Principia

The newest Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episode was a sort of return to the old formula we haven't seen in some time: the whole gang goes on a caper. Said caper was aboard a ship floating a mile up in the sky, so the more current science fiction thrust of the show was definitely there. Still, it was generally a more straightforward episode that we've had of late.

The caper involved teaming up with Jake Busey, of all people. Usually, he's the guy you cast to play obnoxious and/or crazy, so there was a little bit of me waiting for the other shoe to drop here. It was a pleasant surprise to me that it did not double-cross the team, that the character was purely about needing a new ally, and rounding out Mack's past by telling us about "Candyman" and "Mackhammer."

That Mackhammer bit, by the way, might just have led to the funniest joke Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has ever done. When Coulson said, "Mackhammer.... you can't touch this," I roared. Maybe the writers retro-engineered the name from that joke, but however they got there -- props. And speaking of jokes, the characters are moving onto a place where they can crack a few about Yo-Yo's predicament, and it's nice to see levity permeate the proceedings more again.

The writers have also been having a lot of fun with Deke. They've made a small but effective tweak to his character. He's less self-assured than he was when we met him, with his lack of knowledge about his new time period serving as a means to make him more innocent and childlike. Being childlike, of course, is very much the point, so that we can get fun banter between him and FitzSimmons now that we know he's their grandkid. Deke knows it now too, and I imagine it won't be long until we get the opposite of the cliche, enraged "you're not my Dad!" moment, when Deke reveals what he knows.

But I almost enjoyed more the villainous component of the hour. First, we tracked Alex as we learned about his new power -- perfect recall of everything in his life. The episode effectively presented this as a double-edged sword, playing up the dark side of what that would be like. Second, the episode fleshed out Ruby a good deal more, doing for her character what I wished had been done before she maimed Yo-Yo. She now feels to me like a more credible villain from which we should expect great (diabolical) things.

Overall, I'd give the episode a B. And this intriguing season keeps humming along.