TV REVIEW: Coulson Makes a Major Decision For Skye in Agents of SHIELD’s “T.A.H.I.T.I.”

By Felicia Kudronowicz

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. finally returned this week with episode 14, T.A.H.I.T.I., picking up right where we last left off, with Skye being rushed to the hospital after being shot twice in the abdomen.

The situation is intensified when Skye’s doctor announces that things aren’t looking good and that the team should start saying their goodbyes. I can’t help but think that this would have been a much more emotional scene if there hadn’t been such a big break between episodes.

Instead of dwelling on this tragic news, Coulson decides to fight for Skye – by taking her to “Tahiti.” Knowing it was possible for him to successfully come back from the dead, he attempts to find the location from which he was brought back.

May also has a way of dealing with Skye’s prognosis; she goes and beats the crap out of Quinn, her shooter. Coulson meanwhile gives his super secret file to Fitz and Simmons in order for them to find where Coulson received his treatment (hint: it’s not in Tahiti). They find out that all the places in his file are made up. They go through a virtual SHIELD filing system to find a trail that leads to a mysterious mountain location.

The team tries to approach the secret facility peacefully, but the two guards there don’t make it easy. They are forced to break in and a showdown takes place between the two groups with our SHIELD agents coming out ahead. As soon as the mystery mountain guards are killed, Coulson finds a bomb timer counting down from ten minutes. The whole place is going to blow up beneath them if they don’t do something, and fast. Coulson runs to find the medicine to help Skye while Ward tries to disarm the bomb.

Fitz comes running into the room with the medication (called GH) just as Skye is coding. He sticks a syringe full into her, as Coulson runs in yelling not to give it to her. So many mixed signals!

Skye stabilizes but doesn’t wake up. We find out that Coulson found the medicine pumping out of a creepy corpse-looking thing floating in blue goo. Definitely disturbing and difficult to interpret just what was going on there. Either way it’s hard to say if they did the right thing for Skye. Will she come back damaged like Coulson? Would she have preferred to just die? The only thing we know for sure is that Skye is still hanging on!

Hopefully we find out more about Skye’s condition in next week’s episode. While I think this show is thrilling and especially fascinating now that we are finally getting some answers, I also think its schedule is going to make it suffer. People don’t know when to tune in for a new episode and time apart from a show doesn’t always make the heart grow fonder, I think it makes the head get forgetful. Hopefully the upcoming Thor crossover will help bring audiences back in.