If you would like to read a recap of last week’s episode, click here. In what was the best episode this season so far, we finally saw the team come together to find the Darkhold. How long with it last? Who knows. I’ll just enjoy it while it lasts. There is still one more episode before Doctor Strange will be released next Friday so we’ll just have to wait and see how it will impact the series.
The episode starts off with Lucy and Joe before the accident and enter a basement. They appear to be looking for something. Lucy notices the light shining differently around a certain area so she and Joe begin to dig underneath. They find a book wrapped in a cloth underneath a floor title. It is the Darkhold. Once they open it, the pages are blank until writing appears. It appears to be written in German. They believe that the book is testing them. This was a dream and Joe wakes up.
Coulson and Mack are there and attempt to ask him where the book is. He seems to be affected by the ghost sickness. Thinking about the book is elevating his heart rate but he reveals that he buried the book where he found it. He concedes that Lucy has probably found it and then we go to now ghost Lucy finding the book. Joe dies. The book does not cooperate with Lucy.
Back on the Zephyr, Coulson is explaining why he’s not told Mace about their mission. He doesn’t trust him and the less people that know, the better. Especially since it is in the hands of a pissed off, mad scientist ghost. Mack thinks that they should take another crack at Eli. Robbie warns them that Eli won’t talk to them but this time Mack isn’t going to give him a choice. Mack tells Coulson that Fitz’s ghost antidote may be ready but Coulson wants it perfect first. Robbie wants to go with them but they refuse.
Robbie tells Daisy that he wants off the plane so he can do things his way. This is personal for him. She gets him but if he needs answers, he has to trust Shield. She keeps herself at a distance because it is best for everyone.
Fitz’s antidote is ready. Simmons is upset with Fitz. She doesn’t want to hear from him seeing that her lie detector test today. She doesn’t like all the stuff he’s kept from her with Daisy and Robbie and the whole Aida thing. Fitz wanted to tell her about Aida because he thinks that she would find her fascinating. Both argue semantics while Simmons calls her an it. She is worried about the test since she has a hard time keeping secrets.
At the prison, Coulson wants to know what it was like when May died. She doesn’t really have much to say other than it didn’t feel like a trip to Tahiti. They talk to the warden but May notices something off when he begins to attack them. He is also affected by the ghost sickness. May quickly disposes of them but Lucy has also gotten to the guards, making them attack Coulson and May as well.
Coulson sends Mack a distress signal. He forms a pair of teams led by him and Daisy where Daisy’s team went after Coulson and May and he would go for Eli. Robbie convinces Mack to let him join his team and go after Eli. Mack is worried about the Daisy and her condition. If she uses her powers too much, it may shatter all the bones in her body. Fitz arrives with cases of antidotes. When he shows Mack how it works, Mack is worried about the three needles.
Simmons is in the middle of her lie detector test. She does well until she is asked if she received any sensitive information deemed worthy to report. She tries to talk herself out of it but then Mace comes and asks for her.
Fitz is tracking the ghosts from the Zephyr but they are hard to find because they are ghosts. Robbie notices a prisoner that he recognizes. Mack stops him and pulls him away. He wants him to stay under control. Daisy frees Coulson and May. Coulson asks some agents to cure some of the prison staff so he can get them on their side. They then notice several Watch Dogs who happen to be prisoners. Lucy releases them as a distraction. The only way for Fitz to open the gate is to open all the doors in the cell block, releasing all the prisoners in the area (how convenient).
Mace tests Simmons loyalty because he needs her help to debate Senator Nadeer. He needs scientific facts from her so he gets her to communicate with him in his ear and tell him what to say. Robbie tells Mack that he doesn’t want Eli to know about his “Ghost Rider” side so he’ll try to keep it under control. As soon as that happens, a bunch of ghosts show up and then Robbie kills one. Another one gets to Mack not too long after but he injects himself with the antidote.
Mace is about to begin the debate. Mace handles himself until Nadeer blindsides him by bringing up the prison where he claims that Shield has it under control. Coulson, May, and Daisy are being chased by prisoners through a cafeteria but at the exit, Daisy locks herself in and decides to take them on so they can get away. Daisy starts beating up on them while Coulson asks Fitz for another way to get back in.
Mack is okay and he and Robbie got to Eli. They tell him what is going on and that Lucy has the book and he decides to go with them. Daisy is still beating up on the prisoners. Mace continues to handles himself but when she attacks him personally, he takes out his earpiece and reveals to the world that he is an inhuman and that his motivations are personal.
Fitz has found another way in for Coulson and May. Coulson asks May again about her death experience. She says she saw him. Daisy gets roughed up by some prisoners and soon after, Coulson and May show up and save her. Lucy gets to Eli’s cell and is mad that she missed him. Mack saves more guards while he gets Robbie to escort Eli out. Robbie spots the prisoner from earlier and asks Eli to go out alone. Robbie confronts him about attacking him and Gabe when they were younger. He tells him that the attack was a job and not a hit but he doesn’t know who hired him. He reveals that everyone else involved has been killed (but we know Robbie did it). Robbie turns into Ghost Rider and disposes of him.
Authorities arrive at the prison. Coulson and the others are outside and Coulson asks Mack where Eli is. He says that he was with Robbie but then Robbie comes out alone. Robbie thought that he went outside. We then learn that Lucy got to him and takes him in an ambulance.
Mace feels better since his poll numbers went way up after the interview but still wants Simmons to retake the lie detector test. Simmons confronts Mace about the incident that made him famous in the first place and that it didn’t happen the way he says it did, using his own words against him. Mace allows her to skip the test.
May confronts Daisy about her behavior earlier and that shutting herself from others so she doesn’t bring anyone else down but it doesn’t work. Primarily because Coulson wouldn’t allow it. He plucked May out of her funk and he cares too much about Daisy. She brings up the fact that Lincoln wouldn’t want her to kill herself either. Daisy tells May that she promised that she would help with this mission but she would leave after.
Fitz caught Lucy and Eli leaving on camera. Lucy has Eli somewhere and wants him to read the book for her. She wants herself fixed and to finish what she started. Eli appears to get consumed by the book.
Nadeer and Mace are meeting in a car. She confronts him with video footage from the prison. It shows Shield working with Daisy the fugitive and with Robbie who is a known murderer (or at least Ghost Rider is). She blackmails him with it saying that she’ll leak it to the press but the episode ends as she is about to tell him what she wants.
Overall, this was another good episode, showing the team in action. The ghost subplot was boring at first but as we got to learn their plan, they became more interesting even though the special effects with them are not the best. The action here was okay but they could’ve done more. Watching Robbie deal with staying in control of himself was compelling and getting more background on Mace was great. I can’t wait to see the extent of how Simmons is involved with him and maybe get some past history and how he’ll handle Nadeer’s blackmail of him.
Score: 8/10
If you liked this, please read my other reviews here and don’t forget to follow me on Twitter, follow me on Instagram, and also like me on Facebook.
The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.