History Recap / AgentsOfSHIELDS7E06AdaptOrDie

* AbsenteeActor: Iain De Castecker again does not appear as Fitz. Jemma finally explains to Deke that Fitz is guiding their movements from a hidden place, but if the Chronicoms were to find out where he is, they would kill him, so she's suppressed that knowledge. So while Fitz doesn't [[TheGhost physically appear]], he ''is'' revealed to be the one pulling the strings of the operation, and knowledge of where he is jeopardizes his safety and the mission.

* MeaningfulBackgroundEvent: As Coulson exits the virtual world with Sybil and is prepared to detonate the explosives, we can see in the background someone (presumably a Chronicom) descending the hatch into the ship. The implication is that Coulson would not have had the time to escape the ship before hitting the detonator and really did have no choice but to perform a HeroicSacrifice.

* OhCrap: Daisy gets visibly upset when she hears that Nathaniel plans on harvesting her powers.

!!Tropes in this episode:
* AbsenceOfEvidence: May's empathic abilities allow her to detect Chromicoms by their absence of emotions. Regardless of how well they can simulate them, they no more have real emotions than LMD-Coulson does.

** This seems to happen to Marvel earthquake villains in the comics also [[spoiler:(Avalanche was in traction for some time after a battle with the Hulk ended this way.)]]

* CallBack

* EntertaininglyWrong: Not knowing about TimeTravel, Nathaniel Malick assumes that Sousa's youth is because he's an Inhuman, just like Daisy, and plans on performing Whitehall's experiments on him as well if they don't work with Daisy. Luckily for Sousa, he and Daisy escape and Nathaniel - apparently - dies before that can happen.

* FantasticRacism: While she frames it as TheRightOfASuperiorSpecies, Sybil's argument for why Chronicoms are superior to humans amounts to this; as artificial beings that don't age or die, Chronicoms see mortal beings, like humans, as weak and irrational for fearing death, and thus, they're inferior to the Chonicoms and will inevitably bow to their superiority or simply die out. Coulson [[ShutUpHannibal shuts Sybil up]] with a powerful humanist speech.

-->'''Sousa:''' You wanted to hear my story, right? Right, well... It was... foggy. I can't really remember the hit, but I came to, and my leg was a pulpy mess, and I was completely alone. And then Mike Stephens showed up, and the thing about Mike is he was a resolute ass. He would never shut up. He was always bullying the new guys, stole cigs, but that day, he just kept talking to me. Carried me back from the line. [...] For the next couple of hours, he stayed with me. When the Germans advanced, when the cold got so bad, I thought we would freeze. He just kept telling me "we are going home". And then, at some point, I was on a field stretcher, and Mike wasn't.

** The Chronicoms stealing the memories and personalities along with "stealing" the physical bodies of individuals to convincingly replace them, is exactly like the "Delta" [=LMDs=] in the 1988 ''Nick Fury Vs. S.H.I.E.L.D.'' comic maxiseries.

** Sybil is only seen in a virtual environment in this episode when Coulson interfaces with the Hunter ship. While the ship itself is blown up, Sybil's fate is unknown. Though the promo for the following week's episode mentions that [[TrailersAlwaysSpoil Sybil indeed survived]].

** Daisy purposefully hides a shard of glass ''within'' the skin of her hand, as an improvised weapon. Roughly three years previously (by her chronology) [[Series/{{Daredevil}} Frank Castle pulled a similar trick with a razor blade in his arm]].

* RealityEnsues: The massive blood and spinal fluid loss that Daisy suffered at Nathaniel's hands leaves her comatose at the end of the episode.

* AllYourBaseAreBelongToUs: The Chronicoms are hacking into the Lighthouse's system and try to take over all the agents identities.

** From "[[Recap/AgentsOfSHIELDS5E11AllTheComfortsOfHome All the Comforts of Home]]" while watching Rick Stoner's projection Coulson mentions the Hydrogen Wave Crisis being averted during 1972. May suggests that as the cover story for what really happened.

* DidntThinkThisThrough: Nathaniel takes Daisy's powers only to realize too late just ''how'' powerful she is when his bones crack under constant vibrations he can't control. According to Sybil, his plan only had 22% chance of working anyway.

* EntertaininglyWrong: Not knowing about TimeTravel, Nathaniel Malick assumes that Sousa's youth is because he's an Inhuman, just like Daisy, and plans on performing Whitehall's experiments on him as well if they don't work with Daisy. Luckily for Sousa, he and Daisy escape and Nathaniel -apparently - dies before that can happen.
* EurekaMoment: During his argument with May, Coulson notes that she seems to be showing emotion as she goes on about having to mourn him repeatedly, or at least has learned to imitate it. He then realizes the Chronicoms must have done the same by stealing memories in addition to faces.

* HeroicBSOD: Mack goes through one after finding out Chronicoms killed and replaced his parents and being forced to personally destroy the one that replaced his mother. He's so out of it afterwards that he doesn't even seem to notice the ''Zephyr'' leaving without him and Deke.

* ImprovisedWeapon: Daisy manages to palm (literally, she forced it ''under the skin of her palm'') a shard of glass while being harvested by Nathanial, which Sousa then uses to stab the guard who comes to collect him.

* JustAMachine: How May's attitude is towards LMD-Coulson, much to his frustration.

* MeaningfulBackgroundEvent: As Coulson exits the virtual world with Sybil and is prepared to detonate the explosives, we can see in the background someone (presumably a Chronicom) descending the hatch into the ship. The implication is thus Coulson would not have had the time to escape the ship before hitting the detonator and really did have no choice but to perform a HeroicSacrifice.

-->'''Coulson''': You see, I haven't feared death in a long time.\\
'''Sybil''': Is that so?\\
'''Coulson''': Yeah. The fact is, dying? It's kind of my superpower.

-->'''Coulson''': That's my girl.

-->"I'm where I need to be."

-->'''Sousa''': You wanted to hear my story, right? Right, well... It was... foggy. I can't really remember the hit, but I came to, and my leg was a pulpy mess, and I was completely alone. And then Mike Stephens showed up, and the thing about Mike is he was a resolute ass. He would never shut up. He was always bullying the new guys, stole cigs, but that day, he just kept talking to me. Carried me back from the line. [...] For the next couple of hours, he stayed with me. When the Germans advanced, when the cold got so bad, I thought we would freeze. He just kept telling me "we are going home". And then, at some point, I was on a field stretcher, and Mike wasn't.

-->'''Coulson''': What's the difference between a Chronicom and a human?\\
'''Sybil''': Time. Humans have a limited amount of it, and therefore fear death. They act irrationally to prevent themselves or others from experiencing death. Chronicoms cannot die. Time has no consequence.\\
'''Coulson''': So that's the difference that makes your species more valuable.\\
'''Sybil''': Less fleeting. With a home planet intact, we will exist long after you are gone. Once you realize that, you'll give up, or you'll run out of--\\
'''Coulson''': Time. I would argue that you're wrong about three things, if you don't mind.\\
'''Sybil''': Please.\\
'''Coulson''': First, the difference is sacrifice. Yeah, time is limited, which means sacrifice comes at a real cost. Not just data. Heart and pain and blood and sweat and tears. All the good human stuff. [[{{Determinator}} And we will never give up]].\\
'''Sybil''': You said I was wrong about three things. What's the third?\\
'''Coulson''': Me. You see, [[NotAfraidToDie I haven't feared death in a long time]].\\
'''Sybil''': Is that so?\\
'''Coulson''': Yeah. The fact is, dying? [[BadassBoast It's kind of my superpower]].

** Daisy purposefully hides a shard of glass ''within'' the skin of her hand, as an improvised weapon. Roughly three years previously (by her chronology) [[Series/{{Daredevil}} Frank Castle pulled a similar trick with a razor blade in his arm.

* EntertaininglyWrong: Not knowing about TimeTravel, Nathaniel Malick assumes that Sousa's youth is because he's an Inhuman, just like Daisy, and plans on performing Whitehall's experiments on him as well if they don't work with Daisy. Luckily for Sousa, he and Daisy escape and Nathaniel apparently dies before that can happen.

* EntertaininglyWrong: Not knowing about TimeTravel, Nathaniel Malick assumes that Sousa's youth is because he's an Inhuman, just like Daisy, and plans on performing Whitehall's experiments on him as well if they don't work with Daisy. Luckily for Sousa, he and Daisy escape and Nathaniel dies before that can happen.

** Nathaniel Malick is killed due to [[PowerIncontinence being unable to control the powers he stole]].

* SelfDisposingVillain: Nathaniel Malick's death is ultimately caused by his own PowerIncontinence after trying to harvest Daisy's powers for himself.

* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: The story Sousa tells Daisy to keep her awake revolves around a soldier named Mike, who mouthed off and stole from his platoon, and who stayed with Sousa night and day after the injury that crippled his leg, inspiring Sousa to do the same for Daisy at the end of the episode.

* BeCarefulWhatYouWishFor: Nathaniel says that none of Hydra's main branches interested him, not sacrificing members for a squid alien or taking over the world, but seeing Daisy's powers made him research Inhumans, eventually wanting to gain powers of his own. He decides to take one of the most dangerous powers in existance, and has no idea how to control them, much as Daisy did when they first manifested. This culminates in him demolishing his hideout, killing himself (after he broke almost every bone in his body from the constant vibrations).
* BigBadWannabe: While Nathaniel Malick is a real threat by taking Daisy and Sousa out of commission when they could be an enormous asset at the Lighthouse (and ultimately leaving the former in a coma by the episode's end following his experiments on her), he's still a tiny fry when compared with the danger posed by the Chronicoms, and even ends up possibly accidentally killing himself in the episode's climax.

* ElaborateUndergroundBase: Turns out the Chronicom's time ship has been underground throughout their journey, which explains why the team couldn't find it.

* IChooseToStay: Sousa chooses to stay with the team.

* InsistentTerminology: Coulson is adamant on ''not'' being a Chronicom.

* PyrrhicVictory: Luke is seemingly finally killed, as is the Chronicom Hunter ship, as is Nathaniel Malick, and with both HYDRA and the Chronicoms out of the Lighthouse in 1976 and Project Insight foiled, Stoner gets down to returning things to normal. However, many agents were killed for disguises by the Chronicoms, Daisy is rendered comatose from Nathaniel's experiments, LMD-Coulson sacrificed his life, Mack's parents have been killed in this timeline where he and his brother Ruben are still at a very young age, and his resulting grief over this causes him and Deke to be stranded in time.

* TookALevelInBadass: Coulson and May realize that the Chronicoms are [[TitleDrop adapting]] and can now not only mimic the appearances of those whose faces they steal, but their emotions and personalities as well. The Chronicoms take to using their memory-copying machine, not just the face-stealining hand-held device they had been using so far.

** Sybil is only seen in a virtual environment in this episode when Coulson interfaces with the Hunter ship. While the ship itself is blown up, Sybil's fate is unknown.
*** Though the promo for the following week's episode mentions that [[TrailersAlwaysSpoil Sybil indeed survived]].

* WhamLine: May telling Mack that she doesn't feel anything after Mack's father touched her, revealing that he is a Chronicom too.

* BigBadWannabe: While Nathaniel Malick is a real threat by taking Daisy and Sousa out of commission when they could be an enormous asset at the Lighthouse (and ultimately leaving the former in a coma by the episode's end following his experiments on her), he's still a tiny fry when compared with the danger posed by the Chronicoms, and even ends up accidentally killing himself in the episode's climax.

* KillAndReplace: The Chronicoms are systematically replacing S.H.I.E.L.D. agents, copying their memories to make their simulations more convincing.

* SuperhumanTransfusion: Nathaniel is able to use Daisy's blood and spinal fluid in conjunction with Whitehall's research to gain her powers, but he can't control them and it's hard to say if it's permanent.

* TookALevelInBadass: Coulson and May realize that the Chronicoms are [[TitleDrop adapting]] and can now not only mimic the appearances of those whose faces they steal, but their emotions and personalities as well. Fittingly, the technology the Chronicoms are using to accomplish this has changed as well, going from a simple hand-held device that steals faces to a large, table-sized medical-like apparatus.

* AbsenteeActor: Iain De Castecker again does not appear as Fitz. Jemma finally explains to Deke that Fitz is guiding their movements from a hidden place, but if the Chronicoms were to find out where he is, they would kill him, so she's suppressed that knowledge. So while Fitz doesn't [[TheGhost physically appear]], he ''is'' revealed to be the one pulling the strings of the operation, and knowledge of where he is jeopordizes his safety and the mission.

* NiceJobFixingItVillain: The Chronicom who had replaced Mack's father taps May on the shoulder for gratitude as part of his [[BitchInSheepsClothing ruse]], allowing May's empathic abilities to determine he's an impostor. Though in fairness, none of the Chronicoms are aware of May's abilities.

* SpannerInTheWorks: May's empathic abilities allow her to detect who is a Chronicom and who isn't, allowing her and Coulson to save Stoner before he is killed and replaced by a Chronicom, and later on determining that Mack's parents are really Chronicoms in disguise.