Agents of SHIELD : The Bridge
Dec. 13th, 2013 08:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethOh dear...
Agents of SHIELD just passed one of my usual 'dump this show' guidelines: Dead bro walking. All season, people of colour have been the bad guys, and now they bring Mike back redeemed... and kill him.
Usually, at this point, I would give up.
But I know I'm going to keep watching, because Phil Coulson.
There's also the remote chance they'll pull a Pepper. I mean, if Mike was a pretty white woman, he'd be walking away from it looking badass, but all media precedent suggests the black man has no third chances. If he stays dead, I'm going to be embarrassed about watching this show.
It's not like the setup was subtle. He was the guy in the war movie all the way through. You could see it coming. Also, thanks to the 'previously', it's not exactly difficult to guess the focus on Coulson. Biomedical curiousity meets biomedical researchers? It's disappointing he didn't see that coming. Especially given the thing where (a) he knew they had eyes on Mike and him when the guy's eyeball blew up and (b) they had far longer to think about it than we did.
I'm back to disappointed with the plots. They're straightforward and fun and sometimes that means the characters aren't as bright as the audience and that's not cool.
Case in point: Clairvoyant means able to see at a distance. The Clairvoyant is therefore the one controlling the eyeballs. The dude who dug his dining companion's eyes out was probably removing evidence.
Speculation: Something is going on with SHIELD HQ, maybe not as obvious as eyeballs, but something that leaves factions and makes Phil and his odd life status and occasional rule bucking look super suspicious. Centipede could be a government project gone dark, ala X-Men. Or it could be that rich dude who turned up earlier in the season, since they need someone with a lot of money and seem to be economical with loose ends.
Mike stabilising on accident is... comic book science, we have to just go okay and move on.
Ace now has an origin story though.
Also, Skye has a kid she was told to look after and a heart and a huge complex about being an orphan. That's going to turn into heartstrings stuff later.
What's the betting on May being Skye's mom? The more I see how SHIELD is treating race the more I feel there being two asian women on the team wouldn't have happened on accident. /cynic.
May has issues and grumpiness and both wants Ward to not protect her because she's protecting him (hearts) and wants Ward to be protecting her because feelings. She's getting interesting. Except it's via wanting different things than she says she wants. Stoic badass will develop by learning to care?
I've been keeping count of which characters I care about. It's still Coulson and May. Meh.
Coulson: All that talking about the woman he left behind by dying? Er, hadn't they broken up? But it made him sound a little bit war movie too. Like, humanise, then threaten. And when he got knocked down he stayed down, so emphasising he's not the super soldier, unlike some earlier speculation. So he's proper in danger now. Except for the thing where he's the character we followed in to the show.
I know they've killed him once, so does everyone else, endangering his life isn't particularly worrying. He's one of those could only be threatened by danger to others.
I really did like him being calm about Mike handing him over. Just, of course that's the choice. He's okay with it.
So I guess after new year he and we get some more answers and some more questions.
It'll turn out to be something that undermines his faith in SHIELD. Because he's been making all these sacrifices and big choices to stay with SHIELD and not have an outside life and be a bit sad about that, so SHIELD is the only thing left to threaten. Also it's the only way to make the team the underdogs, if they're not extensions of scary super secret organisation but rather isolated within it.
No spoilers, just predicting.
All that about the cellist, I seen on twitter people still insisting that bow=Hawkeye really, and Clark Gregg going *shhhhh*. I like it that he's playing too. I also read every bit of C/C I can get my hands on, so the bit where Coulson is saying relationships with other agents turn out to be trouble makes me sit up and raise an eyebrow. Story!
I feel the cellist is unlikely to be story. She's the normal life he walked away from, and can go stare at if he feels the need to be super mopey.
... I still think fanfic is regularly more interesting than Agents of SHIELD has turned out to be. Not because of the sex, because of the characters.
This week had some good stuff, but I was disappointed by the ending. I don't know anyone who didn't want Mike to join the team. Not one. To have him join only to blow him up? It's ugly, it looks racial, and it underlines how regular characters have different rules.
I miss UK TV. Granted, they rip our hearts out regularly, but you can lose series regulars at any time, just like anyone else.
But other weeks I've been happy to bounce along with the show that does just what it says on the tin.
I don't think it's just that I have a headache this week. (Though I do, and am too nauseous to finish my regular friday take away meal.)
I think it's just I've seen too many black guys turn up just to be evil or die, and it's like punching a bruise. I'm not just fed up of this show this week; by using the same tired racist trope it inherits the accumulated blech aimed at all the other shows that do this.
And like I said, usually I'd dump a show at this point, done it before, will do it again... but I'll watch to see what happens to Coulson, and I'm actually fed up about that.
So unless Mike survived that explosion, this episode sours things substantially for me.
Mid season cliffhanger, but what I'm waiting for I fear they won't show. So.
Will still watch, but with some trepidation.
Also, is this the usual way US TV shows happen? Gaps and gaps and more gaps? Because UK shows have shorter seasons and longer between seasons gaps but you can predictably sit down to watch it of a Friday.
... I say that, yet I basically only watch Doctor Who as an actual TV show. Everything else is a box set.
This way you have more time to get to like a show, with time between eps for discussion and speculation.
... I say that, yet I don't do it. Watch and review, sure, but then go back to the fanfic world which is, for me, very C/C focused and doesn't drawn much on Agents of SHIELD. I'm a Coulson fan, but not a fan of the show he's in, I guess.
Agents of SHIELD just passed one of my usual 'dump this show' guidelines: Dead bro walking. All season, people of colour have been the bad guys, and now they bring Mike back redeemed... and kill him.
Usually, at this point, I would give up.
But I know I'm going to keep watching, because Phil Coulson.
There's also the remote chance they'll pull a Pepper. I mean, if Mike was a pretty white woman, he'd be walking away from it looking badass, but all media precedent suggests the black man has no third chances. If he stays dead, I'm going to be embarrassed about watching this show.
It's not like the setup was subtle. He was the guy in the war movie all the way through. You could see it coming. Also, thanks to the 'previously', it's not exactly difficult to guess the focus on Coulson. Biomedical curiousity meets biomedical researchers? It's disappointing he didn't see that coming. Especially given the thing where (a) he knew they had eyes on Mike and him when the guy's eyeball blew up and (b) they had far longer to think about it than we did.
I'm back to disappointed with the plots. They're straightforward and fun and sometimes that means the characters aren't as bright as the audience and that's not cool.
Case in point: Clairvoyant means able to see at a distance. The Clairvoyant is therefore the one controlling the eyeballs. The dude who dug his dining companion's eyes out was probably removing evidence.
Speculation: Something is going on with SHIELD HQ, maybe not as obvious as eyeballs, but something that leaves factions and makes Phil and his odd life status and occasional rule bucking look super suspicious. Centipede could be a government project gone dark, ala X-Men. Or it could be that rich dude who turned up earlier in the season, since they need someone with a lot of money and seem to be economical with loose ends.
Mike stabilising on accident is... comic book science, we have to just go okay and move on.
Ace now has an origin story though.
Also, Skye has a kid she was told to look after and a heart and a huge complex about being an orphan. That's going to turn into heartstrings stuff later.
What's the betting on May being Skye's mom? The more I see how SHIELD is treating race the more I feel there being two asian women on the team wouldn't have happened on accident. /cynic.
May has issues and grumpiness and both wants Ward to not protect her because she's protecting him (hearts) and wants Ward to be protecting her because feelings. She's getting interesting. Except it's via wanting different things than she says she wants. Stoic badass will develop by learning to care?
I've been keeping count of which characters I care about. It's still Coulson and May. Meh.
Coulson: All that talking about the woman he left behind by dying? Er, hadn't they broken up? But it made him sound a little bit war movie too. Like, humanise, then threaten. And when he got knocked down he stayed down, so emphasising he's not the super soldier, unlike some earlier speculation. So he's proper in danger now. Except for the thing where he's the character we followed in to the show.
I know they've killed him once, so does everyone else, endangering his life isn't particularly worrying. He's one of those could only be threatened by danger to others.
I really did like him being calm about Mike handing him over. Just, of course that's the choice. He's okay with it.
So I guess after new year he and we get some more answers and some more questions.
It'll turn out to be something that undermines his faith in SHIELD. Because he's been making all these sacrifices and big choices to stay with SHIELD and not have an outside life and be a bit sad about that, so SHIELD is the only thing left to threaten. Also it's the only way to make the team the underdogs, if they're not extensions of scary super secret organisation but rather isolated within it.
No spoilers, just predicting.
All that about the cellist, I seen on twitter people still insisting that bow=Hawkeye really, and Clark Gregg going *shhhhh*. I like it that he's playing too. I also read every bit of C/C I can get my hands on, so the bit where Coulson is saying relationships with other agents turn out to be trouble makes me sit up and raise an eyebrow. Story!
I feel the cellist is unlikely to be story. She's the normal life he walked away from, and can go stare at if he feels the need to be super mopey.
... I still think fanfic is regularly more interesting than Agents of SHIELD has turned out to be. Not because of the sex, because of the characters.
This week had some good stuff, but I was disappointed by the ending. I don't know anyone who didn't want Mike to join the team. Not one. To have him join only to blow him up? It's ugly, it looks racial, and it underlines how regular characters have different rules.
I miss UK TV. Granted, they rip our hearts out regularly, but you can lose series regulars at any time, just like anyone else.
But other weeks I've been happy to bounce along with the show that does just what it says on the tin.
I don't think it's just that I have a headache this week. (Though I do, and am too nauseous to finish my regular friday take away meal.)
I think it's just I've seen too many black guys turn up just to be evil or die, and it's like punching a bruise. I'm not just fed up of this show this week; by using the same tired racist trope it inherits the accumulated blech aimed at all the other shows that do this.
And like I said, usually I'd dump a show at this point, done it before, will do it again... but I'll watch to see what happens to Coulson, and I'm actually fed up about that.
So unless Mike survived that explosion, this episode sours things substantially for me.
Mid season cliffhanger, but what I'm waiting for I fear they won't show. So.
Will still watch, but with some trepidation.
Also, is this the usual way US TV shows happen? Gaps and gaps and more gaps? Because UK shows have shorter seasons and longer between seasons gaps but you can predictably sit down to watch it of a Friday.
... I say that, yet I basically only watch Doctor Who as an actual TV show. Everything else is a box set.
This way you have more time to get to like a show, with time between eps for discussion and speculation.
... I say that, yet I don't do it. Watch and review, sure, but then go back to the fanfic world which is, for me, very C/C focused and doesn't drawn much on Agents of SHIELD. I'm a Coulson fan, but not a fan of the show he's in, I guess.
no subject
Date: 2013-12-15 04:50 am (UTC)But I'm tired of the show - watching it is like work, not fun. Husband wants to give it a bit more time, so I guess we'll hang in for a little longer, after it comes back in January.
It does occur to me, in all fairness, that they weren't expecting to have to produce more than six (I think it was) episodes this season. The show did better than the network expected and they had to rush a few more. So it might get better. On the other hand, it's more likely that it won't. Alas.