One of the episode's three distinct story lines focused on events in the HYDRA base. Hale (sporting new hair and civilian clothes) stepped up her efforts with gravitonium by exposing Creel to it. When the "Absorbing Man" touched the metal that itself had absorbed a person, Creel absorbed part of that man's memories. (Or part of the man himself? I suppose interpretations could vary here.) And while it didn't quite drive him crazy, it did drive him to Coulson's side. After springing Talbot, and after another death and revival (Coulson dies more than anyone we know), two-thirds of the group escaped to a snowy landscape. Out of the frying pan into a very cold fire. I'm not sure I really believed Creel's change of heart here, but the odd and unrelatable circumstances made it hard to judge.
Flying around the world with Robin the seer made up the second plot thread of the episode. Though there was very little narrative momentum here (eventually, they got one clue), the main value of these scenes was in May being forced to confront her role as future mother to Robin. This is a great arc for May. She's far from an emotionless character, but she is someone who has been punished for caring at almost every turn in the past. This story has her reckoning both with her feelings for Coulson and the prospect of motherhood, and she really isn't equipped to process it. I like how this is all testing her. And while Robin's mother Polly hasn't been much of a character, I liked the little moment we got where she acknowledged her fate. I almost expected another little knife twist on her, that Robin's final call to sit with "Mommy" would be for May and not her. Still, a nice thread for the side character.
For me, the strongest material of the episode dealt with Simmons, Fitz, and Yo-Yo as the "Invincible Three." Fitz's darkness (or pragmatism, if you're entertaining your own growing psychopath) seemed to rub off on them all, with Simmons in particular going quite extreme. The "poison shell game" was the pivotal scene of the episode, not because there was actually any tension about Simmons dying, but for the ramifications all around the scene. Not telling Fitz about her plan was one cruel beat; actually testing her invincibility theory for real was another. I do wonder just how outsized Simmons' sense of invulnerability will become before she's taken down a peg. She may indeed be right that she can be as reckless with her life as she wants, but surely this could have consequences for someone else at some point?
But don't touch that dial! We got a quite unexpected "post-credits" style scene that again took us back to season one, this time for a scene between Raina (!) and Ian Hall (!). It really hadn't struck me that Creel was hearing two different voices in his head, but here we got the reason for that. The scene was more notable to me, though, just for having actress Ruth Negga back on the show again for a moment. Since she played a major recurring character of seasons one and two, Negga has gone on to the series Preacher, and received an Oscar nomination for her work in Loving. She's had a good couple of years since Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
With its dark moments and (as always) great jokes, this episode worked much better for me than the last. I give it a B+.
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