Agents of SHIELD. Season 1 Discussion Thread

[Alidar Jarok]

It's Tsai Chin, who played Ming-Na Wen's Aunt in the Joy Luck Club. She's not listed on imdb, so I wonder if it was uncredited to preserve the surprise.

ETA: Beaten to it

No idea she was in You Only Live Twice. She "killed" James Bond!

 

[The Old Mixer]

Son of a gun...I never would have known she was the girl from the YOLT pre-credits scene if I hadn't read it here.

"Why do Chinese girls taste different from all other girls?"

 

[bbjeg]

Unfortunately we have a character whose mind was manipulated and the question has to be asked. Second in the age of HYDRA, you can't assume anyone's motivation. I still think Coulson could be a HYDRA agent and maybe Furry manipulated him to be the ideal agent (maybe that's why Fury was so unsure of Coulson in the first place).

Fury was only unsure after the surgery. Before, he sent him to recruit Stark, find Thor's hammer, and have access to experimental laser cannons (Avengers).

No, Coulson's death and rebirth gave Furry the chance to manipulate Coulson. We know Stillwell was Hydra and he was active with Coulson during the first Thor movie.

You say no but in regards to what? That Fury didn't send Coulson to Stark in Iron Man 1 and 2, to Thor and his hammer, or have eye scan access to heavy weapons?

I'm not sure what your point is. Please clarify. If Coulson was HYDRA, Fury could have found out right after Avengers. Or he could always suspected Coulson but had no real proof until he was dead. We still don't know how Fury found out about HYDRA in the first place (access to Coulson's memory perhaps?)

I'm not sure what you're saying. It sounds like you're pointing at Coulson being a HYDRA agent prior to Iron Man. If not, Fury clearly trusted Coulson in the movies (which I was stating in my post) and from what we saw, he only started keeping tabs on him after altering his mind.

So, will season 2 be the rebuilding of SHIELD?

It doesn't have to be, the show isn't just called SHIELD. I'm picturing A-Team meets X-Files in the MCU.

 

[Christopher]

Really? Is that the same USA where people look at you funny for not even having at least an initial as a middle name? XD

The great thing about this country is that we have the protected legal right to say and do things that make people look at us funny.

 

[Gryffindorian]

"Your only name is Skye?"
"Well the orphanage named me Mary Sue..."

Now they're just trolling us...

A little disappointed nobody mentioned that...

Of course, people remember that dialogue, but you can't expect everyone to post word for word script of the whole episode.

 

[Yminale]

[
I'm not sure what you're saying. It sounds like you're pointing at Coulson being a HYDRA agent prior to Iron Man. If not, Fury clearly trusted Coulson in the movies (which I was stating in my post) and from what we saw, he only started keeping tabs on him after altering his mind.

Coulson was assigned to Stark BEFORE Stark let the world know he was Iron Man. Remember Coulson was assigned to investigate a simple kidnapping and the case may have been a low priority. Remember that Fury became directly involved in Iron Man 2 and even assigned Black widow as a deep cover agent. That seems to imply that he DIDN'T trust Coulson.

 

[auntiehill]

Awwwww. I love Patton.


I was kinda hoping he'd just shoot Ward right then and there.

 

[Guy Gardener]

You would think that considering someone stole their Skye, that the Serenity theme song would have come into play at some point in the episode?

Take my love, take my land
Take me where I cannot stand
I don't care, I'm still free
You can't take the sky from me
Take me out to the black
Tell them I ain't comin' back
Burn the land and boil the sea
You can't take the sky from me
There's no place I can be
Since I found Serenity
But you can't take the sky from me...

 

[RJDiogenes]

Regarding Coulson's popularity-- he's the only reason I started watching the show, because he was one of the two things I liked about Avengers.

It was great to see Amy Acker, though I was surprised that Coulson didn't reveal himself to her. It makes sense that he wouldn't, though, and at least it snapped him out of his anger at May. It was painful to watch him being depicted so childishly. But, of course, now May has walked out in a huff-- also out of character-- so the angst must continue. Forced conflicts are a hallmark of "dark" storytelling.

Skye's reactions to figuring out Ward and then coming to grips with it were great. The actress did a wonderful job. Now I wonder what she will do next-- she wanted to get something before they left but Ward wouldn't let her. Was she just trying to get away or was she hoping to leave a message or get her laptop or something?

I didn't realize that May's mom was a Bond girl. That's fantastic.

The Fitz-Simmons-Triplett triangle is amusing. I really hope they aren't stupid enough to make Simmons a HYDRA agent. As unmotivated as Ward is, Simmons would be even worse.

 

[Reverend]

[
I'm not sure what you're saying. It sounds like you're pointing at Coulson being a HYDRA agent prior to Iron Man. If not, Fury clearly trusted Coulson in the movies (which I was stating in my post) and from what we saw, he only started keeping tabs on him after altering his mind.

Coulson was assigned to Stark BEFORE Stark let the world know he was Iron Man. Remember Coulson was assigned to investigate a simple kidnapping and the case may have been a low priority. Remember that Fury became directly involved in Iron Man 2 and even assigned Black widow as a deep cover agent. That seems to imply that he DIDN'T trust Coulson.

^I'd call that a radical interpretation of the text.

First-off, the fact that SHIELD even wanted Stark debriefed indicates that they already knew something was up. Maybe the Ten Rings were already on their radar, maybe a drone or one of their surveillance sats caught his escape and thought his man-sized "escape vehicle" may be a potential threat. In short, Coulson wasn't there because of a celebrity kidnapping (that's not SHIELD's mandate) he was there to gather intellegence on a terrorist organisation.

Secondly, it's clear Romanov was sent in when it became clear Stark was going to be uncooperative with any kind of government agent or authority figure. They needed someone who could stay close to him an monitor his condition; something he was even hiding from his own inner circle.

As both Fury and Coulson made clear in IM2, they had more important things to do than babysit a billionaire having a mid-life crisis. They had an 0-8-4 sitting in a crater in New Mexico and rampaging Hulk in New York. Hell, it was probably only out of deference to Howard (and the potential to gain some headway on the tesseract project) that they got involved at all.

Indeed, right after Coulson is killed in Avenger's, Fury refers to him as his "one good eye". Add to that the lengths gone to to bring Coulson back and set him up with his little independent team...the level of trust there is explicit. The only thing he didn't trust was that the procedure was 100% stable, hence tapping May as a safety net.

 

[Pingfah]

This show gets my vote for most improved. I stuck it out as there is not much high budget action sci-fi on TV, but now after the last few episodes I am genuinely enjoying it.

Thank goodness Ward turned out to be a traitor, he was soooo boring as a good guy.

 

[The Old Mixer]

I'm seeing a lot of mentions of Simmons potentially being a traitor...I'm curious why people are thinking that. People were ready to have me put under psychiatric observation when I brought up the possibility a couple weeks ago....

 

[Turtletrekker]

I could see Fitz turning before Simmons.

 

[Roshi]

That's your opinion. If you look at French society, their sense of superiority is expressed as benign neglect against non-whites. Is it wrong. Sure. Is it hateful, I don't think so. There is a big difference between not caring and active engagement.

Um, whut?

Post proof or shut the fuck up.

 

[Alidar Jarok]

As unmotivated as Ward is, Simmons would be even worse.

I don't quite think Ward is unmotivated and I think we'll get a little more information soon. He was basically a psychologically abused child who was rescued by Garrett and believes that he owes everything to him as a result. The abuse he received is a big part of why he has no qualms killing people. For a long time, he channeled that towards helping SHIELD, but he was always doing it to help Garrett.

 

[intrinsical]

I really hope they aren't stupid enough to make Simmons a HYDRA agent.

I don't know if Simmons is HYDRA, but I do feel there's merit in her turning evil sometime down the road. The way I see it, there's no real reason why the team need 3 geniuses. Skye probably has a different destiny than team techie, which leaves two geniuses. The way Fitz and Simmons have been described as "twins" just feels to me like setup for one of them turning evil on the other.

 

[Mr Light]

one is hacking, one is science, one is robotics

 

[bbjeg]

I'm not sure what you're saying. It sounds like you're pointing at Coulson being a HYDRA agent prior to Iron Man. If not, Fury clearly trusted Coulson in the movies (which I was stating in my post) and from what we saw, he only started keeping tabs on him after altering his mind.

Coulson was assigned to Stark BEFORE Stark let the world know he was Iron Man. Remember Coulson was assigned to investigate a simple kidnapping and the case may have been a low priority. Remember that Fury became directly involved in Iron Man 2 and even assigned Black widow as a deep cover agent. That seems to imply that he DIDN'T trust Coulson.

It wasn't a simple kidnapping, Stark had a front seat to the Ten Rings organization and escaped leaving the base he was held him in ruin. That's not low priority. Not to mention when Coulson called in Pepper's claim that Obadiah was building a suit of his own, Fury sent him more men instead of taking him off the case. That sounds more like Fury trust Coulson to take care of it. I also don't see how sending more men in Iron Man 2 to handle a billionaire living on the edge with an Iron Man suit indicates mistrust towards Coulson. Remember, Fury sent Coulson after Tony fought a Colonel. Reverend covers why Natasha's skills set was needed.

 

[Forbin]

Yeah, I remember Joss saying things like, "We knew that Clark Gregg's Phil Coulson were the keys to the kingdom", and that the show was centered on Coulson from moment one and stuff like that.

As for Joss being "famous for being cheap and lazy"?, yeah, I'm going to write that off right now as the most ridiculous thing I'll hear all day.

And Joss' "revenge" for ABC "forcing" him to use Gregg/Coulson? Maybe it was also revenge on himself for forcing himself to use Gregg in his own "Much Ado About Nothing" as well.

And Gregg was freakin BRILLIANT in Much Ado...

 

[USS Fardell]

And I wonder what agency May's mom is retired from.

HYDRA!!! Just kidding. Probably either CIA, NSA, Military Intelligence or State department.

More likely, CSIS (Canadian Security Intelligence Service).