Fitz hatches a plan to free his friends.
Tropes:
- Admiring the Abomination: Kasius is very turned on by Fitz's ruthless demeanor.
- And This Is for...: Daisy says "This is for Ben" before launching one of Sinara's spheres back at her.
- Apologetic Attacker: Ben really doesn't want to attack May and apologizes for doing so.
- Asshole Victim: Grill, who's spent all his screentime being a jackass, gets killed by Flint.
- Bond Villain Stupidity: Grill could have easily blown Flint's brains out. Instead, he just watches the giant rock forming, which then crushes him.
- Call-Back: During Fitz's reunion with Simmons, he declares that "the universe can't stop us" and that after all they've been through to be together that their love "is stronger than any curse". It is a far cry from "Many Heads, One Tale" when he lamented "We're cursed! The bloody cosmos wants us to be apart!"
- Casual Danger Dialogue: Fitz and Simmons take the time in the middle of an escape to get engaged, then argue over who actually proposed first.
- Character Death: Ben, Grill, and Tess all get killed in this episode.
- Later Subverted with Tess.
- Chekhov's Gun: While the Vrellnexians were featured prominently in earlier episodes, it is a line from Virgil that they had arrived recently that gets a lot more focus. Here, it is established that Kasius purchased them from one of his contacts (now present in his auction) in order to control the human population.
- Chekhov's Gunman: Flint finally comes into focus here as he undergoes Terrigenesis.
- Continuity Nod:
- The buyers Kasius has gathered offer prices in units, which was the currency established in Guardians of the Galaxy (2014).
- Fitz's cover is as a Marauder, a warrior-scavenger band of multiple races first introduced in Thor: The Dark World.
- At the dinner, Fitz is offered Xandarian snails.
- Curb Stomp Cushion:
- May is completely outclassed by Ben, who can read her every move and isn't suffering from a leg wound. However, May manages to get a good hit in by acting on reflex so he can't read her.
- Daisy's battle with Sinara. While Sinara does manage to give her some trouble and gets a few hits in, it's fairly obvious Daisy has the upper hand, and sure enough she ends up winning.
- Dishing Out Dirt: Flint develops the power to control dirt and rocks, which he uses to crush Grill.
- The Dog Bites Back: After having to put up with his abuses for several episodes, Jemma gets to slash Kasius's throat. Sadly, not fatally.
- Don't Think, Feel: May is only able to successfully land hits on Ben by suppressing her thoughts and acting purely on instinct. This is because he's a telepath.
- Dramatic Irony: Fitz tries to have a covert conversation with Jemma when he first sees her, not realizing that her implant is keeping her from even noticing he's there, much less hearing his proposal. When Kasius interrupts and Jemma is obviously shocked to see him, Fitz realizes his mistake and gets Kasius to shut off the implant under the guise of his servants needing to hear what the guests want. It's Played for Laughs towards the end of the episode, when Fitz takes the time to point out to Jemma that he'd proposed first, only to be met with skepticism.
- Drama-Preserving Handicap: Daisy quakes herself up to the level of the spectator box, ready to get some revenge, but Faulnak manages to get his hands on the inhibitor remote and shuts off her powers before she can do so. If Daisy was running around with her powers and no need to be subtle, stopping the Kree would be child's play.
- Elemental Punch: Daisy's finishing attack on Sinara is a quake-enhanced punch which lays Sinara out on the spot.
- The Exile: Kasius is revealed to be this, though he disputes the characterization. His Inhuman weapon trade is an effort to mend fences with his father for some unspecified transgression.
- Failsafe Failure: The forcefield meant to protect the spectators from Daisy is instead used by Fitz to keep them locked in and prevent them from stopping his rescue of her and Jemma.
- Greater-Scope Villain: Faulnak, Kasius's elder brother and their father's favorite son, enters the story. He has been overseeing the family empire for their father, making him a far greater villain than Kasius, but deliberately distant from the current story's conflict. By extension, their father as well counts as this, as everything Kasius is doing is to gain his approval.
- Human Aliens: Senator Ponarian and Lady Karaba are not human, but their actors don't use any make up, not even red eye contacts like previous examples here. Also, Fitz is pretending to be one. The existence of Human Aliens is quite convenient in that sense.
- Hugh Mann: Enoch poses as a Kree to access the surface elevator, telling the Kree guard who doesn't recognize him "I am a Kree, as I have always been." Since Enoch knows the code, the guard doesn't really question his oddness until it becomes clear Enoch intends to travel to the surface, at which point Enoch ICEs him.
- Kick the Dog: Sinara is forced to fight against Daisy to the death because Faulnak, Kasius's brother, felt a Kree would be a more worthy adversary, and because of Kasius's obvious fondness for her.
- Liar Revealed: Thanks to Sinara capturing May, Kasius learned that Ben lied when he said that Daisy and Jemma were telling the truth about coming alone. Kasius has Sinara execute Ben for it.
- Logo Joke: The Marvel logo at the start of the show lingers a moment longer than usual, even after the red background dissolves into the actual show, where the logo still ends up framed by a red toolbox framed at center screen.
- Lost Common Knowledge: Tacos are completely unknown to the humans of the Lighthouse. Truly, it is a dark future.
- Make an Example of Them: Tess is killed by the Kree and then left as a floating corpse as a warning to those who hid Flint.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Despite having been threatened by him, Flint feels awful about killing Grill, since he was a regular customer of his and even gave him spare tokens from time to time.
- Mythology Gag: An obscure one — the episode title was the name of a short-lived Marvel activity and puzzle comic from 1979-1980.
- Negated Moment of Awesome: Fitz proposing to Jemma literally falls on deaf ears.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Ben gets executed for lying to protect Daisy and Jemma.
- No-Nonsense Nemesis: Sinara, knowing how outclassed she is, sends her spheres at Daisy while the inhibitor is still active and attacks when Daisy tries to talk to her.
- Noodle Incident: Whatever Kasius did to get (not) exiled to Earth is not discussed.
- Out of the Frying Pan: Thanks to some quick thinking by Fitz, May doesn't have to fight Ben to the death. Instead, she'll be exiled to the surface, where death is slightly slower, though Enoch is on his way to rescue her.
- Properly Paranoid: Kasius has a forcefield rigged up for the spectator box, just in case Daisy tries to turn her powers on them.
- The Reveal: Sinara defeated and captured May after we last saw them fighting.
- Slashed Throat: Jemma slashes Kasius's throat.
- Some Kind of Force Field: Kasius protects himself and his audience from potential damage from the arena through a force field that is only visible when powering up and then down.
- Star-Crossed Lovers: Fitz defies this, telling Jemma that the universe can't keep them apart.
- Taken for Granite: Subverted with Flint after his Terrigenesis. It sure looks like it, but Elena just took him away to safety.
- Too Dumb to Live: Grill twice sees Flint throws rocks around with his new power and threatens to shoot him unless he stops. So when Flint spends a good twenty seconds compacting the nearby rock into a massive boulder, he just stands there instead of shooting him. Grill might have been hesitant to kill him, given Flint later states they had a fairly good relationship.
- Took a Level in Badass: Fitz's gets Lampshaded by Daisy when talking to Jemma, though Jemma prefers how he was.Daisy: How is Fitz even here?
Jemma: I don't know! He just showed up out of nowhere with his own space ship.
Daisy: It's a baller move. Not to mention the whole Bounty Hunter look he's rocking.
Jemma: I still prefer him in cardigans. - Villainous Friendship:
- Grill is very pissed about being lied to and getting Zev killed for something he didn't do.
- Kasius seems very worried about Sinara being possibly killed by Daisy, though ultimately his family connections mean more to him than her life.
- Wacky Marriage Proposal: Fitz tries to propose to Jemma while telling her about his plan to free her and Daisy, but Jemma's hearing was turned off. Then Jemma proposes to Fitz while in the middle of escaping from the Kree.
- Wham Line: In-universe, "Boshtok"/Fitz (correctly) deducing that Kasius keeps the humans in line by having them kill each other. As soon as he says it, the other guests go dead silent.
- Wham Shot: Coulson finds Tess hanging dead with a sign around her neck saying "bring the Inhuman."
- Worf Had the Flu: May again. Though she does her best against Ben, being injured on top of fighting a telepath means she's in a losing battle (though she gets in a good hit by using pure reflex instead of normal thought). It's only thanks to Fitz that Ben isn't forced to kill her.
- You Have Failed Me: Kasius has Ben executed when he realizes that the latter lied about other agents coming into the future.
