AoS S4 initial thoughts - August 11

Now, S.H.I.E.L.D – the site – has given out a brief update of how things will go at the beginning of S4. Daisy has split from S.H.I.E.L.D. for now and is ‘not’ robbing banks as Quake (or Tremors?). Coulson has been demoted – the president of the U.S. has appointed a new director of S.H.I.E.L.D. Given that the department did not really flourish under his guidance in S2 and 3, the president’s logic cannot be blamed – what can be blamed is the fact that the new director’s name still was not revealed. The Hell? It probably isn’t Norman Osborn, (the man hasn’t made much of appearance in the MCU just yet), and so what is the harm in the lack of info? Are they trying to keep the excitement going?

…Yes, probably. AoS as a TV series has some strange sentiments towards excitement: in the second half of S3, especially, they worked so hard at keeping the excitement of the guessing game (which agent was going to die) that they overshot it, and by the last two episodes of S3 at least some of the fans just wanted it to be over already, and it didn’t work either – the S3 two-part finale had some of the lowest ratings of the series’ episodes, period.

…With movies, it is one situation: 2016’s ‘Tarzan’ did its best to depict the turn of the 20^th century political situation in the first half of the 21^st century – and may not have succeeded, according to some critics. The audiences loved it. ‘Ghostbusters’ 2016 remake (featuring a gender swap) raised a lot of controversy on the web, but the critics loved it (somewhat). The fans were less excited in the long run, (but not because of the Internet trolls, BTW), so now – no sequel (well, for the current being). ‘Suicide Squad’ – the critics did not really like it, but the audiences love it. For the films, too, audiences are key, but not because of ratings – because the admission fee, the price of tickets, etc. With sites like Netflix, it’s similar – it’s pay per view, and few people can master watching ‘Daredevil’, ‘Jessica Jones’, ‘Luke Cage’ (upcoming) in one go, so it all comes down to money, again.

AoS, however, is no more pay-per-view than ‘Chopped’ from the Food Network is, so it all comes down to popularity and ratings, and right now it seems that AoS is trying to bulk itself up via intrigue. It may work for fictional spy organizations and co., but in real life, for TV viewers? It does not.

Back to the fictional spy organization in question. Coulson got demoted and is working with Mack, May is training new recruits (?), Daisy is on the outs with S.H.I.E.L.D., the FitzSimmons have split-

Wait, what?

Apparently, somehow the new director is splitting the FitzSimmons up, with Fitz being on the periphery, and Simmons – a part of his inner circle; didn’t we do just that in S2?

Yes, we have. When Gonzales took over S.H.I.E.L.D. – sort of – Simmons joined him, and Fitz struck out with Coulson and Lance. Considering that for a while, Coulson had to share power with Gonzales (and May); this new S4 information appears to be yet another rehash of S2. One of S3’s problems was the lack of a clean break with S2; now we seem to get more of that same thing with S4 – and it has not even began. Not very encouraging, is it?

However, wait, there is one last thing – Dr. Radcliffe, the new member of S.H.I.E.L.D. (probably), and a friend of the FitzSimmons, is building some sort of a cyborg or homunculus in his lab. Isn’t this very exciting, to sound as Simmons would?

Yes, it does – but this is not the point. The point is that this sort of solution/resolution/plot twist/etc. has come fairly late in the series, as has the Ghost Rider. By now, a large part of the audience has stopped watching AoS, and no tricks are really going to catch their attention…well, maybe they will, but the trend in S3 was the decreasing number of viewers, no matter what the writers, the cast, and the rest of the team have thrown at them. Sometimes even a good show gets a bad turn, and AoS – after the successful S1 – was not that good at all.

In addition, is Radcliffe going to become another villain and be killed in the new season? Only time will tell; so far, his actor is not a member of the main cast, which is not a good sign, but it does not amount to anything: Luke, who played Lincoln, did become a member of the main cast, and still left.

So, for now we are left wondering at what will exactly happen in AoS S4, and will the show prosper or continue to flounder? We will just have to wait and see.