Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Debrief: Episode 1.13, "T.R.A.C.K.S."

Hey trill believers! Agents of SHIELD is back again from its second break and it's recap time. Now I’m going to be honest with you guys: This is going to be a short one and not because I’m lazy or didn’t watch it or rushed through the episode. It’s going to be short because that episode made positively no sense to me. See, I’m pretty good at following stories here. I got Memento after the first watch. I get Inception. I can follow Rashomon. I can explain to you Final Crisis but this episode, titled "T.R.A.C.K.S.," goes so off the track that I was lost after the first commercial break.

This episode is following up from the last episode, "Seeds," with Coulson on the hunt for Ian Quinn since he now knows that Quinn and his company is connected to the Clairvoyant. They find out that Quinn has a package being delivered by train in Italy. So Team Coulson comes up with some Ocean’s Twelve-style train plan to find out what the package is and get Quinn. Here’s the thing: When on the train, the whole OP goes bad and terribly. All the stuff I’ve just said happened in the first 12 minutes. This is the point where the episode completely befuddled me. They decide to tell the story from three points of view. We see Ward and Coulson having to leave the train and their pursuers throw this weird blue gas-emitting grenade. Then the train disappears. Originally on the train Ward had Skye go and meet up with Fitz and Simmons in a safe place of the train. Outside Coulson and Ward try to figure out what happened to Agent May, who was supposed to be on the outside of the train that has disappeared.  

So then they show what happened to Melinda May and how the Italian police connect that Coulson had betrayed them, and capture her and start torturing her. She escaped and followed that guy as he found out where the bus was, but then she killed him by throwing a small knife into his back. Now that the three of them are back together, they focus on getting to the train again. While on the train, Fitz, Simmons and Skye try to handle themselves with the forces of Quinn’s company. Fitz is thrown around like a wrestling buddy. Simmons gets hit with the blue gas grenade, which we learned contained a weird nerve toxin. The train is stopped and the package is taken off and Skye thinks Fitz and she should follow them. That leads them to Quinn’s mansion, where Skye decides to go in while Fitz starts to sabotage the vehicles there.

Ward, May and Coulson end up finding the train since it’s stopped and they wake up Simmons. They find out that Skye and Fitz are at Quinn’s mansion. Skye, while doing her best Solid Snake impression, gets in and finds Quinn with the package along with a hyperbolic chamber containing Mike Peterson. Quinn goes full Bond villain with his speech as he wakes up Mike and the package that happens to be some crazy robotic prosthetic leg for him. Quinn tells Mike to kill Skye, which Mike refuses since it goes against the orders of the Clairvoyant. Mike then goes outside and kills all the people that helped lead the SHIELD to Quinn. Quinn goes full on Skye hater (like many of us in the viewing audience) and shoots like 5 times in the stomach (BLAOW BLAOW BLAOW). Quinn leaves the room and Team Coulson arrives on the scene to get to Quinn, and Coulson asks him where Skye is and he gives him a snide comment that makes ALL LOGICAL SENSE about letting a non-trained girl just wander around in serious SHIELD missions.

Coulson smacks with the gun and they capture Quinn (please note that in about three episodes Centipede lost all their commanders) and the team tries to find Skye. They get to her and see her leaking all over the floor. Simmons has the team put Skye in the hyperbolic chamber so that they can stabilize her. The team is now in a huge state of stress and sadness since Skye, the most annoying character, is dying. The last scene is Mike standing outside looking really creepy watching children at the playground where he writes a note for the Clairvoyant asking if he can see his son, to which the Clairvoyant says not yet. The camera then zooms in on the leg where it shows that it’s part of the Deathlok project.

Anyway. Peaces.

Did You Know?

That Marvel spoiled the Deathlok reveal on their Tumblr, website and everywhere else they could. It seems that the Mike Peterson version they are creating in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is based on the Michael Collins version. He is a probably the most known and liked version of the Deathlok character. Clearly he’ll be a main part of this show from this point on so I’ll be dropping more and more about him throughout. For the really frisky on knowing now the internets is your friend.