Scars (220)

[GateWorld]

AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D. - SEASON TWO SCARS EPISODE NUMBER - 220 Skye is torn between her loyalty to S.H.I.E.L.D. and her connection to the Inhumans as tensions rise between the groups; and Coulson reveals a secret he's been hiding from even those closest to him. (ABC) VISIT THE EPISODE GUIDE >>

[garhkal]

Wow.. Just wow.
So Skye's mom pulls a double cross on Gonzales, but i feel gonzo was going to do it soon anyway.. And i Did agree with what she was saying, that what gives SHIELD the right to force everyone to be 'indexed'..
Ward having agent 33 turn and shoot bobbie? Didn't see that coming, and Mack leaving cause he has lost faith in Coulson? Strange.

[Looney]

I thought they REALLY dropped the ball. I mean they basically kept on course with where the series was headed, but they should have paid WAY more attention the HUGE events that just transpired in Age of Ultron. This episode should have been - 'Put everything on hold while investigate this Ultron thing.' Instead it was another moment like post Thor: The Dark World - "Oh that Ultron deal happened. Moving on to what this show is built to market next." I can't imagine many viewers weren't extremely disappointed with the Ultron references being pushed aside in favor of sticking to the marketing plan. Yeah I know they made references, but they should have been more of the focus of what was going on in this moment. They seemed to be acting like it was not a S.H.I.E.L.D. problem. That just point to the fact that this is a TV show that is trying to do it's own thing and setup the next big marketing campaign.

This season had been steadily declining for me so I've been keeping quiet about it for a little while and hoping stuff that happened around the movie would completely redeem everything. Last week's episode seemed to prove me right. Now it has gone downhill again with what they did this week.

And Mack is leaving so they don't have to pay the actor for another season. It seems strange because it makes little sense until you remember this is a TV show made by a corporation.

[garhkal]

What got me was Mack is willing to leave cause of Coulson's ties to alien stuff, but worked for the "Real shield" when they have that alien device in the cargo hold of the Iliad...? WTF?

[Starsaber]

What got me was Mack is willing to leave cause of Coulson's ties to alien stuff, but worked for the "Real shield" when they have that alien device in the cargo hold of the Iliad...? WTF?

They just had it in storage there, they weren't messing with it the way Coulson was with all of the alien stuff he dealt with.
I think Mack leaving was pretty consistent with the way his character has been set up since the midseason break.

[P-90_177]

I thought they REALLY dropped the ball. I mean they basically kept on course with where the series was headed, but they should have paid WAY more attention the HUGE events that just transpired in Age of Ultron. This episode should have been - 'Put everything on hold while investigate this Ultron thing.' Instead it was another moment like post Thor: The Dark World - "Oh that Ultron deal happened. Moving on to what this show is built to market next." I can't imagine many viewers weren't extremely disappointed with the Ultron references being pushed aside in favor of sticking to the marketing plan. Yeah I know they made references, but they should have been more of the focus of what was going on in this moment. They seemed to be acting like it was not a S.H.I.E.L.D. problem. That just point to the fact that this is a TV show that is trying to do it's own thing and setup the next big marketing campaign.

This season had been steadily declining for me so I've been keeping quiet about it for a little while and hoping stuff that happened around the movie would completely redeem everything. Last week's episode seemed to prove me right. Now it has gone downhill again with what they did this week.

And Mack is leaving so they don't have to pay the actor for another season. It seems strange because it makes little sense until you remember this is a TV show made by a corporation.

Not seeing it personally.

I mean, yeah they could have done more with Ultron, but how? A tv show has limited budget so I doubt they'd have the resources to create even one Ultron bot in an episode for any length of time. I wouldn't have minded maybe them dealing with the fallout of Hulk and Iron Man's royal rumble, but again what exactly can SHIELD do? They still are operating in secret. More infighting to do with Coulson handing over the Helicarrier to Fury? What's the point?

At the end of the day SHIELD isn't the one out of place in this and they aren't being used as a big marketing campaign. Being used as a marketing front WOULD be them dealing with the event of Ultron, and the Dark World. It's my understanding that the only reason why they dealt so heavily with Winter Soldier is that the events of the film gave them no choice. Other than Theta protocol there is very little that has been mentioned that has any impact on anything outside of the SHIELD series. Theta Protocol was our link and it was a cool one. But that's not what the SHIELD council's problem really is with Coulson's. It's his irrational behaviour (in their eyes) and the fact that he's been compromised, and that's all within the show. That's nothing to do with any of the films or the show marketing the next film that's coming along.

[garhkal]

They just had it in storage there, they weren't messing with it the way Coulson was with all of the alien stuff he dealt with.
I think Mack leaving was pretty consistent with the way his character has been set up since the midseason break.

But just having it like that though was still strange..

Theta Protocol was our link and it was a cool one. But that's not what the SHIELD council's problem really is with Coulson's. It's his irrational behaviour (in their eyes) and the fact that he's been compromised, and that's all within the show. That's nothing to do with any of the films or the show marketing the next film that's coming along.

True. BUT one thing i would have liked to see get mentioned by the team in Avengers, was Phil being alive..

[Looney]

Not seeing it personally.

I mean, yeah they could have done more with Ultron, but how? A tv show has limited budget so I doubt they'd have the resources to create even one Ultron bot in an episode for any length of time. I wouldn't have minded maybe them dealing with the fallout of Hulk and Iron Man's royal rumble, but again what exactly can SHIELD do? They still are operating in secret. More infighting to do with Coulson handing over the Helicarrier to Fury? What's the point?

At the end of the day SHIELD isn't the one out of place in this and they aren't being used as a big marketing campaign. Being used as a marketing front WOULD be them dealing with the event of Ultron, and the Dark World. It's my understanding that the only reason why they dealt so heavily with Winter Soldier is that the events of the film gave them no choice. Other than Theta protocol there is very little that has been mentioned that has any impact on anything outside of the SHIELD series. Theta Protocol was our link and it was a cool one. But that's not what the SHIELD council's problem really is with Coulson's. It's his irrational behaviour (in their eyes) and the fact that he's been compromised, and that's all within the show. That's nothing to do with any of the films or the show marketing the next film that's coming along.

(SORRY FOR THE MOVIE SPOILERS, BUT P-90_177 ALREADY BROUGHT THEM UP SO I HAVE TO BRING UP SOME MORE. )

At the REAL end of the day, this series is connected to the movie Universe. Yes it is a TV show on a budget. They can't give Chris Evans a new contract to show up on one episode of the TV series because he would probably make them pay him ten million dollars in that hypothetical scenario. Disney/ABC is never going to pay for direct guest shots like that and they'll try to keep the movies as separate as possible from the TV show, but the TV show has to write in the tie-ins if it wants to keep people coming back. You can not release the second largest movie in this Universe and have the TV series, that is suppose to be a part of that Universe, make only a couple passing references to it a few days after the movie came out. Fans don't want that and it really weakens the show. And that is not just my opinion. It has been something that has hurt this show from the beginning. Look at the drop off in viewership during the early episodes of Season One because people expected there to be guest shots of Iron Man and so on - (not me. I knew they wouldn't be doing stuff like that, but I expected them to write in more tie-ins than they did.)

I think I can best make my point by giving an example of what I mean by tie-ins. I mean little references that let you know they are part of what is going on. You saw a couple in this episode and they were good attempts, but they were not well done. What I mean by that is that over the past two episodes of the series we've seen S.H.I.E.L.D. on the rebound. They are clearly coming back and what happened in Age of Ultron establishes that they aren't really hiding anymore. Granted they would still be very careful not to reveal too much, but I am not talking about that either. Obviously they have to play a part in what is going on, but even the references in this episode made them seem like they were separate. It made it seem like they were not a part of what was going on and someone else was handling it. That makes no sense. Before and after the Avengers deal with issues it is S.H.I.E.L.D. that does all the leg work. It is S.H.I.E.L.D. that feels the need to establish what happened, how it happened, deal with the consequences, and come up with ways to prevent it from happening again. The references made this week were more along the lines of "That happened. It is over. We can take lessons from it. We can forget about it and keep focusing one the problem we want to focus on."

Here are some examples of what they could have done to make it better.

A minimal tie-in that would have made sense is that Fitz could have been told to gather a team or join a team or do something to investigate what happened with Ultron and/or verify what level the threat still existed. Fitz didn't do much in this episode so he was a good candidate.

Another minimal tie-in they could have done was to put Simmons on a plane to help with the wounded in the Ultron incident.

Another minimal tie-in they could have done is to mention more about what S.H.I.E.L.D. would be doing after an event like this and how it was spreading their limited resources very thin.

Another minimal tie-in they could have done is mention a new Avenger's base that is obviously run by S.H.I.E.L.D.

Another minimal tie-in they could have done is mention one sentence about learning about the new Avengers. Or maybe send Simmons to the new base to help do some physical examinations of some new Avengers.

I mean those are off the top of my head and all they are is exposition. Someone just needs to mention a line or two of dialogue to cover those - no guest stars or effects needed.

This may not have been such a big issue if this episode had not aired just a couple of days after the release of the movie. That might be where the real problem is. If this episode had aired in the Fall after a few months had passed since Age of Ultron had been released I think maybe the passing references they made might have gone over better with me and others I know who watch the show. Having this happen just a few days after the release of the movie might be the big problem, but they should have taken that into account when they made the episode. They should have realized the level they needed to go to and they didn't.

And as far as the "MARKETING CAMPAIGN" goes . . .

Possible spoilers for the next Captain America movie.

Spoiler:

My understanding is that everything happening with the Inhumans is leading up to Captain America Civil War, so the show is definitely marketing the next movie. I know it also has to do with what is happening with Tony Stark, but I keep hearing The Inhumans are suppose to semi-replace the X-Men in this Marvel Universe, so they will be a big part of the Captain America movie.

Just rumors, but even if they are not true this show is definitely marketing an idea for characters who might end up with action figures and as a part of their own franchise offshoot.

[garhkal]

Another minimal tie-in they could have done is mention one sentence about learning about the new Avengers. Or maybe send Simmons to the new base to help do some physical examinations of some new Avengers.

Since she seemed hell bent on pushing to get the Inhumans Indexed (along with Skye and Franklin), i agree she would have been a shoe in for doing that.. Say right before Cap and Widow showed up to start training Falcon, Scarlett and that other person (forgot who he was now), she could have a quick scene finishing off typing on a tablet saying "Thanks, you are now indexed and i am done with you"..

[Dr Kaylee Beckett]

I haven't seen the movie yet and the references to it were kind of lost to me. I ended up with the feeling to have missed an episode until they got back to the Inhumans story. All that fuss about the theta protocol for half of the season leads to basically nothing in the show, merely one sequence and a few words and that's it. That was disappointing.

[GodAtum]

At first i hated the SHIELD split, but now the writers are making each side a grey side, no-one is good or bad. i dont agree with how they handle Skye. I'm sure with some physch help her dad could be brought back to normal.

[garhkal]

That depends on whether the drugs he takes for his 'flip outs' have ruined his mind.

[Cmdr Sean Coll]

Loved the episode and the reveal that the Theta Protocol was the original helicarrier. Helicarrier under repair.jpg

But after seeing that the helicarrier had quinjets on its flightdeck I was confused because Coulson had access to quinjets before sending in him team to swipe 1 from General Talbot's base for it's cloaking tech. Couldn't he have asked a tech or 2 that was working on the helicarrier to pull the cloaking generator from 1 of the quinjets to take back to The Playground to have it reverse engineered for the Bus?? He could have come up with a cover story about how he got his hands on the piece of tech they needed to get the Bus back in the air.

[garhkal]

Perhaps those on the initial heli carrier were before they started stealthing individual quin-jets.

[aretood2]

Wow.. Just wow.
So Skye's mom pulls a double cross on Gonzales, but i feel gonzo was going to do it soon anyway.. And i Did agree with what she was saying, that what gives SHIELD the right to force everyone to be 'indexed'..
Ward having agent 33 turn and shoot bobbie? Didn't see that coming, and Mack leaving cause he has lost faith in Coulson? Strange.

The total and utter lack of regard for human life that the inhumans have shown past and present is more than enough reason to index them all. The only thing that keeps them at bay is their fear...funny...isn't that what she was accusing Gonzales of having? Fear of what's different? Am I the only one that noticed that? It's the inhuman's fear that is causing their problems. It is their fear that lead them to this point as much as it is Shield's fear.