- Title: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – Inside Man
- wiki: link
Hydra scores a victory against S.H.I.E.L.D. in “Inside Man” as the illusive Gideon Malick (Powers Boothe) remains one-step ahead of Coulson (Clark Gregg) and his team. Attending the Symposium on the Alien Contagion in Taiwan in hopes of discovering Malick’s inside man, Coulson is betrayed by General Talbot (Adrian Pasdar) in a way that allows Malick to worm his way into the graces of the Russian representative (Ravil Isyanov) and secure a home for Inhumans far from the prying eyes of the rest of the world. Likely more important for what it sets up than the events of the episode itself, “Inside Man” is an okay episode but a large percentage of the plot is directed towards events that may, or may not, pay off somewhere down the line. Also, Coulson’s entire role at the conference (as the sole scientist) is odd as is the fact that multiple world leaders are apparently happy to attend an unsecured event without any of their own security.
While May (Ming-Na Wen), Hunter (Nick Blood), and Bobbi (Adrianne Palicki) travel to Taiwan to act as support for Coulson, get him out safely, and retreive Talbot’s kidnapped son (who Malick is using as leverage) the rest of the team isn’t given much to do this week. Daisy (Chloe Bennet) and Lincoln (Luke Mitchell) have their first lover’s spat, between otherwise flirtatious behavior, and a good chunk of the episode centers around the creature who used to be Grant Ward (Brett Dalton) who ends the episode far stronger than he’s been since his return through the portal. The episode sets the stage for events to come, even if it continues to drag its feet a bit in getting the Ward storyline going. Hopefully the tease at the end of the episode marks a shift in the season’s pacing where its main villain is concerned.
