On the newest Agents of SHIELD, we finally get to do what they were hinting at in the season premier, as we “Meet the New Boss.” In the opening, it’s what seems to be a typical “kid having a nightmare” scene. Except the kid’s father ends up seeing the ghost that’s troubling the boy, and then Dad ends up seeing visions much like the Asian gangsters and even Agent May did last episode. Clearly, there’s more going on than a child’s bad dream.
Continuing the trend of beginning one episode right where the last one ended, “.380″ starts with Daredevil on the roof of Metro General, with far too many ninjas scaling the walls. Daredevil is good, but this is long odds even for him.
“The Man In The Box,” which wasn’t at all about what I thought it would be, opens with the police going through the strange underground area that Daredevil found last episode. Of course, somehow or other, the responding detective is Mahoney. He is starting to feel like the only cop who really works in Daredevil’s New York, all the rest being extras who just fill space in the background. Daredevil shares some information with him, suggests they keep the victims off the grid for now, and then limps off, looking horrible.
Daredevil continues the success of its second season with the ninth episode, “Seven Minutes in Heaven.” A good bit of the episode shows how we got to the point the last one stopped at- the meeting of Wilson Fisk and Frank Castle. It does a fine job of showing how manipulative and ruthless Fisk is, and how incredibly dangerous Castle is.
The eighth episode of Daredevil’s second season, “Guilty as Sin,” shows things getting worse on just about every front for everyone. As seems to be happening a lot of late, the episode starts exactly where the last one, “Semper Fidelis,” left off. Daredevil and Elektra stand next to their discovery, a truly impressive hole.
Appropriately enough given his background, the episode dealing with the start of Frank Castle, the Punisher’s, trial, is titled “Semper Fidelis.” That is, of course, the motto for the Marine Corps. The opening is a montage of Castle getting ready for his trial, the jury pool being interviewed (and they have some very sharply differing opinions on the Punisher), and the attorneys getting ready. Reyes and Tower are prosecuting the case, Reyes no doubt hoping to grab some good press out of it, and Nelson and Murdock, of course, are the defense team.
The Agents of SHIELD return for a fourth season. They lead off with a lot of changes, and a title that could work on several levels: “The Ghost.” To recap a few points: Lincoln’s dead, Daisy quit and is on some kind of crusade of her own, and sometime in the break, Coulson’s been demoted to agent again. There’s a new director, but whoever it is has made themselves remarkably unpopular with just about everyone.
The second season of Daredevil continues with “Regrets Only,” a phrase traditionally associated with invitations to parties. This makes sense as the episode continues, and the plotlines involving Elektra and the Punisher continue. One thing is for sure- life isn’t getting any easier for the firm of Nelson and Murdock.
Episode five of Daredevil’s second season is “Kinbaku.” This might be the least clear title they’ve done for one of their episodes, but I think I see where it comes from. It’s a split episode, happening in the present and ten years ago, when Matt Murdock met Elektra Natchios. I’m not wild about hero shows doing excessive flashbacks, but it works this time out.
Daredevil’s second season continues with “Penny and Dime,” the fourth episode. I’ve never been a huge fan of the Punisher– he’s not really my type of hero. But this series, and specifically this episode, gives him some depth and range and push him more towards at least somewhat sympathetic anti-hero, as opposed to gun-wielding psychopath. If they can keep the scripts of this quality, the series Netflix announced for him might be a lot more interesting than I initially thought.
ComicBookClog 