“Farewell, Cruel World!” is episode twenty of season four of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
In the previous episode, “All the Madame’s Men”, Aida’s body in the Framework was badly damaged when Daisy blasted it out of a window from high up inside the Triskelion. However, this doesn’t much concern her. Simmons discovered that the Looking Glass project is intended to create Aida, and others, a new body (Aida wants to be a ‘real girl’) in the real world using Darkhold-tech. Plus, although Fitz is designing Looking Glass inside the Framework – and he’s finished it – it’s actually being created in the real world on a drilling platform belonging to Ivanov. Aida has promised Ivanov a new body as well, and the latter has also discovered the location of Daisy and Simmons’ real bodies, so will be targeting them.
In order to get out of the Framework, all the agents stuck inside are having to help the resistance against HYDRA. This included broadcasting what really happened at the HYDRA enlightenment cultivation centre, using footage from May’s bodycam. It seems that people have believed it as well, so HYDRA’s hold has perhaps been shaken a bit. Not that this is going to matter if Aida manages to successfully create a new body to incarnate in, and thereby remove her programmed limitations and this allow her to kill everyone. In “No Regrets”, Radcliffe told Daisy about a back door, but Fitz’s father seems to be closing in on the information as well. If he fails; well, Fitz has basically told his father that he will have to kill him, in order to appear strong, just as his father raised him to be.
This episode opens ten days ago on board a cloaked Zephyr One as Daisy and Simmons are being plugged into the Framework. Time passes and the Zephyr is almost out of power. It’s suggested that they land to recharge, but they don’t know who to trust. All other non-essential systems have already been turned off to keep the machine keeping Simmons and Daisy in the Framework running. The only thing left is the cloaking device, so this is turned off as well. A bad idea; Ivanov is planning to shoot them down and he just needs to know their location. With the cloaking device gone, this will be possible.
Inside the Framework, there are riots happening against HYDRA following S.H.I.E.L.D.’s hijacking of the broadcast station. Daisy is pleased to see Trip – she didn’t know he was alive inside the Framework and of course Trip doesn’t know who Daisy is or why she’s so happy to see him.
According to Daisy, Radcliffe said that at the back door – which Aida is unable to remove, but that she doesn’t mean that she can’t mess with it – all they need to do is to go through the exit to unplug from the Framework and wake up in the real world again. daisy says that they can’t rescue Fitz either, and neither Mack nor May currently know about the real world.
Coulson tells May, but she demands proof. Mack, on the other hand, is kept in the dark. He’s also really attached to his daughter, Hope. This looks like a potential problem, given that Hope isn’t alive in the real world.
Fitz is still questioning Radcliffe about what he talked to Daisy about. Although violence is used at first, what Fitz then offers is something different. In “Self Control”, Aida killed Radcliffe’s real body, trapping him in the Framework. What Fitz offers Radcliffe is a new body so that he can live in the real world again. This seems a rather attractive idea to Radcliffe.
Simmons discovers from May that Fitz has a good relationship with his father and realises that is why the Fitz in the Framework is such a bad person. So Simmons goes and sees him in order to help turn Fitz around. This does not go to plan and has pretty much the opposite effect to what Simmons intended.
No post-logo scene in this episode and there’s a point when Coulson says something that appears to be referring to an event from The Avengers.