Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. VII: The Heart Beats On

[Palanan]

So, after a longer-than-usual wait, Season 6 premieres on May 10. A little sooner than the July date first reported last summer, but still after Endgame.

I’m not overly enthused, but I’ll watch and see. Mainly for Fitz and Gemma...best geek couple in the MCU.

(Probably the only such, but they deserve a superlative.)

[Kitten Champion]

I'm genuinely curious as to what they intended to do with another season. Conceptually, I mean.

I can easily see why AoS lasted as long as it did - as it's easy content to port to the Disney streaming service they've been working towards for a while now - but story-wise it found a decent place to end and I don't think there'd be a huge Firefly-esque outcry had ABC not renewed it. It's not like it's the CW where shows will keep marching forward like zombies even with steadily declining ratings, ABC's pretty swift to the chopping block if anything in my experience.

So, I'd like to see "why?" answered with something beyond "because".

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Kitten Champion
I'm genuinely curious as to what they intended to do with another season.

Or two, since it’s also been renewed for Season 7.

And based on the cast list, it doesn't look like Coulson will be in Season 7, even though it looks like he'll be in Season 6...although maybe not for long.

[Kitten Champion]

Or two, since it’s also been renewed for Season 7.

And based on the cast list, it doesn't look like Coulson will be in Season 7, even though it looks like he'll be in Season 6...although maybe not for long.

If Wikipedia is correct - and it's never steered me wrong before - it seems likely that they artificially divided season 6 in half for reasons relating to the actors' contract negotiations.

Which, well, AoS seasons usually divide near the middle. It was one of the issues with retaining their viewership since the first season where dropping off for months because of the winter holidays and then Olympics didn't do them any favours. They cut Peggy Carter into that time slot for a while to keep things fresh, which I appreciated at the time.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Yeah. I'd much rather have a new season of Agent Carter at this point than another of AoS. In part because I prefer Hayley Atwell to Clark Gregg.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Kitten Champion
...it seems likely that they artificially divided season 6 in half for reasons relating to the actors' contract negotiations.

Sounds like a long goodbye for Coulson, then, ending at the mid-season break.

:smallfrown:

[Aotrs Commander]

And still no frickin' clue when it airs in the UK. Which probably means that, once again, those of us this side of the pond don't get to get involved in the discussion until long afterwards.

*sigh*

[Androgeus]

And still no frickin' clue when it airs in the UK. Which probably means that, once again, those of us this side of the pond don't get to get involved in the discussion until long afterwards.

*sigh*

Only if you stay legal :smalltongue:

[Aotrs Commander]

Only if you stay legal :smalltongue:

Can't watch it with Mum if it's not on the telly.

[Dilvish]

If Coulson is gone for the final episodes (last half-season?), then I would like a scene near the end of the last episode of Coulson standing over his own gravestone, something like that.

My other idea for a final scene comes from Endgame. Golden portals open up in front of the team; Dr. Strange's call to battle.

[Joran]

If Coulson is gone for the final episodes (last half-season?), then I would like a scene near the end of the last episode of Coulson standing over his own gravestone, something like that.

My other idea for a final scene comes from Endgame. Golden portals open up in front of the team; Dr. Strange's call to battle.

Judging by the Spider-Man: Far From Home Trailer, the events of Endgame ended in a place for the Agents of SHIELD to have work to do.



Mysterio is apparently from an alternate dimension and the snap tore a hole in the multiverse. So... that has to have repercussions.

Also, it'd be interesting to see who was snapped and who was not and what they did in that intervening 5 years.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Joran
...the events of Endgame ended in a place for the Agents of SHIELD to have work to do.

Is Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. picking up after Endgame? Five years seems like a long time for Phil Coulson to be just hanging on.

[JadedDM]

I actually heard somewhere...

That the new season will take place 1 year after the Snap.

But I haven't found anything to reliably back that up.

[Androgeus]

I actually heard somewhere...

That the new season will take place 1 year after the Snap.

But I haven't found anything to reliably back that up.


Here’s a source (https://www.thewrap.com/agents-of-shield-season-6-avengers-endgame-marvel/).

[Hopeless]

I'm not sure whether I should be posting this as it could be complete bull, but...
There's some theories Mysterio is actually an alternate future version of Peter Parker!

Now back to Agents of SHIELD!

[Palanan]

Well, that was…mixed.


A lot has changed if S.H.I.E.L.D. is indulging in torture to get answers. Yes, Gemma is hardcore about finding Fitz, but this started things off on a bad note for me.

Also, I had been slightly missing Skye, but that’s cured.

So apparently the Zephyr is now a jump-capable starship that’s just bouncing around the galaxy. For me that’s kind of a stretch. It’s one thing to jury-rig the ship to fly around the remnants of the quaked-apart future Earth; quite another to be Star Trekkin’ all over as if the ship was purpose-built for an extended interstellar mission.

That really shreds the suspension of disbelief for me, especially when Pilot Guy is pulling atmospheric flight moves in planetary orbit.

(And alien missiles can’t fly faster than that? Seriously?)

Well, at least they’re not making it too easy to find Fitz.

Are the bloodstains on the capsule window something that we’ve seen before? They made a point of showing us the bloodstains, twice, but Gemma didn’t seem to pay any attention to them. I would’ve thought she’d at least check for Fitz’s DNA.

NOT THE EVIL TWIN!!!! NOT EVIL TWIN COULSON!!!!

Gah. Evil Twin Mad Max Coulson. I thought it couldn’t get worse than last season, but here they are, threatening to go lower.

Sooner or later most shows fall into the Evil Twin trap. For me it’s the tritest possible cliche. From Knight Rider to ST:TNG, it’s fun for the actors but a sign that the writers are running on fumes for ideas.

And beyond the tacky, utterly cliche aspect of it…dammit, this isn’t what I wanted. I wanted a few last moments with Coulson, meaning the real Coulson, to really feel the impact of his passing. Maybe we’ll get a flashback or something, but for now it’s a disappointment.

I know the episode is supposed to be setup, but most of it was a jumbled plate of meh. Other than a vague, distant interest in what Mad Maxson is up to, I haven't been drawn in.

.

[russdm]

Well, that was…mixed.


Yeah, probably is



A lot has changed if S.H.I.E.L.D. is indulging in torture to get answers. Yes, Gemma is hardcore about finding Fitz, but this started things off on a bad note for me.

Also, I had been slightly missing Skye, but that’s cured.

Didn't Shield do that already? I mean it was totally Hydra's MO and we know that Hydra had infiltrated Shield so long, why wouldn't it just have a standard method to use? I mean, maybe not by Coulson, but it did have Shield=Students scouted at school + Hydra's moles scouting the students + (Shield not properly monitoring of its captured Hydra personal).



So apparently the Zephyr is now a jump-capable starship that’s just bouncing around the galaxy. For me that’s kind of a stretch. It’s one thing to jury-rig the ship to fly around the remnants of the quaked-apart future Earth; quite another to be Star Trekkin’ all over as if the ship was purpose-built for an extended interstellar mission.

That really shreds the suspension of disbelief for me, especially when Pilot Guy is pulling atmospheric flight moves in planetary orbit.

(And alien missiles can’t fly faster than that? Seriously?)

I thought Fitz had been brought by Enoch to the ends of the Solar System, like out by Pluto or the Oort Cloud, then came back to Earth to help in the rescue. Maybe something happened with the Ship that Tony Stark was in at the end of Infinity War, start of Endgame?



Well, at least they’re not making it too easy to find Fitz.

Are the bloodstains on the capsule window something that we’ve seen before? They made a point of showing us the bloodstains, twice, but Gemma didn’t seem to pay any attention to them. I would’ve thought she’d at least check for Fitz’s DNA.

I don't know, but maybe they will explain that later?



NOT THE EVIL TWIN!!!! NOT EVIL TWIN COULSON!!!!

Gah. Evil Twin Mad Max Coulson. I thought it couldn’t get worse than last season, but here they are, threatening to go lower.

Sooner or later most shows fall into the Evil Twin trap. For me it’s the tritest possible cliche. From Knight Rider to ST:TNG, it’s fun for the actors but a sign that the writers are running on fumes for ideas.

And beyond the tacky, utterly cliche aspect of it…dammit, this isn’t what I wanted. I wanted a few last moments with Coulson, meaning the real Coulson, to really feel the impact of his passing. Maybe we’ll get a flashback or something, but for now it’s a disappointment.

I know the episode is supposed to be setup, but most of it was a jumbled plate of meh. Other than a vague, distant interest in what Mad Maxson is up to, I haven't been drawn in.


Maybe they can do a good job of explaining it? Like later? Didn't they still have Coulson, like alive, but somewhere at the end of the last season? I thought Coulson had quit Shield.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by russdm
Didn't they still have Coulson, like alive, but somewhere at the end of the last season? I thought Coulson had quit Shield.

As I recall, at the end of last season Coulson stepped out of the Zephyr onto the sands of Tahiti, where he was expected to have only a few days or weeks remaining. That's where they left it last year.

I was expecting the Coulson in Mac's office to be a holo, so I'd resigned myself to having holo-Coulson moments for the next few episodes. Mad Max Coulson, aka Maxson, was unexpected, but not a good kind of surprise.

And now we're dropping ley lines into the mix.

Thing is, there are at least three different concepts of ley lines circulating in today's culture. The most common one is the idea that certain monuments are constructed on "lines of power," which are really artifacts of selective reasoning. There's a study showing you can replicate this kind of ley line with the distribution of phone booths in London. This kind of ley line was mentioned briefly in Thor: Dark World, although it didn't really help anything.

Then there are all the different kinds of ley lines in fantasy and science fiction, which tend to involve hidden conduits of energy or magical power, and which generally follow their own logic rather than being tied to human sites and structures. This seems to be the kind of ley line referenced in last night's episode, especially since the jumpers (for want of a better name) seemed to be really annoyed that there were structures on their crossing points.

The third ley-line concept mainly follows the standard fantasy approach, except in the context of RPGs and with game mechanics attached. These were referenced in 3.5 Forgotten Realms material, and developed more in Pathfinder and some third-party material, notably Deep Magic by Kobold Press.

So we have the fantasy ley-line concept stirred into our galaxy-spanning, time-looping, alien-fighting, LMD-busting secret spy agency. I'm...not sure how this season is gonna go.

.

[The New Bruceski]

Agents of Shield: Fury Road

[JadedDM]

So apparently the Zephyr is now a jump-capable starship that’s just bouncing around the galaxy. For me that’s kind of a stretch. It’s one thing to jury-rig the ship to fly around the remnants of the quaked-apart future Earth; quite another to be Star Trekkin’ all over as if the ship was purpose-built for an extended interstellar mission.

That really shreds the suspension of disbelief for me, especially when Pilot Guy is pulling atmospheric flight moves in planetary orbit.

(And alien missiles can’t fly faster than that? Seriously?)
Apparently they rigged that instant teleport device that General Hale got from the Confederacy to the ship, which is what lets it jump like that. You can see Piper load something into it just before Simmons activates the jump.

[Joran]

In case people are wondering, there's no Avengers Endgame spoilers. In fact, no mentions about the Snap at all.

[The Glyphstone]

They apparently did some serious time-travel future-modification muckery in S5, maybe that butterflied the Snap somehow?

[Palanan]

Yeah, I'm wondering if they didn't time-loop themselves into a separate branch where the Snap never happened at all.

[Dilvish]

This article says that the current season of AoS is set before the Snap at the end of Infinity War. So maybe season 7 could be post-Snap? It is confusing.

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/05/10/agents-of-shield-season-6-before-avengers-endgame-after

[Kitten Champion]

Which is a shame. You have a five-year time period in this universe that's full of chaos and potential drama - one that's unlikely to be explored overmuch in the subsequent movies - it seems like a gift wrapped with a shiny bow for a quasi-fan fiction-type program like Agents of SHIELD to have something to work with without worrying about continuity much.

Still, I do understand that synchronizing the show with the movies would be a headache in terms of scheduling and production - outside of the fact that AoS is pretty irrelevant to Marvel Studios - and have largely come to accept that AoS should probably just focus on writing its own story that loosely slots into a similar reality as the movies than trying to fit together into something vaguely coherent like the comics mostly try to do.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Kitten Champion
…synchronizing the show with the movies would be a headache in terms of scheduling and production….

True enough, but they managed to align Season 2 precisely with the release of Winter Soldier, to the point that if you didn’t see the movie on opening weekend you were hit with major spoilers the following Tuesday night. :smallannoyed:

But given that it wasn’t at all certain that AoS would be renewed for this current season, it was probably much easier for them to follow their own direction in terms of storyline, especially in the rather cheesy version of the MCU galaxy that they developed last season.


Originally Posted by Kitten Champion
You have a five-year time period in this universe that's full of chaos and potential drama - one that's unlikely to be explored overmuch in the subsequent movies - it seems like a gift wrapped with a shiny bow for a quasi-fan fiction-type program like Agents of SHIELD.

True, but diving into this period—the Time Between Snaps, if you will—would mean that AoS would be creatively constricted in a host of ways. Everything would be about dealing with Snap 1 and its aftermath, and that would completely redefine AoS as “that show after the Snap.”

That would fundamentally conflict with everything they’ve built up over the prior seasons, and all their individual character arcs would be overshadowed by living in the aftermath of the Snap. Plus they’d have to explain why every one of their members survived the Snap, when we’ve seen the Avengers et al. decimated by the event.

It would require a completely different show to properly explore the Time Between Snaps—something much darker than AoS, with a different set of expectations for characters and audience alike. Plus, we know that the original Snap has been, well, ameliorated, so that tends to auto-spoil any long-term suspense a Snap show might try to develop.

[Kitten Champion]

True enough, but they managed to align Season 2 precisely with the release of Winter Soldier, to the point that if you didn’t see the movie on opening weekend you were hit with major spoilers the following Tuesday night. :smallannoyed:

But given that it wasn’t at all certain that AoS would be renewed for this current season, it was probably much easier for them to follow their own direction in terms of storyline, especially in the rather cheesy version of the MCU galaxy that they developed last season.

According to Jed Whedon in the above article, when they were making it they really didn't know when either the movie or their show was going to be released, if it came out in January (which was a possibility) it would be rather awkward.



True, but diving into this period—the Time Between Snaps, if you will—would mean that AoS would be creatively constricted in a host of ways. Everything would be about dealing with Snap 1 and its aftermath, and that would completely redefine AoS as “that show after the Snap.”

That would fundamentally conflict with everything they’ve built up over the prior seasons, and all their individual character arcs would be overshadowed by living in the aftermath of the Snap. Plus they’d have to explain why every one of their members survived the Snap, when we’ve seen the Avengers et al. decimated by the event.

It would require a completely different show to properly explore the Time Between Snaps—something much darker than AoS, with a different set of expectations for characters and audience alike. Plus, we know that the original Snap has been, well, ameliorated, so that tends to auto-spoil any long-term suspense a Snap show might try to develop.

Eh... I kind of see your point, but most of SHIELD's meta-plot and major character arcs were more or less concluded in the last season and AoS has as a series already reinvented itself several times with new cast members and entirely different situations to focus upon. "We're dealing with this now for 13-25 episodes" would be pretty much expected by the viewers who've lasted this long.

As for it being dark, the last season was primarily set in a dystopian future where Earth was literally destroyed and a fraction of humanity survived in slavery aboard a bomb shelter floating in space to be bred as super-powered tools of war for alien warlords, it's a relative lite affair merely killing half of everyone compared to that.

As to cast members, ya could let some of them go. Sure, it would feel like the last season of Once Upon a Time where less than half the cast was around, but still, they have a better in-continuity reason to do so than OUaT did and clearly budget is a thing that they worried about enough to artificially split the seasons. Besides that, it's not like the Snap wasn't dusting characters based off of dramatic necessity and meta-reasons in the movies rather than some RNG mechanic. At least we'd know that anyone dusted is basically going to be fine, and they could show up in an epilogue maybe.

...and finally, as to rectifying the Snap, that's actually a non-issue in my opinion. Sure, the dusted ones came back, but it didn't reverse time or rewrite continuity, every event in those 5 years happened and everyone who died unrelated to the Snap are still dead so everything happening within that time-frame is still of consequence. The only things AoS can't do logically within the movie continuity is resolve the Snap themselves - which is fine since even the Avengers didn't think they could - and literally destroy the world - which is fine since that wouldn't happen regardless - so long as the world is as it appears to be in Endgame it's all cool. Which gives them a hell of a lot of leeway to explore the enormous ramifications to the Snap with any kind of stakes lower than global destruction.

[Rogar Demonblud]

True enough, but they managed to align Season 2 precisely with the release of Winter Soldier, to the point that if you didn’t see the movie on opening weekend you were hit with major spoilers the following Tuesday night. :smallannoyed:

Minor quibble: that was Season 1. Season 2 was the lead up to Age of Ultron and the reveal that the big mysterious project Coulson had been spending resources on was rehabilitating a helicarrier.

And yes, that sucked mightily.

[Palanan]

Looks like no one's posted yet. Did anyone even watch this?

I almost forgot it was on tonight, but I'm glad I remembered. Much better than last week, with pacing like an actual action show, rather than the clunky soap-opera-with-spaceships we got in the first episode.

That said, this show still has the worst starship design ever. And there were some goofy moments. But Mad Maxxson kicked into gear this week, making for a decidedly fun ride. Nuanced drama it ain't, but there's something to be said for slightly dizzy fun.

[Kitten Champion]

Looks like no one's posted yet. Did anyone even watch this?

I PVR all weekend shows for Monday/Tuesday viewing. So AoS is pretty much in the same territory Grimm was in a while ago, sadly. Though no one cared enough to make an active Grimm thread around here, for which I don't blame them.

Although, I believe AoS is most used to being seen this way based on all reports I've heard.

[Palanan]

Interesting. I don't even know what PVR is.

But it does seem like they're down to a very, very small fanbase at this point. Odd that they've renewed for two seasons, then, although maybe it was somehow easier for the contracts?

[Kitten Champion]

Interesting. I don't even know what PVR is.

Here ya' go (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_video_recorder)



But it does seem like they're down to a very, very small fanbase at this point.


No idea. It's probably on some website somewhere.

It's not especially risky to have a kind of marquee show to fill a hole in your summer schedule, usually it's a mini-series or some kind of elaborate game show. I'm sure there are other factors like Disney+ streaming coming late this year as well.

They clearly do have enough confidence in viewership to have this season go on without a notable cuts or anything. Like, it wouldn't have been odd if several of the cast members didn't return or there was an obvious decline in effects spending. I compared this to Once Upon a Time because they're on the same network in roughly the same time-frame and are both genre shows with a recurring need for visual effects, and in the last season of OUaT they got rid of the majority of the main cast along with an obvious compromise in terms of sets and visual effects. I was assuming that was what we were going to see with AoS getting a token last season since it was announced, but it doesn't really feel much different from the first season based on last week's premiere episode.



Odd that they've renewed for two seasons, then, although maybe it was somehow easier for the contracts?

As I said, it was artificially cut in half. Though it's not like the division of episodes into seasons is all that meaningful from the perspective of the viewers, every AoS season has been cut into halves narratively speaking.

[JadedDM]

I work nights, so I don't watch any TV the night it airs. Usually on the next day. Speaking of which, time to cue this up.

[Palanan]

Alas, poor S.H.I.E.L.D. thread. Seems like not many people watching the new season. :smallfrown:

[JadedDM]

I'm watching it, I just don't have anything particular to say. I like it. It's good. It's still pretty early to speculate on who this Coulson lookalike is.

[Palanan]

Speaking of early speculation…

My guess is that Mad Maxxson & Co. are fleeing from Something Truly Horrendous, and they’re burning worlds as they go in an attempt to cover their tracks and/or make it more difficult for the STH to follow them.

Pure speculation, likely far off the mark.

[JadedDM]

My own theory is:

They are fleeing whatever is destroying worlds, only stopping by to loot them for supplies then running off when it arrives, always staying one step ahead of it. No idea who the Coulson double is, or why he has his DNA. Clone? Identical great-great-great grandson? He seemed to recognize the name Coulson, although vaguely.

[PairO'Dice Lost]

No idea who the Coulson double is, or why he has his DNA. Clone? Identical great-great-great grandson? He seemed to recognize the name Coulson, although vaguely.

I'm guessing it's an alternate-universe Coulson, now that Endgame has opened up the Marvel multiverse in the MCU and the Mysterio in the Spider-Man trailer is explicitly said to come from an alternate earth. The whole "weird unexplainable phenomena happening at specific points around the world" thing is looking like a "weakening in the fabric of reality" sort of plot point, which generally goes with universe-hopping rather than time-hopping or teleporting between planets.

Sarge recognizing the name Coulson and refusing to go into his backstory for anyone points to him being an alternate Phil Coulson who went all dark and edgy due to growing up in a grimdark SHIELD-less world, and since we didn't get dark!Coulson in the Framework plotline this gives us a chance to see him now, but outside of the standard doppleganger/mind-controlled good guy/etc. setup.

[Gallowglass]

As for Not-Coulson, though I don't think that this is very likely or reasonable at all, but I think it would be interesting if not-Coulson was somehow reincarnated because he still has debts to pay to the Spirit of Vengeance. With all the one lady's talk of reincarnation and the orange lighting in the truck, I think it would be cool, but it also wouldn't move things forward at all.

Also, I'm glad that Enoch is back.

While I find this highly unlikely, I would absolutely piss my pants with joy if at some point Mad Maxxson grimly looked forward and his eyes went fiery and his big rig transformed with wheels on fire into a demonic ghost rider big rig.

[russdm]

Sarge recognizing the name Coulson and refusing to go into his backstory for anyone points to him being an alternate Phil Coulson who went all dark and edgy due to growing up in a grimdark SHIELD-less world, and since we didn't get dark!Coulson in the Framework plotline this gives us a chance to see him now, but outside of the standard doppleganger/mind-controlled good guy/etc. setup.

I think it would

Be better if He had came from a world where the Chitauri or some other threat had actually partially succeeded, maybe even a Shield-Hydra war in the open with heavy weaponary/destructive alien technology. Something that nearly destroyed everything, and forced That World's Phil to do some seriously evil/grimdark actions to win, like maybe even having to kill a member or more of his own team. Someone that has seriously had to make real tough choices like letting people die, having to take some out on the index whose power was threatening but the person was good; you know, real hard choices. Always seemed like they had set it up for Phil having to make hard calls, but the plot always made some kind of solution for him, where he didn't have to do something and live the consequence. I mean, he kills ward, but i didn't see him really do anything that drastic really or try to really come up with a justification to himself. He caught the terrigen crystal, but that would have killed everyone, so its more heroic in my view.

I kinda dislike the usual comic-book heroic daysaves, like the Comic Book Heroes to get save the day, not have to deal with possibly sacrificing their principles for the cause. They get to stay the good guys and not do anything that conflicts with their principles. Especially with the even more annoying Joker Immunity style. Seriously, have some of these villains actually stay dead and that they don't get some plot save at the last minute and have it not be a Doom Bot.

There should be more a feel that the Heroes really won, bringing back the Rogues gallery all the time all the same, just cheapens everything. I mean, why keep trying to fight the Joker, Batman? Just let him do whatever, the plot will make it work out in the end.

Of course, Marvel will never do anything like that, and just trying to find more ways of Doom Boting the bad guys and Joker Immuning them, and of course making the Heroes be all Richard Reedsing as usual.
Maybe thats way i really didn't get into of the superhero comics and was far more interested in the Conan the Barbarian ones.

[Palanan]

o gawd.

Can a show jump the shark in just one episode?



This is getting ridiculous. I don’t want to spend the entire season watching Jemma almost get Fitz back. Just get him back and get home to Earth. Having Fitz snatched away at the last second doesn’t raise any tension; it’s just tedious and contrived.

Also tedious. Tripping in an alien bar could be done right, but this wasn’t. Just embarrassing.

The fight scenes were especially silly. We spent so much time getting Daisy to be an agent, and then move into leadership, and now she’s just comic relief. Which wasn’t even that comic.

Worst alien bar since Star Trek III.

One reason I dislike this extended interstellar side quest is because they really can’t pull off a convincing interstellar environment. Their “aliens” are worse than most of the latex jobs we saw on ST:TNG, their ships are abysmal and the sets look like they were built in someone’s basement.

It just seems so amateur, and even though AoS has always been a little on the low-budget side, this feels like they aren't even trying.

…needed 42 more minutes of screen time.

I kept hoping we’d cut back to Earth for some quality time with Maxxson. Everything about the Fitz-in-space storyline is goofy and contrived; we did that last season and this feels like a lukewarm rehash.

Instead I want more Mad Maxxson, because after last week’s episode I’m genuinely interested in who he is, where he came from and what he’s up to. There are real questions there, as opposed to the Fitz situation, which isn’t telling us anything new about anyone.

.

[The New Bruceski]

Not a fan of Fear and Loathing on Kitzen?

Feels like they watched a few seasons of Farscape or something.

[random11]

Alas, poor S.H.I.E.L.D. thread. Seems like not many people watching the new season. :smallfrown:

I watch it, but find it harder and harder to convince myself it's worth the time.
There is not even much to laugh and joke about.

Fitz arc goes nowhere
Is it directing to the question of how he became a bounty hunter or whatever in the other timeline, or just an alternative action? either way, I don't seem to care.

As for Coulson?
Don't care who or what he is.
People just can't stay dead in this show, regardless if it's technically him or not.

May is still one of the only reasons to watch the show, but that's not enough to sustain it for long, especially with the not-Coulson thing.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by random11
I watch it, but find it harder and harder to convince myself it's worth the time.
There is not even much to laugh and joke about.

Yeah, I do feel this.

And I agree that May has been sadly underused so far. She had one good fight scene last week, but didn't even appear in this episode. :smallannoyed:

[JadedDM]

Did we watch the same episode? There were so many gems in this one.

* Enoch's existential crisis.
* "I think my parents were mice." "That makes sense."
* "I'm tripping balls!"
* Teddy bear Fitz
* Simmons aiming Daisey's hand for her to quake with.

Also an interesting revelation about the Chronicoms. Enoch is an archeologist and observer, but that doesn't mean his entire race is the same way. It seems they don't like it when people mess with the timeline.

[random11]

Did we watch the same episode? There were so many gems in this one.

* Enoch's existential crisis.
* "I think my parents were mice." "That makes sense."
* "I'm tripping balls!"
* Teddy bear Fitz
* Simmons aiming Daisey's hand for her to quake with.

Also an interesting revelation about the Chronicoms. Enoch is an archeologist and observer, but that doesn't mean his entire race is the same way. It seems they don't like it when people mess with the timeline.

Gems and small funny moments can be found here and there.
For me, it was how Enoch casually suggested working in the brothel to make money.

However, small moments cannot stop the fact that I just don't care about the major issues anymore.
I'm tired of the "the princess is in another castle" with Simmons and Fitz, three times in three episodes is just too much.
The fact that the Chronicoms part is extended, just means that we'll get more of this, since it's not going to join the main plot soon.

I'm also tired of having dramatic moments snatched from us just so we can use the same actor/character.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by random11
I'm tired of the "the princess is in another castle" with Simmons and Fitz, three times in three episodes is just too much.

Definitely this. Get them back together and get them home, where the real fight's brewing.

If only to spare me more of their schlocky alien spaceships with ludicrously slow missiles.

[darkrose50]

I got the impression that they were reincarnated.

Crazy lady: <Murder, death, kill> "Now you are a butterfly."
Coulson Clone: "Not everyone becomes a butterfly."

[Palanan]

No, I think she's just crazy.

Possibly a fractured psyche due to trauma from [Undisclosed Massive Plot Point], but still crazy.

[Joran]

I'm still enjoying Agents of SHIELD. Quake's new haircut looks awesome.

Simmons being in Ravenclaw is the most obvious of obvious points.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Joran
Simmons being in Ravenclaw....

...isn't obvious to everyone. I couldn't really tell you what differentiates Ravenclaw from the others.

I wouldn't expect a strong focus on science per se, but are they especially scholarsome or something? If so, then Hermione seems to have been mis-sorted.

[Joran]

...isn't obvious to everyone. I couldn't really tell you what differentiates Ravenclaw from the others.

I wouldn't expect a strong focus on science per se, but are they especially scholarsome or something? If so, then Hermione seems to have been mis-sorted.
Edited for clarity:

As someone who's read 4 of the books and am adjacent to the fandom, the way I understand the houses are:

Gryffindor: Bravery
Ravenclaw: Smart
Slytherin: Ambition
Hufflepuff: Other Heart Loyalty

Here's the Pottermore short snippets:
Hufflepuffs value hard work, patience, loyalty, and fair play.
Ravenclaws prize wit, learning, and wisdom.
Gryffindor is the house which most values the virtues of courage, bravery and determination
Slytherin... turns out leaders who are proud, ambitious and cunning.

In my mind, Ravenclaws are bookish by far, which puts Simmons firmly there.

Hermione's definitely a scholar and a bookish nerd, but she has a grit, determination, and feistiness that also belongs in Gryffindor.

Hermione was probably on the edge of Ravenclaw/Gryffindor; similar to how the Sorting Hat was going to put Harry Potter into Slytherin before he basically begged the hat to go into Gryffindor because his friends went there.

[JadedDM]

So now we know what happened to Deek.

"I will give you 2% of the company to never mention this to anyone." :smallbiggrin:

[Palanan]

I missed this on Friday, and just watched it now.

Gah. Deke. Why did it have to be Deke? I was happier just imagining that he'd winked out of existence.



Mac’s expression as he towered over Deke in front of the Daisy-sim.

And Deke's expression as Mac towered over him.

Really, everything to do with the alien bat going down Keller’s throat, and how they dealt with him thereafter. And everything leading up to that, too.

First, why isn’t there at least one assistant with the doctor? The S.H.I.E.L.D. base is pretty well-staffed at this point, they shouldn’t have problems with finding a medical assistant.

More importantly, why wasn’t Keller immediately put into isolation? Before that, why wasn’t Simcoe’s body put into isolation? And for that matter, why didn’t someone have the presence of mind to re-stab the alien bat once it started twitching?

Things just got ludicrous from there. For a super-secret, world-saving spy agency, no one was acting remotely professional.

Sequoia’s post about Agent Khan, with Mac and Deke arguing in the background.

There were some nice comic touches this time around, but taken together they ended up detracting from what should have been an alien-horror vibe.

They really don’t work out too well, do they?

It was mildly poignant when Yo-Yo has to stab Keller, but the moment was robbed of its greater impact because of how avoidable it all was. Not to mention the overall silliness quotient, which wasn't helped by everything to do with Deke.

I have to wonder how much farther that simulation goes.

:smalltongue:

[Lvl45DM!]

I missed this on Friday, and just watched it now.

Gah. Deke. Why did it have to be Deke? I was happier just imagining that he'd winked out of existence.



Mac’s expression as he towered over Deke in front of the Daisy-sim.

And Deke's expression as Mac towered over him.

Really, everything to do with the alien bat going down Keller’s throat, and how they dealt with him thereafter. And everything leading up to that, too.

First, why isn’t there at least one assistant with the doctor? The S.H.I.E.L.D. base is pretty well-staffed at this point, they shouldn’t have problems with finding a medical assistant.

More importantly, why wasn’t Keller immediately put into isolation? Before that, why wasn’t Simcoe’s body put into isolation? And for that matter, why didn’t someone have the presence of mind to re-stab the alien bat once it started twitching?

Things just got ludicrous from there. For a super-secret, world-saving spy agency, no one was acting remotely professional.

Sequoia’s post about Agent Khan, with Mac and Deke arguing in the background.

There were some nice comic touches this time around, but taken together they ended up detracting from what should have been an alien-horror vibe.

They really don’t work out too well, do they?

It was mildly poignant when Yo-Yo has to stab Keller, but the moment was robbed of its greater impact because of how avoidable it all was. Not to mention the overall silliness quotient, which wasn't helped by everything to do with Deke.

I have to wonder how much farther that simulation goes.

:smalltongue:

I also groaned at Deke but honesstly i like what they did with him. When he was introduced I was worried he was gonna be a Star-Lord clone but he wasnt. Turning him into a silicon valley butthead was pretty well done, though I thought he was an actor on "Agents of SWORD the TV show" until Boobs!Dasiy showed up.
Also, its funny that he clearly has a type.

The alien bat....
Ugh.
Yoyo has FREAKING SUPER SPEED.

I do feel like it was two episodes together that shouldnt have been put together.

[Palanan]

Originally Posted by Lvl45DM!
The alien bat....
Ugh.
Yoyo has FREAKING SUPER SPEED.

And not just super-speed, but metal arms. We've seen Yo-Yo scout an entire floor in an eyeblink, so running after the bat, grabbing it, and crushing it shouldn't have taken even that long.

As for Deke's type, "needy and not that bright" seems to cover it.

[random11]

My reaction haven't changed since thew start of the season:

Meah, whatever, boring, cool fight scene with May, boring, wtf was that, whatever...

[Androgeus]

My reaction haven't changed since thew start of the season:

Meah, whatever, boring, cool fight scene with May, boring, wtf was that, whatever...

Sounds like you should just wait for a May fight scene compilation to be put together after the season ends.

[Gallowglass]

I too enjoy the exceptional May fight scenes.

However, there is a recurring and annoying motif in this show.

May- the supposed bad ass- gets into a cool, long fight with enemy agent. Which ends with another enemy showing up and "capturing" May or ends with the enemy pulling a cheap trick to win, or ends with the enemy escaping due to some unforeseen and lucky happenstance.

No matter what, it ends with May losing.

Meanwhile, one of the male characters, often Mac who was never supposed to be that great of a fighter (he is a mechanic), has a parallel fight that they unequivocally and easily win.

This happens.

Over.

and Over.

and Over.

[Lvl45DM!]

I too enjoy the exceptional May fight scenes.

However, there is a recurring and annoying motif in this show.

May- the supposed bad ass- gets into a cool, long fight with enemy agent. Which ends with another enemy showing up and "capturing" May or ends with the enemy pulling a cheap trick to win, or ends with the enemy escaping due to some unforeseen and lucky happenstance.

No matter what, it ends with May losing.

Meanwhile, one of the male characters, often Mac who was never supposed to be that great of a fighter (he is a mechanic), has a parallel fight that they unequivocally and easily win.

This happens.

Over.

and Over.

and Over.

May tends to take on the tougher targets is the thing. Like that fight with Guiyera. And she unequivocally wins alot of her fights, the enemy has to get creative as well.

Im surprised shes still doing as well. I thought that leg injury last season was gonna slow her down permanently

[Palanan]

Oh yeah, this happened. I keep forgetting I actually watched this last Friday.

And it was, indeed, forgettable. Is there a record for the number of times the shark may be jumped in a single episode?



They are now together (yay!) but imprisoned (boo!) and forced to work on an impossible Cosmic Science ProjectTM by Implacable Alien Captors With No Emotions (boo, hiss!) while Enoch presumably excoriates himself for betraying his “best friend.”

So, overall, not much of an improvement. But this leads to the next point….

After sending a hunter-killer team after Fitz for the awful crime of tampering with the universe via time travel, the Chronicons have now set Fitz & Simmons the task of…wait for it…tampering with the universe via time travel.

That by itself doesn’t bother me. When something pulverizes your homeworld, it tends to rearrange your priorities.

What bothers me is that no one has called them out for their stupid-obvious hypocrisy. In a show which has all but declared snark to be the fifth subatomic force, no one has snarked on this. I feel like Daisy, of all people, should have had some snark on this point. But no.

It took her a minute, but May did put down Mad Maxxson.

Also, I think Mad Maxxon figuring out that May loved Coulson actually demonstrates that in some strange transdimensional way, he’s Coulson where it counts. I’m already seeing a heroic self-sacrifice here, and May mourning Coulson all over again.

And really, that’s all I got. Even nutty Butterfly Girl wasn’t that entertaining.

[random11]

I don't think Coulson will die, these shows just don't do that.
Unless you have a problem with the actor himself, a character might die but he will soon be replaced with a variation of himself.
Flash is probably the worst offender in this, but others tend to follow the same pattern.

So instead, I predict other-Coulson will join the team after the rest of his partners die, and SHIELD will prove to him that they are worthy by beating the bat thingies.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Eh, Gregg's leaving the show, so all bets are off. Besides, they kind of beat that horse into a fine molecular mist with Brett Dalton.

[random11]

So heroic death it is then.

It's sad that we can predict the results based on production news.

[Joran]

Eh, Gregg's leaving the show, so all bets are off. Besides, they kind of beat that horse into a fine molecular mist with Brett Dalton.

I miss our seasonal Agent Ward cameo.

[John Campbell]

Gryffindor: Bravery
Ravenclaw: Smart
Slytherin: Ambition
Hufflepuff: Other Heart Loyalty

Or:
Gryffindor: Main protagonists
Ravenclaw: Huge nerds
Slytherin: Obvious villains
Hufflepuff: No one cares

I thought Daisy and Gemma tripping balls was the best thing about the season so far. Admittedly, that wasn't exactly a high bar to clear.


The alien bat....
Ugh.
Yoyo has FREAKING SUPER SPEED.

Yoyo's power is such an obvious counter to an enemy whose primary defense is agility that, until she used it to kill her boyfriend, I was seriously wondering if the writers had actually forgotten that she had a superpower.

But no. She just wasn't using it because stupid plot contrivance.

[Palanan]

Gah. I didn’t bother to watch this on Friday. Kept forgetting it was there, then finally started a little while ago.

And quit in disgust after

Fitz crawled into Gemma’s childhood bedroom.

Is the whole episode just the two of them stuck in the mind prison? If so I’ll skip it.

[JadedDM]

Why don't you just quit the show? You clearly don't enjoy it.

[Palanan]

I don't enjoy what's happened to it, especially this season.

I was hoping that Fitz and Gemma would make it at least watchable, but not when they're stuck in an alien mind-prison.



Also....

If I recall correctly, Coulson and his crew (minus Fitz) were kidnapped by Enoch and his goons, and flung into the future to stop the destruction of the world, owing to the predictions of Robin, yadda yadda. As I recall, it was Robin's drawings on the refrigerator of the home where Enoch was living.

So here we have a Chronicon tampering in a massive way with causality and the spacetime continuum. Now jump to this season, where Fitz is hunted by Chronicons for tampering in a massive way with causality and the spacetime continuum, which was exactly what Enoch wanted him to do.

Did the writers conveniently forget this between seasons, or is there some key element I'm overlooking?

Also, someone remind me of the Saga of Fitz, and which Fitz we're dealing with now.

This is not Boba Fett Fitz, who lasted 90-odd years in cryofreeze, became a deadly bounty hunter or something, crashed the Kree party on Quaked Earth, helped rescue everyone, went back with everyone to not-yet-Quaked Earth, fought Major Delusions and died from rebar to the gut.

This is Firefly Fitz, who was blasted out of cryofreeze, signed onto a series of tramp freighters, was chased after by Gemma and Daisy for a year, and was finally captured by the Chronicons and dumped into a mind prison.

Do I have that correctly? This Fitz is a little tougher than baseline Previous Seasons Fitz, but not as hardcore as Boba Fett Fitz. Is that more or less the size of it?

[JadedDM]

According to Enoch himself, Chronicons cannot intervene unless it's to avoid an extinction level event. Which in the case of Earth, it was. Also, the prophecy basically said he had to.

Correct. Everything that happened to Fitz starting from the point that he appeared in the future did not happen to this Fitz. So he didn't marry Jemma, he didn't learn Deek was his grandson, he didn't pose as a bounty hunter, didn't learn to deal with his evil alter-ego from the Framework (Leopold) etc.

[Zalabim]

If I recall correctly, Coulson and his crew (minus Fitz) were kidnapped by Enoch and his goons, and flung into the future to stop the destruction of the world, owing to the predictions of Robin, yadda yadda. As I recall, it was Robin's drawings on the refrigerator of the home where Enoch was living.

So here we have a Chronicon tampering in a massive way with causality and the spacetime continuum. Now jump to this season, where Fitz is hunted by Chronicons for tampering in a massive way with causality and the spacetime continuum, which was exactly what Enoch wanted him to do.

Did the writers conveniently forget this between seasons, or is there some key element I'm overlooking?
I recall Enoch said it was allowable (for him to interfere) when it comes to extinction events, since that would necessarily end his job. That's just talking about his own job though. There's no reason the other Chronicons have to follow that as a universal rule, plus the destruction of their planet would qualify as just as much an exception if they did. Also, they're hunting Fitz for tampering with the universe, yes, but that's revealed to be ultimately because they want to know how to tamper with the universe.

[Starbuck_II]

I miss our seasonal Agent Ward cameo.

I loved Ward, sucked he became a bad guy.
He was like B Team Captain America.

[Palanan]

So, can someone give me a capsule summary of last week's episode?

I quit watching after Fitz crawled under the desk into Gemma's bedroom.

Did Fitz and Gemma ever break out of the mindscape prison, or are they still lying unconscious like schmucks? And were there any scenes back on Earth?

[JadedDM]

Fitz and Simmons went through some character development, where Fitz had to deal with Nazi Leopold and Simmons, it turns out, has some really eff'ed up stuff she represses (basically a Ringu version of herself) because she's so very British. But in the end, they fight their demons (actually, their demons start making out with each other and they slip past them), and decide that it doesn't matter if they are trapped in that mindscape forever. At least they are together.

But then Enoch frees them, after having beaten up the guards and turning off the machine. The episode ends with the three of them making their escape.

Also, Fitz learns his other self married Simmons, died, and that Deke is actually his grandson.

[Palanan]

Okay, thanks--I appreciate the summary. Sounds like I didn't miss much, especially with the lame ending in which Enoch rescues them, rather than their geniusing their way out of the situation as they properly should.

Also, what's Ringu? No idea what that means.

[Zalabim]

I would like to remind everyone that Simmons worked undercover, successfully, in a hydra lab long before Fitz even took a level in badass.

The ep also has a brief scene where Daisy and Mack share what they each know, so they're more or less on the same page about the Shrike.

[JadedDM]

Ringu is a 1998 Japanese horror film about a cursed videotape that kills anyone who watches it within seven days. It had an iconic scene of a creepy ghost girl with long hair in her face crawling out of a television set.

https://media1.tenor.com/images/bb0f434a52667e6987484da85d6c96d0/tenor.gif

This was the form Simmons' repressed darkness took, and Fitz even used the term 'Ringu' to describe her, so it was clearly meant as a reference.

[The New Bruceski]

Also notable that the episode ended with Mack filling Daisy in on this year's Earth catastrophe. Her response:

https://i.imgur.com/20aTgOO.mp4
"Well, okay."

[Palanan]

o gawd. NOT KITSON!!!



Just when you think the interstellar escapades couldn’t get any worse, we’re back at Kitson, for absolutely no reason other than plot contrivance.

The guillotine-betting scene was quite possibly the nadir of the entire series thus far. It just looked chintzy, like it was filmed in the driver’s union break room or something. Zero tension, but too dopey to be amusing.

Also, the gambling-den proprietor is paying his security way too much when a woman can put a knife to his back six feet away from them. Agent May would've cleaned the floor with her.

Okay, I’ve had enough Deke for…

…ever, really. I’m not sure what the point of the character is, other than as a seventh wheel that doesn’t belong. And he's just too annoying to be sympathetic in that role.

And, he leaves. Unlike Fitz, I wouldn’t have considered hugging him. “Trapped in a mindscape” is hard to forgive.

Besides that, Enoch has an optimistic view of “mission accomplished,” given that his stated goal of getting them back to Earth hasn’t actually happened yet. “Taking a ship full of lowlifes with a jury-rigged jump drive in the general direction of Earth” is not quite the same as “successfully returned home to Earth.”

As for Enoch's departure...to quote Enoch himself, "I am not sure what I am feeling." At least he didn't explode this time.

You know, if you have two alien creatures in doomed human hosts converging on each other, it’s probably best practice to not let them actually complete the convergence. It never ends well.

Also, “dies when exposed to cold” is kind of an easy fix. Mac gave away the farm pretty fast in exchange for some very basic intel. Don't they have truth serum or something?

In fact, when Yo-Yo was "interrogating" Jocko, I was thinking that Black Widow would've had the entire story out of him in less time than that, plus all of Jocko's secret family recipes.

You know, there are probably nacho commercials with better special effects than the fire-breathing sequence. It was almost painfully embarrassing.

I’m not forgetting Lincoln and Daisy team-blasting Lash in the hospital corridor, which was pretty bad in terms of effects…but this was worse. Much, much worse.

Contrast that with the absolutely beautiful CGI work on the quinjet’s docking with the Zephyr, which is reused footage from a couple seasons ago. I felt like I was watching a completely different show when they showed us that clip again.

Wherever they put their money this year, it wasn’t fire-breathing effects. Maybe they spent it on Kitson.

[The New Bruceski]

Seriously, just stop watching. When was the last time you weren't kvetching?

[JadedDM]

Yeah, when you get to the point that you skip over an entire episode and ask for a synopsis online, maybe you should consider why you're actually watching this show anymore. Sunk cost fallacy aside, ask yourself this: There are only five episodes left this season. Do you think there's anything that can happen within those five episodes that will make you feel that the season has been worth it?

[Androgeus]

Yhea definitely seems like you’d be better served waiting for season 7 to have aired and then binging the remainder of the show. It means you’d only have a week or so of annoyance rather than dragging it out over several months.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Yeah, I stopped trying to watch it live during the LMD arc, since I just could not stay awake.

[The New Bruceski]

Are we rolling into the end of a story arc next week already? Feels too soon but I don't see how they can extend it more.

[JadedDM]

Not sure, but there are still 4 episodes left this season.

[Lvl45DM!]

Yo-Yo actually uses her speed in this episode!

[Palanan]

Only four more episodes? That would be ten short of a usual season’s tally, unless I’m missing something.

As for last Friday’s episode, it was solid and enjoyable. I was ready to spin up the Kvetch-O-Tron 3000TM, but the focus was almost entirely on Mad Maxxson and his nefarious plans. Despite its disappointments, this season has managed to get me intensely curious in who he is and what he’s up to.

That’s entirely due to Clark Gregg. This is about as close as I’ve seen him play a villain, and he does it well.



Thankfully we’re at least done with the whole space thing, which even the characters were sick of.

This alone greatly improved the episode.

So, the “beast” is the same individual who “rescued” Fitz and Simmons, and who claims that she’s the wronged party and Mad Maxxson is to blame.

Since she seems to destroy planets in a snit, I’m a little more inclined to go with Maxxson for now, but I’m guessing they’ll end up destroying each other somehow. Probably in some contrived fashion which lets Mad Maxxson achieve his vengeful goals and yet still die a hero's death.

I confess I was a little surprised when Pink Bangs started crooning to one of the shrikes, although I shoulda seen it coming. I would’ve preferred that they introduced her much earlier, so we would’ve had a more sympathetic view of her throughout the early episodes of the season. She sort of came out of nowhere, so I feel like there was a missed opportunity to mess with the audience a little more.

I also wonder if she’s really what we’re being teased that she is—ancient quasi-immortal worshipped as a god, yadda yadda—or if she’s simply a host for the Shrike Queen or something.

Ahh, the monoliths again. Give the writers credit, they’ve managed to tie this into one of the show’s longest-running mysteries, which is exactly where those &#$%@!! things came from.

I honestly can’t remember what’s happened to them in the current timeline—blasted, lost, dumped at the bottom of the ocean?

I’m a little puzzled at Mad Maxxson’s choice of a bomb to destroy the Shrike Tower. Since we’ve already demonstrated that a little high-altitude cold is all it takes, I would think he’d just want a big tank of liquid nitrogen to spray over the whole thing.

Is it wrong that I kinda want her to stab Deke before this is all over?

…yes, probably. But still.

[JadedDM]

Ahh, the monoliths again. Give the writers credit, they’ve managed to tie this into one of the show’s longest-running mysteries, which is exactly where those &#$%@!! things came from.

I honestly can’t remember what’s happened to them in the current timeline—blasted, lost, dumped at the bottom of the ocean?

All three monoliths were destroyed in an explosion from the kree orb that Hale sabotaged to explode once it was brought back to the Lighthouse. Noah was killed in the explosion, as well. This caused a rift in space-time that resulted in the 'fear dimension' seeping into our world.

[Rogar Demonblud]

Only four more episodes? That would be ten short of a usual season’s tally, unless I’m missing something.

You're forgetting they decided to split 6 into 6 & 7.

[Palanan]

Not forgetting, I straight up didn't know that. I thought Seasons 6 and 7 would both have 20+ episodes.

So when is Season 6.5, aka Season 7, going to be aired?

[Rogar Demonblud]

If I'm remembering right, during the midseason hiatus. So, I dunno, maybe starting about Thanksgiving?

[jlvm4]

Finally got caught up. I'm liking the new season and grateful that Sarge's origins is not really coulson is back from the dead, through time travel or other means, an overused comic trope that I've always found makes it hard to care when characters are endangered or killed.

However, the binge watch really brought home one thing for me: the pacing feels too fast to make me care. While the first season is maligned for being bad while they waited for winter soldier to open, and I agree it was somewhat hit or miss as they tried to find their footing, I actually enjoyed the somewhat slower pacing of the first two seasons. It gave me a chance to really care about and know the characters because every moment wasn't some sort of critical crisis.

It seems like every season since the 2nd, the showrunners decided to keep picking up the pace so that all the little 'life moments' started getting lost. Worse, when we got them (things like Fitzsimmons apartment hunting) they seemed jarring because they were either never mentioned again or not given the proper time on screen to have any real impact. So character arcs kept feeling forced and new characters they introduced did not have the time to become more than placeholders. Character's would take actions that seemed out of character (even if upon explanation by the writers afterward, you could see their logic) And when someone got hurt and/or died it was like a redshirt on star trek, not a special emotional event I think the writer's intended.

So what do you guys think? I know they are now stuck with shortened seasons and next season (7) is their last, but do you wish they had kept the pacing/character development more like season 2-3 rather than the break-neck, every moment is a crisis we've seen this year? It's actually something I've seen in a lot of shows and I'm not sure I like the trade-off of constant action (for fear of being criticized as slow) and character development (which requires extra time including slower, vignette scenes where the world is not necessarily at stake).

[Rogar Demonblud]

Well, the season finale has occurred and...I am not really feeling anything. I didn't even get to 'meh'.

I'm thinking I'm done. I can't really remember anything from this season.

[The New Bruceski]

Ming-Na Wen got an extended Chun Li scene, so I'm happy.

[KillianHawkeye]

I liked how Deke finally manned up at the end, even though his rant was mainly focused on "Why doesn't anyone like me????" nonsense. Still, he owned it.

I was starting to hope that Sarge was really going to be the new Coulson, but in the end I'm glad he wasn't. Can't wait to see what happens next half-season with time travel and robo-Coulson.


Ming-Na Wen got an extended Chun Li scene, so I'm happy.

It's funny, because she actually played Chun-Li in the 90s Street Fighter movie. You probably already knew that, but I was compelled to point it out regardless. :smallbiggrin:

[Palanan]

I've been too distracted by RL issues to comment on this, which in any case doesn't really bear much commenting.

I was more puzzled by several points than anything:


We're told over and over again that Whatzerface and Whatzisface (Isel and Mad Maxxson) are incorporeal beings, from a planet of incorporeal beings, who apparently have been hankering after physical forms for aeons, or whatever. Point being, they have no native physical forms of their own.

So why, when Daisy is quaking the frack out of Full-On Evil Coulson, is he shredding away his Coulson skin and revealing some sort of repto-beast-man underneath? Where did that come from? It was more goofy than anything, and I just can't figure out what it was supposed to be.

Also, who exactly were the three hooded figures with the monolith tokens? Were they supposed to be guardian spirits of the monoliths? Were they inhabiting some sort of monolith-demiplane or whatnot? Why did they need those little tokens at all?

And finally, how are the "monoliths" supposed to actually function, when they were assembled by a "person" who was brought into being by yadda yadda magic energy working from Mac and Yo-Yo's memories? I mean, this show asks us to believe a lot, but when you think about this for more than two seconds it just collapses under the weight of so much ridiculous.

They clearly spent most of their money on Mad Maxxson's rig, because the effects for the last few episodes were just sad. Of special note was the extremely bad CGI of the missile explosion that destroyed the temple in the final action scenes.

Also, for those of us who have spent time in Central American rainforests, that was an extremely unconvincing attempt at a Central American rainforest. "Back lot of Miami film studio" is probably more like it.

I understand they have to budget for actors, sets, transport, props, etc., but the overgrown-back-lot scenes gave it a chintzy, low-budget feel, like a student zombie movie.

This was especially noticeable a couple episodes ago. Nuke about to go critical? Daisy to the rescue! Swarm of Shrikes about to overwhelm you? Daisy to the rescue! Any problem whatsoever? Daisy to the rescue!

It just seemed like lazy writing--whenever anything comes up, they build up the hopeless vibe and then Daisy solves it with a little Quake love.

At least May got to do a little rescuing of her own at the end. Here's hoping she's front and center for the next half-season, because her character deserves it.

I also noticed a disconnect between the first episodes in the season and the later ones, in terms of how Mad Maxxson and his cronies were presented. In the first few episodes, we were told that they were traveling via interdimensional transport, jaunting between alternate worlds, etc. etc. But once the Chronicons entered the picture, and we started hearing about Isel destroying worlds, suddenly the reference frame is interstellar, simply moving between worlds within our own galaxy.

Did anyone else notice this? It feels like the writers started with one notion, tried to cram in too many conflicting ideas, then abandoned the original concept and went with something simpler.

Coulson. As an LMD.

What.

[Aotrs Commander]

I've just caught up (being in the UK and watching it with Mum on a slightly less regular shedule...!)

Personally, I've enjoyed it as much as all the previous seasons (I also thought this season was a little bit lighter in tone overall than the last season, which I appreciated).

I shall eagerly look forward to the next season (with disappointment only for it being the last).



I think the greatest tragedy is Phil and Daisy especially never have gotten to roll with the Avengers directly, because that would have been awesomesauce (I very much doubt we'll get that in the last season, more's the pity.)

Y'know, though I would also love to a little scene with Deke/Fitz/Simmons meeting and Doing Tech with Bruce, Peter and Shuri, which would be glorious.

[JadedDM]

They recently dropped a teaser trailer for season 7:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiv6trv39tQ

Spoilers for season 6 in there, just to let you know.

[Rynjin]

Just finished watching season 6 on Netflix. I quite enjoyed it myself, though from this last page's posts that seems like a minority opinion? I liked the faster pace, it helped the season's multiple plotlines flow together much more smoothly.

Minor spoiler-y question anyone could maybe jog my memory on:

Why does Daisy say "I'd say I could go for a drink, but I guess that's illegal now" in the last scene? Is there some context I'm missing?

[JadedDM]

Why does Daisy say "I'd say I could go for a drink, but I guess that's illegal now" in the last scene? Is there some context I'm missing?

Because they are back during the Prohibition era in American history, a brief period where all alcohol was illegal.

[Rynjin]

Because they are back during the Prohibition era in American history, a brief period where all alcohol was illegal.

I must have missed the bit where they time traveled somehow.

[JadedDM]

Yes, remember when they used the jump drive and Simmons noted they were above New York? But then someone commented that it was weird that the Empire State Building was the only thing they could see above the cloud line, and Simmons commented that was because it was the tallest building in the world at that point? Which made Mac realize that they had modified the jump drive (the insinuation that it can now travel through time and space). And then the big reveal to show the building wasn't even finished yet? (The Empire State Building was completed in 1931, so they are somewhere around that point.)