It’s been quite a year for the Agents of SHIELD, from writing alien graffiti to reliving a tragedy in Bahrain, adding agents who happened to be divorced to dealing with a rogue agent, battling HYDRA to debating who’s the real SHIELD.

It all culminates in a season finale where Skye has to choose a side in a war between SHIELD and the Inhumans, and it may not be the right one.

 ***** SPOILERS  AHEAD *****

In fact, it’s the worst one. Jiaying (Dichen Lachman) learned too much from being tortured by HYDRA. She’s decided she has to protect her fellow Inhumans by attacking SHIELD, and borrow a few pages from HYDRA’s book. First, she killed Gonzalez last week, and claimed he shot her. Then, Gordon (Jamie Harris) frames SHIELD for an attack by stealing a quinjet. That’s enough to convince Skye SHIELD has turned on her, and she clobbers May, mainly thanks to her shaking skills. She can also take apart guns.

It’s also revealed Jiaying is a succubus. To stay young, she had to absorb the life from victims. She used to be upset by this, but after Cal (Kyle MacLachlan) reassembled her, She wasn’t the same after that.

Raina (Ruth Negga) talks to Skye about her visions, and claims that Jiaying is not meant to lead the Inhumans. She won’t go into much detail about other visions she’s had, minaly because Skye probably wouldn’t believe them. She also says it will be the last time they’ll be talking

Meanwhile, Ward and Kara have Morse somewhere in Spain, Kara wants Morse to admit she gave her up to HYDRA because she didn’t want to break her cover, Morse said it was a tough choice, but she had to make it, and she won’t apologize.

Kara demands Morse apologize, because Ward wants it that way. She admits he has made her a new person, and that’s why she loves him.

Jiaying does a great job convincing Skye to support her, saying that she is trying to protect her people. She’s very close to having Skye on her side. Raina also tells Jiaying that she had hoped to lead the Inhumans, but decides that’s not her role. She is really meant to be an angel that will illuminate others, show them the truth, especially about Jiaying. She won’t get that chance, because Jiaying kills Raina….and guess who is there to see it.

Sadly, Jiaying is forced to knock out Skye, but hopes her daughter will understand.

It’s not long before SHIELD figures out what Jiaying and Kara did, but Coulson says they should hold off on an all-out attack. They also find out Cal was experimenting with chemicals to make him strong enough to protect Skye, The combo included steriods, testosterone and a hint of peppermint. When he flatlines while being interrogated by Coulson, he’s given adrenaline. That makes him the Near-Hulk he always wanted to be, only much wittier. He’s soon convinced to help save Skye.

ALICIA VELA-BAILEY (ABC/Mitchell Haaseth)

Meanwhile, Gordon gets on the heli-carrier with a girl named Alisha (Alicia Vela-Bailey) , who can clone herself into a literal “Army of Me” It reminds me of a Saturday morning cartoon superhero. They’re after the Kree rock than can liquify every couple of minutes. Gordon says it can be fatal to Inhumans, but also to others. Jiaying also reveals she wants to gas the crew with terrigen crystals. Either they will make people Inhumans or dead. After that, she’ll defeat all of SHIELD, in the name of her people.

Mac (Henry Simmons), who’s decided it’s not the right time to leave, is able to find Skye, and use her computer skills to stop her mom. Lincoln (Luke Mitchell) starts to doubt Jiaying’s plan, and eventually sides with Skye, He helps her take care of Alisha after she clobbered  the clones.May and Lance head to Spain to rescue Bobbi. She’s trapped in a room geared to kill whoever opens the door. Lance gets there, but Morse takes the bullet. Kara, disguised as may, thinks she’s won, except Ward accidentally kills her. May is there to rescue Morse, but she never gets the chance for another battle with Ward.

This leads to one very interesting battle at the heli-carrier. Fitz comes up with a way to trap Gordon, which leads to him getting clobbered by Fitz, Mac and Coulson. He winds up stabbing himself, as he’s about to drop a terregen crystal. Coulson catches it, but it turns his hand to stone. Mac cuts it off, saving Coulson. It’s that difficult to see.

Jiaying plans to gather a new Inhuman army with a case of crystals. She tries to convince Skye to join her, but when she refuses, she absorbs her daughter’s life. Skye stops her with a tremor blast that also sends a quinjet into the ocean with the crystals aboard. Jiaying tries again, but Cal kills her. He was so determined to reunite his family, but he finally realized it couldn’t happen.

In the end, Morse pulls through, but she’s thinking about leaving SHIELD. This was supposed t oset up a spinoff show for her and Hunter, but that could lead to a new plot line for the main show. The fans prefered Hunter and Morse to stay.

Agent May finally decides to take a vacation, and it might include getting back together with her ex, Andrew Garner (Blair Underwood) and finally telling him about Bahrain. It’s too bad the show didn’t have Jiaying and May talk about what happened. That would have been an interesting scene.  Mac, meanwhile,  decides to stay as supervisor of the alien artifacts.
Even Cal gets another chance. Thanks to the TAHITI process, he is reborn as a veternarian. Skye even visits him to see how he’s doing.

As for Skye, Raina’s vision actually comes true. She will be leading Inhumans on behalf of SHIELD, but she’ll do what she can to keep them anonymous. Entertainment Weekly suggests maybe it will be the start of a new group within SHIELD. Come to think of it, where’s Lincoln?
Coulson is still one-handed, but it’s a reminder that no matter what SHIELD does to protect people, there will be consequences. It’s also likely he’ll get a new hand.

What about those crystals? Well, they started leaking, and found their way into fish oil capsules. Skye will be getting a lot of calls soon.

As for Ward, he is looking for HYDRA officials who are still around,  It looks like he wants to take over after all. He may wonder why there’s so few key HYDRA officials still around, Those who saw Age of Ultron may not be surprised. In any case, Ward as the new head of HYDRA makes sense. After all, it was reborn within SHIELD, so why wouldn’t a SHIELD agent try to revive it?

Finally, after all that, it looks like Fitz and Simmons are finally thinking about having a date. Then, Simmons opens the case where the Kree rock is kept..and it swallows her up. Uh-oh!

Elizabeth Henstridge insists Simmons will be back, according to EW, but she might be a bit different.

So, now starts the speculation on what will be next for the Agents of SHIELD. It’ll be interesting, that’s for sure. It might also be connected to Captain America:  Civil War. Look out, Skye.

Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. returns for a third season this Fall on ABC.