Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. returns tonight with “The Ghost” written by Jed Whedon and Maurissa Tancharoen and directed by Billy Gierhart, so I thought this is the perfect time to recap the two hour finale from season three and remind us why this is such a great show! In many ways, I find it a lot more satisfying than the current Marvel Avenger movies. And a quick heads up –
S.H.I.E.L.D. is still on ABC on Tuesday nights but it now airs at 10/9c.
Season three ended with a two hour double block that ran seamlessly from one to the other, so let’s just call it the two hour movie that it was. “Absolution” was written by Chris Dingess and Drew Z. Greenberg and directed by Billy Gierhart, and “Ascension” was written by Jed Whedon and directed by Kevin Tancharoen. One of the things that I love about this show is the consistency of the vision – keep using the same writers and directors, especially when they keep turning in such great work!
The two hour finale was almost non-stop, terrific action. There were several terrific fight scenes and the quips and snappy dialogue that we’ve come to expect. There were also some really stand out performances in this episode. Chloe Bennet as Daisy was simply amazing as she goes through withdrawal from Hive’s (Brett Dalton) control. Dalton, who we finally lose at the end of the season, is also terrific, particularly in light of the really different personas we’ve seen from him over the three seasons. I’m not going to lie, I always hoped they’d find a way to bring him back onto the team! The other real stand out for me in the final hour was Luke Mitchell as Lincoln. It was bitter-sweet to finally get to know the character only to lose him too.
“Absolution” begins with Daisy dreaming. She’s trying to save herself and Coulson (Clark Gregg) who are trapped in the module on Maveth. She’s symbolically trying to unravel some computer or electrical cords, but it’s a nice symbol of her trying to unravel the threads of her own actions. She is consumed with guilt over what she’s done to her friends even as she suffers from withdrawal throughout both episodes. When she wakes, she’s in lockdown, and only Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge) is coming to see her to get any information about Hive that Daisy can remember.
Meanwhile, the rest of the team is a little busy doing damage control as they try to stop Hive from dispersing the formula that creates Primitives into the atmosphere via a nuclear warhead. They’ve determined that Hive and his followers have taken over a missile silo in the Pacific. Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) works with Talbot (Adrian Pasdar) to get the DOD code to shut down the silo. De Caestecker and Pasdar are hilarious together! I loved Fitz using green screen to fake General Andaz (Patrick John Hurley). It works, and they convince Under-Secretary Thomas (Dorian Gregory) to give Coulson the codes.
In the Pacific, May (Ming-Na Wen) has piloted the quinjet under water to sneak onto the Island and infiltrate the silo so that they can upload the code and steal the warhead back. She has Mack (Henry Simmons), Luke, and Elena (Natalia Cordova-Buckley) with her. May and Lincoln upload the code – just in time! – while Mack and Elena set a trap for Hive.
Simmons and Cordova-Buckley have great chemistry, and I love the banter between the two of them as she tells him he’s too slow. He tells her that not everyone can have super-speed, and she twits him further with, “it’s about your turtle speed!” Mack is carrying the kill switches for the vests that Luke and Elena are wearing in the off chance that Hive gains control of them. She asks him if he’s prepared to use them. He doesn’t answer, but his silence is an affirmative answer. She tells him, good. She would rather be dead that be someone’s slave. Mack tries to give her back her cross, and she’s pissed! She tells him that it’s not a lucky rabbit’s foot, it’s a symbol of faith. She wants to know who would return such a gift! Yet all of them return that gift of self-sacrifice and faith in one another as the finale unfolds. I also really enjoyed them passing the cross around like a hot potato as the episode unfolded because we all knew that whoever had the cross at the end was going to die on the quinjet in space.
May and Lincoln share a nice moment when it’s clear that everything Daisy’s told them has been the truth. Lincoln tells May that at least Andrew’s death hadn’t been in vain. May wonders if he’s trying to make her feel better or himself feel better about Daisy. The two split up so that May can secure the warhead and Lincoln can lead Hive into the trap.
Hive is enraged and goes after the team. Lincoln leads him into the trap, and I loved Elena finishing Mack’s work at super-speed when he’s too slow. Lincoln uses his power to zap Hive and their device scrambles his brain with memories – it doesn’t kill him, but it does, according to Mack, “suck.” Elena calls Mack “turtle-man” and remarks that it’s a good thing he’s handsome! They rescue the hostages. Hive meanwhile is wandering about mumbling about things like fighting the weakness within you, that has James (Axle Whitehead) and Giyera (Mark Dacascos) worried.
May and Radcliffe (John Hannah) both end up at the warhead. Hannah is great in this as he plays the slimey character you love to hate. He’s very impressed when May takes out three Primitives in an awesome fight sequence. Radcliffe wants May to take him with her.
Everyone runs out of the silo, followed by Hive and the team encases him in a gel-matrix chamber. There is an interesting intersection as Daisy tells Simmons that Hive considers himself to be the savior. He truly believes that he is saving them, and this underscores the theme of faith. Absolution is an integral part of the Sacrament of Penance. The penitent makes a confession of all mortal sins to a priest and then prays for forgiveness. Hive took his follower’s confession, in a sense, when he took their memories and accepted them. But Daisy seeks absolution throughout the finale for her “sins” and ends the season by doing penance.
Coulson tries to tell Daisy that no one blames her, but she blames herself. Coulson tried to explain that Daisy was brainwashed – and finally, someone points out that that’s what happened to Ward too. Coulson tells her that Hive didn’t just get into her head, he altered it, like a drug, and she’s going through withdrawal. He cautions her not to seek vengeance because that won’t make her better, it will break her further.
Mack also tries to get through to Daisy. I loved the scene between the two of them. Mack just goes right in to her – none of this staying in the module for him! Daisy is consumed with guilt for what she did to Mack, but he tells her that he forgives her and folds her into a huge hug. She finally breaks down and sobs in his arms. She remarks that Mack is a man of faith, and asks what it was like coming face to face with the devil. Mack says that Hive isn’t the Devil. The devil fills someone with so much anger and dark that t consumes them. Just like Coulson, Mack warns Daisy not to let the darkness fester and grow, but to let the light in to vanquish the dark.
Talbot somewhat grudgingly congratulates Coulson on capturing Hive. I loved Radcliffe trying to ingratiate himself! Coulson tells Lincoln that he has a place at S.H.I.E.L.D. and offers to make him an agent. But Lincoln doesn’t want it now. Lincoln is still smarting after Daisy’s seeming betrayal and remarks that he doesn’t “have anything Daisy wants.”
There’s a cute scene between Simmons and Fitz when he catches her booking a romantic trip for the two of them. He insists it’s not a good time for a trip. She tells him that she’s going to do something with him on the Island that will take his breath away. Fitz is adorably flustered, and Simmons tells him, “Snorkeling!” Fitz then picks up the cross which has fallen out of Mack’s pocket.
Coulson locks down the base, but it’s too late. Hive has already put his plan in motion. Fitz goes to check that the gel-matrix is working properly and while he is on the loading bay, he makes two discoveries. The doors to the hanger are still broken and open and there is a shipment from ABSOLUTION, Montana in the loading bay! While Fitz is there, James and Giyera arrive in the Zephyr and explode the shipment which spews the formula, turning some of the workers into Primitives. Fitz manages to get out of the loading bay only with Simmons’ help. She uses a formula only she and Fitz would know and in classic S.H.I.E.L.D. style, when Coulson asks for more information, she simply tells him, it’s complicated! Unfortunately, the Primitives do manage to release Hive.
Daisy tells Mack that she told Hive everything – including that the Zephyr has high altitude capabilities and suddenly, Hive has his delivery system for the formula – and the warhead is at the base too. Mack joins the rest of the team, and Daisy escapes to Hive. It’s heartbreaking as she begs him to take her back. He doesn’t remember her at first – his mind is still scrambled. Bennet is just outstanding in this scene – which has now become “Ascension.” Hive can’t take her back, however, because Lash has made her impervious to him. In her frustration, she quakes him, and the two fight. This is one of the best fight scenes of the series. In the end, she manages to stab him multiple times and break his bones – only to have him heal himself. Hive takes her prisoner in the module and leaves on the Zephyr.
The rest of the team has to deal with the Primitives running around the base. Elena takes the bullets meant for Mack, and in a harrowing scene they have to use a blow torch to cauterize her wounds when she, Mack, Coulson, Lincoln, and Radcliffe are all trapped in a storage room. When it’s the only way to save her, she insists that Mack do it.
Simmons is alone and hiding by the furnace, which is old school and doesn’t run on the electricity that’s been shut off. They don’t see her because their sight has been compromised in their transformation. They use infrared to see. Simmons figures out that she can blind them by turning up the heat!
The team manages to get to Coulson’s office and use the quinjet to escape. May and Fitz are already hiding on the Zephyr, and Coulson tells the others that he’s going to join them – alone – to stop Hive. Coulson is also looking for absolution for what he did to Ward. It’s his vengeance that really set everything in motion.
May and Fitz have found Daisy in the module, but she won’t come out to help them. She’s wallowing in self-pity. She couldn’t defeat Ward even with her powers. But May insists it’s not her powers that made her an Agent – May made her an Agent. Daisy insists that May doesn’t know what she did. May wants to know why Andrew saved her then. She tells Daisy, yeah, you did a lot of bad things. All you can do now is balance the scales and do some good. “If you want to stay in that box, the hurt stays with you. Believe me.” May would certainly know about locking herself away with her guilt. Just as May is about to tell Daisy that she cares about her, Giyera shows up and knocks her out. Fitz has an invisible gun, however, and manages to kill him!!!
May is ok, but doesn’t have a plan. They feel the quinjet land – and so does Hive. Daisy finds the cross in Fitz’s jacket. She tells the other two that she knows exactly what happens next – it’s all the elements of her death vision coming together.
Hive and Coulson face off, and Dalton and Gregg are terrific in this scene. I liked that at least Bennet and Gregg had nice final scenes with Dalton. Coulson tells Hive that he’s prepared to die because he crossed a line that he had vowed never to cross, and it had devastating consequences: “I hunted you down and killed you unleashing this Ward-reboot-nightmare-Hellbeast on the planet.” Hive tells Coulson that Coulson’s mistake was in opposing the Inhumans, and Coulson clarifies that he set out to protect Inhumans. Hive knows that Coulson is hiding something, and Coulson admits, “Yeah. A couple of stowaways, and I’m here to offer a helping hand. Pun absolutely intended.” And he holds up his super-hand. There were a couple of shout outs to that hand that are important. Radcliff very much admires “the young Scot’s” work on it, and we see that Fitz has added some modifications according to Radcliff’s research in adding the controls that call the quinjet to Coulson’s office.
Hive tells Coulson that he’s given him everything he needs. He plans on ditching Ward’s body and taking Coulson’s – what better way to win over the S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents? He tells Coulson that they are two sides to the same coin – both commanders needing soldiers. But Coulson objects – when Hive gives an order, his soldiers have no choice but to comply, while when Coulson gives an order, they ignore it – so everyone is now on the Zephyr! Coulson tells Hive that he’s “just a distraction” – in fact, he’s a hologram! I loved that they brought this back from the earlier episode with Blake. Coulson goes on to say that while he might be willing to die, he certainly doesn’t want to, and he knew that a villain like Hive would want to monologue! Actually he just says that Hive would want to talk because he’d been alone for so long, but we all know it’s just a nice explanation for villain monologuing! And then we have possibly the best part of this scene – when Coulson leans over, saying, “I’ve always wanted to do this – ‘Help me Obiwan, you’re my only hope…’” – Quoting
Star Wars for the win!!!!
James and Lincoln fight, and Lincoln and Daisy meet eyes for long enough to distract Lincoln and end up with him being seriously injured. Daisy and Lincoln are finally reunited and talk. She apologizes and tells him that she never meant to hurt him. He tells her it wasn’t her – she wasn’t in control. She’s hurt that he never came to see her, and thinks it’s because he was mad at her. She forgets that he was an addict too. If anyone can understand what she’s going through it’s him. He knows that she needed time to put herself back together. Meanwhile, Fitz and Simmons who were trying to help make him comfortable, discreetly back away to give the two privacy.
Lincoln tells her that they need time to work on themselves before they can work on “us.” Daisy tells him that she doesn’t think she can live with the guilt. I loved how the camera went back and forth between Daisy and Coulson as we hear the plan to load the warhead onto the quinjet and fire it into space so the formula will disperse harmlessly. Daisy knows Coulson’s plan because it’s the future that she’s seen. She tells him that she’s accepting fate. Luke Mitchell is just fantastic in this scene as he begs her not to sacrifice herself in a misguided effort to atone for her sins.
Meanwhile, Coulson points out that the team has to decide who goes and who stays to hold off “a wave of Primates and Hive the Terrible.” Mack is eager to be in on the fight because he’s finally built his ax-gun!!! Daisy takes the opportunity to slip away and move the warhead onto the quinjet. The rest of the team fight the Primitives. Hive joins Daisy on the quinjet, but Lincoln has beaten them both there and zaps Daisy off the quinjet before taking off with Ward and the warhead. Lincoln has also fried all the controls so there is no going back. Hive doesn’t assimilate him because they will feel a profound connection when they die together.
Coulson and the team arrive to witness Daisy’s last conversation with Lincoln. She tell hinm that it should have been her to fix the damage to her friends and to him. He tells her that he stole her crucifix and her destiny. He tells her, “Saving the girl that I love and the world at the same time? Feels pretty right to me.” Daisy isn’t ready to say good bye because she has too much to say, but Lincoln tells her they already have – that was the first – and now only time – that he told her that he loved her.
This sequence was really nicely done. As the quinjet enters space there’s a jolt and then silence. The quinjet tumbles through space. Daisy begs the tean to turn it around, but Coulson points out that the remote access is offline and Fitz adds that it can’t be maneuvered in space. Coulson also adds that Lincoln wouldn’t want them to. Daisy insists that Lincoln is paying for her mistakes, but it’s clear that Coulson also carries his own share of guilt as he corrects her and says that Lincoln is paying or all their mistakes. The scene ends as we finally get the context to that shot we’ve been seeing for so long.
The action jumps six months into the future. Daisy is now known as Quake and is all over the newspapers – is she a hero or a rogue? She’s been literally breaking into banks, but very much in a Robin Hood way – giving restitution to people – like Polly Hinton (Lola Glaudini) and her daughter. Daisy finally delivers the robin. Daisy has completely changed her look again – a bit retro-goth actually. Coulson and Mack have Hinton under surveillance. The two are working together to try to bring Daisy in safely. Coulson is now answering to a new Director – spoilers for the new season tell us that because Coulson is supposed to be dead and S.H.I.E.L.D. has been relegitamized, they needed a new public face. Is it possible he’s also trying to atone? Daisy manages to escape the authorities – apparently she’s been working on her powers.
The final, after credit scene returns us to Radcliff. He keeps mentioning Fitz as if Fitz now works for – or at least with him – WHAT?!?!? Radcliff is celebrating. His name has been cleared but he’s actually celebrating the birthday of AIDA (Amanda Rea), who appears to be an Artificial Intelligence robot that he’s created – and when does that every turn out well?!
We’ve been promised lots of big changes to the team this season. I can’t wait! This is one of the few shows that I trust to be able to shake things up without losing the core of why we love it. I’m betting we will still get some of the best and coolest fights on television along with ridiculously good special effects, intriguing stories, and great dialogue – bring it!
Don’t forget to tune in tonight for the season premiere at Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’s new time – 10/9c!
About the Author - Lisa Macklem
I do interviews and write articles for the site in addition to reviewing a number of shows, including Supernatural, Arrow, Agents of Shield, Agent Carter, The Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, The X-Files, Defiance, Bitten, Killjoys, and a few others! I'm active on the Con scene when I have the time. When I'm not writing about television shows, I'm often writing about entertainment and media law in my capacity as a legal scholar. I also work in theatre when the opportunity arises. I'm an avid runner and rider, currently training in dressage.
