Agents of SHIELD. Season 1 Discussion Thread
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I talked to a CDC researcher and he told me that the lab is lined with thermite in case of complete containment failure . Of course they don't mention this. They also don't mention that they have a mutant strain of Ebola Virus, that is deadly enough to kill all of humanity.
^Yeah, that was my first thought as well... 
Sure, I was doing research and he casually mentioned it when our power went off. At the time I always thought that exploding CDC was a myth. I tend to believe it because Level 4 facilities have some pretty extreme safety measures. Your mileage may vary.
^Yeah, that was my first thought as well...
The CDC's Level 4 facility is not some super-secret military lab. It's a public research lab that does legitimate work with some of the deadliest viruses in the world. I don't think anything the CDC does is "secret" but thing like fail safes are not made available to public unless it's legitimate request for information for research or investigative purposes. As for how my researcher friend knew about it, he said it was an open secret at the lab. As for the article, that spokesperson doesn't know what she's talking about. By law all Level 4 facilities must have contingency plans for any possible emergency including the zombie apocalypse (and mundane stuff like earthquakes and terrorist attacks).
And your credibility just went out the window.
Are you kidding? The Klingons invaded Federation space, destroyed the Grissom, attempted to attack the Enterprise (but were beaten to the punch) and then returned fire, killed a hostage and threatened to kill the other two, attempted to hijack the Enterprise, attempted to steal Federation technology, and took the Enterprise crew hostage until Kirk foiled them. That was as different from this situation as any situation could possibly be. Coulson's actions, as well-intended as they may have been, were closer to those of the Klingons than to Kirk and co.
I have plenty of sympathy for their situation, I still find Coulson and his team likeable, and this doesn't change my appreciation for the show as a whole. I just found this incident and the choice to go with lethal weapons first to be out of character for Coulson and his team since they have used the non-lethal option in equally dangerous and important situations before. The lives of team members have been at risk before, and they didn't automatically go for the lethal option then.
They left the plane with only lethal weapons. They continued only using lethal weapons when it was obvious a combat situation would arise and the guns weren't just there as an intimidation tactic anymore. They never presented any evidence of the medical emergency to the guards to further attempt to convince them of their story. The guards had no reason to believe they were anything other than a heavily armed team sent to steal the very dangerous secrets and technology of the facility they were tasked with defending.
On a sidenote, reverse engineering those Centipede stun grenades would have really come in handy for this mission. And I can't believe SHIELD doesn't have something not quite as advanced but still adequate (more like a wide-area grenade than like the night-night guns) in their arsenal that Coulson and team could have used to stun the guards. I honestly think they just wanted to show the team killing some guys to show how important saving Skye was, but it kind of backfired, IMO.
Does your buddy happen to look like Dustin Hoffman? Because I saw that movie too.
Did he also tell you about the government's super-secret alien first contact response team that he was on, and how they were sent to an underwater lab and then entered a spaceship from the future?
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We all understand the REAL reason why, right? Because the writers didn't want those guards around to answer any questions. Those guards had to die.
^ But we're talking about in-show reasons. Plus, they could have achieved the same goal by having it be an automated facility with no actual guards. I honestly think what I said before about the writer(s) wanting to show how high stakes the situation was by showing Coulson's team kill to save Skye was the reason from their standpoint, but it just doesn't sit well for me from an in-show vantage point.
Well, at least we're spending 10-pages discussing the character's motives and actions instead of when batteries and birth control pills expire like in The Walking Dead thread.
Wow, this thread!
Well, at least we're spending 10-pages discussing the character's motives and actions instead of when batteries and birth control pills expire like in The Walking Dead thread.
I don't think I'm the one who brought up their actions in this episode first, but I could go back and check.
I'd argue that his actions with Quinn were worse. His actions with the facility were designed to minimize death if possible while still accomplishing the objectives. They would have kidnapped Dr. Hall, they controlled the life of Chiang, would have kidnapped him, and ended up intentionally killing him. They were planning on taking one of their own recruits to a research facility and forceably holding him there as a prisoner (on second thought, I don't recall him escaping at the end of the episode, so I assume they did).
The show is about agents of SHIELD. Skye said it best when talking to her boyfriend. It's about good people doing good things but also doing bad things while working for an organization that does good things often in bad ways and not always for the best reason. They kill, they hide the truth, they kidnap people, all in the name of protecting a greater good. This has been a theme since day one. I'd be willing to bet that Skye would not have approved of their actions done to save her - particularly if she knew the whole truth including where the drug that saved her came from.
The only issue is that they have the Night-Night gun. I think there were good reasons not to use it (limited ammo (five or six shots, iirc), no ability to shoot through cover, etc.), but they could at least have brought it and didn't. That was a little problematic but I don't think changes much.
That's part of my concern. If they had been trying to save Simmons or Director Fury or Steve Rogers, would the complaint have been the same?
If it makes you feel better, those guys probably downloaded child porn so they deserved to die.
She's in the credits so her life is more valuable!
But why is that the overriding factor in determining how we as an audience feel about their actions? That's what confuses me, that people seem to be getting angry about what they did for reasons that are strictly about legal and bureaucratic technicalities rather than identification with characters' emotions and intentions. There have been literally thousands of stories about protagonists breaking the law and killing people in order to save or avenge their loved ones. So I honestly don't understand why people are talking about this event as if it were an assault with the specific intent to murder and destroy, rather than what it actually was, a mission of mercy gone badly wrong.
If my theory is correct and these were HYDRA Agents (based mostly on the fact that one is named Bob), I bet there are a ton of agents who don't know what the bad guy is doing and are only following orders who end up dying. That's part of the reason why I think it's helpful to separate what Coulson did from what they knew. It's entirely possible for everything to be a misunderstanding where neither side was acting wrongly (and I do think they deliberately made it so Bob, Agent of HYDRA, had no idea that Coulson had good intentions and that he was probably protecting a facility that did bad things). Anyway, here's a list with an attempt to fairly portray the good things and the bad things done by SHIELD in this mission. Let me know if you disagree or think I left something out:
Here's how I would have handled the Night-night gun. Let me know if this would have satisfied anyone's concerns. As I mentioned before, it has limitations. It's a semi-automatic gun as opposed to the automatics they used (and their enemies had as well). It has no penetrative power. It has limited ammunition. In fact, the closest analogy to this episode is Girl With the Flower Dress. There, they tried to bring down Chiang/Scorch through the stun gun as a first option. That option failed and they used lethal force. The option failed because their stun gun has limited ammo.
Had Coulson brought the night night gun and Garrett and Ward brought real weapons, they could have first had Coulson attempt to stun a couple times, but had it miss and hit cover. Only then would Garrett and Ward use automatics and kill them (and then Garrett can say "sorry, nothing personal."). Obviously, the result would have been the same, but it would have been the one final attempt at a peaceful resolution that they still had available. Would this have satisfied people? Obviously, there is an argument that they should have let Skye, Nick Fury, Captain America, etc. who was in that situation die rather than have two guards for another organization die, but I don't think that rule is entirely reasonable under television logic.
Good - Coulson's motives - to save someone's life - were good. It's important to separate this from methodology.
Good - His attempt to work it out peacefully was good.
Neutral - The fact that HYDRA Bob couldn't see that Skye was hurt swings both ways. On the one hand, Coulson can't move her from where she was. On the other hand, Bob obviously doesn't know that this isn't a trap. I think it's entirely possible that Coulson could have worked something out to provide proof had it been asked for. Had Bob not inflexibly stuck to his orders, there might have been room here.
Good - Even after breaking in, Coulson still tried to make one final plea for a non-violent resolution.
Bad - Appearing so strongly armed. While Coulson didn't know what to expect, it certainly didn't help his case.
Bad - Using lethal force when there were non-lethal alternatives. I'll explain below how the show could have handled this better and still reached the same results. The fact remains that they had other options to at least attempt and didn't. Really, they should have reverse-engineered Centipede's stun grenades. That would have completely solved the problem.
Irrelevant - A couple people have attributed blowing up the facility to Coulson. I think that's unfair. He obviously didn't know it was rigged to blow and, if he had a choice, probably would have chosen to not blow it up.
Good - His attempt to work it out peacefully was good.
Neutral - The fact that HYDRA Bob couldn't see that Skye was hurt swings both ways. On the one hand, Coulson can't move her from where she was. On the other hand, Bob obviously doesn't know that this isn't a trap. I think it's entirely possible that Coulson could have worked something out to provide proof had it been asked for. Had Bob not inflexibly stuck to his orders, there might have been room here.
Good - Even after breaking in, Coulson still tried to make one final plea for a non-violent resolution.
Bad - Appearing so strongly armed. While Coulson didn't know what to expect, it certainly didn't help his case.
Bad - Using lethal force when there were non-lethal alternatives. I'll explain below how the show could have handled this better and still reached the same results. The fact remains that they had other options to at least attempt and didn't. Really, they should have reverse-engineered Centipede's stun grenades. That would have completely solved the problem.
Irrelevant - A couple people have attributed blowing up the facility to Coulson. I think that's unfair. He obviously didn't know it was rigged to blow and, if he had a choice, probably would have chosen to not blow it up.
Here's how I would have handled the Night-night gun. Let me know if this would have satisfied anyone's concerns. As I mentioned before, it has limitations. It's a semi-automatic gun as opposed to the automatics they used (and their enemies had as well). It has no penetrative power. It has limited ammunition. In fact, the closest analogy to this episode is Girl With the Flower Dress. There, they tried to bring down Chiang/Scorch through the stun gun as a first option. That option failed and they used lethal force. The option failed because their stun gun has limited ammo.
Had Coulson brought the night night gun and Garrett and Ward brought real weapons, they could have first had Coulson attempt to stun a couple times, but had it miss and hit cover. Only then would Garrett and Ward use automatics and kill them (and then Garrett can say "sorry, nothing personal."). Obviously, the result would have been the same, but it would have been the one final attempt at a peaceful resolution that they still had available. Would this have satisfied people? Obviously, there is an argument that they should have let Skye, Nick Fury, Captain America, etc. who was in that situation die rather than have two guards for another organization die, but I don't think that rule is entirely reasonable under television logic.
Was he pulling your leg? After Googling: CDC thermite -911 -wtc -"9-11" -make -"how to" -poisoning Nothing comes up (other than a few other opinion pieces and this thread). It sounds like your friend was joking or thinks it's lined with thermite.
I just watched the firefight again, and I have a couple of extra points to mention:
- After the mega-flash-bang grenade is thrown, Hudson runs right up to the blinded and disoriented guard and shoots Paul Blart: Vault Cop under his body armor, while holding him. He gutshots him; the most slow and painful wound there is, when he could have just beat him up using their fancy SHIELD martial arts or wrestled him to the ground at that point.
- The SHIELD team were all carrying handguns or submachine guns, so they were all using pistol cartridges that military/police-grade body armor will stop in most cases. Which means in order to get a wounding or kill shot, they would have had to try and shoot Mr. Observe and Mr. Report outside their body armor, ie, in the lower abdomen, groin, legs, head, shoulders/armpit, and arms. Which means the night-night guns would have still been a viable option in that case.
- The flash-bang grenade went off super bright like the Predator's "hahahahaha, you die too!" bomb that he always sets off when he's defeated. It was pretty powerful, and totally blinded and disoriented the remaining guard. Why not just keep throwing those and get closer each time?
In short, it was pretty bogus that they used lethal force on these guys, since even with the options they had available, they could have taken them alive. The Calvary would have taken them down alive --albeit supremely ass-kicked-- if they hadn't left her on the plane.
- After the mega-flash-bang grenade is thrown, Hudson runs right up to the blinded and disoriented guard and shoots Paul Blart: Vault Cop under his body armor, while holding him. He gutshots him; the most slow and painful wound there is, when he could have just beat him up using their fancy SHIELD martial arts or wrestled him to the ground at that point.
- The SHIELD team were all carrying handguns or submachine guns, so they were all using pistol cartridges that military/police-grade body armor will stop in most cases. Which means in order to get a wounding or kill shot, they would have had to try and shoot Mr. Observe and Mr. Report outside their body armor, ie, in the lower abdomen, groin, legs, head, shoulders/armpit, and arms. Which means the night-night guns would have still been a viable option in that case.
- The flash-bang grenade went off super bright like the Predator's "hahahahaha, you die too!" bomb that he always sets off when he's defeated. It was pretty powerful, and totally blinded and disoriented the remaining guard. Why not just keep throwing those and get closer each time?
In short, it was pretty bogus that they used lethal force on these guys, since even with the options they had available, they could have taken them alive. The Calvary would have taken them down alive --albeit supremely ass-kicked-- if they hadn't left her on the plane.
You are making exactly the point that is bothersome.
When the team is sent on an explicit mission and they have to kill someone, they are not acting for themselves, they are acting for the agency, and we presume there is some greater good. (This may be challenged by The Winter Soldier, which will be a fascinating story.)
In acting to save Skye, they are acting only for their own motives, and so what we saw on screen during that hour was the sum total of their motives, objectives, and methods.
In this way, they are subject to audience judgement in a way that doesn't happen when they acting for the agency. This was an explicit part of the story.
The writers could have created a story where a scientist or witness who had valuable, irreplaceable information had to be saved at all costs. This would have taken much of the morally grey area out of the story.
The writers didn't choose that type of story. They chose a story where the team was acting out of their own emotional attachment to Skye, and without any sanction from any authority. The legal, moral, and emotional issues are completely visible within the episode and are put there so that the audience can experience them.
The story was written so that, hopefully, the audience would think about these issues.
The issues aren't "stupid" as some posters here have implied, and neither are they black and white. They were given to us purposely by the writers so that we could have this discussion. Or, possibly, the writers didn't think things through, or didn't think anyone would notice.
There have been some interesting theories that Skye may be Jessica Drew. There is nothing conclusive there, but if Coulson et al were being influenced by pheromones coming from Skye, this could easily explain them acting rashly. As well, the GH25 may react differently with her metabolism than it did with Coulson.
The episode is interesting if there are consequences to explore. What I don't understand is the argument from so many that there should be no consequences, and that the actions of the team weren't even borderline.
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