Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Recap – Episode “Seeds”

By Galen Garner

If you were one of the 6.6 million viewers that tuned in for Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. on Tuesday night then I hope you know what the heck is going on! I was so completely lost in this show that I almost turned it off and resorted to reading a recap myself.

Every week when I think that this show is going to redeem itself by introducing a new character (ex. Torch, Graviton) or actually have an interesting revolution (ex. Coulson’s death) things seem to come unraveled halfway through the show. At least this is the way that I felt after last night’s episode.

In episode 12, Coulson’s team is dispatched to the S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy for nerds that want to do research and development for the top-secret agency. This facility feels more like a crummy junior college than an actual academy for learning about the world’s greatest undercover agency. The team is there to uncover the mystery of a swimming pool that almost froze two cadets to death while playing hooky at night.

This phenomenon is not that big of an interest to Agent Coulson because he chooses to follow a lead with Agent May to Mexico City to uncover more about the secrets behind where Skye came from. The lead they track down turns out to be one of the ex-S.H.I.E.L.D. agents that assisted in delivering Skye to the facility she was left at when she was born. He tells them that Skye is a curse and that she has some kind of crazy superpower that leaves everyone with her dead. I found this rabbit trail to be pretty uninteresting and I can’t image that a leading officer would ever leave his command for such a useless endeavor.

While Coulson and May gallivant throughout Mexico, the rest of the team searches for the reasons behind the mysterious ice water incident. S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy is lame and this comes from many different reasons. First off, the nerdy characters of Fitz and Simmons are treated as royalty at this academy. I would venture to say that even at a prep school the nerdy kids were not cool. Also, the students hang out in a boiler room to get away from the pressures of life at the academy. I just found that aspect stupid and unneeded in this episode. Instead of solving the case, they are popping martinis with college kids.

Eventually while Fitz and Simmons are delivering a speech to a class, one of the students involved in the original freezing incident finds him frozen solid in the middle of the lecture hall. His name is Donald Gill and known throughout the Marvel Comics Universe as the super villain, Blizzard. He is actually a pretty cool character, but in this episode comes across as a scared geeky kid that has no friends.

The episode drudges on to uncover that this Donald Gill is actually in cahoots with another student to sell a “super storm weather” weapon of mass destruction to the billionaire, Quinn. He demands that the students display the power of the weapon by setting it off at the S.H.I.E.L.D. Academy, but instead of watching the destruction he jets off away from the scene. I guess destruction is a strong word here because in the aftermath of this tremendous winter storm there are only a few maintenance guys shown sweeping up leaves.

Coulson and May are the ones to return to the madness to save Donald Gill and whatever the other guy’s name was. Gill is reprimanded for his setting off of the machine and sent to some place called The Sandbox. My guess is this is where the writers for the show get their ideas for each episode because most of them are…well, you get the picture. Also, Coulson tells Skye what he learns about her past and there is some semi-dramatic music that leaves the audiences yawning.

This episode definitely had potential, but there was way too much happening for the flow to be believable or interesting. I wish that the show would return to the following of rogue super heroes like Mike Peterson and head towards the mystery of The Clairvoyant. Those are interesting storylines, not these one-shot episodes that only devote the last minute of the show to the overall story that people want to know more about. This show has to change pace during the offseason or they will quickly fall victim to the unfavorable ratings bear.

___________________________

Follow Brad Gischia on Twitter:  @bamaredsox