Agents Of SHIELD Season 6, Episode 1 “Missing Pieces” Recap And Review

It’s been almost exactly one year since the Season 5 finale. You can read up on it here.

The team has gone through some changes since we last saw them. They lost a leader and while they’re in the process of rebuilding SHIELD, members of the core team are separated literally across the galaxy.

Warning:There will definitely be spoilers for Season 6, Episode 1 of Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD, “Missing Pieces,” below.

(All images courtesy of ABC Studios).

Lost In Space

Fitz is in in a ship in space, in his cryo unit with Enoch watching over them. Unfortunately the ship is attacked and sliced in half.

A year later, a SHIELD team consisting of Daisy, Simmons, Piper, and Davis are in space in a modified quinjet searching for Fitz. Landing on an alien planet, they are told they have violated a galactic treaty. When Daisy meets them, they scan her and registers as “Quake” in their system. She quakes their guns apart and they question the leader. Eventually he admits he purchased Fitz’s damaged ship for salvage. Inside they find Fitz’s empty cryo unit with a little blood inside.

The others are concerned for Simmons. They’ve been on the search for about four months. When Simmons lays inside the empty unit, she sees an alien inscription on the hardware and figures Fitz must have gone to the planet the unit was made in order to get re-frozen. She wants to go there except it’s out in deep space. The others insist they head back to Earth to regroup and replenish their supplies.

Their discussion is cut short as a giant Confederacy ship is nearby and fires upon them. They attempt to fly away, but their front shields are down. They have to set the coordinates to make a jump to Earth. Simmons reveals she already set the coordinates for deep space and saying “Sorry,” pulls the lever.

Restructuring SHIELD

SHIELD is operating out of the lighthouse seen last season. There are a lot of agents under Mack’s command and separate teams awaiting an unknown energy fluctuation. The incident occurs in a park in Indiana. A rough looking guy forces his way through a playground wall after a shimmering disc appears. A second guy attempts to go through and gets stuck halfway.

May brings in a potential new science advisor–Doctor Marcus Benson, a former teacher/colleague/friend to her ex-husband Andrew. He’s not sure if he wants to be part of SHIELD and has no interest chasing bogeymen. Looking over the guy embedded in the wall, he notes the guy isn’t just partially in the concrete, he has components of concrete within him. The guy suddenly comes to and says, “It’s coming,” and drops a timer device. They fear it’s a bomb, but it gives coordinates of the next anomaly point.

A Strange Visitor

SHIELD agents arrive outside the Museum of Natural History in Muncie, Indiana. The three other visitors are there as well, waiting for the arrival of Sarge. The woman of the group acts as a decoy, claiming someone inside has hostages. There’s a huge explosion which catches the agents off guard. With ringing ears, they try to make sense of what happened.

Suddenly, a large truck drives through the smoke, plowing through several SHIELD vehicles. The driver exits, and it appears to be Coulson. He tells an agent to let the woman visitor go, but the agent is confused because he recognizes Coulson as part of SHIELD. The new fellow says he never heard of SHIELD and shoots him.

What About Fitz?

Elsewhere, a man is seen from behind working on some sort of tool. Someone pounds on the door and yells in an alien language. The man answers back in the same language and injects something into his neck. Turning around, his eyes have a silver glow, and he says, “Let’s do this.”

Thoughts

Agents of SHIELD always manages to raise the stakes each season. This premiere episode follows the pattern of catching viewers off guard. Starting out with some of the characters out in space was pretty unexpected, even though some of last season took place in the future and sort of in space.

We may not have the same time jump as in Avengers: Endgame, but we do see a passing of time. It is fitting since time has passed for viewers. Part of the fun will be finding out what happened during that time.

The big mystery is: Who is Sarge? Why does he look exactly like Coulson? My first thought was he could possibly be a Skrull since Coulson was in Captain Marvel. I did ask Clark Gregg at WonderCon (here at 3:39) if there would be any Skrulls in this season and he said no. Having Gregg as the “enemy” feels a little reminiscent to Brett Dalton turning evil, then getting killed and possessed by Hive. This clearly not the same thing but it just has a similar vibe. The characters and viewers will have to adjust to seeing the antagonist having the same appearance as the heart and soul of the team.

It’s unfortunate that we’ll have a shorter season. That means things will have to go at a much faster pace in order to complete the story. We should also be thankful we have a sixth (and seventh) season season. We have a bit to think about until next week’s episode.