Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. S4 Ep1 – The Ghost

It’s finally here, guys: the season four premiere. And IMO, it was worth the wait.

May! I’ve missed you. Nice to see you smile a bit, too.

There’s no “Previously on Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” this time, which is fine with me. Instead, we jump right in with Daisy (dressed much like she used to as a SHIELD agent, rather than the goth getup we saw her in last) tracking down a bunch of bad guys who look to be bank robbers. But it turns out she’s not the only one who’s hunting them. Ghost Rider is, too. He makes short, bloody work of them, while being terrifyingly awesome. ‘Terrifyingly awesome’, in fact, describes all of his scenes in the ep.

The theme of this episode, as stated by both Daisy and Yo-Yo (Yo-Yo! So glad to see her again!), is that “Everyone gets attached to something.” We see that played out in various ways. Daisy struggles to stay detached from everything and everyone, so she can reach her goal of having nothing to lose. Agent Coulson is still attached to Lola, as well as to Daisy and the rest of the people who used to be his team when he was director. He and Mack refuse to stop looking for Daisy, even though the new director has forbidden it. Robbie Reyes, a.k.a. Ghost Rider, is attached to his sweet ride – and more importantly, to his younger brother, who’s confined to a wheelchair. Fitz is attached to Simmons, despite the fact that as the new director’s right-hand woman, she has to report everything to him and so he can’t tell her everything anymore. Like, for example, he can’t tell her about Dr. Radcliffe’s new experiment.

And what is that experiment? Why, it’s AIDA, played by the fabulous Mallory Jansen. She’s the Doc’s life model decoy prototype. That kind of experimentation is seriously illegal after the Sokovia Accords, but Radcliffe – and Aida – insist that she’s not meant to be a weapon (and not like Ultron), and they want to use her for the benefit of humankind. Fitz tells Radcliffe they can’t tell anyone else about Aida – not even Simmons – until “she’s perfect”.

She’s still got glitches to work out, but AIDA’s pretty darn impressive.

A favorite and very effective scene: near the end of the ep, Daisy comes into direct contact with Robbie Reyes and Ghost Rider, instead of just watching him/them from afar. She fights him with her Quake powers, but the Spirit of Vengeance is much stronger. Wondering aloud whether Daisy’s powers mean she has “the devil in” her like him, the Rider defeats her. He has the opportunity to kill her, as he has so many deserving victims already. She even tells him she deserves to die … but he clearly doesn’t believe her, sparing her life. Start to believe it yourself, too, Daisy!

Also, how about that terribly creepy ending?! What is with that woman/possessing force that seems to have taken hold of May? Good thing she seems to be responding more intelligently to the zombie-ish hallucinations than the Chinese bad guys who attacked each other. But will she report what’s going on with her before something awful happens? I guess we’ll find out…

What did you think of the season premiere? Did it live up to your expectations? Let us know in the comments.