Hot off the news that Marvel’s ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ would be getting a full season order, this week’s episode might have been the weakest one yet. After a pretty awesome installment last week with ‘The Asset’, the follow up just wasn’t as strong as the one that came before it. In fact, as I was watching ‘Eye Spy’, I felt as if it were just a filler episode in between two much stronger episodes.

This week, Agent Coulson and his team are becoming a more cohesive unit, but they are tested even further when a mysterious former protégé of the group’s leader appears to be single-handedly committing some high profile heists. Determined to clear his trainee’s name and to get to the bottom of her new life of crime, Coulson does everything he can to get her a second chance.

First of all, I was disappointed by the reveal of who the red-masked individuals were from the photos that were released last month. At the time, there were some theories about them being another villain’s henchmen, but the truth ended up being much more anticlimactic than that.

As disappointing as that was, this episode did introduce another big bad that will likely pop up down the line. This storyline of whoever was controlling Akela Amador and the Englishman will probably be revisited once again as the season continues, and I like that these agents aren’t just dealing with one highly dangerous threat per season. However, after the tease of Graviton in the last episode, I’m just not as interested in this glorified hacker at the moment. Although, if it somehow results in MODOK and AIM being behind all this, then I’m all for it, but I’m not really sure how feasible that is.

Overall, I felt as if the main purpose of this episode was to foreshadow the events of the next episode. Based on the preview after this week’s show, it looks like Skye’s allegiances are finally being questioned after a few instances of is she or isn’t she a double agent. During this week’s mission, there was some dialogue between Coulson and Ward talking about how it must suck to have a trainee betray them. In response to Ward’s cynicism, Coulson says not to jump to conclusions right away. Then, Skye mentions that Coulson has a great judge of character. Those two moments together just scream out that Skye is going to be fairly deep in an undesirable situation. I don’t know for sure what the fate of the Rising Tide hacker will be, but Coulson certainly didn’t look happy in that teaser. Now, I’m all about foreshadowing and setting up future storylines, but it all just seemed to obvious in this episode to me. Maybe if it was hidden a little bit better, then I wouldn’t have minded.

After the episode aired, I already saw a bunch of talk from fans about jumping ship on Marvel Studios’ first TV show to be set in the cinematic universe, but I haven’t given up hope yet. To use an analogy from another show, not every day can be legendary or else none of them are. That’s why I’m still willing to see what else is to come for Agent Coulson and his team. I just hope that it doesn’t get to the point that I’m only watching to see how he survived his encounter with Loki in ‘The Avengers’.

Final Score:

atoms_2.5

 

 

‘Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ starring Brett Dalton, Ming-Na Wen, Iain De Caestecker, Elizabeth Henstridge, Chloe Bennet, and Clark Gregg airs on Tuesdays at 8:00pm on ABC.