RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Except that most viewers won't 'get' those kind of Easter Eggs--not enough, anyway, to assure the necessary viewer-ship for the show to have legs...
It is the paradox of shows like this that we want the easter eggs, but don't want the show to depend on them. This week's episode was a 'less than subtle' tie in to the Movie-verse. Good.
If they'd tied the berserker staff into the Wrecking Crew, it would have been a nice nod. Indeed, based on how skinny the blond was, I'd have liked to see her named "Mary McPherson" and her boyfriend named Carl. Voila, you have a shout out to two villians that have no bearing on the plot. Roxxon next week seems to be similar.*
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Except that most viewers won't 'get' those kind of Easter Eggs--not enough, anyway, to assure the necessary viewer-ship for the show to have legs...
I don't think easter eggs are going to have any affect on most viewers anyway. They're easter eggs because they're there to be found by people who are looking for them. The average unfamiliar viewer isn't going to be affected by them regardless of their inclusion so the show has only its production quality, its acting and its tie to the movies to stand on. If anything, referencing obscure Marvel lore might actually bring a few viewers back to the show. I think a lot of people wanted guys like Graviton and Scorch to pop up every episode and gave up on it when they didn't get what they wanted.
It makes sense that Marvel and ABC are doing what they're doing, but a few more nods to the comics might appease the fandom. Nothing so overt that you lose the uninitiated, but subtle things like a Roxxon sign or including a villain like Scorch who has almost no history in the comics might go unnoticed by most people, but the comics readers appreciate it.
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They may have gone a bit too obscure with Scorch.
Also, some people aren't going to be satisfied unless every single episode contains a comic reference that they recognize. I've seen people complain directly after both the Scorch and the Graviton episodes that they should have used an actual character from the comics.
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I don't think anything romantic happened. I think they just got very drunk and talked.
Care to explain why you think that? the way the scene was constructed, it looked *very* much like they were going to hook up. Any reason to suspect otherwise?
(Plus there's the story tension of "sky obviously has feelings for Agent Frown Face, and they even talked in the bar and he almost opened up to her, but ultimately he hooked up with Tai Chi Girl" which I felt like the scene was aiming for) (Also I have to start remembering the names of those characters).
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It played (to me) like two damaged warriors drowning their griefs together, away from those who wouldn't understand...
Yeah I agree she clearly wasn't being romantic. This was a case of "you need to talk about it and I understand. So come on over and share your story over a bottle of liquor."
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The look on Melinda's face was not one of "let's have sex". It was more along the lines "I have this bottle of scotch. Let's see who gets drunk first".
Frankly, the look on her face was the same look that's always on her face :P
Anyway, time will tell as new episodes come. But the way I understand television, it seems EXTREMELY obvious that they hooked up.
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Huh, goes to show you how differently things can be interpreted by different viewers - I thought it was clear that they were about to sleep together. I guess we'll find out soon enough.
Anyway, my feelings about the show in general are pretty much summed up by this Penny Arcade strip. It's just a lot more bland and formulaic than I was hoping for. I wouldn't say I'm hate watching it, because I don't care enough about what's happening on screen to hate it. I guess I'm eye-roll watching it.
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I loved the Dollhouse Easter egg at the end in Coulson's Tahiti dream:
"Did I fall asleep?"
"For a little while."
Yes, Coulson is just an Echo of his former self.
Well I guess that answers the did they/didn't they question, apparently for quite a while now
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Good for them. Ward is a lucky bastard! :)
Anyone else started wondering who that guy with the wrench was in last night's show? I kept thinking this might be the wrecker with a wrench instead of a crowbar... I didn't catch that character's name though; any of these two in the comics at all? (hell guy or crazy girl?)
No, no connection to the Wrecker except a VERY indirect one--both got their powers from Asgardian 'magic' (the Wrecker through his crowbar, this fellow by tampering with an attempt to recreate interdimensional vortices exhibited during Malkith's invasion) But powers, personality and motive for violence are all vastly different.
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So, yeah, they hooked up.
Anyway, I thought this was a great episode. It had a nice mix of action, special effects, and character development. It really does feel like the crew are starting to slip more comfortably into their roles. I like how Agent Coulson is acting as a fatherly figure to Sky, and it's nice that she is assuming the stance of a moral compass for the team (she always was about morals, but she's becoming less childish about that). Fitz Simmons have for a long time been developed into much more interesting people than the initial impression they made might have suggested.The big surprises of this episode were May and Word, as both of them had more time spent on developing their characters than on fighting stuff. I'm pretty sure I caught both of them smiling at the last scene, too!
It's kinda weird, though, that they didn't even have one scene togather after waking up in the morning... I guess it's typical of them but it does leave some dramatic tension unresolved.
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No, no connection to the Wrecker except a VERY indirect one--both got their powers from Asgardian 'magic' (the Wrecker through his crowbar, this fellow by tampering with an attempt to recreate interdimensional vortices exhibited during Malkith's invasion) But powers, personality and motive for violence are all vastly different.
I don't think he had anything to do with Asagard - the only relation is that he opened a portal to another world/universe/whatever (where he got caught in the middle), and Thor got to earth through a portal between our world/universe/whatever and his.
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This is the first episode of this show I can say I actually liked. It had a tight story, a decent "villain," good special effects and a few genuinely funny moments (I liked the mop dummy and Coulson's reaction to having to blow up his rare SHIELD watch.) Of course, I'm probably being a little biased since it focused more on Melinda May and she's the only agent aside from Coulson who I've liked since the premiere.
I caught onto the whole "something is trying to protect her" thing right from the start but, at first, I thought they might be trying to introduce a TV version of The Ghost (one of my favorite Iron Man villains!,) an invisible, intangible industrial saboteur whose goal is to topple corporations he views as evil or malignant to the world. Destroying a laboratory sounds like something he'd do, and I thought maybe they were going with something like "The man who becomes The Ghost destroyed the lab to protect the woman he loves from something on the other side of the vortex and gains ghost-like powers" angle. Then, it turned out Tobias Ford (the villain I call Blink Dog Man) was just an idiot who has no idea how to talk to women and not the genius, tech-wizard who once single-handedly fought off Iron Man, Blizzard, Blacklash and Boomerang.
While I was watching, I got to wondering if I'd like the show better if Agents of SHIELD just followed the adventures of Coulson and May. They'd be like the Scully and Mulder or Steed and Peel or, heck, West and Gordon of the Marvel movieverse. Fitz and Simmons could stick around as scientific consultants, Ward could keep being a boring supporting character and Skye could be replaced by Fitz's sandwich from the Hub episode.
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I'm not sure how I felt about the episode. I liked it up until then end. Interesting "villains", and I like the character development. Had some humor, but in the end, it kind of seems like they helped the person who turned out to not really have the problem and just let the person that actually did just the "go to hell". Isn't their mission to help and/or contain people with powers? It's indicated his phasing wouldn't work in that room, so why not after convincing him to let her go, get him in there and at least try to fix him?
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It did seem weird that someone trapped interspatially would just vanish if they 'let go of the girl.'
For an actual supernatural ghost resolving their past life issues that have them lingering between the world of the living and their afterlife, that's a tried and true method of dealing with stuff and helping them move on.
For a living dude trapped in some sort of quantum dimensional whoziwhatsit, I wouldn't have thought 'letting the girl go' would be any more or less relevant than lighting candles, drawing a pentagram and chanting in Latin...
In other news, both May and Agent Jawbone seemed inhumanly perfect at everything, and their fling might be the thing to humanize them a bit.
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Did anyone think the villain's dark violet dematerialization effect seemed very reminiscent of X2's Nightcrawler's bamf? And he did say that the other dimension was "Hell" (to his perspective anyway) which fits canon for Kurt's description of it.
Edit: And holy crap, stop teasing us about Coulton; let him (and the rest of us) in on his LMD/Machine Man-ness already. Having him keep it a secret from the others while he tries to process it (no pun intended) would 1) be a nice touch to the "wanting to keep the team in the loop" idea an episode back, and 2) a way to distance himself emotionally from the others at the same time May is starting to let her defenses down.
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I'm not sure how I felt about the episode. I liked it up until then end. Interesting "villains", and I like the character development. Had some humor, but in the end, it kind of seems like they helped the person who turned out to not really have the problem and just let the person that actually did just the "go to hell". Isn't their mission to help and/or contain people with powers? It's indicated his phasing wouldn't work in that room, so why not after convincing him to let her go, get him in there and at least try to fix him?
I mean... let's say they do "fix him" and bring him back to this dimension... the man has confessed to causing an accident that caused multiple deaths - even before he got his powers. After that, he went on a killing spree.
Even for Agent Coulson, who is rather forgiving, anyone who does that is past the point of redemption. You don't help a guy like that ,you stop him.
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Did anyone think the villain's dark violet dematerialization effect seemed very reminiscent of X2's Nightcrawler's bamf? And he did say that the other dimension was "Hell" (to his perspective anyway) which fits canon for Kurt's description of it.
it would be cool if there's a connection... the current comics on the shelves are now dealing with the return of Nightcrawler from the dead... the first comic has Nightcrawler "drop out" of Heaven after he is attacked (in Heaven) by Azazel...
Somehow he seems to be just able to go to hell by thinking about it i.e. stop concentrating on Heaven.
It seems to be just what the Marvel Agent of Shield villain did i.e. he stopped concentrating on Midgard / Prime Material plane...
EDIT: so once you have a connection to hell, it seems you gain some transdimensional power? (either via supernatural means / dying or via mutant ability like Kurt.... interesting... is hell "the subdimensional highway" of Marvel? i.e. the Astral/Ethereal of the Marvel Universe?)
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I mean... let's say they do "fix him" and bring him back to this dimension... the man has confessed to causing an accident that caused multiple deaths - even before he got his powers. After that, he went on a killing spree.
Even for Agent Coulson, who is rather forgiving, anyone who does that is past the point of redemption. You don't help a guy like that ,you stop him.
Sure he screwed up, and is a little screwed up. I missed the part with the cop car, so that might change it a little, but I heard them talk about it a few ties in the show, but I don't think he went on a killing spree. He loosened a bolt on a machine and reported it multiple times so he could have a reason to talk to a girl, who didn't fix the problem, that turns out was kind of a funky machine to begin with, that lead to some people being killed, (including him as far as everyone knew), which then led to the whole town blaming her, (and partially correctly). He then, trapped in a phasing in and out of "hell", tried to protect her, which as far as we can tell was all completely nonlethal as much as he could manage, even when provoked by Melinda, he went for protecting her than killing. Seeing the SHIELD Agents shoot and kidnap her, then lock her away, he didn't try to kill any of them, he tried to either knock them out or to lock them away in rooms, and tried to release her, but couldn't. He had a knife and could have easily just stab them rather than push them into a room and lock the door, or grabbed a gun, but he didn't. And from there we get, "yah, you're damned, suck it up and just go to "hell" like you deserve".
And that leads to MM forgiving herself?
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I mean... let's say they do "fix him" and bring him back to this dimension... the man has confessed to causing an accident that caused multiple deaths - even before he got his powers. After that, he went on a killing spree.
Even for Agent Coulson, who is rather forgiving, anyone who does that is past the point of redemption. You don't help a guy like that ,you stop him.
Sure he screwed up, and is a little screwed up. I missed the part with the cop car, so that might change it a little, but I heard them talk about it a few ties in the show, but I don't think he went on a killing spree. He loosened a bolt on a machine and reported it multiple times so he could have a reason to talk to a girl, who didn't fix the problem, that turns out was kind of a funky machine to begin with, that lead to some people being killed, (including him as far as everyone knew), which then led to the whole town blaming her, (and partially correctly). He then, trapped in a phasing in and out of "hell", tried to protect her, which as far as we can tell was all completely nonlethal as much as he could manage, even when provoked by Melinda, he went for protecting her than killing. Seeing the SHIELD Agents shoot and kidnap her, then lock her away, he didn't try to kill any of them, he tried to either knock them out or to lock them away in rooms, and tried to release her, but couldn't. He had a knife and could have easily just stab them rather than push them into a room and lock the door, or grabbed a gun, but he didn't. And from there we get, "yah, you're damned, suck it up and just go to "hell" like you deserve".
And that leads to MM forgiving herself?
The police car almost hit somebody in a speed that could have easily resulted in death or severe injuries (the kind that leave you in a wheelchair). The man was unfortunately saved by agent Coulson.
Later, he crashed an airplane.
And he went for several potentially lethal blows with that screwdriver of his - like when Simmons was saying, "It's like a door to -" and he jumped her from behind, swinging for her head, saying "hell!".
Sure, he didn't end up killing many people - but that was through *insane* luck. Honestly, how could he have known everyone would make it alive and well from the plain crush?
He was obviously acting with murderous intent, while being very confused and frustrated. They could have showed him more mercy, I suppose, but I really understand them not feeling like helping the guy who came insanely close to killing some or all of them, several times.
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I took the hell shown in Simmons' display to be Svartalfheim, the Dark World from the Thor movie. Ford, aka Blink Dog Man, was shown to be a bit of a bible-thumper, and Svartalfheim was certainly a bleak and harsh enough environment for someone like that to identify it with Hell. Also, somebody probably would have mentioned the smell of brimstone if he was popping in and out of Limbo.
Marvel Studios can't actually use Nightcrawler while Fox holds the rights either so, while they can use purple smoke to show the guy teleporting, they wouldn't be able to verbally connect it to Nightcrawler.
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I mean... let's say they do "fix him" and bring him back to this dimension... the man has confessed to causing an accident that caused multiple deaths - even before he got his powers. After that, he went on a killing spree.
Even for Agent Coulson, who is rather forgiving, anyone who does that is past the point of redemption. You don't help a guy like that ,you stop him.
Sure he screwed up, and is a little screwed up. I missed the part with the cop car, so that might change it a little, but I heard them talk about it a few ties in the show, but I don't think he went on a killing spree. He loosened a bolt on a machine and reported it multiple times so he could have a reason to talk to a girl, who didn't fix the problem, that turns out was kind of a funky machine to begin with, that lead to some people being killed, (including him as far as everyone knew), which then led to the whole town blaming her, (and partially correctly). He then, trapped in a phasing in and out of "hell", tried to protect her, which as far as we can tell was all completely nonlethal as much as he could manage, even when provoked by Melinda, he went for protecting her than killing. Seeing the SHIELD Agents shoot and kidnap her, then lock her away, he didn't try to kill any of them, he tried to either knock them out or to lock them away in rooms, and tried to release her, but couldn't. He had a knife and could have easily just stab them rather than push them into a room and lock the door, or grabbed a gun, but he didn't. And from there we get, "yah, you're damned, suck it up and just go to "hell" like you deserve".
And that leads to MM forgiving herself?
The police car almost hit somebody in a speed that could have easily resulted in death or severe injuries (the kind that leave you in a wheelchair). The man was unfortunately saved by agent Coulson.
Later, he crashed an airplane.
And he went for several potentially lethal blows with that screwdriver of...
And yeah, I just noticed I wrote "unfortunately" instead of fortunately. So, that was a typo :P
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the current comics on the shelves are now dealing with the return of Nightcrawler from the dead... the first comic has Nightcrawler "drop out" of Heaven after he is attacked (in Heaven) by Azazel...
i dropped out of X-titles for a while now in favor of the Avengers titles... and Superior Spider-Man of course, which is the best thing written and Spider-Man since the black suit days...
Anyone here knows what happened to Nightcrawler / why he died in the first place?
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the current comics on the shelves are now dealing with the return of Nightcrawler from the dead... the first comic has Nightcrawler "drop out" of Heaven after he is attacked (in Heaven) by Azazel...i dropped out of X-titles for a while now in favor of the Avengers titles... and Superior Spider-Man of course, which is the best thing written and Spider-Man since the black suit days...
Anyone here knows what happened to Nightcrawler / why he died in the first place?
It was his turn.
:P
Anyone here knows what happened to Nightcrawler / why he died in the first place?
IIRC, he took a shot from Bastion that was meant for Rogue. They were trying to protect Hope at the time, I believe. Kinda had Bastion's arm sticking out of his chest.
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IIRC, he took a shot from Bastion that was meant for Rogue. They were trying to protect Hope at the time, I believe. Kinda had Bastion's arm sticking out of his chest.Anyone here knows what happened to Nightcrawler / why he died in the first place?
So rogue just died, by the way, as of the latest "Uncanny Avengers" comic. Killed by the Grim Reaper. Funny that Nightcrawler is coming back... (it's like the bullet was meant for Rogue, and now that she's going, the elf can come back! lol)
Edit: disclaimer on last... the next issue will confirm or deny her "death" I think... especially since she had absorbed Wolverine's healing factor/claws power before that fight... lol
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If she's dead...Marvel is dead to me. Even allowing for comic book death.
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Her, Wolverine, Dazzler, Longshot, Storm, Havok, Colossus, Psylocke and Madelyne Pryor all died fighting the Adversary for all of about 20 minutes during the 80's. They "sacrificed" their souls so Forge could send the demon back to its dimension, but Roma brought them back to life pretty much as soon as the spell was complete so it was a pretty hollow sacrifice...like basically every other X-Men death ever...grumble, grumble stupid X-men.