Coulson must face the truth, while the team hangs by a thread – is SHIELD finished?

After a somewhat lacklustre outing last episode, the writers return right back to their game and deliver us an hour of highs, lows, and devastation in a classic SHIELD episode to mark the series’ 100th.

First there’s the bomb. Or rather, the result of the bomb having gone off. What does happen when you set off a large yield explosive in a reinforced basement that also contains not one, but three alien monoliths? The answer is a creative one, and one that gives the writers a chance to really push some more weirdness on the team, fitting perfectly with the season to date.

Elsewhere, there’s the small matter of Coulson’s impending mortality to deal with, and deal with it he must. What’s nice with this one is that – whereas when we got the reveal before the season break it felt a little out of left field – in actual fact there’s a logical and previously hinted at explanation. To say more would be to spoil, but suffice it to say it’s one of those things that rewards long term viewers of the show.

There’s also poor YoYo, strapped to a hospital bed and half-delirious on painkillers. After the conversations the poor girl had with her future self, her concern is understandable – everything she was told would come to pass is doing so, perhaps more rapidly than she expected. Her conversation with Mack is touching, and also gives us more time to explore those consequences that were so lacking last week. (It’s almost as if the writers deliberately left that element light last week, knowing there would be heavy lifting aplenty to be done this time out.)

Because make no mistake, this one digs deep, and by the end of it you’re almost swamped in references to the distant and recent past of the show, with emotions ranging from the desperately sad to the wonderfully joyous. Everyone gets their turn to shine here, with no one character standing out from the pack as every cast member has their own moment in a complex story.

As things wrap up, they just get crazier still. In the midst of a normal, happy scene, a revelation gets casually dropped in that may have massive implications for everyone, or none at all, depending on your point of view. That it’s done so cheekily is testament to the confidence the writers and the studio have in the show – that it gets away with it is proof that it’s well-founded.

Verdict: I was hoping it would pick up after last week and boy, did it not disappoint. This is an episode that drips in fan service, and if you’re anything like me, by the end of it you’ll be itching to start a re-watch right from the season 1 pilot. Superb. 9/10

Greg D. Smith