"Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." Debrief: Episode 1.11, "The Magical Place"

So trill believer, here we are in the New Year 2014 and we are back to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. So where’s Coulson? What happened to Coulson? What happened to Mike? Will Skye be less annoying? Just how many times can Agent May side eye in an episode? Hopefully all these questions can be answered now that it’s starting to bother me and to entertain you with my spiteful recaps.

So this episode starts three days after the events of the last episode. Agent Victoria Hand and a large team of agents are with what’s left of the crew trying to find centipede and Agent Coulson. It seems that Agent Hand is more focused on catching Centipede than saving Coulson while that bothers most of the team they go with it...except for Skye. Oh Skye, still trying to break every rule by using her hacking skills except this time she is denied because of the SHIELD access bracelet, looks like Agent Hand is putting her foot down. With Skye’s access cut off and Agent May nowhere near co-signing for her with Hand, the rest of the team hatches a plan to get Skye off of the Bus (big old plane aka mini carrier) so that she can help find Coulson in her own special way.

Meanwhile Coulson is being held in an old nuclear test zone town. You know the ones with all the happy looking mannequins around.  There Mr. Po and Reina, the woman in the flower dress, are keeping Coulson to get him to remember what Tahiti really was. Coulson being the cold beast of an agent gives them nothing so this makes Mr. Po choose to torture him which also continues to be unsuccessful. Out in the world we see Skye trying to use her hacking abilities to follow a money trail to finding centipede and where they might have Coulson but her bracelet keeps locking her out from hacking anything. It seems Agent Hand basically put the uber parental controls on the ENTIRE internet for Skye.

So Skye uses some cunning and cosplays as Agent May and tricks this smarmy business man into thinking SHIELD is about arrest him unless he helps her get into his banking transactions, which somehow works. Over at the Coulson trials, Reina and Mr. Po disagree on how to handle Coulson when Mr. Po tries to flex his connection to the clairvoyant who calls to talk to Reina? The Clairvoyant.  When Reina gives the phone back to Mr. Po he is killed through some crazy blue virus via his old school flip phone (that real killer tech), now Reina is in charge. Reina then, instead of taking the tough approach with Coulson, talks to him in her usual nice/manipulative ways yet confirming some of the issues Coulson does have with his return after Avengers.

Here is where things start to wrap up a bit too easy. Skye finds out where Coulson is, takes the rich guys nice car, and calls Ward to tell him what she has found. The whole crew gathers around the phone, then Agent May comes in, takes the phone, and asks what she knows. After some creative interrogation techniques by Ward, Agent Hand admits that she has plans to launch attacks using centipede. Agent May asks Hand that they be allowed to go and save Coulson using Skye’s Intel. Hand agrees and the team is off. While this is happening Coulson is in this weird bed with this mind thingy so that it can help him remember and record his dreams (??) as he goes in the fantasy of Tahiti starts to fade to show him on an operating table with Dr. Stretain (Ron Glass) telling another doctor that they shouldn’t be doing this with that doctor saying that this is what Fury wants. During this you hear Coulson saying “let me die let me die” over and over again as the shot pulls back we see this weird spider robot shocking parts of Coulson’s exposed brain.

The team then descends on the place and fisticuffs ensue as Skye searches for Coulson. Ward and May defeat their foes and Skye walks in on Reina and Coulson, punches Reina in the face, and gets Coulson out of the machine. Mission accomplished. The team finishes up with Agent Hand, celebrations are had, Skye is relieved of her bracelet and Reina goes to SHIELD jail... but all is still not well.  Coulson pays a visit to Dr. Stretain asking him about the disturbing truth he just found out. Dr. Streatian tells him he wasn’t even there in the beginning of it and that Coulson had been dead for days when Fury used every resource to bring him back. There was one thing wrong they couldn’t give Coulson his will to live back and they made up the fake memories of Tahiti to cover up the memories of his return to life.  Then after the credits we see poor Mike didn’t die. He’s all scared up from the explosion and he lost a leg. The kicker is this when he looks into the mirror he sees a message meaning that he now has one of those crazy robot eyes that can kill you if you don’t do what it says. Poor Mike.

Did you Know:

Well I was looking hard for clues. The only one I see is that really for the first time in the Marvel Cinematic Universe you’re seeing the Nick Fury doing whatever he wants to get what he wants tactics from the comics here. Let me know folks if I really missed anything. Until next week.