Two out of five stars.
If you like mediocre storytelling, lousy acting and dialogue that might as well have been pulled from a series of funny papers, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is the show for you. Despite anticipation, S.H.I.E.L.D. falls far short of co-creator Joss Whedon’s previous TV credits that include Firefly and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Choosing to expand the world of the Marvel Comic movie franchises into other mediums offered a lot of potential. Following the success of The Avengers, Whedon oversaw phase two of Marvel Cinematic Universe, which began with Shane Black’s Iron Man 3 this past summer. Just as the first set of movies led up to The Avengers, this next series will build up to its sequel Age of Ultron, set to hit theaters in 2015.
Yet in addition to upcoming blockbuster sequels such as Thor: The Dark World and Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Whedon decided to develop a TV series that would take place in the same universe. While adapting a classic comic book by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby seems like a great idea, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. makes the second season of Heroes look like a masterpiece.
Let’s take a look at the pilot: after superheroes reveal themselves to the world, the government agency known as S.H.I.E.L.D. (Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division) must deal with the impact of their presence, and the people who are adamantly opposed to their existence.
After a teaser involving a superhuman trying to conceal his identity, the episode shifts toward a new recruit Agent Grant Ward (Brett Dalton). I can’t tell you much about this guy other than that he has dark hair and is good with a gun, because his character—and just about every one on the show—is as underdeveloped as you can imagine. The pilot tells you nothing about who he is, where he came from or why he was recruited by the organization.
Viewers are then reunited with fan-favorite Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg), who has been magically revived since he was supposedly killed in The Avengers. If you’re curious to know how a man survives being stabbed through the chest by an extraterrestrial supervillain, don’t ask me.
We also meet agents Melinda May (Ming-Na Wen) and Skye (Chloe Bennet). Again, I wish I could give you more than their names, but that’s about all we learn about them.
In fact, this episode and the ones following it feel more like hour-long toy advertisements than anything else. Almost every scene features Coulson showing off all the cool gadgets they have, with the dialogue not going far beyond that. There are moments as you’re watching this pathetic excuse for a TV show where you wonder how Michael Bay wasn’t involved in it.
Despite Whedon’s role as co-writer, director and executive producer, the show simply lacks the essence of the Marvel movies. A good show shouldn’t be driven by superheroes and crazy special effects, but S.H.I.E.L.D. isn’t even compelling. Not only are the characters entirely one-dimensional, the plot lines are nothing but cliché.
The premise of this series is more or less along the lines of Fringe and Alias. Yet what separates it from those shows is that viewers aren’t given any reason to care for these characters. Five episodes in, the show still hasn’t given audiences a substantial reason to keep watching. There is plenty of homage to the source material, but these “plot” elements are meaningless to anyone other than fanboys.
While this and the equally insufferable comic-based series Arrow each had potential, both were ruined by sloppy writing and cast members that could’ve been borrowed from soap operas and Disney Channel shows. My hope is that the failure of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. will be the biggest flaw within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, leaving room for more quality films.
