Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Nothing Personal (1x20)

Every time I start a review for this show, lately, I feel the need to say this upfront: it's actually good now! Seriously. I keep waiting to learn that it's a fluke... that we're going to fall back into boring patterns, but no. Everything that has happened since the HYDRA twist has been ten times better than what came before. This episode is no exception to that. Let's see what happened:

May meets up with Maria Hill and tells her where Coulson and the others are. Hill reveals that she works with Tony Stark now, and that they're trying to privatize the nation's security with Stark Industries. At Providence, Simmons finds Koenig's body, and Fitz finds a message left from Skye telling them that Ward is HYDRA. Simmons examines the body and concludes that Ward was the one who killed him. Fitz has a meltdown at the thought of Ward betraying them. Coulson says they need to focus: Skye is with Ward now, and they probably don't have long before Ward figures out that Skye knows the truth. At this point, Maria Hill leads US troops to Providence, Talbot among them. When Coulson explains to Hill what's going on with Ward and HYDRA, she helps Coulson and the rest of the team escape the base.

Meanwhile, on the Bus, Skye is continuing to play the good girlfriend, and Ward doesn't seem to suspect anything. Skye leads them to the cafe where she first met Mike Peterson, saying that this is the place to open the encrypted files. While in the cafe, Skye stalls for time and tips off the cops about Ward's identity. Ward is able to evade capture, and although Skye tries to drive away, she too is caught: by Mike Peterson. Peterson and Ward hold Skye captive. Ward tells Skye that his feelings for her are real, even if everything else is a lie. She is disgusted, and refuses to open the files. At this point Peterson, working on orders from Garrett, threatens to kill Ward unless Skye does what needs doing. She caves, unwilling to let Ward die, no matter what he's done.

In order to open the files, they have to bring the Bus up to a certain altitude. While in the air, Maria Hill confronts Ward, distracting him long enough for Coulson to get on board the plane in midair. It's a close call, but Coulson and Skye are able to escape Ward and Deathlok by using Coulson's car, Lola. Deathlok tells Ward that it's over, but Ward seems unwilling to let the team get away, even if he now has the files he wanted.

The team, battered and scared, retires to a hotel. Skye tells Coulson that she left some sort of trap in the hard drive. Fitz and Simmons have a talk, where Fitz admits how scary all this is for him. He asks Simmons to promise him that she's not HYDRA. She does. May turns up, and she and Coulson seem to forgive each other for all that went down. May has recovered a file from Coulson's fake grave. On it is a video of Coulson himself, saying that the TAHITI project brought subjects back to life, but at great cost. There was intense mental deterioration, and the only way to stop it was to erase the subject's memories of what had happened. The Coulson on the video urges Director Fury to shut down the TAHITI project, since the risks are too great.

Where to start? Do I have complaints?

If I had to be picky, I'd say I don't really understand Talbot as a character. His animosity with Coulson seems fairly unfounded, and there's not enough time to explore it properly. But honestly, that's a nitpick.

Everything about this episode was awesome. Maria Hill and her badassery? Awesome. I loved it how she just smirked when Ward made a sexist joke and promised to pass it along to Romanoff. Yeah, I'm sure Natasha could squash Ward no problem. I really want to see that now. Hill is a woman of honor, in the end, as she immediately decided to help Coulson once she knew it was the right thing. I'm also intrigued by the fact that she's working with Stark now. Is that going to continue to play out in the next Avengers movie? The crossing over between the movies and the TV show has been really fantastic of late.

Fitzsimmons! My babies. That conversation by the pool totally broke my heart. The poor dears. I really hope that Simmons isn't a traitor... I don't think Fitz would survive it, honestly. Their love for one another is impossible to ignore. At the moment, I'm loving the delicious tension in the fact that Fitz clearly feels romantic love for Simmons, and I'm not sure if Simmons feels that way back. Also, kudos to the actor for portraying Fitz's freak out. For a character that normally provides some lightness to the show, he really did a good job with the angst.

Skye. I can't believe it, but this episode is so amazing that I actually have to praise Skye. She was able to fool Ward for the better part of a day, and she only decided to stop the charade because she thought she had him beat. All of the exchanges between Ward and Skye were just so delicious, because you could just see that the more that Ward said, the more Skye was hating him. And then Skye's whole speech about Ward and Garrett was amazing, as Ward came to the slow realization that something was off. Great writing, great, acting. Man oh man.

And then there's Coulson's awesomeness. I can't believe he managed to save Skye! What a crazy stunt. It was so fun to see him pull something crazy like this and actually succeed. It sort of restores our faith in him as a competent leader, even if he has gone overboard.

Deathlok wasn't put to too much use here, but I liked the parallel of Ward and Deathlok both declaring that their actions aren't personal, and are just about work. Also, when Skye tried to get through to Mike Peterson, Deathlok brought up some good points: his son was supposed to be safe in S.H.I.E.L.D.'s hands, and now that the organization has fallen, his son is no longer protected. Skye was the one who promised to keep his kid safe, so that's adding some interesting drama as well.

Then we have the TAHITI project reveal. At first, I was a bit annoyed. It seemed like a retcon to let Fury off the hook for what he did to Coulson. But actually, I sort of like it. The idea that Coulson himself is implicated in his own ignorance. What does that say about culpability? And although the episode didn't come right out and say it, we can now imply that Skye might be in danger, too. After all, she knows about the drug inside her, doesn't she?

I'll leave it there. I'm eagerly awaiting the next one!

9/10