Agents of Shield VI: I am an Agent of SHIELD

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Originally Posted by Joran

Spoiler: We're INVINCIBLE

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Well, actually, all we know about your future Simmons is that you stay alive long enough to have and raise a child. No promises for Dr. Jekyll.

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Spoiler: My response at the end of the episode:

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DANGIT SIMMONS WRONG LESSON!

https://www.schlockmercenary.com/2005-04-03 lower left panel: Kevyn: Face it, Petey. We're trying to change the past, so that this event in the galactic core never happened. That event is what's making time travel possible in the first place. Without paradoxical causality, we can't succeed.

Simmons, you're trying to change the past you observed. If it's possible for you to succeed, YOU'RE NOT INVINCIBLE and if it's not, well, dang.

So is the Confederacy a thing from the comics?

Not that I recall, but I bailed some years ago when the big crossover buy everything crisis things became an annual event.

Okay. Now I am legitimately angry. I am angry with this series, and here's why.

No matter how stupid the plot devices, no matter how contrived the situations, no matter how painful the dialogue or how Mary-Sue-ish Daisy has been, the writing has striven to at least be somewhat consistent. And I respect that. One of the (precious few) things about this present season that appeals to me is how it manages to nod back to previous, better seasons. That respect for continuity is important.

And then, tonight.

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Okay. So one of the big moments is where Yoyo, still convinced that she's invulnerable and now equipped with metal hands, is going to disarm / beat up a bunch of robo-minions and save the day. Awesome, I look forward to it. But - gasp - she can't, because her powers cause the circuits in her metal hands to misfire, causing her pain.

The problem is that she used her powers in the very last episode to lock Mack in the cell. Hells, we saw that moment in the episode recap. You can't just pretend that didn't happen.

That's garbage. This was garbage. That moment was total and contrived garbage. It was a bad and forced attempt to create stakes to the situation, stakes which did not have to exist.

This show has a tendency to get contrived once they need the pieces to start falling into place. And I'm usually much more forgiving of that, because those contrivances tend to be at least a bit better written than this.

But a contrivance that depends upon completely ignoring continuity, including the immediately preceding episode, is just the worst bad for this show. The absolute worst.

It's the Deke of this show. And I feel about it the way we all feel about Deke.

He's just the worst.

Hmm, the episode after next, episode 19 of the season, will be the one coinciding with Infinity War. I've been wondering a little if the alien invasion Hale's deal is supposed to save humanity from is Infinity War, but with where we are right now and three more episodes after that I don't think the scheduling would fit right.

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Originally Posted by Red Fel

The problem is that she used her powers in the very last episode to lock Mack in the cell. Hells, we saw that moment in the episode recap. You can't just pretend that didn't happen.

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You mean when her hands then malfunctioned and she nearly shot them?

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Originally Posted by Androgeus

You mean when her hands then malfunctioned and she nearly shot them?

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Good points by both you and Red Fel. As a response to Red Fel's post, I was thinking of possible ways the continuity problem could be explained. One, Yoyo's previous use of her powers wasn't long/involved enough to be a problem. Two, it was a problem, only not as severe as the second incident. The previous time may have also done damage to the arms that would make the next time of a problem.

Still, it would have made more sense if Simmons had expanded on her explanation. Maybe whenever they meet again.

Other things. Simmons is drunk with the power of 'we can't be killed', while Fitz is going deeper down the road of the ends justify the means. Both have the potential to become well-meaning supervillains. Having their grandson nearly die may bring some sense back to them.

Now Ruby looks like she will be the Destroyer of Worlds. Is she, isn't she? Maybe her and Daisy do the deed together as they fight it out.

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Originally Posted by Douglas

Hmm, the episode after next, episode 19 of the season, will be the one coinciding with Infinity War. I've been wondering a little if the alien invasion Hale's deal is supposed to save humanity from is Infinity War, but with where we are right now and three more episodes after that I don't think the scheduling would fit right.

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I've been wondering if the alien invasion happens after Infinity War. The alien contact seems to know about the pending invasion. Would he know about Thanos coming? Wasn't there supposed to be a Kree invasion of Earth as part of the later movies, that eventually got cancelled? The movie idea, not the invasion. The idea of a Kree invasion may have been moved to the small screen.

Speaking of the movies, what about Captain Marvel? Will something related to the movie appear in AoS? Coulson and SHIELD may have got what they needed for the Tahiti project from the events of Captain Marvel.

I think it would be way too much to have Brie Larson do a cameo on AoS.

Since Captain Marvel isn't out until next year, I think you can just forget about anything related to that showing up on AoS. They probably won't even have anything related to AM&W this summer.

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Originally Posted by Dilvish

I've been wondering if the alien invasion happens after Infinity War. The alien contact seems to know about the pending invasion. Would he know about Thanos coming? Wasn't there supposed to be a Kree invasion of Earth as part of the later movies, that eventually got cancelled? The movie idea, not the invasion. The idea of a Kree invasion may have been moved to the small screen.

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Wasn't the vision of "what's coming" Thanos's ship from the end of Ragnarok?

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Originally Posted by The New Bruceski

Wasn't the vision of "what's coming" Thanos's ship from the end of Ragnarok?

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That was my thought.

My god those robots were terrible shots

Just caught this today.

Spoiler: The Issue of Inconsistency.

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I have to admit I didn't see it when I watched the episode, but it's really glaring now. I mean wow.

At the moment the best excuse I can come up with (and it's a weak one) is that locking Mack up was a simple, quick action. One push, jump back, close door in real time. No effort to make any complicated actions in hyperspeed, nothing requiring complex coordination anyway. And it still apparently created neural anomaly, as Androgeus points out, just a subtle one that was misconstrued. Remember that Fitz-Simmons wasn't saying that her powers where now unusable, just that [Garrus]calibrations[/Garrus] would be required to fix the problem. So... it could work if you're willing to make enough assumptions for it.

Spoiler: TalBot

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This part, on the other hand, upsets me from a logistics standpoint. That call was out of the blue and at a time when all of Hale's heavies are either out of commission or AWOL...So this wasn't a gut reaction from a specialist, this was a contingency set in place ahead of time. Okay, fine, I can even accept the thought that Carla's initial fumbling relief-slash-worry was a ploy to buy time to collect the script and steady herself. For this to work, however? The stars had to have been in such alignment for that to work that I'd expect to see the Ninth Doctor cosplaying as an elf in the background (Thor 2 reference. Yeah, I'm sorry for bringing up that movie.). It also would require Carla to not only be a willing conspirator but a proactive one. All to another running punt to the poor man's crotch. He was annoying. He didn't deserve this...

Spoiler: Vindication of a Snowflake

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And now we have pieces in order to render the end of the world not Daisy's fault after half a season of claiming it was totally Daisy's fault. Granted, we never saw any evidence she does anything beyond be at the right place at the wrong time, but... Meh. It's just a little frustrating that the "Destroyer of Worlds" is likely going to be its would-be savior instead.

Spoiler: Deke

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I do feel a bit sorry for Daisy on this count, at least. Woman attracts the most annoying people on the planet like it's a secondary superpower. That she had long before becoming Inhuman... Did Triplett have a crush on her? If so, he's the only likable person to pull it off. Deke's role in this episode was dumb. He disobeyed orders to accomplish nothing except get shot by a gunman with an active interest in not killing the only other agent on the field. If he'd stayed home his impact would have been about the same. Heck, he couldn't even die properly, which at least would have drilled the critical lesson "Immortals can still lose" into the heads of Fitz and Simmons. About the only constructive part he played in this was giving Mack and Miss Accidental Traitor a chance to do major surgery by... well... by YouTube. "Got a swiss cheese man and a doctor that's flaked out on you? Make Google do it."

Oh, yeah, and voice what, perhaps, we've all been thinking: Mack is awesome.

All told, not a fun episode. There wasn't a moment I actually enjoyed, and a lot of moments that were tedious, annoying, or eye-rollingly bad. They've brought enough idiot balls to fill a ball pit.

They keep pushing this whole "we're invincible" thing, who are the writers going to kill off? Also, if those three think the future can't be changed, why are they even trying? The result should be the same no matter what they do. But of course, we know the future can be changed otherwise the season would be a waste of time. I get they wanted to dip into the cosmic/outer space part of the Marvel universe because GotG and Thor have been popular, and they had to do it in a space that wouldn't affect the movie story lines. It just feels contrived.

If this show makes it to another season, can they make use of the other evil science organization that has already been introduced, AIM? Hydra is getting a bit worn and tired.

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Originally Posted by Calemyr

[/SPOILER]

Spoiler: TalBot

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This part, on the other hand, upsets me from a logistics standpoint. That call was out of the blue and at a time when all of Hale's heavies are either out of commission or AWOL...So this wasn't a gut reaction from a specialist, this was a contingency set in place ahead of time. Okay, fine, I can even accept the thought that Carla's initial fumbling relief-slash-worry was a ploy to buy time to collect the script and steady herself. For this to work, however? The stars had to have been in such alignment for that to work that I'd expect to see the Ninth Doctor cosplaying as an elf in the background (Thor 2 reference. Yeah, I'm sorry for bringing up that movie.). It also would require Carla to not only be a willing conspirator but a proactive one. All to another running punt to the poor man's crotch. He was annoying. He didn't deserve this...

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I assumed that somewhere off screen a HydraBot is holding a gun to her son's head ensuring all the cooperation they could want
But yes I LIKED Talbot but they really won't let the guy scrape a fragment of dignity

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Originally Posted by leafman

They keep pushing this whole "we're invincible" thing, who are the writers going to kill off?

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The annoying thing is that the writers control the events.
So they are the ones that give invincibility armor despite all odds against them, and later they are going to take pride in the fact that one of them finally dies.
"See?, bet you almost believed they ARE invincible, didn't you?"
Well yes, but that's only because of all the ridicules things they survived by chance alone.

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Originally Posted by Calemyr

Did Triplett have a crush on [Daisey]?

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No, that was Simmons, I think.

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Originally Posted by Calemyr

Just caught this today.

Spoiler: The Issue of Inconsistency.

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I have to admit I didn't see it when I watched the episode, but it's really glaring now. I mean wow.

At the moment the best excuse I can come up with (and it's a weak one) is that locking Mack up was a simple, quick action. One push, jump back, close door in real time. No effort to make any complicated actions in hyperspeed, nothing requiring complex coordination anyway. And it still apparently created neural anomaly, as Androgeus points out, just a subtle one that was misconstrued. Remember that Fitz-Simmons wasn't saying that her powers where now unusable, just that [Garrus]calibrations[/Garrus] would be required to fix the problem. So... it could work if you're willing to make enough assumptions for it.

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It's not weak, or even an excuse.

There is a big difference between pushing someone (largely a grapple) and actively trying to throw a series of punches.

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Originally Posted by Erys

It's not weak, or even an excuse.

There is a big difference between pushing someone (largely a grapple) and actively trying to throw a series of punches.

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Except we don't even know that she got to that step. She said she was going to punch out the robots and steal their guns, but we don't know if she even started to do that. All we know is that she snapped out, then immediately snapped back cringing in pain.

And as for the argument that her "malfunction" with the gun was the same thing, I disagree for two reasons. First, her reaction in this episode was immediate, not delayed - she snapped out and immediately suffered consequences. In the last episode, there was no reaction whatsoever for at least a couple of minutes.

Second, her hands didn't malfunction when it came to the gun; they moved along the table and knocked into it. One of the points they made is that the hands themselves do not feel; they don't have nerve endings that let her feel with them. She specifically asked Coulson that when he was trying to be reassuring. As human beings, we are accustomed to operating by both sight and feel; I can forgive the idea that she wasn't thinking about where her hands were, and they dragged along the table and brushed the gun. I'm not convinced that it was a delayed reaction to her using her powers.

Overall, I just think it was a badly-written, contrived effort to take her out of the scene, because they knew that her presence would ruin Strucker and Atomic Blondie's attempt to hijack the device. They needed her out of the room, and if she could use her powers and her hands there was nothing that could force her to leave. So her hands had to malfunction, to add stakes, then she had to fight the robot with neither hands nor powers, and then she had to be disabled by falling out of a window, all in order that the bad guys could threaten Fitz and Simmons.

If this was meant to be foreshadowed by the previous scene with Mack, they could have done it. Easily. Show some sparks on her hands. Show her wincing. Anything. They did not do that. That tells me that it was not planned that way.

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Originally Posted by Red Fel

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Except we don't even know that she got to that step. She said she was going to punch out the robots and steal their guns, but we don't know if she even started to do that. All we know is that she snapped out, then immediately snapped back cringing in pain.

And as for the argument that her "malfunction" with the gun was the same thing, I disagree for two reasons. First, her reaction in this episode was immediate, not delayed - she snapped out and immediately suffered consequences. In the last episode, there was no reaction whatsoever for at least a couple of minutes.

Second, her hands didn't malfunction when it came to the gun; they moved along the table and knocked into it. One of the points they made is that the hands themselves do not feel; they don't have nerve endings that let her feel with them. She specifically asked Coulson that when he was trying to be reassuring. As human beings, we are accustomed to operating by both sight and feel; I can forgive the idea that she wasn't thinking about where her hands were, and they dragged along the table and brushed the gun. I'm not convinced that it was a delayed reaction to her using her powers.

Overall, I just think it was a badly-written, contrived effort to take her out of the scene, because they knew that her presence would ruin Strucker and Atomic Blondie's attempt to hijack the device. They needed her out of the room, and if she could use her powers and her hands there was nothing that could force her to leave. So her hands had to malfunction, to add stakes, then she had to fight the robot with neither hands nor powers, and then she had to be disabled by falling out of a window, all in order that the bad guys could threaten Fitz and Simmons.

If this was meant to be foreshadowed by the previous scene with Mack, they could have done it. Easily. Show some sparks on her hands. Show her wincing. Anything. They did not do that. That tells me that it was not planned that way.

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I dunno, it makes perfect sense to me. If the arms can move at super speed that means Fitz and Mack can make robots that move at superspeed, which they do not do. The difference between shoving Mack and grabbing the guns is that in the Mack one, Yoyo is moving at superspeed, with the arms largely static, while in the robot fight, the arms themselves have to make movements at superspeed without Yoyos powers helping.

I am so checked out on this series that I can hardly bring myself to think about it.

The characters have become sad, plastic caricatures of themselves, and both their “character arcs” (for want of a better term) and the overall storyline are so hopelessly contrived and needlessly twisty that I can’t even enjoy this as a mindless action show.

That said, tonight was marginally better.

Spoiler: Ruby

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Ideally I would’ve liked to see her get a lightsaber to the face, but throat cut by her own razordisk was satisfying enough.

Up until that point, it was a muddled mess, bouncing between halfway decent action and some thoroughly inept intimidation by Ruby and Strucker McWhiny. Seriously, they actually let Fitz and Simmons build the gizmo backwards the first time around? Any competent villain would’ve been watching them carefully to make sure they didn’t do exactly that. Strucker knew the technology, so he certainly should’ve known better.

Speaking of which—Fitz and Simmons don’t know how to transfer the gravitonium, but Strucker does it with a garden hose?

*facepalm*

Spoiler: Daisy

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For the first time in forever I didn't actually dislike Daisy. She stepped up to leadership and made things happen, and her line to Coulson was perfect: "This is what that looks like."

Only thing is, she specifically told Coulson to stay behind so he could "quarterback"—but when he tried to do just that, she shut him down and told him to go look at crayon drawings. Other than telling Talbot to shoot him, Coulson was pretty much rubbed out of relevance tonight.

Spoiler: Previews

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I try not to watch previews, but I couldn’t help notice that next week’s episode seems to feature a very large spacecraft. I’m guessing the first skirmish of the Infinity War starts next Friday night?

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Originally Posted by Palanan

I am so checked out on this series that I can hardly bring myself to think about it.

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And yet you not only continue to watch the show, but post detailed analysis of it here. Kind of a weird thing to do for something you can 'hardly bring yourself to think about.' :smallwink:

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Originally Posted by Palanan

Spoiler: Ruby

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Speaking of which—Fitz and Simmons don’t know how to transfer the gravitonium, but Strucker does it with a garden hose?

*facepalm*

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Spoiler: Gravitonium

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Yes, that was weird. That was weird *in the show.* The Gravitonium wanted to be transferred, it's aliiiiive.

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Originally Posted by JadedDM
And yet you not only continue to watch the show, but post detailed analysis of it here.

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Pfft. A couple paragraphs don’t qualify as detailed analysis. For what that really looks like, see Red Fel’s last few posts.

And yes, I continue to watch it, the way you watch a Maserati with blown tires speeding towards a crowded intersection. It’s awful, but you can’t look away.

More seriously, I’ve enjoyed this show through its ups and downs for the past four seasons, even as I continue to wish they’d made a lot of different decisions along the way. In fact I was enjoying the first part of this season immensely—far more than I had the previous two—but midway through it suddenly collapsed under the weight of its own contrivance and pretension, and now I’m just watching to see when all the chunks finally hit bottom, and where they scatter from there.

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Originally Posted by huttj509

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That was weird *in the show.* The Gravitonium wanted to be transferred, it's aliiiiive.

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But do we really know that, though? Gravitonium seems to be incredibly powerful; I’d think that if it wanted to be transferred, it would do its utmost to pour itself into Ruby, no matter what buttons anyone pushed.

We know there are two personalities eternally fighitng inside it, but I don’t know if we know anything else about its motivations.

Fffff... Alright. Okay, let's do this.

Folks, I am just about checked out on this series. At this point, I am basically watching the last couple of episodes out of a misguided sense of obligation. But let's do it anyway.

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Okay. Hale suddenly gives a crap about her daughter. Know what? I can buy that. I can accept that, over the last episode or two, Hale suddenly realized that the murderous little psychopath she raised is her daughter, and maybe she screwed up as a parent, and needs to own up to that. I can buy it. I can buy that when SHIELD bursts in, her first thought is, "Please, help my daughter." I can buy all of that.

But then Ruby crushed that guy's head like it was tissue paper. Rumpled that crap right up. And Hale's first instinct was to cringe the Hells away from that monster - not to approach and comfort her terrified daughter, but to NOPE right out of there. Which makes total sense.

And then Yoyo... Somehow overcomes the agonizing pain long enough to commit murder. We'll address that little slice of life in a moment. But Hale's reaction is... Sure, let's kill all the SHIELD. Let's murder them for this. And honestly... I'm not sure how I feel. I'm really not. If she had more than five minutes of being a concerned mom, I could see the vengeful Mama Bear roar in this. But she has spent the better part of her appearance on screen being brutally pragmatic, and frankly caring more about Creel than this girl. So I'm not sure how well established this vengeance thing is for her.

Back to Yoyo... Also not sure about that. Don't get me wrong, as soon as she stepped out of the chamber, pretty much everyone in the room with Me - Myself included - was asking, "Why aren't you going to kill her right now and save the world?" And Yoyo does exactly that. And I'm fine with that. But Yoyo's whole thing this entire portion of the season was about the predestination paradox - how they're all bulletproof because the future is set in stone. And then she... Just straight-up changes the future. Just cuts that timeline right off, along with a big chunk of Ruby's neck. Setting aside how the Hells she was able to do that given the already well-established agonizing and disabling pain she's been experiencing - which apparently comes and goes now? - her decision to do so is just... Confusing.

Now, let's talk SFX. Ruby floated out of that chamber and I too was transported... Back to some old-school Christopher Reeve-era movies where a character would float around in place while standing rigidly still, and awkward camera angles would look down on surrounding characters gaping like slack-jawed fish. That was a magical time for a very young Red Fel, and I love to revisit it when watching those movies. Not when watching what should be a modern show. That was absolutely terrible.

And then Ruby... Basically showing the same two facial expressions throughout the scene, and more or less repeating the same lines (which Creel already did better) over and over again. Also, did anyone notice that Creel maybe killed himself? Not 100% clear on that. Point is, this was not the best-directed scene of the season. And that's saying something.

Look. She was an annoying character and I'm glad she's dead. But levitating Gravitonium-corpse? Teleporting vengeance-mom? There was just too much contrivance, too much cliche, and too much bad directing, for me to enjoy this.

Save the future, Yoyo. The next throat you slice needs to be that of "Marvel's Agents of SHIELD."

As for your last, I'm pretty sure the only reason why they haven't already announced the show's cancellation is because they don't want to risk any kind of anti-buzz going into Infinity War.

My thoughts:

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Did Yoyo save the world? I don't think she did.

First, if killing Ruby was all it took, why did future Yoyo not say so? Instead, she said what led to the end of the world was that Coulson was dying, and the others tried to stop this. To save the world, they would have to let Coulson die. None of that has happened yet. Also, it was said that before the world ended, a bright light appeared in the sky. That also hasn't happened yet.

This all leads me to believe that they have not broken the timeloop yet. I think this is exactly how things played out the last time, too.

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Originally Posted by JadedDM

My thoughts:

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Did Yoyo save the world? I don't think she did.

First, if killing Ruby was all it took, why did future Yoyo not say so? Instead, she said what led to the end of the world was that Coulson was dying, and the others tried to stop this. To save the world, they would have to let Coulson die. None of that has happened yet. Also, it was said that before the world ended, a bright light appeared in the sky. That also hasn't happened yet.

This all leads me to believe that they have not broken the timeloop yet. I think this is exactly how things played out the last time, too.

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I think the light in the sky was the Kree beacon that Hale activated to bait Shield, which has already happened. But yes, keeping Coulson alive hasn't caused any really serious trouble yet, so there are still other things to come. As I recall Future Yoyo said that she tried and failed to convince the team to let Coulson die, and Present Yoyo hasn't done much arguing on that point yet. She only just now got around to telling anyone about it at all.

I would be very surprised if the loop is already broken. I expect that the future Earth was destroyed by some combination of Quake's powers and the gravitonium, not Ruby. Maybe Daisy just triggered it to explode somehow, she's already been shown to be able to affect gravitonium when she compressed the blob of it used to seal the rift.

Random low-confidence speculation: it seems like the explosion when Ruby died dispersed the gravitonium that she had absorbed. Maybe the minds trapped in the gravitonium concentrated themselves in that 8% in their eagerness to get a body, so Ruby going first inadvertently got rid of them and made the other 92% safe (or safer, at least) to use.

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Originally Posted by Douglas

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I think the light in the sky was the Kree beacon that Hale activated to bait Shield, which has already happened. But yes, keeping Coulson alive hasn't caused any really serious trouble yet, so there are still other things to come. As I recall Future Yoyo said that she tried and failed to convince the team to let Coulson die, and Present Yoyo hasn't done much arguing on that point yet. She only just now got around to telling anyone about it at all.

I would be very surprised if the loop is already broken. I expect that the future Earth was destroyed by some combination of Quake's powers and the gravitonium, not Ruby. Maybe Daisy just triggered it to explode somehow, she's already been shown to be able to affect gravitonium when she compressed the blob of it used to seal the rift.

Random low-confidence speculation: it seems like the explosion when Ruby died dispersed the gravitonium that she had absorbed. Maybe the minds trapped in the gravitonium concentrated themselves in that 8% in their eagerness to get a body, so Ruby going first inadvertently got rid of them and made the other 92% safe (or safer, at least) to use.

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At the very least, it's worth noting that this is a case of Chekhov's Gun Pause Button. They showed us that the transfer was paused - they lingered on that, paused, not stopped - at 8%. It does stand to reason that, at some point, the transfer will resume. So, yes, it is entirely possible that they haven't broken the loop yet.

Heck, it's possible that they try to infuse the Gravitonium into Coulson in order to prevent his death, or to silence the voices which only seem to agree on the fact that Coulson needs to pay, or any number of reasons, and that's what needs to be prevented. Any number of possibilities.

Almost all of them profoundly stupid.

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Originally Posted by Rogar Demonblud

As for your last, I'm pretty sure the only reason why they haven't already announced the show's cancellation is because they don't want to risk any kind of anti-buzz going into Infinity War.

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On that note, this is one of the few times (maybe only?) we didn't get a direct tie in with Agents of SHIELD and a coming up Marvel movie. Normally, they'd play a short bit of the next movie/trailer, like with Winter Soldier instead of the stinger.

P.S.

Spoiler: From the previous episode

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The SHIELD subreddit just pointed out that Ivanov is dead... like actually dead; that was his head on the body. I didn't realize this and thought it was weird that they kept mentioned that he was dead. Makes a lot more sense, but the death of a major antagonist really needs to be made more clear.