Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. - Season 3, Episode 1 Review

I suspect any long-time readers of this blog (if there are any, but if you are one, dear ready - thank you for putting up with my ramblings!) will know that I wasn't fond of Agents of SHIELD: season 2. Despite giving almost every episode a "good" rating, as a whole season, it really didn't work for me. The cast I was just beginning to grow attached to was added to with bland new supporting characters, the small team idea of the first season was scratched, entire characters were re-written and plot lines just hung around loosely.
For a show that began with the tagline "not all heroes are super", its fantastic to see that Season 3 goes completely against that by 180 degrees and instead decides to be set-up for a future Inhumans movie (which no doubt will retcon/ignore this show) with Skye now being Daisy Johnson and the inclusion of an increasingly large Inhuman cast. Luke Mitchell, who was a supporting actor last season and lead in The CW's incredibly popular The Tomorrow People, is now one of the main cast; probably one of the more interesting, mind. I don't dislike having the Inhumans story-line, but I hope it actually does something for the rest of the Marvel-verse. I doubt Matt Murdoch or Jessica Jones will ever go "hey, this food has some kind of alien substance in it..." or Thor mention "hey guys, I should probably warn you about the Terrigen crystals".
But, review the show you've got, not the show you want/it wants to be.
The status quo, tone and overall approach to Agents of SHIELD has changed yet again this season. While the show is still taking itself way too seriously, the supporting characters introduced last season are still pretty dull and Skye/Daisy's badass-ery should be more to do with her hacker skills than because she's Agent May mark II now (although Chloe Bennet looks great in her new costume) - at least I wasn't confused as much as I was this time last season.
The plot follows Daisy locating as many Inhumans as she can, while Coulson is looking into a mysterious woman who's been kidnapping various Inhumans for reasons unknown, and Fitz is investigating Simmons' disappearance. These plots I actually quite liked, as well as seeing Lincoln trying to live a normal life with his powers, but I couldn't care less about what cheap blonde Black Widow and the annoying Brit are up to, let alone what Simmons is doing in a badly colour corrected other dimension/planet. This was very much a set-up episode, and therefore I have little I can say about this as a standalone piece of television. There was no sign of Grant Ward or May, despite being credited.
Overall, this episode was fairly enjoyable. I lost interest in the show with Season 2 and Season 3 is going to have to do a lot more to wash that sour taste out of my mouth. Scrap your other TV shows Marvel and work on making Agents of SHIELD better. 7/10

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015) - Movie Review

Image
The Mission: Impossible franchise has experienced a mixed reception across its four prior installments, with the most popular being 2011's Ghost Protocol. I'm not entirely with the series, only that its pretty much Tom Cruise and co pulling off dangerous missions with some cool action and a catchy theme music, although I did end up watching Ghost Protocol one random night. Despite this, I have very little recollection of the actual film, and it obviously didn't leave much of an impression on me. Suffice it to say though that Rogue Nation is the first Mission: Impossible film I saw the trailer for, liked the look of and went to the cinema to see it, and my expectations were pretty reasonable - cool action, good stunts and an entertaining watch. I guess I got what I expected. The story follows the disassembling of the IMF, while Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) is pursuing The Syndicate - a rogue nation that causes havoc across the world. Hunt teams up once again with Benjamin Dun
Read more

Doctor Who: The Power of the Doctor (2022) - Review

Image
And with that, the Thirteenth Doctor's era has come to a close. It's easy for regeneration stories to be overshadowed by the programme's future - understandable given the show's constant change and renewal - but suffice it to say that The Power of the Doctor makes for a fitting conclusion to this era of the programme. Kicking things off with a heist on a space train, we're reintroduced to the Cybermasters, returning from The Timeless Children back in Series 12. It's good to see them return, even if their ultimate roles in the narrative serve mainly as cannon fodder more than anything else. Their Cyber-converted planet, which I'd speculated to Gallifrey, was a nice idea even if it served as a backdrop to the events unfolding rather than playing a significant role. Quite why Ashad and his Cyber Warriors were brought back, other than fan popularity, I'm not sure. An off-hand comment about the Master cloning Ashad doesn't quite resolve the character'
Read more

Doctor Who: Revelation of the Daleks (1985) - BFI Event Review

Image
As Doctor Who’s twenty-second season drew to a close, the future of the series was uncertain. The show had been unceremoniously cancelled during the broadcast of The Two Doctors, before the BBC backtracked and decided that the show was “on hiatus”. The plans for Season 23 were swiftly abandoned as the show attempted to reinvent itself. Revelation of the Daleks marks the end of Doctor Who’s run of success, making it rather apt that it should be set in Tranquil Repose: a place where the rich and wealthy of the universe go to rest in suspended animation, until such a time as they can be cured from whatever disease or illness is about to kill them. Naturally, Tranquil Repose is all part of a cunning ploy by the Cybermen- I mean, the Daleks. Davros has taken over the planet as its “Great Healer” and uses the bodies of the nearly deceased to create a new army of Daleks. The Doctor and Peri arrive to discover that a trap has already been laid, and that Davros has become the target of not only
Read more