Violet recaps of Season 4 Episode 20 of Agents of SHIELD, titled Farewell, Cruel World!, where the agents in the Framework try to find the backdoor so they can get back to the real world! Following the recap, both Violet and Josh share their thoughts about the episode.
- His thoughts on Farewell, Cruel World!, Episode 420 of Agents of SHIELD
- Her thoughts on Agents of SHIELD, Season 4 Episode 20: Farewell, Cruel World!
Flashing back to 10 days ago, we see when Simmons and Daisy first went into the Framework, with the help of Yo-Yo and some other SHIELD agents, while on the zephyr. However, running the Framework is draining the zephyr’s power. They have turned off as many things as they can, and as a last resort, they turn off the cloaking.
Meanwhile, in the Framework, Daisy is excited to see Tripp — forgetting that he doesn’t know who she is here. Simmons pulls Daisy aside and catches her up about AIDA trying to create a human body for herself in the real world. Daisy tells Simmons about the backdoor out of the Framework that Radcliffe told her about.
Daisy notices Mack and his daughter, Hope, leaving. But she stops him and asks him to go on a mission with them. With Hope’s prodding, he agrees. Meanwhile, Coulson tells May about this world not being real, but she seems skeptical.
Over at HYDRA, Fitz goes to Radcliffe’s cell and questions him. He also tells Radcliffe about the machine that could build him a new body in the other world. Radcliffe realizes that it was the result of the Darkhold. Radcliffe admits that Daisy is looking for a way out.
When Simmons talks to May, she finds out about Fitz’s father, Alistair Fitz. Simmons then takes it upon herself to go to Alistair’s place and points a gun at him. She tells Alistair that Fitz is in danger, and tells Alistair to call Fitz and tell him to come here alone. Alistair makes the call, but also warns him that the fugitive is there and to bring all his men. He throws the phone at her, distracting her, then begins to choke her. On the other end of the line, Fitz hears a gunshot. We see Alistair laying on the floor, and Simmons fleeing.
When Daisy asks May and Coulson if they know where Simmons is, May says she went to see Alistair Fitz. Daisy says they can’t leave without Simmons, but May isn’t worried about her.
Fitz, Radcliffe, and some HYDRA soldiers show up at Alistair’s place and find his dead body. Fitz demands that Radcliffe lead him to Simmons, where he intends to kill her.
In the real world, the zephyr detects Russian aircraft heading toward them.
In the Framework, Simmons returns to SHIELD HQ and tells them what happened. Simmons is devastated that Fitz won’t come with them now, that they’ve lost him.
Over at HYDRA, Ophelia learns about Alistair’s murder. She has someone tell Fitz that she wants him to abort the mission and return. However, Fitz refuses to return until after he finds his father’s murderer.
Daisy, Simmons, Coulson, May, Mack, and Tripp fly over to the location of the backdoor exit. However, Daisy has to convince Tripp that he needs to stay there. After Daisy says her goodbyes to Tripp, they find the coordinates of the backdoor — it’s located in molten steel.
Ophelia learns that Fitz isn’t coming back, so she tells the doctors to proceed with the plan to transfer her over into a human body in the real world. We see the machine beginning to form the body in the real world.
Mack is upset at Daisy for taking him away from his daughter and taking him on a wild goose chase. Daisy realizes she can use her powers to quake through the molten steel to get to the backdoor. But HYDRA shows up and gunfire is exchanged, distracting them for a few moments. They take the soldiers down, and Daisy is in fact able to quake through to find the backdoor. Coulson goes toward it, ready to jump in, but he gets shot by more HYDRA soldiers who have come in. They get rid of those soldiers too.
May runs to Coulson’s side, as he lay bleeding. He asks her to take a leap of faith and go through too. Then he leans back and falls down into the backdoor. As he does so, the Framework is temporarily disrupted, and everyone in the room is able to see that this world is not real.
Coulson wakes up in the real world and implores May to jump. A few moments later, May wakes up. Coulson picks up a sharp weapon and moves to stab it into AIDA. Meanwhile, AIDA’s body is almost fully formed.
Back in the Framework, Fitz finds Simmons, and points a gun at her. She tries to explain the truth to him, but as far as he’s concerned, she murdered his father and has been out to destroy him and Ophelia this whole time. He tells her to get on her knees, but when she doesn’t, he shoots her in the leg. She tells him she loves him, but Fitz holds the gun to her head and tells her to say to him, “I am nothing to you.” She doesn’t, and waits for the gunshot. But Radcliffe shoots the HYDRA soldier who was guarding him, which distracts Fitz for a moment, allowing Radcliffe to take hold of him, and throw him into the backdoor.
Simmons goes through and wakes up in the real world, where the zephyr is under attack.
Daisy tells Mack it’s his turn to go through, but when he learns that Hope is not alive in the real world, he decides he would rather stay — even though he knows this world is not real. He says Hope is real to him. Daisy tries to tell him that people in the real world really care about him, but he says to tell them he’s sorry.
Daisy wakes up in the real world on the Zephyr and tells Yo-Yo the bad news that she wasn’t able to save Mack.
When Fitz wakes up in the real world, with Coulson and May, Fitz is devastated when he realizes what he’s done, though Coulson tries to comfort him, saying that it wasn’t his fault. Meanwhile, AIDA’s human body has completed. We see her robot body decapitated on the floor. AIDA moves toward Fitz, who also approaches her, and she implores him to be with her. Coulson and May realizes that AIDA is just a human like them, and tell Fitz to move so that May and take the shot. But he doesn’t move, and AIDA grabs Fitz, and they disappear into thin air.
Back in the Framework, Mack returns to SHIELD HQ, where Tripp is keeping watch over a sleeping Hope. He is surprised that Mack has returned. Mack lets him know that everyone else made it through. After Tripp leaves, Mack tells Hope that the others aren’t coming back, and they went to a place like Kansas in The Wizard of Oz. Hope asks if they’re going to Kansas too, but Mack gives her a hug and says everything he needs is right there.
Her Thoughts on Agents of SHIELD, Season 4 Episode 20: Farewell, Cruel World!
“Wow” is what I have to say about this episode. Just WOW. So good! As the kids would say, it game me “all the feels.” ALL. THE. FEELS. Agents of SHIELD once again did not hold back on delivering a powerfully emotional episode. With all the agents (except for Mack, who chose to stay) making their return to the real world from the Framework, it almost felt like a season finale. The final scene of AIDA disappearing with Fitz felt like a huge cliffhanger, and I’m glad we only had to wait a week rather than several months to see what happens next.
I guess the question is how was AIDA able to do that? Well, with her being able to build her own body, and her knowledge of Inhumans, it makes sense that she would have the knowledge and power (thanks to the Darkhold) to make sure that the body she built for herself was capable of doing things beyond a normal human’s capabilities and having Inhuman powers. Why not? So of course she has the power to teleport. The next question is, what other powers does she have?
The good news for the agents that woke up is that they all seem to remember who their real selves are. The bad news is that they have to deal with the knowledge of how they affected people in real life as a result of what they did in the Framework – especially causing the death of Mace. Fitz’s reaction to AIDA, despite having his memories return, was a little odd. Where was his mind at that point? I can only imagine that waking up from the Framework is like waking up from a vivid dream where you actually remember everything that happened, and while in that dream you became really close to (or angry with) someone, so when you wake up you still feel the lingering feelings of that closeness (or anger), even though you know that what happened in the dream didn’t really happen in real life. Fitz saw AIDA (“Ophelia”) just moments after waking up, so he was struggling to reconcile his real life feelings and knowledge with the lingering feelings from the dream of love for Ophelia, and anger toward Simmons for killing his father.
Another thing I’m wondering about is will Mack indeed stay in the Framework permanently? Or is this just temporary? Will the SHIELD team (especially Yo-Yo) go back for him? It was a bit curious that Daisy didn’t specifically mention Yo-Yo to Mack to help convince him to go back to the real world, but then, Mack doesn’t actually remember Yo-Yo, and at this point I’m not sure there’s anything that anyone could say to tear him away from his daughter. I don’t want to lose Mack anymore than the SHIELD team does, but I can understand his decision. Hopefully we’ll be able to get him back. I guess it all depends on whether the show is done with the Framework now that everyone aside from Mack is back.
In any case, I’m excited as always to see what happens next!
His Thoughts on Agents of SHIELD, Season 4 Episode 20: Farewell, Cruel World!
COMING SOON
Scenes from Agents of SHIELD, Season 4 Episode 21: The Return
Preview of Season 4 Episode 21 of Agents of SHIELD
I thought this was a great episode. It was especially touching to see Mack’s relationship with his daughter. However, I was still surprised by Mack’s decision to remain in the framework. He always seemed to be the most grounded of the team. As hard and emotional decision as it would have been, I thought for sure that he would have chosen not to remain in a virtual world. I wasn’t surprised by Fitz’s actions. It’s been clear from the start that he’s had a thing for AIDA.