TV REVIEWS: FTN Reviews Agents of Shield Season 02 Episode 09: “…Ye Who Enter Here”

After not airing last week, and the last episode revealing that Coulson’s team had found the entrance to the hidden city, a lot of expectations were built up for this episode. Sadly, it didn’t deliver in a lot of ways. It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t  as fantastic as the last couple of episodes.

Chief among them was the fact that we got little development in the finding of the actually city itself, especially when numerous hints were dropped that it is in indeed Attilan. Not the least of which came from Raina who confirmed that the “blue angels” were the Kree, and that only the “chosen few” were allowed to enter the temple and “embrace their destiny”. No doubt meaning those with Inhuman bloodlines could be transformed by the (hopeful) Terigan mists. But for most of the episode, all we got Coulson and Bobbi just trying to find the temple entrance, and then the team scanning the entrance and then…well I’ll save that for later.

The unexpected storyline was the one involving Raina, as she again became hunted by Hydra, forcing Coulson to extract her in order to protect her. This storyline was also expected because of the return of Agent(s) Koenig. Yes, as in plural, as in two, as in LMD’s…yeah, you know it’s that. The hilarity of the situation was amazing, especially when other characters voiced are questions about the situation, like…how many of them are there?

Also returning was Agent 33, who still had May on her mind…I mean face. To be honest, this return was kind of weird, especially with how the preview played it up. There’s no way she can fool anyone with that scar and voice, so…why is she back? Or even alive? Seriously? Hydra, please explain!

A good thing that did emerge from the Raina storyline, aside from the Kree namedrop, was the interaction between her and Skye. It was here that we found out her dedication to Skye’s father, and what Skye means to him.

Something that was put on point in this episode was the strained relationship between Fitz and Simmons, not much has been made of this in the last few episodes, so it was risky to bring it back up again. Thankfully, Bobbi was the one to do so, enacting her big sister vibe with Simmons to bring light on the situation. Weirdly though, the situation was kind of sidestepped thanks to Fitz. It was weirdly justified I suppose, but the conversation between just felt off.

Then of course, there was the scene with Mac at the temple. There were some serious logic leaps in these scenes. Especially when you compare them with what we saw in the preview for next weeks episode. You know something is down there, you can’t use electronics, then you send your strongest guy down there, virtually unprotected, and don’t expect something to happen? Really? And if Mac is really dead, I’m going to be really ticked, cause his death would really be meaningless in my opinion.

Thankfully, as usual, Ward was there to save the show. As he in one scene furthered the entire plot, taking both Raina and Skye into his custody to head to the temple. Classic.

Finally, the end scene was honestly pointless, yes, Whitehall being ticked at Ward was cool. But ordering the Bus shot down then cutting to black? Yeah, like that’s going to happen…

“…Ye Who Enter Here” may not have lived up to the episodes prior, but it did do some things right, and it does leave me excited for the midseason finale next week. Let’s just hope with as big a bang as they’re promising.