Inhumans, two S.H.I.E.L.D.s, and Ultron? The latter half of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 2 is slowly becoming the insane Marvel Universe-with-creamy-Coulson-center that show we always hoped it would be.
And since the twists just keep coming, we’ve set up a single discussion thread so that no one has to wait to talk about the latest surprise in Agents of SHIELD. Spoilers ahead for the latest episode, of course.
To follow Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. recaps and discussion threads on Tor.com, visit the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. tag page.
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A couple things.
First, from last week’s episode, when Skye’s talking about how well-stocked the cabin is…did folks notice the clever little Easter Egg reference there to one of the Marvel One-Shots, involving Coulson and snack cakes?
From last night’s: You know, it only just occurred to me that Dr. Crazypants never actually came out and said Whitehall “killed” Skye’s mother. At least, I don’t remember him doing so. (And if he did, it might have been to Skye, who he was trying to manipulate.) It was always “what they did to” her. If that’s the case, then very nicely done, Jed and Maurissa, managing to slip that one by.
So how did she survive? If she’s the closest thing the MCU setting has to Wolverine, did her body just grow all its organs back after they dumped it?
I’ve got the sneaking suspicion that the Inhuman Shangri-La people are going to be the primary antagonist by the end of S2…
The closing stinger was an especially nice touch. Fitz finally gets to eat his sandwich!
That was a lot of stuff that happened!
So, one of the major criticisms of the early SHIELD was that it didn’t feel like it was party of the MCU. With Deathloks and Inhumans all over the place now, it seems like that’s pretty moot. Good to see Mike Peterson back.
It’s interesting how the characters are being shuffled around into groups that all have some distrust built-in. Skye, Raina, and Cal with the Inhumans; Simmons, May, Bobbi, and Mack with Gonzales; Coulson, Hunter, Peterson, Fitz (probably), with Ward(!) and Agent 33; it doesn’t seem like these groups of characters can stay stable for very long, and after an episode or two they will probably bounce around again.
As I write this all down I note that we have a large cast here. Surely not all of them can stick around regularly after the end of the season? But it makes sense to bring out the heavy hitters as we ramp up to Age of Ultron.
The way that Fitz-Simmons reunion and deception was all tied together was brilliant fun. I missed some of the details of it while watching, but I guess Fitz must have noticed that Jemma was scanning the cube and sending a copy to a 3D printer. And their dialog, once I read it again, was perfectly duplicitous–everything they said to each other had double meanings.
I’m still not sure what it is about Simmons; the writers seem to continually get away with making the viewer suspect the worst of her, but she has always been unfailingly loyal to the team. But she does seem to have secret depths, doesn’t she? Somehow she is the most mysterious member of the team.
So, after last night’s episode, it seems FitzSimmons are getting closer again. Nice teamwork on getting the cube away from RealShield. Way to go Fitz!
Loved seeing Peterson again, being the one-man-reinforcements. I was expecting an Avenger when Coulson mentioned it being one man, but I like this better.
Loved Coulson’s remark on not telling Lance who the backup would ‘because he just wanted to see the look on his face’. :D
And I was expecting that he would turn to Ward, halfway the episode, when they talked about going for ‘bad options’. Because how many options are there really, and Ward was brought into the spotlights 2 episodes ago, and he is kind of a neutral side now…
Agent 33 could be very useful to Coulson’s team too.
I’m guessing the only reason why Skye’s dad still lives is that Gordon’s boss turns out to be Skye’s mom.
YAY A THREAD!
VALIDATION: The feeling you get when Melinda May says the thing you’ve been saying on the internet for three weeks!
And apparently, Cal just sewed Jianying back together and her powers did the rest! So yeah, pretty much Wolverine.
So much good stuff this episode, the FitzSimmons duplicity! Coulson’s “back up”. I laughed so hard when Hunter told Coulson to start looking at the bad options, and woke up to discover he’d called SHIELD. Coulson is so hardcore. I also liked the juxtaposition between Coulson’s dedication to not killing any SHIELD agents, vs what we saw last week from REAL SHIELD
Cal’s aggreived patriarch act is tiring, I hope Gordon teleports him off a cliff soon.
Gonzalez’ xenophobia was way more prominent this week, especially with his repeated refusal to acknowledge Skye, and other powered people, AS PEOPLE, instead of things. That also left a nice little loophole for him to have some powered person imprisoned on the ship, and still refer to him and May as the “only two people” on the ship, because he doesn’t view them as people.
Now, NEXT WEEK! We get to see how May became the Cavalry, when she faced off against a powered person who could influence people’s minds. My guess is, whatever is on the ship, if it’s a who, it’s another one that can do that, and that it actually is controlling everyone who was on the ship, which is why the longer Bobbi stays off it, the less sway it’s holding over her.
I just think bringing Ward onto the team is not a good way to convince people that Coulson is responsible and capable of leading Shield. He’s a known Hydra agent for goodness sake.
It’s interesting. I thought that this week’s episode was going to have lots of action as Coulton took back SHIELD from the interloper, but it turned out to be largely a breather episode. But next week’s looks very action-intensive.
I think Cal is a great character, and his attitude is understandable. It’s too bad he can’t seem to control himself. I hope he doesn’t get killed off, because he’s so much fun overall.
I don’t think Coulson’s going to bring Ward “onto the team” per se. He thinks Ward can help him find where Gordon took Skye. It’s going to be interesting to see what Coulson offers Ward to get him to play ball. A pardon? Some kind of help for Agent 33?
This is all so exciting. Six episodes remaining in the season. Three will air before Age of Ultron, and three will air afterward (assuming episode 19 doesn’t get pre-empted for some reason, in which case it would be two and four; only the ones through 18 are scheduled on the Wikipedia page so far). It’s going to be interesting to see how they weave it in.
Of all the things that could have bothered me (thinking about “realism” about this episode, the only thing my mind got stuck on was that May wouldn’t know the difference in weight between a loaded or unloaded gun.
But I rationalize that with the fact that this was a relatively special gun, not a “standard issue” of anything May might have used, as it had belonged to Gonzales’ grandfather (father? I forget).
@1 I didn’t notice the snack cake thing and I should have. Nice catch.
@2 I agree, the FitzSimmons bit was very well done. I saw what they were doing and was “on to” it (though I didn’t see the switch coming), but the way they played it, you couldn’t be *certain* they were playing RealShield until the end.
@@.-@ I’m not sure Cal knew Jiayang was alive until Gordon took him. The “There’s someone who you need to talk to.” at the end of that episode, looking back, seems like it was probably her. I missed where he said there was a powered person on the ship. I also missed anything/everything re: mind control. I only saw on the teaser for next week that there’s someone who “takes people’s pain” or something (psychic vampire?). Can you elaborate on what I must have missed? Also I agree that Gonzales’ xenophobia is very apparent, and find it interesting that some folks on teh Intarwebz are taking his side.
@7 They do make inert bullets that have the right weight but no propellant. (For use in filming movies, for example.) He could very well have loaded the gun with those, and May would have known it, though admittedly that is a bit of reading into things.
I sure hope that person who “takes people’s pain” doesn’t turn out to be Spock’s half-brother…
Idle thoughts:
Gonzales v. Coulson: This conflict is a bit more interesting than it looks on the surface; they both have points. Gonzales asserts that Coulson is insufficiently transparent. He has a point, but the other operational difference between the two, never stated, is that Coulson runs SHIELD like he operated his team: as family. Gonzales treats SHIELD more abstractly, as an ideal and an institution. Coulson’s approach is sometimes disturbingly partriarchal (daddy knows best, and sometimes daddy doesn’t tell the kids everything.) But since to Gonzales no one SHIELD agent is more important than another, that also means that SHIELD agents might be disposable. Coulson on the other hand refuses to let anyone under his command kill a SHIELD agent.
The nature of the show tells me that Coulson is ultimately going to win out here: the personal dynamics of the show are ultimately more familial than professional. But I think (and hope) that there is ultimately a compromise.
Personal dynamics:
Coulson: he’s daddy, duh. Sometimes this is a little uncomfortable; Daddy is in charge but he’s also the one that the ‘kids’ seek approval from. Still, he is basically a softie: he gets criticism from both sides on how he treat powered people. Not just Skye, but also Mike–Gonzales perceives him as coddling and accumulating powerful people. The Inhumans see him as chaining them up. We know he has personal relationships to both, and that he relates to them as people.
May: The politics of May and Coulson as mom and dad are a little more retrograde than they appear, I think. Dad gives approval; mom is the enforcer. I don’t think this is that uncommon a dynamic. Still, May is a badass.
FitzSimmons: Fitz is kind of an open book. He’s mentioned before that it was just him and his mom; obviously SHIELD is family to him just like it is to Skye. Simmons remains the puzzle: She is tightlipped about her past and her feelings.
Ward: Reaching out to Ward is going to have bad consequences. Right now he’s still conflicted about his feelings for Skye. But even though he is estranged, he is still part of the family, and we have seen what Ward does to family.
Hunter: OK, I wasn’t really expecting Hunter to bond like he has with Coulson. And I am not sure I fully buy it. Coulson has shown appreciation for Hunter before–he hired him not in spite of the fact that he’s a loose cannon, but because of it. But is Hunter signing onto team Coulson because he believes it, or to get back at Bobbi and Mack?
Bobbi: Yeah obviously she is going to join team Coulson eventually. As cool as she is, I look forward to when this plot is behind us and she has a chance to relate more to the other members of the team. She has obviously held back from getting to close to them.
Mack: This is tricky; he clearly has fraternal feelings for Fitz, but he also seems to be firmly on board with Gonzales. So if he is going to switch sides, it would probably come from SHIELD threatening Fitz. I like Mack; he’s a cool presence and I’d like to see him stick around.
In other review sites, I saw people commenting that Skye’s mom being alive may imply we can expect to see Whitehall again too.
@7, They haven’t said there is an Inhuman aboard the boat, this is supposition that could explain why they are all so afraid of powered people.
And the thing about Cal knowing she was alive, I’ve already read interviews about it, he knew. It’s been explained that the loss of their child is why they split, and Cal deludedly believes that by finding Daisy he can reunite with Jianying.
The initial explanation about the gifted in Bahrain that earned May the name Cavalry was that they had some mind control powers and established a cult that May had to take out to get to her. My reading from the teaser is that she CAUSES pain, not just takes it.
Now whether she is the same person that could be the prisoner, I don’t know. Gonzalez said May “took them down” but if she was taken prisoner, nothing would tick May off faster, IMO.
Here’s an interesting thought. There are untold numbers of people out there with Inhuman potential. What if the terragen mist isn’t the only way to unlock it? What if it could be unlocked with things like, say, vita-rays, or the closely-related gamma radiation? Or ice machines, or gravitonium, or whatever…
Maybe the real reason the Kree abandoned Earth was that their weapon program there was too successful. So maybe we’re not quite as outgunned as Fury thought. Which, given the necessity of the Index and such, turns out not to be an unalloyed good thing.
Going to be interesting to see how this all leads into the Civil War.
@12, Well Lincoln did tell us that they go through Terregenesis without a Diviner
@13 Yeah, but the obvious supposition there is some kind of more modern terragen mist gas chamber. Since all the diviner really does is unlocks the ancient Kree temple’s terragen mist dispenser.
@14, No, the mist is inside the Diviner, it just has to be taken to the temple to activate it
By the waaaay, here’s a little something something I noticed through some googling and wiki walking.
That scientist Mike Peterson has been tracking down, the Dr. List who’s been experimenting on metahumans?
We last saw him in “Aftershocks,” a member of the Hydra round table whose members Coulson tricked into mostly killing each other.
But before that, we saw him in the post-credits stinger of Captain America: The Winter Soldier. The MCU wiki says he was also a major character in a MCU tie-in comic book linking Winter Soldier and Age of Ultron.
Experimenting on metahumans, indeed.
@16, I read an interview with Olmos who flat out said the next several weeks are leading straight into AoU so that makes sense.
I thought it was Lentz though
After last year, I fully expected that this would work hand-in-hand with the story as set up in AoU. And it seems clear that it’s building to the Civil War.
I don’t have much to add to what’s already been said, but Olmos’ character strikes me as very much a short-term arc. I don’t know about the rest of the RealSHIELD team, but I suspect that we won’t be seeing Gonzales beyond the end of this season.
Oh, and I second KalvinKingsley @7. I do not buy that May wouldn’t have known that the gun was loaded.
@18, It’s indicating stuff for Civil War, but from the horse’s mouth, these events are going straight into AoU
And she knew the cartridge(the clip) was loaded, but there is no indication that there was a round in the chamber, and no way of knowing that without pulling back the slide.
First of I have to say I loved last nights episode. The second season of SHIELD has really kicked into high gear, and for me at least has become must watch television. Really excited with what they have done and where they are taking the show.
Now lets break down Afterlife a little bit.
First thought that came from last nights episode is how much I want Skye and Lincoln to get together. Lincoln came off just flirty enough for me to think there is some interest there, and it would be an interesting way for the Inhuman faction to be split. Those who think they should not be afraid and help people going with Skye and Lincoln, those who are afraid staying in the mountain retreat with Gordon and Skyemom.
Second is kind of tied into the comics. I dont read Marvel as much as I wished I did, so this is basically coming from online research done on characters that have been identified as having direct corolation in the comics. That being said, Doesnt Cal basically transform due to the drug he uses to get super strength? Thats what I have found online anyway. I am interested to see if we have not yet seen all that Cal can do.
Loved how Fitzsimmons got the cube away from Realshield, although how Fitz gets the cube into Coulsons hands is going to be interesting. Its not like Coulson has a phone number that you can look up in yellow pages anymore. Maybe Fitz knows something we dont.
The return of Mike was unexpected yet super awesome. His upgrades are bad ass and fit into what Coulson wants Shield to be. Loved his emp rockets that he used to take down the second quinjet(not sure if thats spelled right) and his encyclopedia mind. Interested to see what other tricks he has hiding in his mechanical body and the reunion of him and skye. They started the show afterall, and have always had what I describe as a good brother sister relationship.
I suspect there will be a split among the Inhumans, though I’m not as thrilled with Lincoln as you are. But Skye clearly has different goals than they do and I expect that will cause a rift. To me, the big issue is her mother: which side will she come down on? I can’t predict yet, but I’m guessing there’ll be conflict between her and Skye.
May and the gun, another possibility: she knew damned well it was loaded, but she’s trying to play down her competency and get Gonzales to underestimate her. (Which, yeah, good luck with that, “Cavalry,” but worth a try.)
It is clear that SHIELD has completely abandoned the classic format of an A story that is self contained in a single episode, and a B story that carries forward a longer story arc. The story has become a straight serial adventure, with each episode a cliffhanger leading into the next. This has definitely changed the character of the show, which was perhaps too episodic earlier in the first season. I do like the faster pace, and the fact that they don’t tease us too long with mysteries or string stories out–balls that are in the air come back down pretty quickly. The juxtaposition of the day SHIELD fell with Bobbi and Mac’s action in real time was a nice way to show us some of their backstory.
The SHIELD versus SHIELD story we are seeing is nicely nuanced. Neither side is really the good guys, although with Gonzalez starting to make comments that indicates he thinks powered individuals are something less than human, and one of his fellow leaders using real bullets on Skye instead of an icer, the pointySHIELD faction is getting less sympathetic as time goes on. Not to mention their decision to come in with guns blazing, rather than contact Coulson and try to hash things out. I can see the conflict in SHIELD not only leading to Age of Ultron, but also laying the seeds for Captain America: Civil War.
Coulson had been running out of comrades in the past few episodes, so it was nice to see Deathlok show up this week. And a more self-actualized Deathlok, with a costume that is definitely much improved over his original super-suit. I hope he sticks around for a while, as he has always been an interesting and sympathetic character.
I am not at all pleased to hear Coulson talking about working with Ward. To me, that crosses WAY too many ethical lines.
It was interesting to see Skye’s mother back–her immortality powers also must come with some heavy duty healing powers, that brought her back to life after literally being cut to pieces by Whitehall. It was interesting to see her show affection for Cal, as he seems like a rather unsympathetic and unlikeable character. Perhaps he shows another side of his personality with her, although the blind teleporter guy doesn’t seem to like Cal one bit.
The FitzSimmons bit where they faked everyone out was the best part of the show. The fact that they have put at least some of their differences behind them was heartwarming to see, and Coulson now has another ally back out in the field, and the MacGuffin headed back in his direction.
Looking forward to some real exciting stuff next week, as we see May and her “Cavalry” origin story.
One of the things I love about the series is the lengths it goes to provide you with closure. I can’t say how happy I am that Fitz finally got to eat his sandwich. Maybe he’ll mellow out a little more now.
(I’m firmly convinced that the real reason Fitz hated Ward so much was not that Ward brain-damaged and nearly killed him, but that he never forgave Ward for throwing Simmons’s sandwich away that time they were out in the field together.)
cdietz@21: “That being said, Doesnt Cal basically transform due to the drug he uses to get super strength? Thats what I have found online anyway. I am interested to see if we have not yet seen all that Cal can do.”
The comics version only has super strength when he transforms. Doesn’t mean that they won’t feature a transformation, but they’ve tinkered with how it works (and Cal’s slightly dissolute look already seems like a toned-down version of the bestial appearance of Mr. Hyde)
@22 Absolutely there is going to be conflict. Jianying has had 20 years to fantasize about what her reunion with her daughter would be like, and these things never go as expected.
@24 Everybody keeps freaking out about the Ward thing, and I don’t get it. This is textbook Coulson letting other people’s obsessions do his work for him. And he’s not talking about giving him a bunk on the Bus, he’s talking about getting information from him.
@24 AlanBrown:
I am not at all pleased to hear Coulson talking about working with Ward. To me, that crosses WAY too many ethical lines.
That is why it was considered a bad option. ;)
On ethical stuff, I agree with you. However, Coulson seems to have a clearer view on the big picture than Gonzalez and friends do.
And he is willing to deal with the devil if it can get him the results he thinks are needed. I would probably do the same.
Coulson shows more empathy than RealShield. Remember he orders Lance to only use icers.
And how about this:
http://www.ew.com/article/2015/04/09/shield-spinoff
I’m betting that spinoff focuses on Deathlok. He’s about the only semi-major character who could carry a whole separate series built around him. And the fact that they’re bringing him back now in a major role suggests he’s primed for bigger things.
@30, It looks to me that they are considering a mid season fill in, a la Agent Carter. Which bums because I NEED MOAR AGENT CARTER
Hey, don’t bring me into this….
Deathlok is great, but I agree with @31 Aeryl: MORE PEGGY!!!
More Peggy would be nice, but I gather the ratings for the first Peggy may not have been all that. I’d think if they were doing it they’d say so.
I’ve seen speculation elsewhere that it might be an Inhumans series, but I just don’t see that. Dealing with Inhumans is the main series’s brief, and they wouldn’t want to dilute that.
@34, It didn’t do too well in the ratings, but they hardly marketed it and was never even shown in several markets where it would have done well(someone from Ireland told me today they had to bootleg it).
And what it does have is a rabid fan base*waves hands energetically*. The company that made her lipstick SOLD OUT because the fans found out where it came from and Stetson saw an uptick in sales because we wanted her hat. They’d be stupid to ignore that, and the opportunity to bring some more Golden Age characters to life.
They need to establish a Marvel show during all seasons, IMO. AoS for Fall/Spring, an mini like AC for Winter Break, and now something in the summer. Keep the interest in Marvel up all year long, especially now with movies coming out all year, instead of just summer.
On What’s On the Aircraft Carrier: So, I was watching Thor: The Dark World last night, and there was the stinger about the giant jotunheim monster chasing pigeons, and it occurs to me we never got onscreen closure about that thing…
I like how ambivalent they’re playing Simmons. On the one hand, ew, fantastic racism (because when you show the real thing on TV, people can overreact nowadays)! On the other hand, she’s LOYAL, and while she might sometimes come off as a hypocrite (powers are BAD! Except when it’s Skye, cause she’s a friend!), she’s also a good character study in a person trying to resolve two conflicting ideologies she feels strongly about. Unlike Gonzalez and ‘real’ SHIELD (and am I the only one who gets ‘compensating for something’ vibes whenever they use that exact phrase), while she’s anti-powers, she’s against the POWERS and not the people with them. She brings up legitimate medical concerns concerning a relatively unstudied (not counting attempts to weaponize) phenomenon which has been shown to be capable of hurting the people WHO HAVE THEM. She comes off as a doctor who genuinely wishes to help but at the moment has only been left with amputation as a treatment: everything sucks.
On the Hunter question, I think Coulson signed him up for the same reason he did Skye. Think about it: Hunter’s character arc is basically a watered-down version of Skye’s arc in the last season, except with no powers. Or at least shares a lot of elements: he’s the (relatively) naive newcomer, slowly becomes part of the team, love interests turns out to be a ‘traitor’…
On Lincoln: STOP ASSUMING! Sheesh, dude. Either Gordon dropped the ball or Gordon deliberately didn’t tell Skye all the stuff Lincoln assumes she should know because the ominous ‘elders’ are going to kill her.
If we can’t have another Peggy Carter midseason replacement series, I want a Howling Commandos midseason replacement series, with Peggy and Jarvis joining them on some of their missions. More adventures with Dum Dum Dugan in the post WWII era!
Just rewatched the whole “You want me to leave” scene. And really, in retrospect, it is such a brilliant piece of writing that I imagine whoever was responsible was probably hard to live with for a few days after that. Every line has an obvious surface meaning, and then when you go back through it after you know what’s up, it has an even more obvous double meaning. Amazing. Damned fine work.
Well, we have a new week to discuss.
– We now know the origin of the Cavalry story, and see why May is ambivalent about people calling her that. A good twist to a story is one that you don’t see coming, but feels more right than what you expected. And in my humble opinion, this was a good twist.
– Skye has dinner with mom and dad, and it is surprisingly mundane and cozy.
– Except for the fact that Raina saw it in advance. She may be prickly, but also precognitive.
– Coulson has been off on mysterious missions, building something even his own people don’t know about. And even May is having doubts about him.
– But Simmons can’t open the toolbox for May, and is afraid to admit that she gave it to Fitz.
– And Fitz is off to join up with Coulson and Hunter. I was hoping to see more of Deathlok, but I guess he is off on his next mission.
– It seems like there is starting to be some grudging cooperation between pointySHIELD and roundSHIELD. If pointySHIELD calls themselves Real SHIELD, can Coulson call his folks SHIELD Classic?
Lots of good stuff there this week. Getting the full deal on May’s backstory, and tying it into Jianying’s secrecy was a good move.
Whatever Coulson is doing, I don’t think it’s what they think it is. Andrew seemed pretty adamant about not returning to SHIELD, and if Coulson already had this relationship, why the subterfuge about sending May to get him to help Skye?
I’m still confused over the whole “need to be secret” thing, because Gordon obviously knows. It seems like Lincoln HAS to know, as he walked in on the dinner, listened to Cal talk about Skye as his daughter, and it doesn’t seem like Cal and Jianying being a former couple is much a secret. WHO EXACTLY are they keeping this a secret from?
Well, there’s some irony for you. Remember how broken up Raina was when she found out “the Clairvoyant” was just a high-level SHIELD agent with access to their database?
Guess who’s the Clairvoyant now?
@41, I caught that too.
Here’s what I suspect is going to happen. The inexperienced Lincoln is going to run and blab to Raina about this, when he should tell Gordon. Raina is going to twig onto the family dinner thing rather than the clairvoyance thing, and go a little nuts in that way that she does. Will she burst in and interrupt the family dinner? Set Cal off in a rage?
Also, in reference to @40, I note that it was Gordon who told Cal last week that he’d sealed both his own fate and his daughter’s. I have to wonder whether Jiayang is actually as “in charge” as she thinks she is. There could be some political maneuvering going on below the surface that she either isn’t privy to or is trying to rationalize away in her joy at being reunited with her daughter.
I find myself wondering whether Gordon, Lincoln, and/or Raina might be involved in some kind of plan to rid Afterlife of what they see as three huge potential albatrosses around its neck.
This week showed some nice plotweaving. Many lines are coming together, with Su Yin and May both connected to the Beirut incident, and it underlines that Coulson, Hill and Fury may well have been a minority in SHIELD even before the day it fell to Hydra.
The situation with May not knowing about Coulson’s secret project looks to be a reverse situation to the one last season, where May had to regain Coulson’s trust, after it became clear she had been spying on him. I think Coulson and May have been through enough together to end on the same side, even with Andrew having been spotted with Coulson.
Loved the part were Hunter said an electric handdryer was enough to shake off Fitz’s trailers. Lance, you keep growing on me.
I am wondering the same as Robotech, considering Afterlife. Something is going on there, and Skye coming there is probably a catalyst to a power struggle.
Lastly, I am sorry to say Walt Disney is giving me a sour taste where Avengers 2 is concerned. They only show it in 3D and IMAX 3D in my country and, since I wear glasses, this is not an option for me. I’ll have to wait for the DVD, in september. And that while “Hunger Games: Mockingbird pt. 1” proved that many people prefer 2D still. Thank you for ruining my Agents of SHIELD season, Disney.
I’ve never had a problem wearing 3D glasses over my regular glasses. Generally they’re made to accommodate them.
They give me a headache after the movie. I have heard similar complaints from others.
What irks me most that there is no choice. Even with the last Hobbit movie they squeezed in a 2D showing once every few days, and several IMAX ones.
FYI, guys, her name is Jiaying.
And I hear ya about the 3D that sucks. I won’t go see them out of general principle(it’s easy to be principled when you’re broke, HA!). I had a friend with a depth perception problem and he had the same problem.
I developed an instant like for Lance once I realized he was the new punching bag, but I appreciate the ways in which they are fleshing him out.
I’m irritated again with Mack. “Why go [to the alien city] at all?” BECAUSE HYDRA. Or did you forget about them!
Interesting. I conflated her with Su Yin, the leader of the metalbending city from Legend of Korra.
Leader of a secretive, reclusive scenic mountain city, focusing on teaching people with special powers not shared by most of the rest of the world…wonder why I’d mix them up like that?
I didn’t think of Raina actually becoming the real Clairvoyant until you guys mentioned it. Duh. Should have connected those dots…
And, while I forgot about it, at some point, Coulson reportedly did mention the Theta Protocol to one of the Koenigs, who was apparently helping to implement it. And he was shown in early episodes going on, or coming back from, trips whose purpose were not revealed to others. So perhaps he does have a side project going on. Could it be something that helps the Avengers defeat a certain robotic threat? Or something that has an impact on events in the wake of battling that robotic threat?
@@@@@ 49:
I wondered if instead of a training facility for powered people as Mack guessed, if it was a facility for training new (normal) agents. Coulson doesn’t have the facilities/manpower of real shield, and I would guess that he is going to need to bring in and train new agents eventually.
@49, @50: What Coulson tells Koenig is that, if things go south, he should activate the Theta Protocol. That does tend to suggest that they’ve been training a bunch of powered people secretly, and by “activate” he could mean “send them in as back-up.”
@50, That’s been my thought as well, and that REAL SHIELD’s unreasoning fear has led them to the wrong conclusion.
I’m wondering how the cronology of AoS is supposed to match with the films, but at a guess ‘right now’ Stark is in the middle of building his robot “suit around the world”, and then it will all go wrong, and the week after the film has come out we’ll see AoS dealing with the aftermath.
I’m guessing there won’t be much of a tie in with Daredevil for a while, they seem to be content to keep it only loosly connected.
@53 They’ve been dropping some pretty broad hints there’s a tie-in leading up to the movie, most recently in the preview at the end of this week’s episode. Last week Mike mentioned Dr. List, who was seen briefly in the episode where all the Hydra bosses met then killed each other off, then before that in the post-credits stinger for “Winter Soldier.” Apparently SHIELD is going to be chasing him down over the next couple of weeks, and that’s going to tie into the events of the movie, which will also feature him, somehow.
@54, My thought has always been that the Avengers attack the HYDRA base where the Maximoffs were experimented on, because we see Tony with Loki’s staff, but what if it’s Coulson’s SHIELD crew who did that and they escaped?
I don’t know if anyone watched the Kimmel show that had the cast on there, but Clark Gregg did a video guest spot, where fans from all over were asking questions, and he asked if they would consider going to the small screen. They got uncomfortably quiet but that would be the best troll of all time, not to have the Avengers appear on AoS, but Wanda and Pietro? THAT I can see.
So here’s a question going back to last week – Mack was with Fitz when Fitz figured out what Jemma was up to. The next time we see Fitz is the scene where he switches out the Toybox for the fake and Mack is still with him. Are we supossed to assume Fitz somehow fabricated the fake without Mack knowing about it in the intervening time, or did something happen to give Mack enough doubts that he was willing to be in on the switch?
@56: It was Simmons who was fabricating the fake. Fitz realized that was what she was doing when he noticed she was scanning the box’s surfaces to send its specs to a 3D printer. Fitz knew that what she was doing couldn’t be related to opening the box; witness his consternation when he saw it on the scanner. Mack would have read it as consternation she was working with them, but Fitz knew that creating a copy was the only thing those surface scans could possibly have been useful for, and he just barely stopped himself from saying it out loud. That was what made him figure out, in turn, that Simmons was pulling a fast one, and led to their dual-level “You want me to leave!” conversation.
I do find myself curious as to what the Koenigs are up to during all of this. Is the audience supposed to just assume that they were on the base in the background when RealShield fully initiated their coup attempt? Otherwise, why wouldn’t we have heard Bobbi or Mack (or May, after her exposure to RealShield’s supposed data on Coulson’s activities) mention that the Koenigs are unaccounted for and could be working with Coulson.
I’m a big fan of this show, but I continue to get irked by the fact that a lot the action and developments tend to be more plot driven then character driven; I can’t always reconcile how superspys could often make such blatant mistakes or have such major blindspots.
For example: if the Koenigs answer to Coulson, Realshield views Coulson as a potential threat, and then Coulson disappears, then one of the first things RealShield should do is address the Koenig situation (even if it’s just mentioning for the audience’s benefit that the Koenigs have been neutralized, or that they are being pursued, or whatever).
Ignoring some of my minor qualms, I think the last few episodes have been all kinds of fun to watch:
-I was completely surprised by the little girl plot twist in May’s backstory. I can see why May isn’t fond of her nickname at all.
-I loved how Raina’s “nightmare” references from previous episodes crystalized into her dreams being prescient/clairvoyant in nature (although I have the same questions about how Lincoln found that out as some of the other commenters.)
-I felt a combination of joy and sadness when Skye realized her actual age (seriously, such a simple detail that so many of us take for granted, but she had no way of actually knowing for sure until someone who actually knew could tell her).
-I’d ship Gordon and Raina, but I’m more inclined to believe that Raina is playing Gordon (or at least, trying to) since he is the gatekeeper and fairly powerful.
-I’m confused how last episode Jiaying told Cal he couldn’t see their daughter and in this episode she arranges a family dinner. I’d be more concerned about her potentially ulterior motives then some kind of power play from other Afterlife characters that haven’t even been introduced on the show yet.
And a quick prediction: When Hunter (and the viewer) first met the Cabal that rules RealShield, there were 6 folks: Bobbi, Hunter, the Academy Director (forget her name), Kirk Acevedo, Edward James Olmos and some other guy we haven’t seen since. I have a theory that RealShield is being misled/used by someone(s) with ulterior motives and have been given Coulson as the fall guy, and I think that the unnamed sixth person is somehow behind it.
…And this post is superlong. Flashback to my WoT reread Wall of Text days…
@58, My theory on that is that an Inhuman with mind control powers is being kept on the ship, that’s why Fury wanted it sunk(do recall that Bobbi and Izzy were there to evacuate it, not kill everyone else aboard), and that’s why they inexplicably fought to retake it from HYDRA, not because “they weren’t taking orders from Fury” but because they’ve been mentally manipulated. My guess is that Gonzalez KNOWS what’s on the ship, and fears it, and it’s using his genuine fear to drive this crusade against Coulson.
@59 – I’ve seen your theory before and I am cool with that one. I don’t even think that yours and my theory @58 are (necessarily) mutually exclusive; Agent what’s-his-name and whatever’s being kept somewhere on the carrier could be in cahoots.
I will say that the show does need to ultimately show that something is affecting/manipulating the judgment of the “board” of RealShield. Otherwise, the audience is supposed to believe that right after the recent betrayal of Hydra, these RealShield agents thought it was acceptable to:
And to do all of that with the amounts of self-righteousness emanating from them while not seeing a problem with their actions or methods at all? Nor realizing how their actions would be perceived by anyone else in the organization they claim to respect? Especially someone like Mack, who has been presented as having such a strong sense of character?
I wouldn’t be able to buy that. To me, that would truly be evidence that the story on this show is solely plot driven, not character driven (I can maybe overlook no one in the world being aware of a SHIELD aircraft carrier floating around the ocean for months if there is something supernatural at play affecting the character’s perceptions; but otherwise we’re supposed to believe that the US government’s military and spy network is so incompetent as to miss a freaking SHIELD aircraft carrier when it’s conducting a worldwide hunt for any/all SHIELD personnel?); and that the writing in regards to the characters themselves is fairly poor.
But for now, I’m putting my faith in Marvel, the showrunners and the writers to pull this thing through.
as to miss a freaking SHIELD aircraft carrier
That’s actually not hard to do
@61 While sitting in the water? Care to explain why you think so?
So I just saw a trailer for next weeks episode where Coulson actually says Strucker’s name. I dont think that AoS has actually mentioned the villian we saw at the end of Winter Soldier. I had nevere made the connection that the doctor we see in that clip was one of the Heads of Hydra we saw earlier in the show. I really think AoS is going to ramp up for when Avengers 2 comes out and interested to see how they do that with the 2 episodes they have left before we get to see the big movie. Also, how the hell is the US Armed forces not aware that Shields aircraft carrier is still floating the seas? I can understand that it may not need to stop in port to take on fuel or food or anything, although depending on what those Quinjets run on it would get awful expensive to have to fly in all the food, but doesnt the US government spend like billions of dollars a year making sure they can track ships all over the world? And unless Shield is buying Russian shouldnt there be some record of sales? I mean i will go along with it because I love the show but come on man, that thing wold be swarming with seals like two days after Shield got put in the dog house
@63: Presumably, Gonzales has cultivated government connections a bit more powerful than Coulson’s been able to manage so far. But then, he had more time to do that. I got the sense he was more of an operator than Coulson, who seemed to devote most of his time to leading his team.
Coulson wasn’t ever really into the politics, which is part of why he got blindsided when Hydra turned out to have infiltrated so much of SHIELD. The people who were might just have a head start on him in some ways.
Yes, the US government spends billions attempting to track all ocean going vessels. They do not succeed. The Earth’s surface is 75% water, that’s A LOT of places to try and watch, so it’s not that inconcievable that they would have been able to avoid detection.
The show has also referenced Strucker several times.
Furthermore, who knows but what SHIELD helicarriers might not be submersible, too? Submarines are really hard to track.
That pointySHIELD aircraft carrier, when they finally gave us a full view of it, looked like a good old-fashioned waterborne craft, not one of the flying, helicarrier variety. How does it hide? I would imagine that an outfit that can cloak aircraft can cloak an aircraft carrier.
What you can’t cloak, however, is the logistical tail of an aircraft carrier. It needs food and supplies, and unless SHIELD agents take vows of chastity (and we know they don’t), the crewmembers all have families they want to see and communicate with from time to time. Not to mention how to cloak the salaries of 4K to 6K people, who probably all earn from $60 to $80K apiece. I would imagine that participating governments cut off their funding to SHIELD when the HYDRA connection got revealed. An aircraft carrier is way too big for a black budget slush fund to continue supporting a year after its funding was eliminated. I have said it before, someone who has experience in economics and government finance has to squint really, really hard to enjoy shows like this.
I can’t explain why, but I have a feeling that Raina’s current form is not her final form. I think those spines sticking out of her are feathers growing, and when they finally come in, she will be pretty spectacular looking.
@67: Watch Avengers again. The original helicarrier also looked exactly like a regular aircraft carrier until it took off.
@67, There is an Inhuman comic character that looks surprisingly close to Raina’s current form, named Naja, so I don’t think so.
And it hasn’t been a year since SHIELD fell. There was a statement not too long ago as to how long it’s been, but I can’t remember what it said, but it’s been half a year at best.
And there is every possibility that the Iliad was already a blacksite op before the fall of SHIELD, only allowing unmarried people to serve aboard it with already existent unpenetrated deep covers.
One could argue that anything is possible when it comes to Marvel’s universe, sure. However, every indication given up to this point is that Shield helicarriers only operate above water and in the air, not below water. Also, every indication given up to this point is that the helicarriers only cloak when flying; and that cloak only works on the bottom of the hull, not the top, as evidenced in the scene when Hawkeye’s quinjet with the boarding team was approaching the carrier in the Avengers movie. (Plus, wouldn’t it be hard to cloak the island/bridge/air-traffic-control section of the carrier as it has many weird angles and protruding sections and antennae?)
We can entertain any cool possibility (that is what fans do, and scifi/fantasy fans even moreso). But confusing what’s possible with what has been in evidence so far (on both the big and little screen) and presenting it as a likely option that makes hiding Realshield’s helicarrier (for months, even) seem as something that isn’t that hard to accomplish? And not just from the US government, but also from CoulsonShield and Hydra who both knew that it had existed beforehand and what its capabilities would be? Well that is stretching things in my opinion; YMMV.
As for the issue of bureaucratically hiding the carrier from the US military/spynetwork, I wasn’t even thinking about the salary part as much as the food/fuel/maintenance issues related to masking something that big and mobile. However, @@@@@ 67 does bring up a good point about the salaries being something traceable. To be fair, that would probably apply to all Shield agents now. Hydra too, for that matter.
Anyone else really wish they’d make one thread per week for AoS discussion at least?
Anyways, it’s loony theory time:
1. Agent May (and probably the rest of the team) know full well what Theta Protocol is. In “What They Become,” Coulson is talking to several members of the team as they are heading in to take down Hydra in San Juan at the Kree Temple site. He finishes some instructions and then takes one of the Koenig bros “aside” (basically just turns to him while in the same room) and tells him “Head back to base. If things go south on this, I want you to activate Theta Protocol.” Koenig starts to protest, but Coulson shuts him down “That’s an order.” or some such. This is done like…5 feet from team members (I don’t recall which, but I’m pretty sure one was May.)
2. Because of (1), May/Simmons are playing dumb because Bobbi and Mack (and various others) are still watching them. They are pretending to be investigating so they can figure out exactly what “real” SHIELD believes about Coulson – all the better to get the drop on them when the time comes.
3. Everything Coulson’s been doing “on the side” has been on the orders of Nick Fury. Further Looney-ness: And that’s been on the orders of the World Security Council (what’s left of it). The new WSC members are not so willing to be out in the open, considering what happened to their predecessors. But it will turn out that Coulson isn’t keeping secrets/doing bad things, he’s doing exactly what he’s been instructed to do.
4. The Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver are on the Iliad. SW is the one manipulating the minds of the “real” SHIELD folks. She didn’t have time to get into Hunter or May’s head because they weren’t there for long. Bobbi is strong-willed enough that she’s been rebelling by staying away from the Iliad for long enough.
5. Cal is going to get teleported off the side of a cliff in the next episode, where it will be revealed that Skye’s mom isn’t necessarily less of a monster than Cal is.
OH WOW!
Well it does look like next week’s episode is going to “unnamed Eastern European country” for a showdown with List and Strucker.
What they’re doing with Ward is interesting, I wonder how Keira will act when she sees that Ward’s feelings for Skye aren’t gone.
Good to see Bobbi and Mack coming around.
Well, that was entertaining.
Did anyone notice Cal’s middle initial is L? That makes him “Cal L”! Skye is the daughter of Cal L! Eh? Eh? Am I right? :)
Heh! I noticed it, but didn’t say the pronunciation to make the connection.
I can’t help but wonder if, in the post-show teaser, when the voiceover guy said “Plus, an exclusive scene from Marvel’s Avengers: Age of Ultron”…
Maybe they’ll have a scene from the movie that actually ties in with the episode?
@75, That’s what they did for Cap2. They had Coulson saying something about needing to talk to Fury, and then showed most of the car chase scene where HYDRA comes after Fury.
@59: You know what would be an interesting coup?
If that theory was correct and the one who’s been manipulating things on Other Shield is… David Tennant, aka The Purple Man. He then loses his SHIELD connection (maybe they find a way to immunize specific people against his control), but manages to escape in time for AKA Jessica Jones. :)
I mean, it’s pie-in-the-sky unlikely since I’m sure we would have heard about a guest appearance (the only other way to do it is if he remains unseen but they refer to him and maybe slip in a scene from the early filming of JJ of him walking down a street looking mysterious), but it would be pretty cool.
@77, I agree that what’s desperately needed right now is some kind of tie in.
I’m also kind of hoping that Coulsen gets to spend some time in a room with Gordon and asks, “Hey, out of curiosity, you don’t happen to spend your spare time in New York beating up human trafficers while wearing a mask that covers your entire upper face, do you?”
“… No.”
“Too bad, it would have explained a lot. And I would have liked you more.”
Here’s a cheerful thought. A quantum entanglement has two ends. What if Hydra is able to track down the location of Afterlife via Gordon’s teleports there and back?
@80, I think they can.
@80: that seems logical, and it certainly may come up, but it seems a little odd that they didn’t already notice it if they kept seeing teleports happen in the same place that many times. I wonder if Afterlife may have some kind of defense keeping them from seeing that end of his jumps.
Or….this is real pie-in-the-sky type stuff, but…do we know for sure Afterlife is on Earth? Just how far can Gordon go?
I noted somebody probaly that electric guy telling Skye something that suggested Afterlife was not on the (a?) Continent, which suggests and island. Considering all the eastern surroundings and all the mountains, I’m guessing Japan.
But as I said, that’s pure speculation ;)
@67, @70:
Budgeting for a helicarrier doesn’t bother me. The daily beast is reporting that the US department of defense this year has over $79 billion in black budget operations. They go on further to say that experts believe that the defense department is probably hiding a lot of operations inside the budgets of normal budget categories – like personnel. The army right now as a program called the tractor hip; the navy has something called chalk eagle. So to me – for a much smaller shield it doesn’t seem all that inconceivable that if they had help from someone in the government they could completely hide. Or even better, if they had people inside the government who ran major program areas or departments who could hide them inside everyday spending. But to be fair, how exciting (and how long would you watch ) AOS if the good guys could be foiled by a gang of government accountants?
I’m willing to bet that eventually either AoS or the Avengers will have an accounting based run-in with someone like Henry Peter Gyrich.
I watched Avengers 2 today.
There is a small Agents of SHIELD, spoiler in there, but basically, that movie rocks! :)
Edit: oh, and Samuel Jackson :D
I wouldn’t be surprised to see Afterlife wiped out by Hydra at some point. Or, to make things even more morally ambiguous, wiped out by pointySHIELD.
@Alan:
I guess it’s a spoiler because we were supposed to see the movie after the next SHIELD episode, which we already know will be action packed.
The movie in itself gives a lot of fleshing out on Black Widow. Which I loved, because I love her character.
One spoiler: ‘auntie Nat’
Considering the wide gulf in quality between the two, it’s impossible for me to feel like the movie spoiled anything on the show.
Also, hurry up, America! I wanna be able to talk about the movie already!
Quite a show tonight. The original six SHIELD agents were back together again, but only to prove that as a team, they are broken beyond repair.
– Coulson shows a ruthless streak, and a willingness to manipulate everyone around him, including May.
– Simmons also shows a ruthless streak — to the point of considering cold blooded murder — she has been affected far more than her calm exterior reveals.
– Fitz, for once not suffering, seems to have almost made a full recovery.
– Skye, even when not using her quake powers, had a combat scene that put May to shame. And she has gone pretty far to master those new powers.
– May, for once, other than to express her betrayal, didn’t have much to do besides fly the plane, in a pretty awesome crash scene (but the Bus is gone?) (I myself suspect they won’t waste all those sets, and instead will soon find another Bus in mothballs, watched over by a lanyard wearing Koenig).
– And Ward disappeared into the sunset, realizing that he had done too much damage to ever be forgiven.
And, while Raina predicts doom at the hands of metal men, the ball is handed to (dum dum dummmm!) THE AVENGERS!
Kevin Tanchoroen’s hand is obvious again tonight during Skye’s fight scene. WOW, that was some gun kata shit right there.
I loved Coulson and Hill’s incredulousness at Gonzalez Democratic SHIELD. As I’ve said before, the ideal of “everyone having a voice” is a nice idea, but when it comes to combat units that MUST act decisively, it’s terrible in practice.
So apparently Theta Protocol is something to do with the Ultron program?
I feel sorry for Kara. I don’t think she will cope with Ward’s abandonment well.
I wonder just what exactly Raina thinks she has to threaten a woman with phenomenal healing powers? “I’ll stab you with my quills!” “Have you SEEN my scars?”
Ward isn’t gone forever, and I guess Tony is going to help rebuild Mike?
Now I’m wondering if we see the other side of this conversation in Age of Ultron. Maria Hill at the desk, Coulson’s face on the screen, repeating the same conversation. That would be cool. (Those who’ve seen the movie already, please don’t confirm or deny, thanks.) Really, it’s kind of interesting that DisneyMarvel thinks SHIELD has enough viewers that it’s worth trying to entice them into going and seeing Age of Ultron. But then, I suppose that since they’re making the show anyway, they might as well…
One of the things I love about this show is how much the characters have been permitted to change over time. A lot of shows, once you’re in one role, you’re stuck in it. But Skye has gone from Miss Defiant Anarchist Hacker to Miss Badass Agent of SHIELD (really, the super-powers are almost ancillary). Fitz and Simmons have gone from fresh-from-the-academy nebbishes to badly broken in different ways, and only Fitz seems to have fully recovered so far.
I thought Ward left Kara with SHIELD to serve as his mole. Just speculation, but I don’t trust Ward or his puported good motives.
@93, When Ward was saying that to Coulson, they cut to a shot of her in that hospital room, looking lost and it appears, asking the med tech where Ward was. Perhaps it’s an act, but for now, I’m going with genuineness on this. They’ve been very oblique for the audience when referring to what exactly Ward promised her, but I think it was her old life back
@93, @94: Of course, the way this show works, it’s only not all an act until it suddenly is. We saw that much with Grant Ward in Season 1.
@95, I disagree on that. There are definitely hints that Ward isn’t on the up and up from the start, but they are very subtle. So Ward really was an act all along, and the cues to see it were there, IF you were looking for them. Which again, is why I think this is genuine. With what we’ve seen of Kara since regaining her identity, duplicity isn’t her strong suit, despite the fact that it USED to be.
Skye’s oner action scene was extremely well done.
@97, It was incredible. There was a neat comment on the Av Club that theorized she used her powers to sense where the other combatants were, enabling her to use the environment like she did.
I want to know what Coulson was alluding to when he told Gonzalez that he knew what was in the hold of his ship…
@99, I saw that in the SneakPeek so I’m SO MAD we didn’t find out. Hopefully we will next week.
Well, I’ve seen the Avengers, so I see where Agents of SHIELD led into the movie. And led into it pretty well.
But there was very little in the movie that leads back into where the TV show is going, so we’ll have to tune in next week and see!
Except for the fact that I don’t think after the events of the movie SHIELD is going to be operating in the shadows anymore.
I don’t think the movie is going to affect Coulson’s and Gonzales’s SHIELD fragments that much. Avoiding spoilers as much as possible, I don’t think Nick Fury’s appearance in A2 necessarily says anything about SHIELD as an overall organization. He’s just got his own fragment of it, the same way Coulson and Gonzales do.
I’d expect more changes to come from the final three episodes (or one episode and a two-hour season finale) of the TV show itself. Going by the in-our-next-episode trailer and the sneak peek that just went up, it seems that the show is really too involved in its own plot arc to do much more than maybe glance up and say, “Hey, so what about all those killer robots, eh? Crazy couple of days we just had. That Tony Stark, what a kidder.” If we even get that much.
I’m still holding out hope for a Samuel L. Jackson cameo in the season finale…
Ok, I’m going to try and avoid direct spoilers for the film, but if you’re really paranoid about spoilers skip this one.
So, in the film Fury turns up with a big toy that used to belong to Shield.
Question is, did he get it from Colson, pointyShield, or some other old Shield faction who’s just been laying low, looking after things Fury thought he might want?
@104, Maybe that was Theta protocol! I DON’T KNOW
@104: I think he just kept it in a garage somewhere. A very, very big garage. Note that it’s very specifically the one from the first Avengers movie, not Winter Soldier (he said, dancing all around the spoilers). Pretty much the same way Coulson et al kept the Bus.
That Nick Fury. He even steals office supplies on a grand scale.
@106, LOL
Hmm; how to do this without spoiling too much? Maybe “theta protocol” had to do with the structure in Upstate New York at the end of the movie? Fits some of the elements that Mac mentioned a few episodes ago. That could be another potential tie in between the movie and the TV show.
Well, now we know that the Theta protocol was the helicarrier that Fury pulled out of his hip pocket at the end of Age of Ultron. Which makes Coulson a big hero. But not to his friends at either pointySHIELD and roundSHIELD. In fact, he claims to be Director of SHIELD, but it seems to me that the organization is more fragmented than ever, which leaves him without much to be in charge of. May just flat out hates his guts at this point.
We finally got some good looks at pointySHIELD’s carrier, and it looks like an ordinary waterborne aircraft carrier to me, not like any helicarrier that has appeared to date in any of the movies. If it does fly like the others, it is definitely an older model or something, with nothing above the waterline (other than a deck full of quinjets) to indicate it is special. Not sure what the blob in the hold is–I am drawing a blank on anything from the comics that might give a hint.
And we had Cal turn himself over to SHIELD, but along with a lot of his empty energy drink vials. It seems we may finally see him in full Mr. Hyde mode next week.
And what are Ward and 33 up to? I can’t figure out what their end game might be. Except to be evil, which I hate. Even antagonists should have believable motivations.
Speaking of antagonists, Skye’s mom is definitely not into negotiating. Blew Gonzalez away just on general principles, and set up her own “Gulf of Tonkin” incident by shooting herself, and claiming it was Gonzalez that did it.
I will miss Mac on the show, as it seems like he won’t be back next season. I liked Tripp, also. I see a disturbing trend.
At least Bobbi is still alive, as Ward keeps using the icer gun on her, not a real gun. She is a great addition to the show, and I would hate to lose her.
So it looks like next week is full on SHIELD versus Inhuman (and they finally said that word). With poor Skye in the middle of it all. At this point, I have NO idea what will happen next.
Agent 33 is holding a grudge against Bobbi, because she was undercover at HYDRA. She was ordered to break cover for Gemma, but not for Kara, and she’s angry. So Ward’s told her, enacting vengeance and suffering, like he did on his family, is the “key” to moving on, so that’s what she’s going to do.
I may not know for sure WHAT’s going to happen, but eventually Skye will learn how her mother betrayed her intentions with SHIELD, and it will be on.
I have a feeling Mack will be back. Someone has to go save Bobbi.
Really nice fakeout the show pulled. Making us believe Raina was the dangerous one, that Gonzalez was the warmonger, and Jiayang was a calm, rational leader—right up until the very end. Damn. She and Cal really do make a pair, don’t they?
Speaking of Cal, anyone else feel like the reason he was shown to have those empty vials (and it was telegraphed earlier what they were) is that we’re going to see him in full Hyde hulk-out mode next episode?
The irony is, if they’d let Coulson go after all, he probably would have been okay, due to his exposure to the alien blood. Or at the least, his manner wouldn’t have infuriated Jiayang the way Gonzales’s did…
@111, I agree, and yes were about to Cal’s Other Guy
The weird thing is that on the one hand, Gonzales had it coming (he was warmongering – bringing a handgun to a diplomatic meeting); but planning a first strike (and faking an attack attempt) that doesn’t even achieve much makes Jiaying appear as a quite bad leader, either.
The truly sad things is that both parties are quite hypocritical – Shield’s all “you’re too dangerous if you have powers and need to be put under guard, and we even don’t consider you a person at all; unless you happen to play on our team/are too strong to take down (then it doesn’t even matter that you’re completely alien, yes, I’m looking at you, Thor)” while the Inhumans are “you’re not allowed to take out any of ours, no matter how dangerous they are; unless it’s us doing the taking out.” A little bit too much unchecked (and unreflected) tribalism going on there for my tastes; and it makes me wonder whether the writers even notice how nonsensical that is.
What can I say, except for wanting Jia Ying killed dead. She killed Adama!
I actually liked Cal today, which is a first.
I missed icers being used on Bobbi. I hope she is not dead.
If she lives, there will be payback :D
@114: Not only did Ward say that she was waking up before shooting her again, the gun also had blue flash (the typical icer signature).
@114 & 116, And the chrome barrel.
The interesting thing, is I STILL don’t think Raina is on the up and up(and it’s not like SHIELD would have negotiated with her anyway).
The whole thing sucked all around, but as soon as Skye finds out Cal’s hulked out on the SHIELD jet, she’ll know the score.
Hunter seems like an obvious choice there. Maybe he and Mack will, possibly with help from FitzSimmons.
Agreed, though in this particular case she may just have misinterpreted her vision a la Melisandre.
@118, Well Hunter goes without saying.
SHIELD doesn’t have any mandate, does it? Coulson and Gonzalez are private citizens with no governmental authority, no police powers or anything like that who have assembled a paramilitary force out of the disbanded remnants of a spectacularly incompetent intelligence agency. SHIELD’s “agents” are ex-spies who can’t get over being out of a job and illegally spy on, assault, kidnap, and even kill both US and foreign nationals.
Legally they’re not different from a bunch of “concerned citizens” in white hoods or ski masks coming to take away your children, and will burn down your house and gun you down if you don’t agree to unnecessary medical procedures.
Are the showrunners not aware of how they’ve positioned their characters?
@114, @116, @117 – Also, when Ward first shot her, she had that purple streaky “dendrotoxin face.”
The gears were creaking pretty hard in this episode. We spent what felt like forever with Gonzales and Coulson in opposition, people debating the merits of democracy vs. hierarchy, and then basically we get “Go see the movie to understand why we’re friends now.” I can understand Whedon’s frustration with the TV show. Everything just feels a bit mechanical, even the stuff that I liked. It’s a shame, because the previous episode was awesome.
I don’t really see this being resolved at the end of next week, either. I have a feeling we’re going to see Skye severing ties with everyone.
@121: It’s a point worth thinking about, isn’t it? But then, the vast majority of superheroes are just as legally unsanctioned. The fact that people do that is one of the mainstays of superhero universes. At some point, it becomes one of those things where you have to invoke the MST3K mantra, though you never know—they could come out and address it at some point.
SHIELD seems to be operating as a more serious version of the “Men In Black” organization from the titular movies—the guys who went in and removed all government knowledge of themselves afterward so they could operate within their own mandate.
These people aren’t superheroes, though. They just operate in a superhero universe.
Of course, the show won’t ever deconstruct the idea of superheroes and undermine its own reason for existence, I get that. But it seems like the show just glosses over most of the problematic aspects of an unsanctioned, unmandated pseudo-agency like SHIELD, and what it means for the “good guys”.
I don’t expect The Sopranos, but I would like a bit more thoughtfulness than The A-Team, you know?
@125: How are they not, technically, superheroes? There are plenty of other superheroes whose “powers” are just skills and equipment. (Tony Stark, for example.) Why not them too?
@125: I don’t think the show is “glossing over” all those problems. I think it’s actually raising them. What it hasn’t done, yet, is provide any answer other than “we can trust Phil Coulson”.
126: No capes, obviously.
Since returning from the mid-season hiatus, I feel that with each episode Agents of Shield is becoming more and more flawed. There are a lot of good elements, but the story is flawed, the plots have major holes and many of the characters often don’t act intelligently or consistent to their previously exposed behavior/beliefs.
I like this show, but I also watch it and cringe because so many things don’t make sense and are often glossed over or treated as if they didn’t happen. The characters don’t act like real people; the plot drives the characters’ actions, and not vice versa.
For example:
Coulson: shows the ruling cabal of RealShield (Agent May included) what “theta protocol” was (although I still subscribe to the fact that another part of theta protocol includes the new Avengers facility in upstate New York; hence the “bunks and beds” that Mack mentioned a few episodes ago), it’s clearly demonstrated that without the helicarrier hundreds of lives would have been lost, and then Coulson still accepts the cabal members as “advisors?” After the group lied, infiltrated and damaged his base, assaulted and attempted to kill his agents and executed a coup? (And he actually says in this episode that they executed a coup!)
May: mysterious, reserved May-with all of her secrets, deception and lies- is still mad at Coulson because he didn’t tell her everything in his capacity as director? This is the same women who spied on her good friend because the previous Shield director ordered her to? Coulson ultimately forgives her after she fully comes clean about her deception but when the tables are turned she isn’t willing to do the same?
Jiaying: has been (up to this point) presented as someone who is compassionate, wise, patient and thoughtful. She has some rough edges, but all-in-all she is someone who has championed inner beauty and seeing the good in others and the beauty of their powers. She’s also championed the desire to keep the Inhumans as secret as possible. And then in the first 5 minutes of meeting him, she kills Gonzales with a terrigen mist bomb in order to provoke a war with Shield that will be very public and require her people to use their powers for destruction. So screw centuries of peace and privacy?
Mack: After -just a few episodes ago- expecting Fitz to get over the whole “being deceived by Mack, Bobbi and RealShield” thing and stay with them, Mack chooses to leave Shield because he can’t get over Director Coulson’s having alien blood? Isn’t Mack supposed to be highly principled? He’s willing to sacrifice his principles that easily.
Bobbi: Superspy, deceptive, observant Bobbi doesn’t notice anything fishy about the situation until it’s too late, allows Kara to take them far off course, doesn’t check in immediately after subduing Kara and then is taken unaware by Ward?
These things just didn’t make sense.
Plus:
Gonzales had a cargo that was treated as super-secret initially (maybe his fellow cabal members knew about it), but now that 2 Inhumans come across it the cargo becomes treated as no longer secret?
The cargo itself had no (obvious) mind control or suggestive powers? So six senior Shield agents really saw no problem creating their own little RealShield group, hiding their existence from other Shield agents and then planning and executing a coup against the properly selected Shield director?
The helicarrier and Shield base must now be in really close proximity to one another, as characters were ferrying back and forth between the two throughout this episode.
Just so many questions or plot holes for a show that had hit its creative peak in the first half of the season. I hope some of this is addressed in the 2 hour finale, but it doesn’t look like it will be.
Similar to the points made at 113, 121 and 124 –
Another thing about the Jiaying/Gonzales (or more accurately the Inhumans/Shield) talks that were painfully obvious to me and that I was surprised some of the more perceptive parties in the episode didn’t point out: The hypocrisy of Shield’s efforts here.
Shield is an unsanctioned, secret organization full of unaccounted for dangerous individuals who answer to no recognized government or international authority and are conceivably a threat to the well being of others. And they are trying to “Index” the Inhumans for essentially being the same thing.
Why weren’t the parallels of the two organizations pointed out by anyone? (Coulson, Skye, Jiaying, or even subtly by the showrunners and writers?) Why should the audience see Shield as the good guys in this situation? I think maybe the writers did gronk the hypocrisy on some level, which is why they had Jiaying act so far out of left field in killing Gonzales (the man who up until this point had been calling all enhanced “freaks”).
But wouldn’t that require an expectation of the audience to be kind of lazy and forgetful; and for the audience to, all of a sudden, want to empathize with someone who instituted the coup of Shield and sent out his men to capture or kill Skye?
I’m just not buying the handwaving of “Shield has a mandate to protect the world from danger, however Shield defines it” as an excuse, here.
@129, The SHIELD base is in the Caribbean, this was established a few episodes ago.
The Iliad is also NOT a helicarrier.
@129:
I like this show, but I also watch it and cringe because so many things
don’t make sense and are often glossed over or treated as if they didn’t happen. The characters don’t act like real people; the plot drives the characters’ actions, and not vice versa.
This is exactly the problem I’m having with the show right now. I loved the end of Season 1 (post-Winter Soldier), and I liked the first half of this season, but now the showrunners seem to have forgotten nearly everything about the characters they’ve been building for almost 2 seasons now.
I’m all about characters in a show: I can forgive some episodes with plot holes far more than I can forgive the plot running over the characters.
I can’t decide which I hated more: Mack abruptly deciding to leave or May’s continued distrust of Coulson (after 2 seasons of establishing how close she and Coulson are, and how theta protocol turned out to be not an Inhuman recruitment base — especially considering when she went behind Coulson’s back it was to REPORT ON HIM. That seems like a bigger trust issue than not mentioning he was building a helicarrier. Besides, she knows he’s the director, not co-directors with her. She of all people should understand what the chain of command means.).
On FitzSimmons: So Fitz is now nearly 100% back to normal; they seem to have gotten bored with his problems in Downton-Abbey-Mr.-Bates-limp style. And Jemma is the crazy would-be killer (well, I guess now she is a killer; she just got the wrong guy).
@131: Can we be sure it’s not? I just checked the first Avengers, and that helicarrier looked pretty much like a normal one, too, until it raised the rotors and took off.
@131 – They’re in the Caribbean? I totally missed that. When did they spell that out? I know the Inhuman City was in Puerto Rico, but I didn’t realize that the Shield base was that close to it.
As for the Iliad: whether it’s a helicarrier or just an aircraft carrier, my point remains the same.
@132 – I also can deal with plot holes if the character’s actions make sense based on established characteristics or beliefs. Mack and Melinda May’s actions (amongst others) really don’t.
As for FitzSimmons, you make some good points. I didn’t feel as strongly regarding their characters (although Jemma’s behavior in the arctic Hydra base and subsequent behavior since then does seem out of character for her).
@KiManiak
You mentioned Jia Ying as wise and caring. Let me point out she is also ruthless to the core. Remember how she wanted to ditch Cal a few episodes ago.
She confirmed that in the last episode.
And as much as I disliked Gonzalez, he did not deserve this.
@134, In the episode where REAL SHIELD took over Coulson’s base, he walked to a beach bar in the Caribbean somewhere, where he met up with Hunter.
@136 We don’t know that he walked. I figured he took an airline or something, the better to get right the hell out of dodge before RealSHIELD could get their mitts on him. That’s pretty flimsy evidence on which to base their location.
No, because it’s already been several hours since Hunter left, and it was going to take him 12 hours to get to the SHIELD base.
@Fiddler – Yeah, I get that she can be a bit harsh (or maybe “hard” is the better word choice) but I would question whether she is completely ruthless to the core. Remember, her plan was to kick Cal out of Afterlife, not kill him. And even that plan was in respect to the rules of Afterlife and likely in spite of her own wishes; clearly she still has feelings for Cal. To me, she came across as more self-sacrificing than ruthless or cutthroat.
By the way, I’m totally not excusing her murder of Gonzales. I’m just saying that it came way out of left field, even more so than Jemma’s murdering of Bakshi and apparent lack of remorse.
@136 – I don’t consider that definitive, merely your interpretation of the locale of that particular scene. It seemed as if you were stating the Caribbean as the location based on definitive evidence presented by the show, and not on your own speculation. If you have some, I’d love to hear (see) it. Otherwise, I think it’s safe to assume that we still don’t know where the Shield base is.
ETA: I don’t think the response at 138 provides evidence either, just more speculation. Clearly Hunter and Coulson communicated after Coulson left the base and met at an agreed upon location.
If anything, I think it provides proof the base is not in the Carribbean. Coulson wouldn’t stay anywhere near someplace RealSHIELD could easily find and recapture him.
Remember, next time we see the pair of them, they’re at a car dealership on the mainland stealing an SUV. They certainly didn’t “walk” there from the Carribbean. And if they didn’t “walk” there, why did Coulson have to “walk” to the Carribbean bar?
I got the impression that Hunter escaped from the pointySHIELD carrier (which looked like a fairly unmodified US Navy model surface ship, not like the Avengers style helicarrier with its distinctive island, and angled flight deck one deck above the fore and aft flight deck) fairly close to a tropical beach, as small submersibles don’t have much range. But I never thought Coulson was in walking distance from the beach where they met–I thought he flew to get there. And that was a pretty generic beach bar, could have been anywhere not only on an island, but on the Southwest, Southeast, or even Gulf Coast of the US.
And I didn’t think Jiaying’s actions at the meeting were too far out of character. She showed many times that she was suspicious and manipulative, and folks underestimated how apart from humanity she and the other inhumans see themselves. And after all, it was humans that chopped her up to experiment on her. She and the other inhumans tend to see HYDRA and SHIELD as not too much different. And as folks above have pointed out, SHIELD is certianly not without flaws, and not pure in its motives.
Personally, I expected Jiaying would be evil, or at least ruthless when it comes to protecting the Inhumans.
I also think that while Jiayang’s actions were a shock they are not totally outside her character. I don’t think we know how old she is but I recall the elders refering to her as being around for generations.
I think she is a 1000 plus and over and over again she’s seen her people feared and killed whenever they are found out by normal humans. Whatever Skye or other younger inhumans may think she doesn’t see any reason why this time should be different.
If I had barely survived horrific medical torture by Nazis, and some guy from an organization that’s 50% Nazis came with a bunch of armed men and jets to my home and told me he’s going to run medical tests on me and my people…
…hell, I’d probably kill the shit out of him, too, and good riddance. Gonzalez, Coulson, and the others were being Darwin Award-levels of stupid if they didn’t see how that was gonna go.
I am feeling very smug about guessing that Theta Protocol involved the spare helicarrier :)
Also, I wonder how much of what we’re seeing in AoS is building towards Civil War, with the index standing is as a precursor to registration. You can already see the team (well, all the characters) starting to come down on one side or the other. Fitz and Simmons are a good example, she’s becoming more extreme in her dealing with problems (“lets blow up Ward!”), while Fitz has had a taste of what it’s like being ‘the other’ and he’s becoming more sympathetic.
Re: Jiaying – I get what some of you are saying and why you think Jiaying is capable of doing what she did. After all she was tortured by Hydra, SHIELD may not seem much different to her and Gonzales insulted her by trying to manipulate her and compare his experience with Hydra to hers. And she has shown that she can be manipulative, when it is in the best interest of her people.
I want to be clear on my end. I’m not saying that Jiaying isn’t capable of murdering Gonzales; I think almost anyone is capable of murder given the appropriate circumstances and motivation. My opinion is that it just seemed highly unlikely -based upon what we’ve been shown of her character/actions so far- that the circumstances and motivation were appropriate to have Jiaying commit murder; that’s what I mean when I say it’s out of character.
Almost anyone in Agents of Shield could conceivably act the way she did and we could look at some detail the show has given us to allow for the possibility. The motivation leading to murder and the willingness to accept the consequences of those actions are what I believe keeps them from doing it.
I didn’t believe that Jiaying’s displayed actions (not killing Cal when he became inconvenient, for instance), behavior (getting Skye and Gordon to focus on the beauty of their gifts, not exult in the destructive capabilities) and beliefs (wanting her people to be secret and protected, above all else) demonstrated that she would commit such an act (that would go against what she had previously stated and shown were her values) and be willing to accept the consequences (put all of her people’s lives at risk, make them have to use their powers towards destruction and kiss any hope of secrecy from the outside world goodbye).
(How’s that for parentheses overload?)
That’s what I mean when I’m saying it is out of character. Otherwise the viewer would have had to expect the following of Jiaying:
1) murder of an envoy;
2) a declaration of war against SHIELD; and
3) likely public exposure to the outside world of a people that she spent the vast majority of her inhuman lifespan trying to keep secret and safe.
I think it’s believable the viewer would expect Jiaying to be capable of 1) if it were to prevent 2) and 3), but I have a hard time believing that the average viewer would expect that she would want, or take action that would result in, 1), 2) and 3).
Well, how about that? Both Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and Agent Carter have been renewed. Squeeee!
Unfortunately, it turns out that the other spinoff, the Bobbi and Lance Show, ain’t happening. Oh well. Given the choice between the two, I’d prefer more Agent Carter anyway.
I was pleased to see Agents of SHIELD reviewed, but even more excited that Agent Carter is returning. Bobbi and Lance are two of the more compelling additions to Agents of SHIELD, so I think it is wise to keep them in the cast to strengthen the original show’s appeal, rather than spinning them off into something new.
If we do see another Marvel show on ABC, I would prefer to see something new. Elsa Bloodstone, for example, might be fun on the ‘monster of the week’ format show.
@147, I’m now thinking the whole thing was a fake out so we’d convinced she had plot armor going into this week.
Or the announcement is delayed because they realized the took all the tension out of that story.
@148, Rumors I’m hearing is that the Bloodstones may be on AC as an intro into Dr. Strange?
Elsa is too young for the Agent Carter, but her dad would fit right in. That would be fun. He always had an Indiana Jones vibe to him, and would mesh well with the 1950’s adventure setting. And it would help pave the way for some mystical and magical stuff to appear in the MCU.
I watched this again this weekend and was struck by a possiblity. The empty vials that were found on Cal are supposed to be some kind of rage/ strength drug? (Or so I’ve been assuming). What if he either gave some of that to Jaiying covertly or she asked to be given some. Would that account for the sudden change in personality? Jusk throwing that out ther, I guess we’ll find out tonight.
I wonder if Theta Protocol was always intended to be the helicarrier, or if that was a sudden retcon in order to tie in with the movie? I was discussing this with some friends last night, and it really “feels” like it was originally supposed to be something to do with powered people. It doesn’t make a lot of sense that Coulson would keep something like a helicarrier from May, but it would make more sense if it was something dealing with powered folks, who would have been a hot button for her after Bahrain. It doesn’t really thematically fit with Real SHIELD’s “is the alien blood messing with Coulson’s mind” concerns that they built up over several episodes.
(And really, why keep it from everyone except Koenig, except for wanting it to be a surprise for the audience? Would anyone in SHIELD not want the helicarrier rebuilt?)
Kind of funny, when you think about it. It took a movie tie-in to make season 1 suddenly worth watching—but now this movie tie-in turns out to be the weakest and most tacked-on-feeling part of the whole show.
@152, I think it’s also tied into the new facility, because yeah they never explained where the beds and stuff were going, though they did explain that his mysterious trips were to see Andrew
I started rewatching AoS Season 2 starting with episode 11. There is much foreshadowing there already.
And Mack is already a rebellious fucktard there. I will not miss him, and I hope he never returns.
Also, in episode 11, we saw some of the Elders JiaYing answers to, in the scene where Gordon is trained as a kid.
EDIT: and the moment Lance Hunter was introduced to Adama’s SHIELD, is where I started to love him :D
Gonzalez: ‘You must be Lance Hunter’
Lance: ‘and you must be crazy’ :D
@154, Nope, Mack is here to stay, and I love it.
FFFFUUUUUUCCCCKKKKK
That’s all I have to say about that last scene. Okay, not all. Since it attacked Simmons, that means she’s Inhuman, right?
Ward finally taking on the leadership of HYDRA. OH JOY.
Coulson going to get Hill to requistion him a hand?
And who would have thought Cal was the one getting a redemption arc this season?
NOT SIMMONS!!!!!!!!!!!! *sob sob sob* Ok we got that out of the way.
Great season finale, it both wrapped up everything from this season and planted the seads for next season. Pretty much confirms that we will see the secret warriors next season, although who will be on the team will be fun to see. I personally liked that Ward has decided to just go all in and become the Head of Hydra. Intereseted to see how that turns out. But the main thing is FitzSimmons. Poor Fitz, he finally gets the courage to ask her out to dinner, she has shown interest and said yes, and Simmons gets eaten by an alien stone. I dont think it necessarily means that Simmons is an Inhuman, remember that Gordon said that it is very dangerous to Inhumans. Maybe that means that Simmons will eventually become very dangerous to Inhumans too, which may be needed because of the fish absorbing the terrigenisis crystals. Wonder how long it will take SHIELD to figure that out. All in all, great job ABC and Marvel you definitly have me hooked and desperatly waiting for next season. And that doesnt even include Agent Carter coming back. Mmmm, Hayley Atwell, shes yummy
As a friend of mine posted on Facebook, “To be fair, ‘Omega-3’ does sound like the sort of thing that should grant superpowers…”
Incidentally, did people notice how what happened with Coulson was a perfect bookend for the fate of Agent Xena early in the season?
Clearly, the fish oil is the MCU’s equivalent to the “Terragen Bomb” that went off recently in the comics—a way to get more new superheroes when they can’t use “mutants” due to the X-Men movie deal.
@158, I did think about that, but more relevant to me at the moment, was thinking about Jorah Mormont going “Damn it” when Mack did that.
So Mack is the Official Nicknamer of the group
Skye is Tremors, Fitz is Turbo
I guess Coulson can be Nubs and Gemma is…..Lunch!
TOO SOON?
@Aeryl: Mack sure redeemed himself. Nice touch that he starts out with an axe, since Gonzalez was taken down by Hydra with an axe wound to his leg on the day Shield fell, on the same ship…
Speaking of Redemption. I did not see that coming for Cal, especially in Mr. Hyde mode. Well played. Kyle MacLachlan has put in an excellent performance all season. But he went to Tahiti. It’s a magical place. And the ending scenes between him and Skye, both pre and post Tahiti were moving.
So, we finally get confirmation that Ward really killed the dog when Garret was grooming him. That has been a point of debate. Nice flashback to season 1.
I chuckled at ‘Ginger Ninjas’. Dirty male me had a thought about how dating her could be interesting. ;)
JiaYing is not only ruthless, as KiManiak and I discussed earlier. She is also a vampire. The fact that Elders stopped giving their lives to her post remake says enough here.
Ward. Well, he is Ward, a sociopath to the core. Watching him grooming Kara as a Sith Lord’s apprentice was interesting, but I will not miss Kara. Oh, the irony there in how she died. It will be interesting to see him lead Hydra, but knowing Ward, the monster will only have one head now.
I loved how May packed her bags for a beach vacation, and still took her gun. :D
On Simmons, I did not like that last scene. I am sure we will see her again, but what I love about her is being a brilliant scientist without superpowers. Poor Fitz :(
They can cut off both of Coulson’s arms and he will still rule ;)
The ending was shocking but, they can’t really get rid of Simmons like that right? It’s a twist, but it’s so incomprehensible that it would rob it of any emotional impact if she was gone.
I’m glad that they suddenly realized “Oh hey, Mack is here and he is pretty good, we should let him do stuff!”
@161, I thought it was lingerie, for SEXAY TIMEZ with Andrew, but maybe it is just a bikini!
@162, She will come out of that thing, but AS WHAT? My thought is she’s going to be like Rogue, with the ability to take Inhumans powers back.
It is going to be fun trying to guess which third- or fourth-tier Marvel heroine Simmons will become when she comes out of that thing, isn’t it?
@164, Time to start scouring Secret Warriors I guess.
Venom?
OK, that’s amusing. Freeze framing on the bottle of fish oil, I see the label declares it offers “Health Benefits That Will CHANGE YOUR LIFE“.
Yeah…
It was a fun episode, no doubt about that. I liked the action and fight scenes quite a bit and the fact that there were some physical (and sometimes fatal) consequences to some of the action sequence . Also, let me just say that if the showrunners don’t find some way to bring Ginger Ninja back, then Marvel needs to dropkick them for someone with a little more Vision (heh) soon.
So, Jiaying isn’t just a last-minute-warmongering-psycho, she’s now a last-minute-warmongering-psycho-vampire, with a Dr. Evil type carrying out of her master plan to eliminate the good guys? Whatever. If the writers decided to make her a cartoon villain, then fine; the show is based off of comic book characters after all. I agree with you Fiddler, she was definitely written as ruthless here. Too bad she was also written as a fairly incompetent, Bond-villain (old school Bond villain, not the more competent Bond villains of the recent movies).
Roll call-
Skye: Glad the show reminded us she was a master hacker, along with her other more recently acquired talents and abilities. Also, great fight scene between her and the Ginger Ninja.
Ward: Let’s see how he does as the new leader of Hydra.
May: Badass as always. Also, gotta love a woman who packs a hot bikini and a gun for her vacation.
Fitz: “Science, biatch!” Loved it! And he finally gets the courage to ask Simmons out, only to accidentally unlock the container housing the deadly artifact that ultimately swallows her up.
Simmons: I actually like her character’s growth over the 2nd half of the season from being someone who believed enhanced needed to be feared/distrusted/eliminated to someone willing to believe that Gonzales provoked the Inhumans by attempting to kill Jiaying (bummer about that). Also, I could see the artifact giving Simmons some Leech-like powers, more than Rogue-like powers; but either way, I think she will end up being able to neutralize Inhumans.
Coulson: Bummer about the arm. Glad he and Mack were able to resolve their issues, though.
Bobbi: I respect making a tough call in order to infiltrate Hydra and get them to trust you. But not showing any remorse? The needs of the many may outweigh the needs of the one, but you can still feel for the sacrifice that the one makes (especially if you forced that sacrifice on them).
Mack: Loved the axe. Amused by the nicknames. But you’re in charge of the artifact that you claim won’t be opened for 100 years and you don’t even place a lock on the container? Come on, man!
Hunter: Was in this episode.
So Coulson was the Marvel Phase 2 Star Wars homage victim of S.H.I.E.L.D. He’s probably most sad that he can’t drive Lola right now….
And I’m glad that Mack is sticking around.
I assume Coulson will get a new hand. I hope it serves him better than Peter Pettigrew’s.
Here’s something interesting to think about. When Cal had his big goodbye with Skye, did he know what was about to happen to him? Did Coulson make the offer, as he had with Ward a few episodes back?
If we assume that he did—and in retrospect, the dialogue does seem to suggest it—it makes the scene play out with an entirely different shade of meaning.
There’s not really any doubt, I think, that he went to TAHITI willingly. He wasn’t restrained when the guards led him away from Skye.
When Cal told Skye/Daisy he was “going away for good,” and then walked away willingly, I think he knew what he was getting into. It seemed like a more final goodbye between them. Which I appreciated — Coulson learned from his own TAHITI experience that it’s better to let someone walk into it instead of being forced into it.
In this show, people being forced into things doesn’t end well.
…Which makes me wonder about Simmons in season 3!
From the peanut gallery:
When Coulson finally found Mack aboard the Iliad, Mack asks “What took you so long?”
Coulson replies “It’s a large ship, and there is poor signage”
To which the Sailor comments “There is EXCELLENT signage on that ship, thank you very much”
He was very offended on behalf of the ship.
I wondered if there was something special about Simmons as it seemed to choose her over Fitz.
I read a few days ago that the Bobbi/Lance show might be back on again; I wondered if her confession that she didn’t want to do “this” anymore is the exit they will use to start the new show with.
Robotech @@@@@ 171
When Cal had his big goodbye with Skye, did he know what was about to happen to him? Did Coulson make the offer, as he had with Ward a few episodes back?
I’m pretty sure Cal knew what was going to happen. Unlike what Coulson promised to Ward on still remembering Kara, for Cal remembering Skye was no option though, since she was the core of what drove him to become what he was.
I do hope they will cancel the Bobbi/Lance spinoff, because both characters are not strong enough to carry a show (they are both too secondary), as much as I like them. I do not live in the US, so I have to download AoS to watch it. I doubt I will bother checking on a Bobbi/Lance show.
Now, an Agent May Show on what happens on her holiday, that is what I’d love to see.
@176: They aren’t going to do a Bobbi/Lance spinoff after all. They are, however, going to do Agent Carter, season 2! I’m with you that I wouldn’t be that interested in a Lance/Bobbi show as I find them less interesting.
And I’d love a short about May’s holiday! That would be great.
@177 Rumors resurfaced again today. My guess is the initial walkback was because Jed & Mo got ticked they took half the tension out of the finale by announcing it. I honestly wondered if the whole thing wasn’t just a giant troll, because when the gun went off, I believed she was instantly dead. When I saw that she was still alive, I knew she’d make it, but I bought it for a second. Though I agree with @176, they aren’t strong enough for their own show.
I applaud a 2nd season for Agent Carter. :)
Maybe Simmons will come out of the Kree block of gooey stuff as Captain Marvel! (well, probably not, but still, I think some superpowers are coming to her future–hopefully powers for good, and not something that turns her into evilSimmons)
Agents of Shield is the target of so much criticism that old and new viewer’s enjoyment and perception of the show is being negatively affected.
I remember telling my friend to check this show out and he replied by saying that he thinks it was lame. I then asked if he had seen the show and he replied by saying “no, but I read a review about it”
No show is perfect. It gets harder for actual fans of the series to enjoy this series themselves with all these reviews pointing out what this series did wrong this time.
Anyone else notice that May’s locker number was 33?
I thought Mack made a pretty fair Casey Ryback.
Maybe Simmons will come back looking like this…
I didn’t see any mention here of the possible meaning of the number assigned to the cargo room on the carrier being 47. There has been a writer/producer running in-joke for over 25 years of including 47 in TV series and films. It is said to have been started by Joe Monosky who joined Star Trek: The Next Generation and was a graduate of Pomona College. It spread from ST:TNG to the other ST shows and films and influential people like JJ Abrams got really into it. A lot of the series he was/is involved with include 47 inclusions, both visually and in transcripts. The series Alias (JJ Abrams) not only inserted 47s into almost every episode, they wrapped it into the series mythology overtly. Look up the series Castle and there are lots of links to 47. I don’t think the carrier John C. Stennis (CVN-74) was chosen randomly for exterior shots because 74 is 47 backwards (something ST:TNG did too as a way to cloak 47s more). So I believe both the cargo room number and carrier ID were on purpose. That “47” on the cargo room wall (about 6′ tall) was pretty darn big but the carrier number was even bigger (about 20′). The show itself has the DNA of 47 in it when it began as it was ordered to series based on a Marvel short called “Item 47.” :) Still, as I only found two 47s in two episodes of two seasons of transcripts (transcripts don’t cover visual ones) these might only be a nod to the short film “Item 47” that spawned the series. The question would then be “Why did the writers of the Marvel short use 47 in the title?”
Of course it was because it was the 47th Chitauri weapon recovered from The Battle of New York (lol), but why 47? Why not 46 or 48? I don’t think this is coincidence.
@183, Any Casey Ryback is superior to the original Casey Ryback
Apparently Lincon might be joining the team (see here)
Question for the Powers That Be: Will there be a new thread for the new season, or should we continue to use this one?
I am also inquiring as to whether/not we will have a thread for the new season.
It might be too much to hope for, but I was kind of hoping there’d at least be some kind of review of the first episode. Maybe they could find someone else to write it if the other guy’s not interested. I mean c’mon, this is Marvel’s flagship TV show, intended to be the glue that ties all the movies together. It’s gotten a lot better since the first season. It merits review and discussion, dammit.
Mack had the best lines
I’m in love with Joey I hope he sticks around! No more killing gay people SHIELD! I’m on the Joey/Mack ship now!
Her name is Daisy, Phil. This refusal to move on with life indicates problems.
Science Bobbi!
MegaQuinJet
NotAbigal Brand!
Hey look President Ellis is still in office!
Was that a Civil War hook I just heard?
Adding my vote that Tor at least puts up a Season 3 comment thread. It’s going to get kind of tedious to scroll through ~200 comments or click on “newest comment” and hope that the page loads.
And is there anyone at Tor who is actually interested in the show who could take over reviewing it? If Chris is done with it, I understand, I’ve bailed on shows. But I’m with @191 — it seems like a huge oversight for Tor to just drop Agents of SHIELD completely.
At the least, a new comment thread would be great.
They’ve announced they are not doing individual episode reviews anymore… except for Doctor Who, it appears. I think its possible we’ll get a discussion thread, however. And, I would guess that they will have occasional posts, still, especially around the time of Civil War’s release.
And, if not, Charlie Jane Anders does episode reviews over on i09.
Here’s an idea: anyone who would be willing to write a weekly review column themselves might follow the non-fiction submission instructions here and make the offer. Maybe if they get enough submission offers, they’ll either pick someone, or at the least assign some new staff writer to it.
Hello, all–just a heads up that a post is in the works for next week which will cover the first two episodes of the season and hopefully serve as a new discussion thread for S3. We’re not able to commit to weekly coverage at this time, but hopefully there will be a lot to talk about this season, so watch this space!
Thanks! We appreciate it.
Thanks,@197 Moderator!
Did I miss the promised new thread?
The Season Three thread can now be found here–enjoy!