“Providence”
Directed by Milan Cheylov
Written by Brent Fletcher
If you haven’t seen Captain America: Winter Soldier and you dislike spoilers you are probably going to want to avoid this thread and episode (And the SHIELD threads/episodes for the rest of the season.) I won’t spoil things on purpose, of course (Rosebud is his Shield) but, there are plenty of ramifications from the movie that are sure to change the entire tenor of the TV series.
We’re dealing with the aftermath of Turn Turn Turn in this episode. SHIELD is in total disarray. Ward and Garrett’s Hydra team is taking advantage of the situation. This is the third Brent Fletcher written episode of the season. In his first episode he introduced us to The Girl in the Flower Dress and in this episode we get to see her return.
The episode starts to the girl in the flower dress in prison garb making paper flowers. Ward surprises her by opening her cell door, and gives her a present from The Clairvoyant. It’s her flower dress! She can return to her uniform, and get back to her evil life of crime.
Back at SHIELD headquarters, Coulson is in front of a huge screen with lots of bad news about busted helicarriers, and the surprising demise of SHIELD. Skye enters with more bad news. There are only 3 SHIELD facilities still intact. But, our favorite team is still together, sans Ward.
The Girl in the Flower Dress, who has a name, by the way (It’s more fun to say The Girl in the Flower Dress, but easier to type Raina. Rainait is!) Raina doesn’t seem enthused to find out that The Claivoyant has no powers, and is just a lying SHIELD agent. She is welcomed to HYDRA by a secret elevating barber’s chair in Cuba.
Back at headquarters Fitz is trying to fix the plane while Triplett and Simmons give him advice, and Coulson is dealing with Colonel Talbot, a dangerous Air Force muckity muck who wants to visit on a peace keeping mission, but is forcing Coulson to enact Odyssey Protocol. Which seems to mean run run run. Tripp wants in on the plane and the running, but Coulson is against it. Simmons speaks up for him, and Coulson agrees, only if she is responsible for him. Fitz doesn’t seem especially happy about this plan.
Coulson wants Skye to erase all existence of the team from the world. And, he wants her to collect all of the SHIELD badges. (Including the one she just earned!) He gives Skye the phone to call Ward. She calls him and lets her know that she is erasing his existence, and she doesn’t know where they are going. She asks who he is going to be now that he has a clean slate, and Ward seems to believe having a clean slate means he can take over someone’s life answers Tom Brady.
Garrett eavesdrops on Ward’s conversation, and makes fun of him for picking Tom Brady. I guess Hyrda hates the Patriots. Huh, you’d think they might be fans. They have a conversation that shows how much Ward fell for Skye, and perhaps the rest of the team. Garrett reminds him WHY he was on the mission, and WHO
sent him on the mission. More mysteries! Just what we all wanted! Garrett shows Raina his lab of mistakes, and the meds he stole from Coulson’s rebirthplace. Ward gives her the hard drive filled with FitzSimmons research on the drug. She’s in charge of Project Centipede again.
Coulson’s badge must have recognized that it was being shoved into a safe not to be seen again for months, because right when he put it in there coordinates to a remote Canadian forest popped up. He’s sure it’s from Fury, because it is Fury’s style and no one can copy that style.
Raina gets Ward to tell her how he infiltrated Coulson’s group. He performed a selfless act of bravery by jumping out of the plane to save Simmons. He let things get intimate between him and May, his biggest obstacle. He became Skye’s SO to see how she thought. And, he convinced Coulson to let him join the group by not wanting to join the group. Reverse Psychology! He must have gone to the same Medical School as my 4th grade self. Ward owes Coulson something, he owes Garret everything.
Ward and Garret use the prisoner gambit to break into the fridge. I mean, really, have none of these guards watched Star Wars? They break into the fridge and steal all sorts of valuable weapons. It turns out that Slingshot program was all a big fake. Not only did they keep these dangerous weapons, but they harmed monkeys by sending them up in some of those rockets., according to Garrett. Hopefully, these were criminal monkeys. Garrett uses the plasma weapon from “0-8-4” to blow holes in the walls and free all of the prisoners. Ward tells him that Coulson told him about something in the top secret basement, they use the plasma weapon to get it.
An addled Coulson leads the team on a 7 mile hike through snowy Canadian forests with no base in sight and no fuel left on the plane. When they finally get there and everyone has expressed doubts he goes on a tirade ending with an apology and throws his badge in the air. A gun shoots the badge, and there you have it. Secret Base found! He goes to the gun and identifies himself. A secret door opens and Eric Koening Agent of SHIELD Level 6 welcomes them to the secret unnamed based that he calls Providence.
Koening takes Coulson aside to let him know that Fury is still alive, but no one knows were he is. Coulson isn’t allowed to share this information with the rest of the team.
During the hike to the base May tells Skye that Fury was nervous about what would happen to Coulson after he figures out what happened to him. She tells Coulson that she is worried that Hyrda put something in his head to make him go to that location in Canada. Poor May. She spends the season being right pretty much all of the time. And, now here she is with SHIELD being destroyed, all her friends distrust her, and she things there is something wrong with the man she loves, but won’t admit it. At least she has a parking spot for the plane.
Oh, and speaking of people to feel bad for. Poor Fitz. “The last thing I want is for things to change.” “Fitz. It’s too late for that.”
The hard drive that Skye backed up all of the data on is encrypted and only be opened by her. Garett sends Ward back for 24 hours to get the data. Afterwards, he has to bring Skye back. Garret has some kind of medal thing on his side, which is apparently related to his need to know more about Coulson’s cure. (More mysteries!) Garrett beats up Ward to give him a good cover, and Ward shows up at the secret base back to old times, and Skye is ready for that drink.
Ian Quinn is complaining about being lied to and being in prison and not being a rich guy anymore when Garrett shows him the Gravitonium to shut him up.
This episode was a definite letdown after last week’s incredible tour de force. It wasn’t a bad episode, but there wasn’t much focus. It was a bridge episode that answered some questions from last week, and asked more questions for next week. These kind of episodes are enjoyable in terms of the series as a whole, but as stand alone episodes they suffer.
On the other hand, there were plenty of things to enjoy about the episode.
The return of Raina? Awesome. Ruth Negga is terrific in the role and it is good to see her back. I’m kind of wondering if there is going to be more to her story. She never seemed to quit buy in her new situation, and she seemed to dig into Ward’s story. That could have been just for the audience’s benefit, or perhaps it was Raina’s way to find a way out of her new non-clarivoyant situation.
Ward as a bad guy? Very good. They left no doubt that he isn’t deep under cover in this episode. He owes Garrett and he is willing to do pretty much anything for him. Everything (or almost everything) he did for Coulson was a Romonovian way to get on the inside. But, he does have a soft spot for Skye (shooting Skye wasn’t part of the plan!), and I suppose we are going to see where that goes the rest of the season.
Patton Oswalt as Agent Koening? So much fun! He’s the best, and he was really good in the role.
Setups for the future? Fun! Sure, I make fun of the fact that they are throwing new mysteries so quickly after they answered questions. But, really isn’t that what makes these types of stories great? Wondering what’s going to happen and looking forward to next week. What’s up with Garrett’s side? Who sent Ward, and Why? Who was in charge of Tahiti? What’s Skye’s secret power? (Oh yeah, that’s an old question.)
Favorite lines and stuff
[ul]
[li]“We have Internet” “Yay!”[/li][li]Coulson is a Call of Duty Fan. You’d think he got enough shooting done in real life.[/li][li]“Lanyards for others on a case by case basis”[/li][li]“Have you ever read Moby Dick?” “Have you?” “That’s not the point.”[/li][li]“This is not good.” “Did you find bears?!?”[/li][li]“HAIL HYDRA!!” “Alright alright. Put your arms down Kaminsky. You look like a West Texas Cheerleader at a pep rally.”[/li][/ul]