In Review: Agents of Shield (S7 – E5) – A Trout in the Milk

Synopsis: After a bumpy landing in the disco decade, the team – Daniel Sousa in tow – reunites with more than one familiar face at the S.H.I.E.L.D. hangout and discover exactly how to dismantle the Chronicoms’ latest plan.

Story

The team find themselves in 1973 and discover that the Chronicom’s have altered the timeline so that Project Insight is ready to go a lot sooner. To that end, Wilfred [Freddie] Malick, who should actually be dead by this point, but isn’t has compiled a list of future threats to Hydra, which includes members of The Avengers. Sousa, Daisy, Coulson, and May go to the old speakeasy, which has been a S.H.I.E.L.D. safe house for decades, but once there they find that Enoch has been missing for a year, but do spot Rick Stoner, who is another legend from S.H.I.E.L.D long history. Meanwhile, Mack and Yo-Yo explore The Lighthouse, which was supposed to have been abandoned in 1972, but instead of finding it deserted they learn that it happens to be the launch base for Project Insight.

The Acting

Ming-Na Wen has a bit of fun this week with the recent development that Agent May cannot actually feel unless she touches people and inherits what they are feeling. In one instance she makes some brief physical contact with a rather drunk partygoer at the speakeasy and gets to show us what a rather tipsy Agent May would be like. This new power that May has also allowed for some interesting and fun interplay between May and General Rick Stoner. In this particular scene, May is trying to stroke his ego to get information about insight and when the launch date is.

Also really fun to watch this week was Enver Gjokaj as Daniel Sousa. Understandably Sousa is out of his comfort zone with the informality of the 1970s and is somewhat disturbed by the fashions and the lack of eye contact from people on the street. But it is the scene where he loses his grip a little and calls Simmons out for not knowing when the next time jump would be that really showed us how much out of his element Sousa was. It also allowed for Deke (Jeff Ward) to jump to Simmon’s defense.

Overall

Aside from all the trappings of the 1970s, which included very bad fashion, and the 8 track players. This was a rather slow burn episode, which was light on action, but heavy on irony and humor. I loved the fact that all the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents were wearing colorful jumpsuits at the base in the confines of The Light House, and Yo-Yo comparing the whole scenario to classic bond films of the era was brilliant fun.

Overall. A fun way to spend 45 minutes. The next stop will probably be the 1980s.