TV REVIEW: The Gang’s Back Together in Agents of SHIELD’s “The Dirty Half Dozen”

By Felicia Kudronowicz

This week on Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. we finally got the reunion we’ve all been waiting for in “The Dirty Half Dozen.”

The team might have gotten back together, but that doesn’t mean it was a cheerful homecoming.

The episode starts with Skye and her dysfunctional family. They made it safely back to their secret location, but Skye wants to go back for Lincoln who was left behind with HYDRA combatants. At first they are hesitant to let her go, but Raina who suddenly starts having visions, to go along with that last prophetic dream, sees Skye rescuing him. Skye convinces Gordon to take her back to save him, but to be safe he takes her to SHIELD instead.

Back at the SHIELD base, Coulson is talking to Gonzales for the first time since the “real” SHIELD took over, and naturally, the pair are treading very cautiously around each other. Coulson comes up with a plan to rescue Mike Peterson who we learn was also captured by HYDRA. He proposes a team of handpicked agents, and of course it’s the old gang. Gonzales permits the selection because he doesn’t care if Coulson sacrifices his own people. Just as they are about to leave, Skye appears.

However things quickly become awkward when Ward helps explain the layout of the HYDRA base. Everyone in the room is giving him death glares and he decides to address the elephant in the room. I’ve said it before, but I still feel a lot of sympathy for Ward. He had a really tough upbringing and HYDRA was the only family he really knew. Stupid Joss Whedon always has to make characters so multi-dimensional!

After they talk about Ward being a jerk, they all agree to complete the mission even though no one seems to truly trust him. They make it to the HYDRA base where they pretend to get shot down, but instead land on the base. Skye goes to find Lincoln, May and Coulson go off and Ward and Bakshi head in together. Simmons decides to go after Ward herself with a splitter bomb to get rid of him once and for all, but she gets Bakshi with it instead. Ward is shocked that she would try to murder him and he tells her that she’s really changed. You can see in her eyes that she this statement affects her more than it should.

In the end, everyone makes it out (except Bakshi). Ward decides to leave on his own after he realizes it won’t be easy to regain the team’s trust. He leaves Agent 33 with SHIELD and tells Coulson to give her another chance. SHIELD also has Mike Peterson and Lincoln in their custody. We also find out that Coulson was there to get information from HYDRA’s database. It turns out that HYDRA knew that the scepter of Loki is still out there and Fury might still be alive. We also get a special guest appearance from Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders). She says it’s time to call in the Avengers, which happens simultaneously with another vision of Raina’s that tells her major destruction is on the way.

Overall this episode was action heavy and the highlight was definitely Skye kicking butt at the HYDRA base. She has really come far since that pilot episode. The whole scene with her was not only amazing in terms of her skills, but also the camera work. It was almost like watching a video game. I also loved her Sonic the Hedgehog joke about Raina and her and Ward being snarky with each other. The MVP of this episode was definitely Skye.