Now that we know that the mysterious symbols in Coulson's head were a city layout, we finally understand why he was having such a hard time.
He had the equivalent of Dora The Explorer's singing map in his head.
Can you imagine trying to sleep with all the racket going on ?
"I'm the map, I'm the map, I'm the map, I'm the map, I'm the map !"...
...over and over constantly.
Phew ! Tough guy Coulson for not letting that send him round the bend!
So we have a map of the city but no location for it, what to do, what to do. I can see a complicated plan involving a watch, sattellites, Australia, Fitz and six minutes coming on.
Well...the guys are good at this sort of thing, so it'll run like clockwork and there won't be any nasty surprises naturally.
But let's put that aside for a moment and look at the other things going on.
Where to start..
Skye's father is back this week, and having had a little lie down and a bit of a chill-out, isn't pulverising HYDRA agents on sight.
In fact he's being very civil.
In an exchange about the Obelisk/Diviner with Daniel Whitehall, he has plenty to say. Unbeknowest to the S.H.I.E.L.D.crew the good doctor seems to know what the Diviner is, what it is for and how and where best to use it. Daniel Whitehall wants to know what the price for this info is...
And we learn a lot about Daniel Whitehall in this episode too. His real name, what happened after his capture, what he was doing with the Obelisk in 1945, and how he managed to escape the ravages of time.
Then we have Ward, who has located his sibling. You can feel the love instantly. The two of them get together over a coffee to laugh about old times.
You can tell that last bit is a lie.Right?
We've got Fitz trying to learn a technical fix that has to be performed against the clock.
And we've got the interrogation of the unsavoury Mr Bakshi by Morse.
Actually, there seem to be a lot of tense conversations this week, with a real highlight being a flashback to Whitehall's captivity and his battle of wits with Peggy Carter. He wants to use his knowledge of the rare artifacts he has and the technical/medical knowledge it has given him as a bargaining tool. Carter has seen the files and film footage of the experiments and wants him to rot.
With Coulson in mission mode, we have globe hopping and unexpected people turning up in unexpected places. Trip ends up shot, the bullet wounds become a lesser problem a few seconds later.
Ward expertly breaks down his brother to get what he wants. He now seems to have completed his transformation from charmless bastard to complete bastard.
Fitz recovers some of his mojo.
Morse pushes her prisoner too far, with more than one unexpected result.
Lots of plot this week, with a definite coming together of the pieces. Characters cross paths and they all seem to be pointing at the same thing, the location of the mysterious city. There may be different motivations here but it looks like it’s going to be a big pile -up.
One gripe though. The makeup that shows Daniel Whitehall as old isn’t very convincing, it makes him look like a man wearing unconvincing old person makeup.
And just to make sure we get our quota this week,we have , experimentation on humans, mental cruelty, physical abuse and vivisection. Just in case you were missing the torture.
It’s up there with the best of the series episodes so lets hope it hasn’t peaked too soon.