Around the Water Cooler: Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – “0-8-4” (spoilers!)

Agent Melinda May is having none of this bullshit. © ABC/Marvel Studios
Agent Melinda May is having none of this bullshit. © ABC/Marvel Studios

Care for a spoilery place to talk about the second episode of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., now available to watch on the ABC website? Click on through!

  • The only thing that kept me from yelling at Coulson for letting the Peruvians on the plane is the fact that a) they are part of the official government, even if their leader wasn’t smart and didn’t bring a helmet into a zone with known rebel activity and b) Coulson’s way of trusting competent people to do things competently usually works for him. Note: I said “usually.”
  • Halfway through this episode during Skye and Ward’s talk in the lounge area of the Bus, I realized during his speech about being “the whole solution” that Ward is the Captain America-analogue, the ideal soldier—or in this case Agent—who always gets the job done perfectly. And Coulson’s reference to Skye being a consultant in the same way that Tony Stark is means that she’s supposed to be the Stark-analogue: brilliant, unpredictable, irreverent. I’m not sure how to feel about that. Part of me feels like that’s a trick that a fanfic writer would use to get someone interested in their “original characters.” Heck, most of me feels that.
  • I’m not sure I liked the way the camera movements or the edits foreshadowed that the Peruvians were going to do a heel-face from the instant they got onto the Bus. I noticed it as soon as they did the close-up onto the locking mechanism on the weapons case. Same with the foreshadowing of how important the flying investigation drones were. It all seems so obvious.
  • As lovely as it was to see Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury doing a cameo, I think it was a wasted effort because of how much it was a throwaway scene. Cobie Smulders’ cameo in the pilot episode? It did much to move the plot and felt less contrived.
  • I’m still trying to get a handle on Fitz and Simmons. She’s definitely the alpha between the two of them, and I kinda like that.
  • If Ward is Captain America-ish, then Agent Melinda May is very Zoe Washburn. You could hear it in her voice just before she drove the SUV into the lab. I don’t know why I feel better about this character-trait lifting than I do the Ward/Captain America fusion.

What did you think?