Lash: Big Blue Mystery

[KirkB]

Since the question has been raised I figured we should address it but I don't want it to eat away at the episode post so I thought our big blue mystery man should have his own entry.

 

Who do you think Lash is? Is he one of the main characters, like from Coulson's team? Someone we've seen, like as been offered Andrew or one of Rosalind's people? Or has he not yet been officially introduced?

 

I don't have a specific guess but my money is on someone we've already seen. Probably not anyone from Team Coulson.

Edited October 22, 2015 by KirkB

[Crim]

Whoever he is, he looked at an incapacitated Sky and just moved on, so it would make sense that he is someone who knows who she is, and therefore we've seen or will see soon. Could he be one of Rosalind's people, logistically? They get on site pretty quickly, so he'd have to slip away from the team and back on short notice. It would be possible if it's all sanctioned by higher ups, even Rosalind herself. However, that would be so much of a retread after Hydra and the "real SHIELD", and it wouldn't lead anywhere new, and Coulson said as much when he told Skye about their cooperation with Rosalind.

Edited October 22, 2015 by Crim

[xqueenfrostine]

As I said in the Devils We Know topic, I'm ruling Rosalind out entirely as a possible Lash.  We know she was with Coulson when the attack on Lincoln and Daisy were happening, so barring some super power that allows her to be in two places at once, she's out.  And I'd actually be surprised if she knows who Lash was.  Outright lying doesn't seem to be Ros's style.  She seems to prefer evading to lying, and she seemed genuine when she accused Coulson of being responsible for leaving dead Inhumans for her team to find.  And we saw her talking to some of her own people about someone else getting to their Inhuman targets before they do.  Since Joey is one of the only Inhumans SHIELD has been able to get to first, it seems unlikely that she meant SHIELD as the one who was beating them to their targets.

[ChelseaNH]

Do we know if Lash has only been going after pre-fish oil inhumans?  If so, that points to someone who was living at the inhuman hideaway before SHIELD horned in.

 

Otherwise, I got nuthin'.

[xqueenfrostine]

I don't think we know that yet.  Lincoln and Alisha's friends were definitely changed before the terrigen outbreak, but Dwight Frye (the Inhuman SHIELD and the ATCU apprehended) appeared to have been changed more recently since part of her cocoon was still in his apartment.  Of course, Lash might have killed him just to keep him and whatever information he had about Lash away from the ATCU, but he might have always planned to kill him once Frye stopped being useful.  

[Crim]

I've just rewatched season 2, and the Cavalry backstory got me thinking. We know the selection process took a long time, and there were people who took rejection badly (no surprise here). If Lash really is killing only the pre-outbreak Inhumans, maybe he is someone who became an Inhuman now after he was denied the mist earlier, and is finally able to kill those who were chosen. Revenge/resentment. Skye would then not be a target because, despite the timeline, she is similar to the new Inhumans: she was clueless when she was exposed to the terrigen mist, and it happened independently as she wasn't part of the Inhuman society in any way until she became one. I'd take this over yet another hidden hostile faction, organization, or even small group, especially while there are active Hydra and ATCU story lines. The Rogue Gallery heap is tall enough at the moment.

[Raja]

Circumstantial evidence since he knows about Jaiying's group suggest that Lash has some relationship to SHIELD. Judging by how he was looking at Alicia in the recovery/cell room, his leaving May when things were better, and von Strucker's terrified face my vote right now is Andrew.

[Snarkette]

I'm betting on Andrew.

 

Regardless, I *love* his hairstyle. Sonic is so in right now.

[SnoGirl]

Do you think Raina could have foreseen her own death and prevented it? And then somehow evolved (I feel like I just compared her to a Pokemon character) to Lash?

I hope it's not Andrew. They should have some muggles on the show. And with May bring practically inhuman herself, I hope that Andrew is as normal as he could be.

[xqueenfrostine]

I think the silhouette of the person Lash turned into would make it very difficult for Lash to be Raina.  Ruth Neggs is 5'3, and human-form Lash appears to be either male or a tall woman.  Lash definitely shrinks in height as s/he transforms, but not enough to be someone petite given how tall s/he is to start out with (he's taller than Mack, so well over 6 feet tall).  Plus with Ruth Negga being cast on Preacher, I would be very surprised to see her back on Agents of SHIELD in any significant capacity. There's just no reason to bring a character back from the dead if the actress that played her is going to have limited availability. 

[SnoGirl]

Ugh, I forgot how many masculine facial characteristics Lash had. I take it back.

What about Creel? He also could shift back and forth between being a human and something else. Could he have found some alien rocks that are causing him to sonic out into Lash?

[xqueenfrostine]

Unlikely since Lash doesn't seem to be made of a solid, uniform substance.  When Creel took on a new form, it looked like a stone/metal/water form of himself.

 

If Lash is someone we already know, I think odds point to it being someone who isn't already established as an Inhuman or enhanced.  

[enness2000]

OK, now that we know more, can anyone piece together the Lash stuff in a way that makes sense? He has Jiaying's notes, which is how he has the names of the Afterlife 'graduates'. And possible their e-mail addresses? (Although the idea of Jiaying carefully transcribing g-mail addresses into an ancient-looking notebook cracks me up). And then he finds the hacker guy from two episodes back...somehow? Since SHIELD didn't seem to know about him, could Jiaying have had a list of potential inhumans that the Afterlife crew hadn't tapped yet? And in that episode, he also seemed to just happen to know where to ambush the ACTU van. I'm just having trouble seeing the overall picture that takes Andrew from "I was compelled to track down an Inhuman, and once I was near him I uncontrollably transformed and slaughtered him" to "I can hunt them, sometimes, but other times need a virus and a helper monkey". 

[Crim]

He has Jiaying's notes, which is how he has the names of the Afterlife 'graduates'. And possible their e-mail addresses?

I thought he only had their names and found the rest through social media or the email addresses were their real names or maybe the hacker did it, and the virus in the emails allowed him to track them down. He wouldn't have needed the hacker if Jiaying's ledger had enough details.

And in that episode, he also seemed to just happen to know where to ambush the ACTU van.

Because of the SHIELD people on it. We've seen Andrew "casually" ask a lot of questions and get answers about more than just the Inhumans he worked with. Maybe he even listened in on SHIELD's communication at the time.

[Maverick]

 The guy who wrote the virus worked for the Social Security Administration so he was able use their names from the book to track them down.  When Andrew/Lash ran across him he cut a deal to have him track down the other Inhumans rather than be killed (because that guy was an Inhuman too).

[KirkB]

So he didn't kill the hacker guy until he became a threat to him in terms of giving SHIELD information, and he has avoided killing Daisy on at least two occassions (the hospital and after he attacked the van) so Andrew must have more than just a burning need to kill Inhumans. Is he only killing the ones he sees as dangerous? I wonder what criteria he uses for that? Or is it more that the transformations isn't complete yet? And why is that, exactly? The two other Inhumans we have seen affected, Skye and Raina, were completely changed when they came out of their cocoons. So why does Andrew seem to be the only one whose transformation comes and goes, except of course for drama reasons?

[OtterMommy]

And why is that, exactly? The two other Inhumans we have seen affected, Skye and Raina, were completely changed when they came out of their cocoons. So why does Andrew seem to be the only one whose transformation comes and goes, except of course for drama reasons?

 

I finally got a chance to watch this last night and all I can think of is that, when Skye and Raina, transformed, they were exposed to a much stronger force (the Obelisk), whereas Andrew just got a puff of the Terrigen dust?

 

Grabbing at straws here, but that's all I have on this one.....

[Raja]

I finally got a chance to watch this last night and all I can think of is that, when Skye and Raina, transformed, they were exposed to a much stronger force (the Obelisk), whereas Andrew just got a puff of the Terrigen dust?

Grabbing at straws here, but that's all I have on this one.....

And since it happened in the temple both a Kree soldier Gordon and whoever he was talking to saw the emergence of Daisy and Raina. Whereas the others were hit with a synthetic mist from melted down diviners.

[Watcher0363]

My thoughts on Lash. Because the inhumans were created as weapons in a war. It only stands that they would need the equivalent on the military police. Lash could be genetic encoded to kill any inhumans who are not loyal to the Kree. Since the Kree are gone and Lash is not fully transformed, he is killing anyone who is not loyal to the human race and or Shield. 

[jhlipton]

Did Lash survive the bombing of the castle?  It looked pretty thorough, and wouldn't they check for body signs?

[Raja]

Did Lash survive the bombing of the castle?  It looked pretty thorough, and wouldn't they check for body signs?

Most definitely. It remains to be seen if he will be a major player when the show returns or a reoccurring character when muscle is needed like Deathlok

[KirkB]

It's just like the comics really. If you didn't see the body (and sometimes even when you do) he's not dead.