Agents of SHIELD Review: Terminator Salvation

Agents of SHIELD is back to save us from the midseason drought. Ghost Rider may be gone, but the Darkhold and its effects on AIDA remained to be dealt with.

I had high hopes for AIDA. She could have been a great villain in this episode. Instead, they decided to turn her into a stereotypical terminator. And definitely not the good kind.

You see, “Broken Promises” is chock full of references to Sci-Fi movies. And they pop up unnecessarily every now and then and turn AIDA into this comic inconsequential flavor-of-the week villain.

Which AIDA actually was. She was the terminator, GLaDOS and the robots of Westworld all rolled into one. The result was that she served as a sort of comic relief that shot at people.

We’ve had that type on Agents of SHIELD before. But AIDA was touted as somewhat of a big bad. To see how the show treated her is the sign of a wasted opportunity, a broken promise if you will.

Now, let’s talk about that cliffhanger. It’s obvious that Radcliffe is the big bad now and AIDA is just a pawn. There’s an obvious issue here that Radcliffe might turn out to be the same kind of villain that AIDA was in this episode.

After all, he’s been serving as the show’s comic relief for quite a while. I really hope that the writers tread carefully with a villain like Radcliffe since he doesn’t really have any special abilities to be your average Agents of SHIELD villain.

Instead, the writers could depict how his quest for the Darkhold consumes him bit by bit and he turns into a narcissistic person who gains powers over the course of many episodes.

Now, let’s talk about what I consider the real plot of the episode: Senator Nadeer and Vijay. That part of the story would have been executed flawlessly. If it weren’t for the Watch Dogs.

How many times have they popped up? I’ve lost count. They pose no serious threat and take up a lot of screen time. As I said, Senator Nadeer and Vijay’s story was executed very well from the beginnings of trust to the ultimate betrayal.

However, the Watch Dogs did literally nothing. And they will continue to do literally nothing until they get written out of the show. Someone needs to put a stop to this.

We also got to witness Daisy beginning to bond with the new director of SHIELD. It seems that all his motivational talk might be having some effect after all.

There was obviously a lot of mistrust between the two of them. Mace practically forced Daisy to work for him and Daisy forced Mace to save her from jail in some way.

So, they’re stuck with each other and over the course of the episode, they manage to resolve their various issues. I think we could definitely see the relationship between them become like the one Coulson and Skye had in Season 1.

There’s also the matter of May. Just how May-esque is the robot that’s replaced her? She seems to behave exactly like the real May would have done? I actually think the robot could switch sides at some point.

Stray Observations:

• So, who exactly is this Superior that Senator Nadeer kept talking about? I have a feeling that it’s either Mace or General Talbot or someone new.
• Vijay is still alive. He’s probably pissed off at his sister. I think we might have a situation here.
• Holy crap! What happened to Simmons? Her lessons with May seem to have paid off.
• So, is Radcliffe a villain or just a scientist trying to create eternal life? His motives are rather foggy at the moment.

Rating: B-