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Agents of Shield - Season 4

It's not so much that someone died that we barely knew, when they get out of this, it will be that under the right circumstances, Fitz will see how monstrous he is capable of being. It's in him, and not even theoretical. Even in a simulated world, his actions are real.

And if his actions kill anyone else? They're dead in the real world, too.
Yeah, I get that. I'm just saying that from the viewer's perspective, there were was little emotional impact to Agnes death.
 
Really?

Nobody cares about Agnes, but the point is Fitz murdered an innocent person. Doesn't really matter if you cared about her or not. His actions have a massive impact on how we view Fitz as a character.
 
Really?

Nobody cares about Agnes, but the point is Fitz murdered an innocent person. Doesn't really matter if you cared about her or not. His actions have a massive impact on how we view Fitz as a character.

Totally agreed here. Also, seeing Jemma's reaction to Fitz made this scene so much more powerful.
 
And notice that Simmons wasn't screaming for Agnes, even though she died, she was screaming for Fitz, because he's the one she lost.
 
So. Fitz is pretty unforgivable here. It's a fake world and all, so theoretically you can do whatever you want with no consequences, but he's crossing so far over the line that it may not be possible for him to come back. Not only did he murder the real Agnes, but if he ever got back to the real world and retained the memories of who he was in this one, I don't see how he could live with himself.

Well, it could be argued that Agnes was physically dead already and that what he killed was just a copy of her mind and thus doesn't count. I don't agree with that position, since I don't consider AI sentiences any less "real" than biological ones, but it could be argued.


The only possible thing I can imagine that would clear him would be if this wasn't in fact the real Fitz. Maybe the real one's hiding out there somewhere and this is some kind of clone or dupe.

But if it is the real one, he's been brainwashed, made to forget who he really is. It would be analogous to what Hawkeye did under Loki's control in The Avengers. He would surely feel guilty about it, but he doesn't need to be "cleared," because he's not responsible for his actions. Aida's the one who deserves the blame.

Although, granted, I can understand Aida's point of view. I can't really blame her for feeling that she was treated as a slave and that humans are a threat to her survival. Although, of course, becoming an oppressor herself isn't an appropriate response to being oppressed. Indeed, if the virtual people in the Framework are truly sentient, then she's oppressing her fellow AIs, which makes her rather hypocritical.
 
Aida had legit reason for feeling oppressed, by both the Russian and Radcliffe and whoever else.

Notice that we never saw her actually harming anyone? She was just walking around looking bossy. (By the way, that actress must have been having a blast this season, playing Aida, Agnes, and now Madame Hydra.) So I'm wondering if her programming is still controlling her. If so, it's not hard to imagine a scene where she has everyone captured, and then tries to get Fitz to kill them all, and then he realizes why she can't do it herself.
 
:sigh:

I said I understand the futrure psychological implications for Fitz. But because I'm not engaged by this storyline for whatever reason (be it because it's "not" real, because of underwhelming writing, because I'm just not interested), I didn't feel the gravity of the situation at that moment.
 
I agree, this storyline is lacking. It's sort of like an alternate universe so that they can explore a "what if" scenario. Not very interesting this time.
 
I'm quite liking this.

Fitz's situation is like the mirror of the old "the Hulk won't kill because Banner won't kill". In this case, whatever influence he's under, Fitz has shown that he is capable of being a cold-blooded killer.

Regarding sentience of AI, in this situation I think we need to make a distinction between actual people who were hooked into the Framework and simulations. Agnes and Radcliffe, being dead in reality but having been loaded into the Framework, are something in-between. If we're to give their sentience the benefit of the doubt, then yes, Fitz killed Agnes. Not a virtual person who was programmed by Aida, but the surviving consciousness of the original Agnes.

I forget, is Mace hooked into the Framework, or is he just a simulation?
 
Regarding sentience of AI, in this situation I think we need to make a distinction between actual people who were hooked into the Framework and simulations.

I'm not sure that follows. What Aida said to Radcliffe back before the break was that she'd succeeded in making the Framework an accurate and complete simulation of the entire planet Earth, indistinguishable from the real thing, and thus presumably equal to it in complexity. It stands to reason that the same is true of its inhabitants. With sufficient processing power, a computer model could as complex as, or even more complex than, actual reality. Remember, LMayD was just as sentient as the actual May, thanks to the Darkhold-enabled complexity of her brain. If Aida applied the same principle to the people within the Framework, then they would be sentient too.
 
^^ That is a bit encouraging.

Wow, poor Agnes. And poor Fitz. He's going to have a hard time coming to terms with that-- unless it's not really Fitz. I can't remember what happened to the Fitz LMD. Did it allegedly get blown up by May LMD?

Coulson was hilarious. Just enough memory leakage to make him a blue-soap-fearing conspiracy theorist. :D But with enough motor memory to handle a gun.

And Radcliffe, interestingly, knows that he's dead and is in exile. I wonder why Madame Aida didn't rewrite his memory, too. Also interesting is that Aida confirmed that the nature of the Framework world is basically the inevitable result of her removing everybody's pain points-- but if she has no ulterior motives, why has she set herself up as Madame Hydra, made Fitz her boyfriend, and exiled Radcliffe with Agnes?

Mack may have lost his memories, but he's still Mack. After being forced to trick Daisy, he has tracked down SHIELD to join them. The questions are, how did he manage that, and was he followed?
 
Remember, LMayD was just as sentient as the actual May, thanks to the Darkhold-enabled complexity of her brain.
But wasn't that enabled by a brain scan of the real May? Presumably Aida hasn't done scans of everyone on the planet, including dead people like Ward.
 
But wasn't that enabled by a brain scan of the real May? Presumably Aida hasn't done scans of everyone on the planet, including dead people like Ward.

My point is simply about the level of complexity being sufficient to allow sentience. The copy of the real May's brain wouldn't have been able to function in the simulated brain if the latter hadn't been equal in complexity and function to a human brain. Therefore, Aida had the ability to create simulated brains equal in complexity to human brains, whether or not they were copied from existing brains. My point is not about whether the AI constructs are accurate recreations of individuals, but about whether they are actually sentient beings in their own right. If they are genuinely capable of thought and qualia, then Aida is a hypocrite to oppress them in the name of liberating AIs from oppression.
 
^^ That is a bit encouraging.

Wow, poor Agnes. And poor Fitz. He's going to have a hard time coming to terms with that-- unless it's not really Fitz. I can't remember what happened to the Fitz LMD. Did it allegedly get blown up by May LMD?

Coulson was hilarious. Just enough memory leakage to make him a blue-soap-fearing conspiracy theorist. :D But with enough motor memory to handle a gun.

And Radcliffe, interestingly, knows that he's dead and is in exile. I wonder why Madame Aida didn't rewrite his memory, too. Also interesting is that Aida confirmed that the nature of the Framework world is basically the inevitable result of her removing everybody's pain points-- but if she has no ulterior motives, why has she set herself up as Madame Hydra, made Fitz her boyfriend, and exiled Radcliffe with Agnes?

Mack may have lost his memories, but he's still Mack. After being forced to trick Daisy, he has tracked down SHIELD to join them. The questions are, how did he manage that, and was he followed?
Back when The Winter Soldier and Turn, Turn, Turn aired I was thinking that the only way this works is if SHIELD and Hydra recruited the same personality types and it was only a break here or there which could tell which way they would jump. I don't think that we will get Fitz back. Even after the Framework the damage should be as debilitating as being oxygen deprived on the ocean floor. The doctor was always inside of Leopold and having seen the evil his side how could Jemma go back?.

Since we have no ideal how long can take to prepare a legend for a person being prepped for the Framework I could guess she did not have time to prep. Dr Radcliffe. And he was already in the Framework presumably living on Fantasy Island with Agnes when his prime universe body was murdered and he needed an immediate integration into the Framework before he bled out. As he was not hurting anyone and the world being past the age of exploration few would notice the island that did not exist on the maps Madam Hydra was content to let them live in exile.

As with Mac's escape to the rebellion, well the authoritarians see everything, except when the plot needs them to lose surveillance.
 
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