Agents of SHIELD Rewatch: S1E6 “FZZT”

Oooooooh girl.  You know what time it is.  It’s time to get zapped.  I love this episode.  This was the first episode that let me know that this team of actors really had some range.  We get some emotional moments from the comic relief characters and it pays off in a big way.   This post is going to be longer than usual.  I’m going to be picking out smaller details of note. ^[1]I’m also trying out footnotes?  For non-sequiturs. We’ll see if it sticks There is a lot to love here.   This episode has everything: May offering a cookie, a search for a scented candle, bickering best friends, electro-static events,  a showcase of acting chops,  an impromptu skydiving session, tears, so many tears. So lets milk it

A boy scout troupe is telling ghost stories around a campfire. Mr. Cross, the scout leader, says he hears a humming sound and walks ominously into the forest.  The kids are like “haha he’s just trying to spook us” but then a cup starts floating in the air beside them! Then Mr. Cross screams in the distance! The boys take cover in a truck as a bolt of lightning sparks around the camp and rips the car battery out of the vehicle!   They go searching for their leader and find him floating in the air. Dead.   Wow.  What a camping trip.  They better trade in the next troupe meeting for a therapy session.

On the Bus,  Simmons is running Coulson though a physical.  He seems to be in tip-top shape…. for a man his age. 

In the lab, Ward is testing out Fitz’s improved Night Night gun.  ^[2]Is this the first time Fitz and Simmons have been apart in two separate scenes? I can’t think of an instance in the first 5 episodes when they weren’t in a scene together. That’s interesting to … Continue reading. Ward is not impressed and says it’s an ounce too heavy.  When he walks out,  Fitz does an iconic impression of Ward; “I’m Agent Grant Ward. I could shoot the legs off a flea from 500 yards – as long as it’s not windy.”  And Skye laughs of course because it was genuinely very funny.  Last episode, Fitz felt betrayed by Skye for secretly canoodling with a Rising Tide hacker, but he is so over that now. She’s apologized and she’s been following orders. Fitz doesn’t care about her ex-boyfriend….  He tries to express to her that they are connected and speak the same language, but Skye thinks he is talking about Simmons.  He tries to deny this, but Simmons comes in and does her own impression; “I’m agent Grant Ward and I could rupture your spleen with my left pinky – blindfolded.”  Good stuff.   My vote goes to Fitz for funniest impression, but it’s close.    Ward comes in and Simmons says that “poor silly Fitz” left a dummy round in the pistol.  This is a lie, but Ward tests the gun again and says it’s good now.  They all have a lil chuckle.  Aw friends.

We are out at the scene of the opening incident.    Skye is shadowing Ward, but he’s like ‘stop smothering me.’  They see the floating body of troupe leader Adam Cross.  Simmons says it’s sad, but amazing. No one has any idea what could cause this floating effect.  FitzSimmons notices a hole in Cross’s head.  Simmons gets a close-up look and the body sparks.

Skye is looking up background info on the victim.  Coulson and Ward show up just when she finds something because they can track her every movement because of the bracelet thing. ^[3]I’m not at all sure how this bracelet tracking tech works, but I don’t really care  Adam Cross was a good dude. He volunteered lots of places.  The guys say “you’re missing something. Dig deeper.”  And Skye walks off.   Then Coulson starts worrying that they’re being too tough on her…. What?  You said ‘dig deeper’ its fine, dad. Your daughter was grounded for a reason. She’ll make it through this very minor punishment you’ve given her.  But it’s cute that Coulson is worried about it.  

Simmons is performing an autopsy.  Fitz is in this scene but he’s sitting outside the door to the lab.  He doesn’t like the smell of putrid decaying flesh corrupting his pristine workspace…  Ugh (this is a good ugh) then they have this perfect adorable talking-over-each-other bickering about a time when Simmons left a cat’s liver next to Fitz’s lunch.  Love that. Love them. Best friends – with each other and with me. 
Anyway, Simmons shows Coulson that the man’s brain was completely fried by something twice as strong as a lightning strike.    Then Fitz picks up another electro-static event on the satellite.  They rush off.

They track the signal to a farmhouse just after it pulses and disappears.  Inside a barn, they find another floating dead man!  He also has a burn mark on his forehead.  

Skye finds out that the two victims were both volunteer firefighters at the same firehouse.   They were first-responders when the aliens crashed New York (in the Avengers Movie).  

Cut to a suspicious-looking man polishing an alien-looking helmet.^[4]Okay I definitely did not put all these pieces together on my first watch.  This helmet is like the ones the Chitauri (the aliens) were wearing during the New York battle (in the Avengers movie).  … Continue reading  So now we are supposed to realize that all three of these men are probably tied to this alien helmet – which is now sparking electricity just like the dead bodies have been. 

Our team is thinking these guys were all killed with an alien weapon.  They go to the firehouse to try and protect any more possible targets.  The shifty-eyed helmet polisher is there… he’s sweating a lot.  He catches Coulson’s attention by being extremely sweaty and suspicious.  His name is Tony Diaz and he’s “not feeling too hot.”

^[5]I watch all of these episodes by myself.  I do not laugh out loud when I’m by myself unless I am truly taken by surprise by a joke.  Laugh-out-loud moment of this episode was when Skye is talking … Continue reading  Simmons is perplexed by the wound on the man’s forehead.  It appears to be an exit wound! Something shot out of his head when he died! ^[6]are we supposed to know what shot out of his head? I’ve watched this episode a few times now and I still don’t understand what it is that shot out of his head. The satellite is now picking up another signal reporting electro-staticness…. At the firehouse where Coulson and May have gone! Dun dun dun.

Back to the firehouse.  Tony hears humming. Uh oh, we know what that means, but Coulson isn’t onboard yet.  He seems to think Tony is responsible for the other deaths and that he is hiding an alien weapon somewhere.  A frying pan starts floating behind Tony, so Coulson points a gun at him to get him stop!   May finds the helmet in another part of the firehouse.   Tony says he and the first two victims cleaned the helmet a couple of days ago.  Simmons deduces that they must have contracted a virus from the helmet and that is what is killing them.   Coulson puts down the gun and gets everyone to evacuate the building… except Tony who is slowly realizing what is about to happen to him.  Oof this is rough.  You know we saw a happy troupe leader just before he exploded and we saw some guy we didn’t know after he exploded, but now the audience is watching this man realize that he is about to explode.  It’s a really sad and quite tender scene between him and Coulson.  Fitz tries to get him to evacuate with the others, but Phil takes the earpiece out and sits down with Tony.  He makes sure there is no one the man wants to talk to in his final moments.  Phil then shares his own experience… he died too… in the Avengers movie.  And even though he was told he was only dead for 8 seconds, he knows it was longer than that.  He tells Tony that the other side is beautiful.   Tony starts sparking so Coulson slowly gets up and leaves him.  He stands next to May outside as a blue electric glow pulses from inside the firehouse and goes out.  Damn.

 Fitz scans Coulson, Ward, and May to make sure they didn’t catch any electro-static energy from the firehouse.  The Chitauri helmet is being packed up onto the Bus to be taken to ‘the Sandbox’ – a SHIELD research facility in West Africa that specializes in hazardous materials.   Coulson orders Simmons to find a cure for this alien virus they just discovered.

May is suspicious about Coulson having a physical. “you’d tell me if something was wrong?” she asks.

Back in the lab, Simmons is enthusiastically describing the properties of this deadly virus. To me, she comes across as being too excited after such recent dire events, even though they were strangers. But hey, that’s why I’m not a genius biochemist. And then, as she is explaining how the virus spreads through electro-static shock, Coulson notices a metal instrument floating behind her, a sign that Simmons herself has caught the virus. He closes the door to the lab, quarantining her off from the rest of the plane. Not my bff Jemma!

I absolutely adore the short scene that follows. We get 26 seconds with no dialogue, just Fitz and Simmons sitting back-to-back with the glass doors of the lab between them. Fitz is working on a device we don’t yet know the purpose of. They both look worried separately but give an encouraging smile when they look at each other. No lines. just somber music. for 26 seconds.  When a show needs to pack a story into one 44-minute episode, those ‘empty’ seconds really stand out.  

Simmons believes she contracted the virus from the first victim, Mr. Cross.  This gives her approximately 2 hours to find a cure before she brings the whole plane down with her sparky death.  Oh and they cant land because they are over an ocean – of course.

Fitz passes his newly crafted vaccine delivery system through the lab door.  Simmons tries her new anti-serum concoction on a cute white rat, but nope it sparks and floats. We see this is the second rat they have tried this on.  One live rat is left. 

Ward and Skye are watching footage of the lab.  Ward is frustrated that he can’t punch his way out of this one.  There is no person to fight here.  They just have to wait; wait for whatever they are called upon to do.

   Agent Blake ^[7]nah I don’t know if i’m supposed to recognize this dude or not. I do not recognize him. But context clues – he’s clearly a superior of Coulson video-calls in and orders Coulson to drop any infected cargo… any… infected cargo.    Coulson pretends that the call cut out and that he didn’t hear the order.   He is confident that if anyone can cure this virus in such a short amount of time, it is the woman who is currently infected in the flying lab.

Fitz and Simmons bicker through the lab door.  Fitz blames Simmons for dragging him into this ‘flying circus’ though Simmons proclaims this has been the highlight of his pasty life.  The bickering ends when Fitz puts a point to the fact that they have been beside each other for years.  You can see him realize that this could be the end of all that.  Simmons talks the problem out loud once more and they realize that the only being who survived this virus would have been the alien who wore the helmet in the first place.   Fitz rushes to get the helmet  ^[8]I love the way he busts into the containment room to grab the helmet.  He is just so excessively floppy.  It’s an endearing character-defining trait and pushes his way into the quarantined lab despite Simmons’s objections. They’re going to solve this together, “like they always do.” Aw.  It’s a very cheesy moment but quite nice.  

They whip up another anti-serum and the team comes to watch as they administer it to the final rat.   It takes longer this time, but the rat eventually pulses and floats just like the others… oh no.   Simmons composes herself long enough to address Coulson with the request that her father be notified of her death before her mother.  Oof.  Then she asks for the others to leave so she can have a moment alone with Fitz.  He is busying himself with coming up with the next test, but Simmons has already decided it ends here.  She HITS FITZ IN THE HEAD WITH A FIRE EXTINGUISHER and runs out of the lab.  Damn Jemma.

As Coulson is ghosting another call from Agent Blake in the control room, the group is notified that someone is lowering the cargo hold ramp!  I love this shot of Ward realizing he is now being called upon to act. He rushes off to be a hero 

Fitz gets up from the lab floor like “wtf” and notices that Rat #3 is alive! The rat was just paralyzed. The serum worked!  But he turns to find Simmons standing at the edge of the open cargo hold ramp preparing to jump!   She turns towards him for a moment and is then blown out of the plane! Nooooooooooooo!

Fitz grabs the serum and fumbles with a parachute, but Ward the Hero zooms into frame and takes both from Fitz and jumps out like a pro.  He torpedoes down to her, shoots her up with the serum, and deploys the parachute.   Phew  

Up in the principal’s office, Coulson is reprimanding Simmons for her reckless actions… because they would hate to lose her. Aw.

When Ward tells Simmons that he thinks what she did was brave, Simmons admits to Ward that she lied about the ounce being removed from the night-night gun at the beginning of the episode, but Ward already knew that.  He does his own impression of himself “I’m Agent Grant Ward.  I just jumped out of a plane without a parachute on and saved your life”  cute try. But you did have a parachute mostly on – just not buckled.  And the impression isn’t quite right.  But I appreciate the attempt, friend.

May sees Coulson going over his physical results.  She finally gets down to it.  Coulson put himself through the tests because he feels different.  He wants to know what is wrong with him.  She has him open up his shirt to show his scar ^[9]well actually she says “take off your shirt” but he doesn’t take off his shirt. He just opens it up a couple inches.  I am personally disappointed that he didn’t show me the whole … Continue reading ; the scar from Loki’s scepter stabbing him dead in the Avengers Movie.   May says “whether it was 8 seconds or 40, you died…. You feel different because you are different.”    In here there is also a moment when May says “you know how long it’s taken me to – “ but Coulson cuts her off.  A hint to some traumatic past…

Fitz tries to explain to Jemma that he was about to jump out of the plane to save her. She thanks him for being by her side and giving her hope.  She calls him a hero and gives him a lil kiss on the cheek.  We linger on Fitz for 13 seconds after she walks out of his bunk.  I’m telling you, these seconds are precious.

Final stinger. Agent Blake is on the Bus to pick up the helmet. He is mad at Coulson for disobeying a direct order.  Coulson doesn’t care.  Blake gives Lola a little touch on the way off the plane. Get your GRUBBY FINGERS OFF —