reason to exist on the show.

Poor Skye. I think they took it a little far with Jiaying trying to kill her. I didn't think Cal would end up being the sane parent. Skye got to drive Lola. Yay Secret Warriors!

gingerly

That was reeeeeally good.

I do agree that the Ward/Kara stuff has felt a little tacked on this season, but it all set up the torture with Bobbi (/Hunter/May) well in the finale, and those scenes were amongst the best. I totally cheered when Bobbi broke free.

Ward could be a good straight up villain next season, but I still think his days on the show are numbered.

Nice resolution to the Cal/Jiaying arc. It was the ending Cal deserved and probably needed, but there was still a bit of sadness there when it was revealed he went into the Tahiti program.

Mack is awesome, I hope he stays.

RIP Raina and Gordo.

FITZSIMMONS. FITZ. SIMMONS. </3

Time to start reading Secret Warriors!

And finally:

"Science, biatch."

Raonaild

Definitely the best line of the night.

In close second ... "I'm the guy who kills Gordon."

The problem though is that the vendetta against Bobbi kinda came out of nowhere. There were hints that she'd done something unpleasant while with Hydra, but nothing really specific, and it wasn't really fundamental to any storyline this season. The only purpose that part of the finale seemed to serve is that it helped reconcile Hunter and Bobbi, and maybe indirectly May and her ex. I had hoped that whatever Ward and Kara had going on, it would be something a bit more meaningful to the main plots this season.

Oh, and of course it's a long ways away, and I'm just guessing at the date, but I thought I'd start a countdown to S3:

 

Doing the math, that actually means that if we were to do an AoS rewatch where we watched one ep per week, we would only get through about 19 eps until the S3 starts. Not even a full season.