We had a short break but we’re back, just in time for the end of the world!
Source: Marvel Television/ABC Studios. Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Dove Cameron as Ruby Hale.
Brainwashed by HYDRA and activated by his wife reading his trigger words, General Talbot begins his mission. He makes his way to the command center of the Lighthouse and begins tampering with the cameras, but Mack catches him. He notices something is weird about Talbot, but chalks it up to spending six months being tortured in a HYDRA prison immediately following a coma.
Under the watchful eye of Ruby Hale and Werner von Strucker (aka “Alex Braun”), Fitz and Simmons try to rebuild the infusion chamber they broke – or rather, Fitz does while Ruby uses Simmons as target practice for her throwing chakrams. Fitz says that he needs to Simmons to help repair the machine, and Ruby lets her go help but warns them to be quick about it.
Elsewhere, Yo-Yo’s robotic arms are still damaged from using her superspeed. It doesn’t stop her from using them to take out more guards though, despite the extreme pain.
Daisy and May decide to storm the HYDRA base, only they find it a tad too easy – Hale surrenders. She doesn’t care about anything right now except keeping the world and her daughter safe. On the base, Carl Creel is a broken (Absorbing) man. In his cell, he says that the gravitonium’s previous victims are arguing in his head. Franklin Hall is smarter, but Ian Quinn is louder. He just wants them out. He turns himself to the cement of the wall and begins banging his head against it, demanding they get out of his head.
At the Lighthouse, Deke needs lady advice. He approaches Coulson and Mack about a girl – who definitely isn’t Daisy because she hates him – and asks what he should do. They both admit that everyone knows he likes Daisy and that he was right; Daisy hates him. They convince him the future tradition of leaving lemons on one’s bed is still a sign of affection in present day.
Ruby is out of patience and decides to kill either Fitz or Simmons, but they tell her to back off; they finished the machine. They put the part in and Ruby and Strucker get ready to infuse her with gravitonium. Fitz and Simmons snicker, because gravitonium is fickle and will not go through the tube to the infusion chamber – only it does. They are in awe. They really don’t understand the properties of this element.
Talbot makes his way to the room where they are keeping Polly Hinton and her daughter Robin, the Seer. He starts going through her drawings (“Redrum, redrum”) when Polly and Robin return. Talbot pretends he got turned around and is in the wrong room, but still demands to know more about Robin’s drawings. When will they come true? How? Polly explains that they don’t work that way, so Talbot chokes out Polly with a sleeper hold and tells Robin she is coming with him. She has seen him before and she knows.
The infusion begins and Ruby immediately realizes it is a bad idea as she screams in pain and begs to be let out. Strucker thinks Fitz and Simmons sabotaged the machine, but Hale and S.H.I.E.L.D. enter and says it is the gravitonium. They pull the plug at 8% infusion. Ruby flies out and starts to cry. The voices of the gravitonium’s victims are too much. Strucker offers to help her through it and accidentally she crushes his head like a soda can.
Jesus Christ.
After realizing that the video feed of the Hinton’s room was a loop and recalling Mack’s strange conversation with Talbot earlier, Coulson and Mack realize Talbot is a HYDRA sleeper agent and try to convince Talbot that he has been brainwashed by HYDRA, but he is having difficulty resisting his programming. He can’t accept that he has kidnapped a little girl. He turns the gun on himself and they use this to have Robin run over to Mack and he takes her to safety. Coulson asks him to turn the gun onto him, and he almost shoots when Mack reappears and shoots Talbot with an I.C.E.R. tranquilizer.
Amped up on her gravitonium infusion, Ruby pulls Daisy across the room and again laments that she isn’t good enough for her mom. She starts choking Daisy to death with gravity, and her mom stops her – they are on the same side! Before anyone can truly talk her down, Yo-Yo rushes in with superspeed and violently slits Ruby’s throat with her own chakram.
Oh damn.
As Hale screams and holds her daughter’s body, the corpse floats into the air and releases a pulse of gravity which knocks them all down. S.H.I.E.L.D. arrives as Daisy and Yo-Yo get up, but Hale is nowhere to be seen. May asks what happened, and Daisy angrily explains that Yo-Yo killed Ruby. Yo-Yo believes she just saved the world.
Distraught by her daughter’s death, Hale approaches the alien Confederacy and demands an audience with Qovas. She tells him that S.H.I.E.L.D. has the gravitonium, and that they should just take it from them.
That episode had some unexpected turns at the end. I am super curious to see where this goes. Despite the dramatic exit of Dove Cameron’s Ruby, this episode didn’t wow me in too many ways (though I do like the sort-of thematic connection to Avengers: Infinity War.) I give it a 7/10.
Bring on the end-game!
