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Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: The End

"Here's to us. Who is like us? Damn few."

Season five began in the future, on a destroyed Earth and with the team learning they were at the epicenter of its destruction. The second half of the season saw the team back to their time, trying to keep the end of the world from happening. But the more they tried, the more they got closer to it. And it all came to a head in this outstanding season finale.

This was the conclusion of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s time travel story, and the writers made great use of the character's (and our) knowledge of the future to create tension. When Mack goes to rescue Polly, Fitz realizes that neither of them makes it, and we are off to watch what were probably Mack's and Polly's final moments in the previous iteration of the loop. Will they die this time too? When Daisy leaves the quinjet to fight Graviton, it's "the last time anyone saw Daisy Johnson alive," a scene that goes back to the eighth episode of the season. Only now we know its context: Daisy is not about to destroy the world (of course she isn't), she is off to try to save it. Last time, she didn't, she died trying and the world collapsed right after her defeat.

This is it. These are the final minutes before the Earth goes boom or is saved. It's an entire season of storytelling seamlessly converging into one defining moment, and it's pretty impressive.

A reminder of where the season started.
Before the episode gets there, there are a lot of shifts and turns within the team. Yo-Yo is simply excellent, demonstrating a strength of character and ethical resolve that make me love her like never before. In fact, this is the best writing for Yo-Yo since her introduction on the show. Her arc in this episode is beautiful. She takes a stand for the world and she has a personal reason to do so – if the world is destroyed, her future is, by far, the most terrifying of all – but this is saving the world we are talking about, why didn't Yo-Yo get more support from her peers?

After she has already been cowardly defeated by May, Yo-Yo shares a scene with Coulson that is pivotal to understanding her mindset: it's not that she wants him to die, she wants to make sure the world lives on. This is a key moment not only for Yo-Yo, but for Coulson as well. He has resisted the idea of artificially prolonging his life for quite a while now, and Yo-Yo's stand in all of this is the closest he gets to having someone agree with him. Yo-Yo lost the debate against the group, but she won it in Coulson's eyes. They bond at an intellectual and emotional level, which beautifully sets up Yo-Yo desperate attempt to resurrect him later. It's so poetic, for crying out loud, I love it. She gets it done, she brings her boss back to life and her journey this season is complete. She didn't have it her way, but her resolve was enough to make a difference.

Daisy and May are, unsurprisingly, all about saving Coulson. Daisy has valid points against the idea of injecting Talbot with odium, but she is clearly being driven by her desire to keep Coulson alive. May, however, barely offers a counterpoint and takes matters into her own hands by wasting the odium. It's such a coward move, the exact same thing that Mack was talking Yo-Yo out of doing. It's disrespectful to the idea that Mack was trying to get across ("We vote") and to the whole team. A few episodes ago I defended May and you guys argued that she too was letting her emotions control her. You were right, but I still didn't think May would go this far. It's May we are talking about and she has seen the Earth in pieces. Even if she was flying with Robin's narrative that Coulson was the key to solving everything, she still chose to ignore another prophecy of Robin's: that he was going to die. Curiously, like Yo-Yo, she didn't have it her way, but her actions inadvertently contributed to saving the world.

May's solo decision-making wasn't her best moment, and that raised a red flag for Daisy. Maybe they were letting their emotions get the best of them, she wondered. A conversation with Deke shed even more light into that matter: as a leader, she was too concerned about fixing Coulson, but not concerned enough about fixing the group's unit. So Daisy decides that she isn't ready to lead yet, and passes the torch to Mack. It's a great moment for her, as she realizes that she can still lead the charge but it's better to have someone else calling the shots. Like Yo-Yo, Daisy has a terrific arc in this finale, rising as the Earth's champion and protector. Her conversation with Coulson in the quinjet is among my favorites scenes of the episode. There she is, in total disbelief that he didn't take his cure, that he's still dying and that she will have to face Talbot alone. Coulson is amazing, giving her his final words as a mentor and preparing her for battle. And off she goes.

I'm on the fence about Mack becoming a leader, though. I can see now that the season was building up to it – Mack successfully led the revolution against Kasius, and he was the one left in charge when Daisy and Coulson were absent – and Mack has what it takes to lead, but I'm afraid he is too narrow-minded to take over S.H.I.E.L.D. I mean, humans have precious souls and therefore shouldn't be killed, but aliens are expendable? If the writers intend to keep Mack as the Director, they really need to expand his worldview. In any case, Mack also gets to shine when he uses his "we save lives" rhetoric to do just that: rescue civilians and keep them safe aboard the Zephyr. It's in line with the MCU's commendable tradition of not treating civilians as disposable and having the heroes spend some time saving them.


All the character work in the first half of the episode lays the ground for a tense climax, which is split into three fronts: Daisy vs Talbot; Mack and Polly in danger; and Yo-Yo trying to reanimate Coulson. The script, the editing, Jed Whedon's directing and Bear McCreary's score are the key elements that make this part of the episode work so well. I especially liked how Coulson's and Daisy's fronts of the story intersected when Simmons rushed to find the centipede serum and it wasn't there. It's the "aha" moment of the story, when we finally understand how Philip J. Coulson puts all the pieces together and everything shifts as Robin utters the words: "Something is different." This is a hint to the audience that the damned loop is about to be broken.

This is good writing, y'all, this is good writing.

The use of slo-mo is inspired. Daisy is losing the battle, Coulson is unresponsive, Fitz is under a pile of debris. All seems lost. Yo-Yo performs a speedster CPR on Coulson, while chanting in her native language, "Forgive me, my God, for all that I have done," a chant that carries over the entire montage. Then Daisy sees the centipede serum. Not only did Coulson not take it, he left it for her. It's the decision that changes everything, that gives her the edge and leads her to victory.

The Protector of Worlds rises.
I will say that Daisy's victory was a bit abrupt, though. Not that the fight didn't last long enough – by TV standards, it was pretty epic – but the final blow lacked oomph. I only realized that Talbot had been defeated when they showed him floating in freaking space. There was something missing, you know, something that translated as "Daisy is about to send Talbot's ass out of Earth." But this was a minor flaw in what was otherwise a great showdown.

So, Daisy wins, Coulson breathes again and everybody can celebrate, right? No. One of the team members is injured and he won't make it. Not in this timeline.

When May and Fitz went into the Remorath's ship to save Mack and Polly, they contributed in a small way to changing the future they were trying to prevent. And Fitz paid with his life for it. It was a casual death, but filled with meaning. Fitz became a broken man when he was inserted into the Framework against his will. There he killed Director Mace by having a building collapse on top of him. It's also under debris that Fitz succumbs to his death, having at his side his good friend Mack, who just a couple of episodes ago said he needed fixing. Fitz won't have the time to fix himself anymore, but he dies doing the right thing, trying to be a good man. Iain De Caestecker was brilliant during Fitz's final seconds, but it was Henry Simmons' portrayal of Mack's despair that completely destroyed me and left me sobbing. Terrific acting all around.

This screenshot is an appreciation of Iain's great acting.
Now look how big Henry Simmons' hand is.
Simmons' wordless reaction is also touching and her grief carries the episode into its final act. The team gathers and Coulson delivers a speech about the journey they have had together, about the ones they have lost. Coulson defends that they have to move on, but Simmons disagrees and she has a point. We can't move on. The missing person becomes a part of us, that hole is always there, it never goes away. There is no moving on. Both Clark Gregg and Elizabeth Henstridge shine here.

The scene gets even more powerful when it's revealed that they are not saying goodbye to Fitz, but to Coulson. Because, you know, there is a Fitz sleeping in a cryo-chamber out there in space, and Coulson is still dying. And so, Coulson raises his glass in celebration of his team, and one by one they say goodbye to him. I cried every single time I watched that scene. Gregg said in an interview that the actors couldn't rehearse it, so they asked the director to start shooting and they would try to deliver their lines. The level of emotion is palpable and that scene would have been a perfect way to end the series.

But it wasn't the end. Coulson gets to spend his final days in Tahiti with May, and the rest of the team is on its way to find cryo-Fitz. It's a bittersweet and strong ending to a season that was a true roller-coaster.

Here's to Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. What comic book shows are like it? Damn few.

What about the tie-in with Infinity Way?

It didn't happen, let's move on. I don't care if the final scenes of the episode are set a few minutes before that Infinity War event, or a couple of days after it. The episode was perfect as it was.

What about that sixth season?

I'll be honest, after watching this episode, I started to wonder why Agents was renewed. The show is great and the writers are on top of their game, but renewal decisions aren't based on those things. The ratings weren't good enough to justify a renewal, there was no pivotal tie-in with the movies and, if someone thought that the show was renewed so Marvel TV could connect itself to the movie side and explore the falling out of Infinity War, that is probably not going to be the case.

Coulson's arc is finished and he was practically written out of the series. Moving the show forward without him is risky (how many shows were successful after the leading actor left?), but bringing him back could undo the emotional conclusion of this season finale. Of course, Tony Stark has been retired for a couple of movies now and he is still very much active, so something similar could happen with Coulson. Nick Fury, uh, Maria Hill, or, uh, someone could show up and give him a cure, and he'd spend season six depressed about being alive. They could even have a musical. I mean. And when they can't sing, they can lip sync. I mean.

Or the writers will prove capable of delivering a good season without Coulson. I still bet they will bring him back. Whatever happens, I'm curious to see just what they pitched for Disney that convinced the Mouse to give the show another season.

And what will it be about? When the renewal was announced, they released a video that had dust, as in cosmic dust. Will next season involve actual space adventures?

Anyway, here are my wishes for season six:

- Coulson. No explanation needed.

- Hunter and Bobbi back. I know Adrianne Palicki is busy on another show on another network, but surely she could guest star in one episode, right? And bringing Hunter back would be great for Fitz, since Hunter was the last friend he saw before going into hibernation.

- You know what they say: lights, camera, action. Well, where were the lights? More lightning, please. This season was too dark, and I'm not talking about the tone.

- Not setting half of the scenes in corridors would help, too. :) I know the show is working with a smaller budget, but it can be done.

- Exploring Daisy's powers in more creative ways. She can control vibration and generate earthquakes, but mostly all she does is push things away.

Time travel shenanigans

Since Agents didn't really establish what time travel theory they were working with, I had a bit of trouble understanding it all. After giving it some thought, I came up with a comprehensive (I hope) guide. I still get confused when I think of the specifics, so my advice is not to think too much about it.
1. 2017. Diner scene. The team (minus Fitz) is sent to the future.
2. 2018. Fitz goes into cryo-sleep.
3. Team (with Fitz) plus Deke arrive from 2091. That causes Fitz to get "duplicated": one returned with the team, while his younger self is in cryo-sleep.
4. Battle of Chicago.
5. Daisy, Mack and Polly die. Talbot quakes the world apart.
6. Coulson dies at some point between 5 and 7.
7. 2022. Robin predicts Simmons' death. Yo-Yo is captured by Kasius.
8. Over the years/decades, the entire team dies, minus Yo-Yo, who is killed and resurrected by the Kree endlessly.
9. Deke is born.
10. 2091. Team (minus Fitz) arrive from 2017.
11. Fitz is awaken from his cryo-sleep.
12. Yo-Yo meets her future self, who warns about the choice of saving Coulson.
13. Team (with Fitz) plus Deke go back to 2018.

And we go back to...

3. Team (with Fitz) plus Deke arrive from 2091.
4. Battle of Chicago.
5A. Daisy kills Talbot. Earth is not quaked apart. Fitz dies.
6A. Coulson dies (to be confirmed by season six).
7A. Cryo-Fitz is awaken by the team (to happen in season six).

I should add that this is only a "loop" from the team's perspective. From everyone else's, it's more like a tree with branches (hi, Continuum). So, no matter what branch happens, there is one Fitz in cryo-sleep until 2091.

A simpler take on time travel is Harry Potter's, and I'm going to use it as an example to discuss duplicates. Hermione always duplicated herself when she traveled back in time. She only traveled to a couple of hours back, so if she traveled from, say, 10 PM to 8 PM, when she reached 10 PM again, naturally her duplicate would "vanish." That was a "point of convergence." Even though time travel in Agents is a bit more complicated, the rule of duplicates is the same. The point of convergence for Fitz was 2091, but since the future changed, that point was lost.

The only reason why the team wasn't duplicated too is because they traveled from 2017 to 2091, and when they returned, it was to 2018.

Now go watch Continuum, it's a great show (it starts slow, but if you are here, you are okay with shows that start slow) and it presents time travel in a mostly comprehensive (and cool) way.

Intel and Assets

- I didn't say much about Talbot in the main part of the review, so here it is: he was a decent foe, but nothing special. Definitely no Aida or Ward. This season wasn't about stopping one specific villain, though. In a way, we can say that the big bad was the future they were trying to avert.

- Deke was pretty cool here, and the writers left his fate hanging. Did he stop existing or did he just leave for an extended vacation? Deke vanishing out of existence makes no sense, it would create one billion time travel contradictions, so I'm a firm believer that he is just having a nice time around the globe, drinking Zima and lemon juice. Also, isn't it interesting that Deke left right before the big battle? He knew that the world was about to be destroyed again, and he chose to leave the Lighthouse anyway. I guess he preferred to die rather than live confined to the Lighthouse under Kree domination.

- When the slo-mo sequence started, Yo-Yo continued to appear at regular speed. That was a nice touch, it was the exact moment she started using her speedster power to try and resurrect Coulson. Talk about an effective CPR.

- Polly survived and had a happy ending with her kid. This warms my heart, that woman deserved a happy ending after all she'd been through.

- Still in the Zephyr, Fitz said he wanted to test the buildings' structure. The Whedons are evil.

- Guys, finding Cryo-Fitz also means Enoch will be back! Forget a tie-in with the movies, Enoch is all that matters.

- All the elements, plot points and characters from previous seasons that this season brought back as part of its main arc: centipede serum, gravitonium, Dr. Hall, Ian Quinn, Raina, Jasper Sitwell, Talbot, Creel / Absorbing Man, Whitehall, the Von Strucker family, Jiaying's healing powers, Robin and Polly, The Superior, robots, the Framework and Doctor Fitz. It's truly impressive how the writers managed to insert all of that into one big story and make it work.

- Not to mention bringing all versions of Hydra together in episode 15.

- There were also the special returns of Hunter and Deathlok, and the apparitions from the Fear Dimension: Hive, Lash and Dead Astronaut.

- And no Grant Ward!

- The past few episodes quietly showed how the Lighthouse became humanity's safe haven after the Earth cracked: "Option Two" established that the Lighthouse had food and water for decades, and the finale showed the team taking several civilians into the Zephyr – those were the survivors May was flying to the Lighthouse in "The Last Day." Another impressive bit of work from the writers.

- In season four, the world saw Daisy LMD shoot Talbot. In season five, the world saw Daisy fight Talbot/Graviton. That must have been why in the original timeline the survivors concluded that Daisy was the one who destroyed the world. However, wouldn't the team have corrected that interpretation? And wouldn't Kasius family know the truth? Papa Kasius met both Daisy and Talbot, he could tell who was good and stable and who was crazy enough to tear the world apart.

- The first season finale was called "The Beginning of the End"; the fourth season finale, "World's End"; this one, "The End". How will the actual series finale be called? End of Ends? Ultimate End? The End: This Time We Mean It?

- Some similarities between this episode and Buffy's fifth season finale (Buffy spoilers follow, obviously): both episodes were conceived as possible series finales; the main characters die (kind of, when it comes to Coulson); both episodes show the epitaphs to their deceased (or about to be deceased) protagonists; both episodes are centered on a moral dilemma that presents two options, and the resolution comes through a third, previously unknown option. Are there more similarities?


- The first shot of the season:


- The final shot:


Quotes

Mack: "Now you wanna sacrifice yourself, too?"
Yo-Yo: "No, but I'm willing to, we all should be."

Fitz: "Simmons and I will prepare the remedy. Everyone else should prepare for the end of the world."

Yo-Yo: "You are going to die."
Mack: "Everyone dies. And on that day we'll have to answer up there for what we've done down here."
Yo-Yo: "It's not God I'm afraid of."

Yo-Yo: "I was never arguing for you to die. I just... I was just arguing to not bet everything on you."
Coulson: "And I would've taken your side."
Yo-Yo: "I know."

Deke: "You know, when I first met you guys, I had never seen anything like that. I had seen people kill for each other without hesitation all the time, but I had never seen a group that was willing to die for each other."

Coulson: "We've seen what happens when we don't let nature take its course."

Daisy [re: Mack]: "He has the biggest heart. I mean, physically, but also, you know..."

Coulson: "What do we do?"
Mack: "We save lives."

Woman [re: gun]: "I have a feeling that isn't going to do much."

Coulson: "Find the strength in your heart to appeal to his good nature. And if you can't, find the strength in your arms to beat his ass senseless."

Daisy: "We fought for you. We fought each other for you."

Robin: "Something is different."

Yo-Yo: "Perdoname, Dios mio, perdoname por todo lo que he hecho."

Coulson: "I lived a life surrounded by heroes, none bigger than all of you."

Simmons: "We don't move on. We hold that place in our heart, we close off, we lock the door, we visit from time to time, but we don't move on. Even after we say goodbye."

This episode would have been a terrific conclusion to the series. As a season finale, it's damn near perfect. Well written, climatic, and, above all, deeply emotional. It deserves four out of four stars.

And that's a wrap for season five. Thank you guys for reading these reviews and also for providing your perspective on things. This season was a blast to review and discuss. May we meet again after the one year break.
--
Lamounier

11 comments:

  1. This comment ended up being a bit long so it will be in two parts.

    This episode kind of reminds me of Buffy's Chosen in that I feel it was an adequate finale given the season that had come before (and at this point I have to say this season does rank at the bottom below Season 1 even). I could go over the various issues related to the time loop but that could take some time. Still here's hoping the writers can do better with their sixth season.

    I suppose its hard to be on Yo-Yo's side because while the saving the world point is good the way she went about it wasn't right. The reason "she looks like the bad guy" is because she wouldn't tell anyone what she learned until the last minute, helped break a mentally unstable man from prison and murdered someone in cold blood against orders. I sympathize with some of the stuff she went through but she has no reason to act like she's the victim for everything that went down.

    Also I have to say Coulson's disease really does run on "plot-convenient-itis" to borrow a term from Council of Geeks (used for an Orphan Black video of all things). I mean it seemed he was on death's door for most of this episode and now he'll be well enough to go on a retirement vacation for a couple of weeks. I mean the Tahiti ending is cute and all but come on.

    I kind of have mixed feelings on the Director Mack thing as well. Especially since with the way everyone's behaved this season I have doubts that just putting him in charge would solve all the problems. I don't necessarily need Daisy to be Director or anything but I think I would prefer if the crew had a Council of Directors or if they got a Director from outside of the circle (like maybe Agent 13 is still around?).

    I'm kind of annoyed with how Talbot went out. It seems that not being able to save him kind of undermines that whole "save lives" point the episode was pushing earlier. Especially since Coulson didn't really seem to believe that talking him down was going to work. At the very least Glenn deserved a moment of pathos before he died (if he is indeed dead the writers have hinted he could possibly be alive). Also kind of a quick fight for a villain that had been built up for 5 seasons.

    Okay so let's go into the time loop. Since we saw that footage of the Quinjet scene in Episode 8 and in this episode that means it had to have happened in both timelines. This means in both timelines Coulson likely would have not taken the serum and put it in Daisy's gauntlets? So what exactly changed the timeline then. Did Daisy not just notice the serum was there in the other timeline? I also have to presume that the serum was always going to end up in those gauntlets because Robin only says SOMETHING'S DIFFERENT after Daisy injected herself. I get that the writers didn't want to reveal their hand until it was dramatically convenient but I'm not really sure it adds up. It gets even more complicated when you add in that Daisy and Talbot crashing down to Earth is what caused the damage that led to this Fitz's death. So was that crash always supposed to have happened or was Fitz supposed to make it out of that in the other timeline?

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  2. (Part 2)

    The writers have been kind of vague with how long term any of the effects of the serum will be on Daisy. Apparently Mike was able to keep some of his enhanced strength after his Centipede experience so I guess Daisy keeping a bit of the boost is on the cards (unless its not the same for Inhumans or something). Hopefully it won't cause too many problems either way.

    The whole Fitz death thing feels a little cheap to me. As people have pointed out this essentially undoes any development he's had since Rewind and while that does give this death a bit more punch the execution is all wonky. Somebody on a IGN review brought up the the double Critchton situation in Farscape and I think that was definitely a better execution of this sort of thing. Also it ties into how the events of The Devil Complex have been given insufficient follow-through since now the Fitz that did what he did is now gone (and we never even got a proper reaction from Coulson to the situation). Hopefully there will some follow-through addressing what happened with Daisy still maybe having some difficulty working alongside a version of the man who did what he did to her.

    I probably wouldn't be irked by the Infinity War thing as much as I am were it not for the fact that they had to bring up some of the events at all. It just makes the whole thing feel like a tease. I can understand why they didn't bring up the "snap" but it still feels like a major missed opportunity. At the very least I hope for some answers to how that ended up affecting the Agents if it wasn't wiped from time or something.

    While I was on the train of having Coulson stay dead for the next season given that we only have 13 episodes and have been moved to summer I'm not sure how viable an option that is at the moment. If we were guaranteed to get a seventh season I'd probably be more confident (or if the Coulson fans weren't so mad and were threatening to ditch the show). I suppose they could maybe get Mephisto to save his life if they needed to but again I'm not sure what the best option is. I don't pity the writers for having to work under these circumstances.

    I would be down for a SHIELD musical. Plus we actually have a female lead with singing experience this time.

    For Season 6 I'd like them to try and resolve that loose end of Vijay Nadeer from Season 4 being in the ocean. That's probably the biggest loose end they have left now that the gravitonium has been dealt with. I'd also like them to bring Sif or Professor Randolph back because I'd like to see their reactions to what happened to Asgard and stuff. I guess we might have to deal with Daddy Kassius since he was kind of a loose end this season but I'm not in a particular rush (the Kassius Family are kind of lame villains). I'd also think Mephisto (especially if Ghost Rider is involved), the Taskmaster or something to do with the Skrulls would offer a lot of potential as well.

    When I think of duplicates and time travel I tend to refer to Bender's Big Score. It's also kind of why I question if taking him out of suspension before he was supposed to have saved the team is the best idea but at this point I'm not sure how all this is meant to work logically.

    I wouldn't have minded some Grant Ward.

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  3. Great review of this episode, Lamounier, and indeed the whole season :-)

    Thanks especially for flagging that excellent opening/closing shot pay-off, something I would never otherwise have noticed.

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  4. Talbot’s fight had to be abrupt. He could simply crush Daisy with a flick of his wrist. He didn’t because he wanted to absorb Daisy. When he failed he lost his head and charged Daisy, giving her the only opportunity to blast him into space.

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  5. Thank you, Tim. :)

    Good points, tvrantings. A few agreements / counterpoints:

    helped break a mentally unstable man from prison

    Are you talking about Talbot? Those were Yo-Yo's orders, it's not like she did that against everyone's will.

    I would prefer if the crew had a Council of Directors

    I agree, I thought of that too. I think Mack and Daisy would work well as co-leaders, actually.

    This means in both timelines Coulson likely would have not taken the serum and put it in Daisy's gauntlets? So what exactly changed the timeline then. Did Daisy not just notice the serum was there in the other timeline?

    I thought of discussing that, but my review was so long already that I decided not to. My guess is that either Coulson didn't put the serum in Daisy's gauntlets, or she didn't notice it.

    So was that crash always supposed to have happened or was Fitz supposed to make it out of that in the other timeline?

    Fitz never went through that in the other timeline, that's what I assume anyway. If so, it proves that some variations happened each time the loop repeated, but the pivotal events remained the same.

    I agree with you about the lack of followup to the events of "The Devil Complex." I was especially disappointed that this Fitz died without ever trying to make amends with Daisy. I like your idea of Daisy having reservations about working with cryo-Fitz next season, still traumatized by what dead-Fitz put her through.

    The writers addressed the Fitz problem in an interview. Iain De Caestecker not being available for the first few episodes of the season added an extra complication to their time travel story, they ended up with two Fitzes and eventually saw it as an opportunity. I will say, though, that I have some trouble "accepting" the duplicate as the real one. Continuum did a time travel once that undid pivotal developments for nearly all the characters. I was upset at first, it felt like the real characters were gone. But the season that came afterwards was terrific, the show's finest, and I ended up being okay with it. Here is hoping the AoS writers can do the same for Fitz / season 6.

    As for the Infinity War tie-in, I don't think the writers were teasing the events of the movie, but using them as part of their narrative, as a component of Talbot's motivations. And I think they didn't know about the snap, which is why the tie-in didn't happen the way everyone thought it would. Without Joss Whedon and with the ego issues between the bosses of the movie side and the TV side, I doubt the writers of Agents were told much. The final scenes of "The End" are clearly set a while later (no way Simmons would have gone from "my husband died" to "let's find his duplicate" in a matter of hours). In any case, on the long run this won't be an issue depending of how Avengers 4 undoes the the end of Infinity War.

    As for how this season ranks, I put it above seasons one and three, maybe above season two as well.

    I would love to have Ghost Rider back. I forgot to add that to my wish list. Robbie Reyes is a terrific character, as well as a great match for Daisy.

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  6. When I was referring to the prison breakout I was referring to when Yo-Yo assisted in trapping Mack after Jemma tricked Mack with her acid Russian Roulette game.

    The writers have implied that the final scene was still meant to take place before the ending of Infinity War.

    Oh and since I didn't mention it before thanks for a solid season of reviewing. Its definitely good that the show is still being reviewed here and with overall consistent quality after the change-over.

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  7. The writers have implied that the final scene was still meant to take place before the ending of Infinity War.

    I know, and I usually take the writers' words as words of God, but in this case specifically I'm a little skeptical. In any case, that means they could still address the end of IW.

    Thank you, tvrantings.

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  8. I guess they have enough time between season 5 and 6 that Avengers 4 will be already out. So they assuming that movie will reverse "the event" they might not even need to adress it in the season 6 premiere.

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  9. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has been renewed for a seventh season!

    https://www.marvel.com/articles/tv-shows/marvel-s-agents-of-s-h-i-e-l-d-officially-renewed-for-season-7

    Completely unexpected news, considering the ratings and that we're still half a year away from the airing of season six. Great news, anyway.

    Let's party.

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  10. Lamounier, what an exceptional review. You brought up a lot of things I had forgotten, established a timeline and mentioned everything I was thinking about this exceptional episode.

    I was waiting for the moment when the timeline changed, and it didn't disappoint. "Something is different." Daisy was awesome. Coulson was awesome. Everyone was awesome. Even the writers were awesome. Talbot's death was a bit underwhelming, but in an episode of good stuff, I was okay with it.

    I cried when Fitz died. Couldn't help it. And for a moment, I forgot that the younger Fitz was in cryo.

    This indeed would have been a perfect series ender. Although I'm glad I have two more seasons to go. Even though they're shorter.

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  11. Billie, yay! I'm glad the finale worked for you. This is easily the type of story where the conclusion will either make it or break it, and "The End" definitely elevates the season.

    Though the Agents of Hydra arc has the best run of episodes, I'm actually more impressed with season five. It was *not* an easy arc to pull off. Like you mentioned a few comments ago, the different points of view and conflicts between the characters were earned and very well written.

    Whenever I rewatch the series, this will be the season I'll be looking forward to the most. Everything falls in place, it's impressive storytelling.

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