The Asset

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. took a bit of a step forward for me with this week's new episode, The Asset. Though the episode was steadfastly predictable in the way its "oh no, Skye is (not really) selling out our heroes!" plot line played out, it did devote considerably more time to characterization than the previous episodes, and that was a good thing.

It could be interesting to see what they do with Skye next. Her aggressive training at the end of the episode was the visual expression of her now being "committed," but I do kind of hope it's not as simple as that. And I wonder whether this show would dare to go somewhere as dark as, say, the Jayne storyline that played out on Firefly, with Jayne actually turning on the crew. In any case, there's intriguing potential there.

I also can't help but wonder if it's a coincidence that the quality also ticked up when the series stepped out of the shadows of the film franchise a bit. Yes, we were still teased with the mystery of Coulson's death and resurrection (for my money, the "you're rusty" dialogue repeated throughout seemed to be playing with the notion that he's some kind of android or something), but generally the show wasn't going out of its way to mention an event from one of the movies at every turn. Nor were there any cameos from movie characters this week.

A final thought on this episode -- the teaser and early scenes set in "Sterling, Colorado" were good for a laugh. Yes, the background depicted did look rather plausibly like the Colorado Rockies. (Seems likely it was actually shot in Vancouver, though.) But half a second with a map would tell you that Sterling, located in almost the northeastern corner of the state, is nowhere near the mountains. The backdrop there wouldn't look anything like what was shown. (Though they did seem to wink at themselves a bit with the cowboy and Old West jokes a bit later.)

Overall, the show is beginning to move in an encouraging direction.