Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 1 Episode 6 "FZZT" Discussion Thread

[Upset Spideyfan]

I honestly find her the least attractive female on the cast so I don't think she even works as eye candy. :/

 

[jonathancrane]

I finished watching "Fzzt."

The corny jokes were at a record minimum, the premise was neat, and it was an emotionally pulling (not wrenching) episode. I'd give it a 4/5. If they can keep up this quality for the rest of the season, I will be very pleased.

 

[Xeno]

I honestly find her the least attractive female on the cast so I don't think she even works as eye candy. :/

None of them do it for me since I'm a straight woman, but the way some go on about Bennet you'd think she was the only woman on the show. Henstridge is beautiful and Ming-Na Wen is positively glorious. The two of them have the added advantage of being able to act as well as look gorgeous.

 

[cherokeesam]

None of them do it for me since I'm a straight woman, but the way some go on about Bennet you'd think she was the only woman on the show. Henstridge is beautiful and Ming-Na Wen is positively glorious. The two of them have the added advantage of being able to act as well as look gorgeous.

Henstridge and Ming-Na do nothing for me, in the looks department or the acting department. I honestly was hoping and expecting the showrunners to have some guts to go ahead and "Jossinate" Simmons in this episode. Would've been great to see a heroic death, and see how the team --- particularly Fitz --- dealt with the aftermath in the shows to come. When they didn't go through with it, the whole emotional impact of this episode fell flat for me.

 

[S. Grundy]

None of them do it for me since I'm a straight woman, but the way some go on about Bennet you'd think she was the only woman on the show. Henstridge is beautiful and Ming-Na Wen is positively glorious. The two of them have the added advantage of being able to act as well as look gorgeous.

Other than being a "double agent," who will ultimately side with S.H.I.E.L.D., Skye is an utterly useless character.

I also found it ridiculous that she was living in a van in the Pilot, such nice shiny bouncy hair, and a wonderful complexion.

 

[Whiskey Tango]

Yeah I can see how grooming and proper hygiene would stick out in a world with magic space vikings and alien invasions.

 

[Endeavor]

she bathed in truck stops and gas station bathrooms

 

[C. Lee]

Other than being a "double agent," who will ultimately side with S.H.I.E.L.D., Skye is an utterly useless character.

I also found it ridiculous that she was living in a van in the Pilot, such nice shiny bouncy hair, and a wonderful complexion.

Living in a van is not the same as living in a box in an alley. There are plenty of "homeless" people who don't look like they are living in a post apocalyptic landscape.

 

[Eddie]

It's also worth noting that Skye went to L.A. in her van specifically to draw S.H.I.E.L.D. to her (according to her talk with Miles). She wasn't just some vagrant. It's possible she was bathing at a fellow Rising Tide member's house or something.

 

[Shikamaru]

I assume this has probably been discussed before, but would have anyone preferred Simmons to die?

In my opinion, I would have liked that direction much better. I find Fitz-Simmons way too generic and symbiotic. They feel more like one character split into two than their own unique characters, which I don't think works well for ensemble teams. I think they could have easily fixed that problem if Simmons would have died. Then you could have turned Fitz into his own full unique character not just by giving him more screen time but also by the impact that Simmons' death would have on him as a person.

 

[Docker2.0]

I'm hoping most of the cast dies except Ward, Ming and Coulson. They just don't come off as elite. With all the the established characters in the Marvel universe, what's the point of making up new lame ones? ESPECIALLY Skye.

 

[Endeavor]

I love Simmons and Fitz. If i had to pick anyone to die right now it would be Ward.

 

[Docker2.0]

Sorry but they are annoying characters and I just find it hard to suspend my belief that an elite organization would let geeks in like that go on missions that offer nothing but science. I'm not to fond of Ward but at least he's kind of what you'd expect in something like this. With the team Coulson put together, it comes off as the Monster squad but just older.

 

[Shikamaru]

Ward is my favorite after Coulson. Skye and Melinda May are ok/meh. Fitz and Simmons are just annoying.

 

[Endeavor]

I don't find them annoying at all. I like their hard to understand geek-speak.

 

[Wine-N-Cheese]

People actually like Ward??? I don't even remember him being in the show, half the time.

 

[Harry_Lime02]

7 episodes in is a bit early to be killing a main character IMO. I'm sure one of them will bite it eventually though, there's plenty of time.

 

[Shikamaru]

7 episodes in is a bit early to be killing a main character IMO. I'm sure one of them will bite it eventually though, there's plenty of time.

Not in a Whedon show. He has done similar stuff in the past. Sometimes he even treats the first 5 or 6 episodes as one big pilot that establish the status quo of the show.

 

[Mr. Dent]

If they killed a character I'd buy more that SHIELD are in life threatening situations. I wish they had made a character with the intention of killing them to at least give the impression that the danger is real and no one is safe.

 

[cherokeesam]

I assume this has probably been discussed before, but would have anyone preferred Simmons to die?

In my opinion, I would have liked that direction much better. I find Fitz-Simmons way too generic and symbiotic. They feel more like one character split into two than their own unique characters, which I don't think works well for ensemble teams. I think they could have easily fixed that problem if Simmons would have died. Then you could have turned Fitz into his own full unique character not just by giving him more screen time but also by the impact that Simmons' death would have on him as a person.

:raises hand:

Yeah, I already posted a few spots back that I genuinely hoped that last week's episode would've actually resulted in Simmons' death. Not to be vindictive or anything, but just because it would've made for better storytelling. The episode was genuinely emotional when it felt like they were actually going to Whedon her out of the show; but then when we got the usual deus ex miracle cure, it reverted to (boring) business as usual.

 

[metaphysician]

Living in a van is not the same as living in a box in an alley. There are plenty of "homeless" people who don't look like they are living in a post apocalyptic landscape.

And given her hacking skills and at least moderate disregard for law, she could probably hack herself up enough stolen money to pay for things like "occasionally staying at motels."

 

[Shikamaru]

:raises hand:

Yeah, I already posted a few spots back that I genuinely hoped that last week's episode would've actually resulted in Simmons' death. Not to be vindictive or anything, but just because it would've made for better storytelling. The episode was genuinely emotional when it felt like they were actually going to Whedon her out of the show; but then when we got the usual deus ex miracle cure, it reverted to (boring) business as usual.

It does seem like a very Whedon thing to do, probably the most Whedon thing in the show so far. Which begs the question of whether or not someone convinced/forced him to take a different route.

So much wasted potential IMO. I think it would have offered great character development for Fitz and really make him at least as interesting as Skye and Ward (not that Skye and Ward are these incredibly deep characters but they are still leagues ahead of Fitz-Simmons in that department).

 

[Xeno]

It does seem like a very Whedon thing to do, probably the most Whedon thing in the show so far. Which begs the question of whether or not someone convinced/forced him to take a different route.

So much wasted potential IMO. I think it would have offered great character development for Fitz and really make him at least as interesting as Skye and Ward (not that Skye and Ward are these incredibly deep characters but they are still leagues ahead of Fitz-Simmons in that department).

Fitz and Simmons were more interesting than Skye and Ward will ever be when they were just bickering scientists with dueling accents creating solutions out of a veritable box of scraps in the back of the Bus. Once they were the focus of the show for once, they became far and away the best characters behind the dynamic duo of Coulson & May.

There is no need to fridge one of the scientists to make the other interesting. However, if they killed off Skye in some horrible way, Ward would instantly become a darker, more sympathetic character through grief and guilt. Since those two have a sort of pseudo-relationship going, it would make sense to kill her off to **** with the almost-not-quite-boyfriend's empty head. It would be easy to do as they've shown us multiple times that Skye can't fight, refuses to learn, ejects the clip out of her gun when trying to fire it, etc. Just send her up against a Very Bad Person, let her eject the clip from her gun and giggle about it, then BOOM! Ward is a grieving SO and the ratings tick up a notch in one shot.

 

[Eddie]

Fitz and Simmons were more interesting than Skye and Ward will ever be when they were just bickering scientists with dueling accents creating solutions out of a veritable box of scraps in the back of the Bus. Once they were the focus of the show for once, they became far and away the best characters behind the dynamic duo of Coulson & May.

There is no need to fridge one of the scientists to make the other interesting. However, if they killed off Skye in some horrible way, Ward would instantly become a darker, more sympathetic character through grief and guilt. Since those two have a sort of pseudo-relationship going, it would make sense to kill her off to **** with the almost-not-quite-boyfriend's empty head. It would be easy to do as they've shown us multiple times that Skye can't fight, refuses to learn, ejects the clip out of her gun when trying to fire it, etc. Just send her up against a Very Bad Person, let her eject the clip from her gun and giggle about it, then BOOM! Ward is a grieving SO and the ratings tick up a notch in one shot.

Sorry, but it makes no sense to kill off Skye anytime soon. The mystery of who the heck she actually is has been just as much a part of the show as Coulson's revival. It's one of the core mysteries of the plot right now.

 

[Xeno]

Other than being a "double agent," who will ultimately side with S.H.I.E.L.D., Skye is an utterly useless character.

I also found it ridiculous that she was living in a van in the Pilot, such nice shiny bouncy hair, and a wonderful complexion.

Skye is absolutely useless, and worse yet, she is unbelievable. Not for her clean hair and clothes, but for the fact that Coulson would even take her aboard a mobile SHIELD base and allow her to join his supposedly elite team. That made zero sense in the pilot and as the show goes on it makes even less sense.

At the start a lot of fans believed that Coulson must have had some sort of secret plan for Skye. Perhaps he knew she was still working for Rising Tide and hoped to turn her. Or maybe he has some special ability to sense when people have hidden superpowers and knew that Skye is secretly Jessica (Drew)(Jones)(Fletcher)(Rabbit)(Whatever). People came up with ridiculous theories to explain Coulson's actions because it didn't make any sense. None of the theories panned out because the writers don't have any plausible reason for putting Skye on the team.