Agents of SHIELD. Season 1 Discussion Thread

I seem some Firefly similarities, slight though may be. I do see the comparisons between "the Bus" and Serenity.

 

This isn't Joss. It's Jed.

He may be using his brother as a role model, and might even be Joss-lite...

But here's what you'll notice about Joss-heavy, his smaller characters get a lot more traction in the romance wise because the franchise isn't balanced in their shoulders, that they can break up, or just do immorally dirty things and move on without he series being wrecked completely.

As far as Life model Decoys, lets just remember that Nicholas Brendon has a twin brother, and even pushing 40 they could still be somewhat identical, that was such a laugh that once on Buffy.

 

I suppose one could see it as Coulson trying to create his own mini team of Avengers, made up of the same kind of quirky outcasts and oddballs as in the actual Avengers. Having seen how effective that can be, maybe he's trying to prove the same thing can be done without superpowers.

 

You can't read too much into those "comparing the casts of different shows" things, because it's easy to posit comparisons between just about any two casts if you cherrypick the right details. Just yesterday I came across a comment on another forum remarking how the Agents of SHIELD ensemble parallels the ensemble of time-slot rival NCIS, except without a David McCallum parallel -- and they alleged that Gibbs, like Coulson, was "deceptively easygoing," whereas my impression of the character from what I've seen and heard is that he's a perpetual grouch.

It seems quite a reach to make a SHIELD/Firefly comparison, since this show has six leads and that one had nine. Plus these are such a clean-cut bunch of do-gooders except for Skye, whereas Serenity's crew was mostly thieves and scoundrels and fugitives. And SHIELD represents government and central control and everything that the Firefly characters were opposed to or running away from. And while I'll grant a functional similarity between Serenity and "the Bus" as standing sets/home bases for the teams, as well as a certain structural similarity in their interior layouts, the former was an old, endearingly clunky, lived-in ship while the latter is extremely slick and posh and, so far, rather sterile. (It could probably have used that fish tank.)

 

Just watched the first episode- not bad at all, decent fun.

 

Although the ratings was a smash in the first one, they really should have made it a two hour special. I found bits of the first one didn't work for me at all, but I loved the second (albeit a tad predictable) the interaction is interesting and The Bus is great. Shoulda been two hours I tells ya!

 

My point is that Reyes's troops were at least trying to avoid lethal force except as a last resort, while the SHIELD team seemed entirely unconcerned about the lethal consequences of their own plan -- even to their own team leader, for they almost got Coulson killed (again) in the process. That just seems reckless. Heck, what if the HYDRA weapon had been pointing in a different direction, say, right at Coulson's head, or at the cockpit controls? Granted, there is a self-defense justification here, but when the heroes' plan seems to show even less regard for lives and safety on both sides than the villains' plan, that suggests at the very least that the heroes need to work on their planning skills.

 

That's the best theory I've heard yet.

 

In their defense one can say that they were undergunned, outnumbered and maybe killed soon so they had to improvise quick and move fast so everything that resulted was just rolling with it and improvising further.

Only two of them had tactical training against an opponent that was trained in combat to the last person and if the plan was a bit wonky and risks the death of the enemy so be it.

Given their base situation they handled it well which was the point of the whole episode - to get them working as a team (well ignore all the physics mistakes and the magical rubber boat that can seal a car sized hole in a plane ).

 

Good point. Batman has the luxury of using non-lethal tactics because, well, he's Batman and confident in his ability to subdue superior numbers of armed combatants in hand-to-hand combat.

But if you're a hacker or science geek who barely knows how to throw a punch, facing armed soldiers who are threatening to drop you out of an airplane, figuring out how to save yourself without hurting your attackers is probably not going not going to be a priority!

 

As I said, realistically the pressure would be equalized in a couple of seconds anyway, and they'd lost altitude by that point so the air was supposedly breathable. So I don't see the raft as sealing the hole, just blocking it enough to catch Ward.

Still, that's what bothers me about the MCU in general. Most Marvel superheroes have very clear codes against killing under any circumstances. At times it's even been claimed that Captain America never killed anyone even when he was a soldier in WWII. That's a bit excessive, granted, but on the whole, Marvel (and DC) superheroes have a regard for life and go to great lengths to avoid lethal force, or at least they did for most of their histories. But MCU characters are quite casual about killing. Tony Stark supposedly became Iron Man to atone for his years as a weapons designer, but now Iron Man is the most powerful weapon around and he kills without blinking, so that's sending a mixed message.

On the other hand, Coulson did save Reyes, and Ward tried to save the soldier. So that gives some indication that this show will be a little more conscientious about human life than the movies have been. But if that's their goal, they need to go easier on the redshirts in the future.

(Although it's not just Marvel. These days the TV version of Green Arrow is a lethal vigilante and the movie Superman solves problems through cervical dislocation while letting whole skyscrapers full of people collapse unremarked. And that's downright wholesome next to what I've heard Superman does in that Injustice: Gods Among Us video game that came out recently.)

 

It's not how many men you have under you, it's how many men you have on top of you.

 

Almost a certainty.

 

Bit of a long shot (and I'm no expert in Marvel comic mythos) but isn't the guy who gave that sceptre to Loki supposed to be the master of death or some such? You know, the sceptre Coulson was stabbed with? The one last seen in SHIELD's (Romanoff's) hands?

Just saying maybe there's a connection there.

 

He's the would-be paramour of Death Herself. In the comics, anyway.

 

That would be Thanos, yes. Interesting thought, although I suspect that they're going to save any big Thanos-related revelations for the movies . . ..

 

Hmmm.

They probably can't have Thanos, the costme alone even if it isn't 70 percent cgi, in S.H.I.E.L.D. but what about Death?

Death could look like anyone, even a bloke.

Coulsen, if he did "come back" from the dead, beit ever so brief a death, and he's not a devious cunning ruse/trick... Down the line Thanos could get jealous... If his relationship persisted beyond a brush with Death.

Imagine in Avengers II: "Hey Grape face!?! She's just not into you anymore!"

Hela is Death is Loki's daughter if the Asgardians are really Gods linked to the fabric of the universe, and not just powerful aliens playing about.

 

He's not prepared enough to be Batman.