'Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.' Recap: 'Hot Potato Soup'

Written by John Edward Betancourt

THIS IS THE EMERGENCY SPOILER ALERT SYSTEM...YOU ARE ADVISED TO READ AT YOUR OWN RISK...

You know, every single time I sit down to watch Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. this season, all I can do is smile. Because holy cow, the show has truly found its stride and every single episode is just delivering on all of the goods, providing us with plenty of action and adventure and jaw dropping moments and I've never seen the plot move this quickly when it comes to this show and last night, was no exception to that rule, and if anything, 'Hot Potato Soup' managed to up the ante by giving us one epic ending...and the return of the Koenig family...

Yes that's right, Patton Oswalt once more donned his bevy of badges to reprise his role as...all of the Koenig brothers in an episode that centered around the fact that Coulson entrusted this clan of doppelgängers with the Darkhold, meaning that Radcliffe and Nadeer's merry band of thugs were after the Koenigs to get their hands on the book and let's leave the plot summary at that, because we have some bigger and more important moments to discuss, starting with the Koenigs because we finally learned so much about this mysterious family last night. For starters, we found out that there are four brothers in the clan, since we met the anti-war Thurston in this episode and we also discovered that all of them were able to get into S.H.I.E.L.D. by way of the fifth Koenig, L.T.; their elder sister and all around bad ass and the whole segment of the show that revolved around them was nothing short of magic because Patton Oswalt is ridiculously talented and it's always a joy to see him bring these characters to life. 

But while that part was a blast, there were some heavier moments to be found in this episode, specifically in that the pursuit of the Darkhold, finally revealed May to be an LMD and I don't think I'm alone in the fact that this reveal was quite the unexpected twist. I wholly expected the May-Droid's secret to remain just that for a lot longer than a handful of episodes, but this show does love to surprise and well...it was a devastating reveal when all is said and done since Phil's heart strings were tugged upon for a brief moment by the May-Droid and you could see the horror in Coulson's eyes once it dawned on him that the woman standing before him was actually an android and it should be interesting to see where the LMD storyline goes from here now that everyone in S.H.I.E.L.D. is completely aware of the fact that May has been kidnapped.

However, the most intriguing and disturbing part of last night's episode, was Radcliffe's storyline and the fact that this man is quickly becoming one evil villain through and through. Sure he may not be a bloodthirsty monster, but good heavens; he faked being a captive and had Billy Koenig threatened with physical harm in the hopes of getting info on the Darkhold and he also had no issues with invading Billy's mind with his machinery to get the necessary intel and at this point, the man is getting outright scary when it comes to how far he will go to get what he wants and to make matters worse...we also met the Superior last night and well, it turns out that he's nothing more than an angry mountain of muscle, but he does have an ugly goal in mind...to kill Coulson, and Radcliffe doesn't seem too concerned about whether or not Coulson lives or Coulson dies...

When all is said and done however, this was one breathtaking episode. Between the hilarious moments involving the Koenigs, to the stunning surprises with May and Radcliffe, this story simply didn't let up and I loved every single second of it. I'm really digging that the show is giving us a far more low key villain, or in this case, committee of villains for the back half of season four. It means that the team has to face a dynamic range of evil, making their plight all the more difficult. Either way, I love that the stories are getting all the more intense and I would hope that now that everyone knows that May is missing that a big time May-hunt is about to get underway to save one of their own. Until next time.

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