Joss Whedon brings Avengers sequel Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D to TV
Marvel - Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
A first look at Marvel's latest TV sequel to The Avengers 'Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D'. Coming soon to the Seven Network.
Joss Whedon's creations raised the bar for teen dramas (Buffy the
Vampire Slayer), elevated science fiction (Firefly) and up-ended the
horror formula (The Cabin in the Woods).
Then he got hold of Marvel's stable of superheroes and made them fun again.The Avengers, which ended up as the third-biggest movie ever, introduced millions to the sensibilities of Hollywood's most powerful nerd (besides J.J. Abrams).
Now, that movie's small-screen spin-off arrives on American network TV in prime time - and will be fast-tracked to Australian screens by Channel Seven.
But there are no vampires, spaceships, zombies or Gwyneth Paltrow in this show. There are no scares, gross-outs or complex mythology. Also no excuses.
Joss Whedon.
"Welcome to Level Seven,'' she tells Agent Ward (Brett Dalton), who has just been called up to the big leagues.
He's cocky and in over his head, but he grasps the agency's mission: "We're the line between the world and the much weirder world.''
And because the world witnessed the Avengers' coming-out party, now called the Battle of New York, that line is constantly shifting. Paired with the endearing self-awareness and cerebral nods to pop culture Whedon brings to his best projects, it's the perfect setup for the most promising new TV show of the American fall season.
Because Disney bought the rights to Marvel's Avengers franchise three years ago, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (that title is really annoying to type, by the way) landed on the American ABC network.
The Mouse House obviously sank some resources into the show, but sceptics wondered whether it was possible to make a superhero series on a small-screen, Mickey Mouse budget.
This is no "cosplay'' convention: Samuel L. Jackson will not be showing up in an eye patch. Luckily for ABC - and anyone who had to look up the word "cosplay'' - S.H.I.E.L.D. isn't a superhero show. Despite being network-pretty to the last drop, its heroes are all Jason Bourne and no Jar-Jar Binks.
The focus will be on characters who don't possess stupendous powers - the mortals, as Whedon says, "who didn't get the hammer or the super soldier serum.''
"The thing that appealed to me from the very beginning was the idea that everybody matters, that the people who get shunted to the side in a giant epic can take the spotlight,'' Whedon told reporters recently. "You know, the underdog, the common man.''
Canadian actress Cobie Smulders.
Whedon, who co-wrote the pilot with his brother Jed and sister-in-law Maurissa Tancharoen, is on board to write and direct The Avengers big-screen sequel, so it isn't clear how much involvement he will be able to have with the TV show. But he pledges that the producing team he has put in place will keep things fresh and interesting on an episode-to-episode basis.
"Every week, it's not going to be some new hero. It can be a device. It can be a mystery,'' he says. "We want to deal with every aspect - spy stuff, hero stuff, heartfelt stuff, humour. We want something that feels a bit different, so it's not just turkey every day.''
S.H.I.E.L.D. came into play in the first Iron Man movie, with Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) begging for a sit-down with Tony Stark. Gregg's performance made Coulson the Marvel universe's favourite bureaucrat; he appeared in Iron Man 2, Thor and The Avengers, where his death galvanised the good guys. So it's a surprise to see Coulson walking around alive on TV.
"I did stop breathing,'' he insists. (Yes, that's what we remember seeing.) His return required more than fancy off-screen CPR, but Hill's whisper of "he can never know!'' behind his back tables the discussion.
Brett Dalton in Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.
When one freelancer catapults several stories into a burning building to save a woman trapped inside, breaks the sidewalk with his landing and runs off unharmed, a smartphone video of the rescue goes viral faster than sleepwalking kittens.
To track down the hacker group behind that footage going public, S.H.I.E.L.D. calls on Fitz and Simmons, lab-coated gadget-pushers fulfilling the role of James Bond's Q with a quippy Chip-and-Dale dynamic. Coulson even cajoles his reluctant martial arts go-to gal, Agent May (Ming-Na Wen), back into the field.
Eventually, they locate a brainy blogger named Skye (Chloe Bennet), who lives off the grid in her van. Defiant, she accuses her interrogators of covering up "Project Centipede.'' When that term elicits nothing but blank stares, she realises, "You don't know what that is.'' Of course, they're about to find out.
The climactic fight in The Avengers
is referred to as ‘the battle of New York’ in the new show Agents of
S.H.I.E.L.D. The Avengers (l-r): Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), Thor
(Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (Chris Evans), Hawkeye (Jeremy
Renner), Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), and Hulk (Mark Ruffalo). Picture:
Marvel
S.H.I.E.L.D. doesn't land far from Buffy territory, where babysitters and British bachelors guarded the gateway to hell, or Marvel's X-Men, where the benevolent mutants teamed up against the interesting ones, or even Men in Black.
But as far as fictional government agencies go, S.H.I.E.L.D. isn't even that shadowy - its unwieldy acronym appears on black SUVs and even megaphones. Instead of a spy story, S.H.I.E.L.D is shaping up to be an action-packed, out-of-the-box procedural.
If the pilot hasn't oversold us on production values that will plummet later, the show should be able to avoid the disappointing downturn that NBC's Revolution suffered after Iron Man director Jon Favreau turned in a great first episode.
Despite being Marvel's flagship live-action TV show, S.H.I.E.L.D is more likely to generate catchphrases than Halloween costumes.
The first hour ends with the show's first "gifted'' subject physically and emotionally devastated, surveying the ruins of his former life. "It's a disaster,'' someone tells him.
"No,'' he says. "It's an origin story.''
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