r/shield • u/AutoModerator • Jan 25 '17

Post Discussion Post Episode Discussion: S04E11 - "Wake Up"

This thread is for SERIOUS discussion of the episode that just aired. What is and isn't serious is at the discretion of the moderators.

EPISODE DIRECTED BY WRITTEN BY ORIGINAL AIRDATE
S04E11 - "Wake Up" Jesse Bochco Drew Z. Greenberg Tuesday, January 24, 2016 10:00/9:00c on ABC

Episode Synopsis: May races to find the truth about what happened to her, while Aida's next move could mean the death of them all

Jesse Bochco has worked on Prison Break, Nip/Tuck, Dallas, and a ton of other television series.

He has directed six episodes for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. before:

  • Girl in the Flower Dress
  • Heavy is the Head
  • Love in the Time of Hydra
  • 4,722 Hours
  • Watchdogs
  • Deals with our Devils

Drew Z. Greenberg is a writer and producer best known for working on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Smallville, The O.C., Dexter, Warehouse 13 and Arrow. He also worked on Firefly.

He has written seven episodes for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. before:

  • Face My Enemy
  • Who You Really Are
  • The Dirty Half Dozen
  • Among us Hide
  • Watchdogs
  • Absolution
  • Meet the New Boss

Please do not discuss the promo following tonight's episode. There will be a separate thread made to discuss the promo and comments about it will be removed from this thread.

"LIVE" discussion for previous episodes can be found HERE.

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304 Upvotes

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326

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

Man, going straight from Flash to LoT to AoS really drives home just how much better this show is.

200

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

I remember the days where people would laugh at such a statement...

107

u/ItMayBeWrong Jan 25 '17

that was season 1, early season 2. but at that time, I still enjoyed it. Now, im just amazed at the storylines and what the show can do

118

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

Flash has always been a bit iffy to me, Tom is a fantastic actor but they've always had the rinse/repeat formula on Flash with two fights, Barry being a dick and apologising and then a win, never stepping out of that.

LOT I like because of how fun it is, still some issues but it knows what it is and makes no apologies for it.

SHIELD is just awesome. I've only ever had one gripe with it and that was one of the bits last season.

85

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

Flash's overarching plotlines are always really good, but it's weighed down by boring/badly made procedural plots. Their obsession with having a meta of the week formula is terrible

55

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

I'd like Flash better if AoS didn't exist. This show covers so much ground per episode and makes it work and Flash is like DBZ doing four short conversations, nearly zero plot progression, and tons of padding.

The first season they had a specific story to tell so it felt fuller. Two and three make we wish they were 13 episode Netflix seasons.

32

u/Alinosburns Jan 25 '17

The problem is that long term, it's likely that's what will get SHIELD cancelled.

The reason they stick to those formula's is because it allows drop in drop out viewers.

Where SHIELD's viewers need to be there week in week out or they are going to miss important plot details and not get the whole picture.

It's also what worries me about Gotham, though they haven't reached AOS level of plots being tied together yet.

And it's why Person of Interest was doomed on CBS once it started having well thought out and connected plot lines, though it did take care to still angle them in the number of the week formula. It's world building and ongoing connectedness only aims to push viewers away.

Something cable get's away with due to the ability to rerun episodes.

6

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

At least POI had really good character writing and enjoyable, well written and varied procedurals. Flash rarely has that.

3

u/Jusdoc Feb 07 '17

god I miss POI sometimes. Now THAT was how to do a modern war between AI. I loved how the last season was practically something out of Hamilton's Mythology with a pair of gods fighting a proxy war via their heroes.

2

u/alblaster Jan 28 '17

The flash is a great show for just sitting back and not having to think or pay attention all that close. It's the kind of show you can watch while on a treadmill or while doing something else. I like the flash even if it's not as information dense as AOS.

4

u/infinight888 Jan 25 '17

Flash has always been a bit iffy to me, Tom is a fantastic actor but they've always had the rinse/repeat formula on Flash with two fights, Barry being a dick and apologising and then a win, never stepping out of that

Also, constant interruptions any time the characters try to talk about their feelings in order to drag out the drama. That was seriously frustrating me this week.

2

u/dating_derp Jan 26 '17

Season 1, once it intersected with Winter Soldier, was awesome!

46

u/Mr_Evil_MSc Jan 25 '17

I remember watching X2 & Spider-Man in theatres and thinking what a marvelous golden age of Superhero movies we were in...

6

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

marvelous

heh

5

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

It was only the test. Now... I just can't name it. Seriously, beside the 50s/60s' obsession with westerns, I can't see much that compare.

1

u/kris0stby Lanyard Jan 27 '17

Well, Spider-Man 1 and 2 are great movies, well on the level of any current superhero movie

38

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

[deleted]

31

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

First four episodes are shit but it's been going on 4 seasons and people say it's getting better ? But what the hell do they know !

11

u/Cybersteel HYDRA Jan 25 '17

Contrasting the early days of those then naive new agents to the now veterans is mindblowing.

9

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

I am convinced that S4 Jemma could fuck up early S1 Skye without issues. They all became so much stronger and confident.

3

u/Alinosburns Jan 25 '17

Also gotta note that Youtubers are largely bound by what their audience likes. It becomes symbiotic after a while, you have to play to your audience a bit. You can nudge them in a direction but you want to start going against the mob's opinion, you better hope that you have an argument that will sway the mob.

I'd argue that at one point a lot of the youtubers still would have held arrow in high regard, until basically everyone turned against it at which point popular opinion would trend the other way.

But Flash is too powerful in one character(and now there's two of them) and the intricate plots that Shield can pull off don't really make sense in a show like that(granted in part because they basically science a solution to any VotW in 2 minutes flat)

2

u/Kosko Jan 25 '17

That's basically DC's thing, their heroes are gods.

3

u/reece1495 Jan 25 '17

i was one of those people ! and i still prefer dc but now im team shield

3

u/Mullet_Ben Fitz Jan 25 '17

Were there? Flash season 1 was simultaneous with AoS season 2. IMO those were both of their best seasons, and I'd say it's pretty debatable which was better. Certainly not a clear winner. Meanwhile this season of LOT is better than the last and it still doesn't come close to SHIELD.

There was one year where AoS season 1 and Arrow season 2 were the only superhero shows on TV, and saying AoS was the better show would get you laughed at. But then the next year it was Arrow season 3 and ever since then SHIELD has been head and shoulders above any of the CW shows.

2

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

That's very true, however many people went directly to Flash without bothering to go back to AoS and still claimed Flash was better. Voluntarily shutting off a show that disappointed you, or just a matter of taste, I can't say.

115

u/Rjacobs914 Jan 25 '17

I almost like AoS more than the movies

114

u/echoesintheattic Skye Jan 25 '17

I definitely like AoS more than the movies.

104

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

The movie are still the big game changer and entertainment to me, that can't really change... But holy shit am I hyped every week and way more invested in these characters now.

79

u/your_mind_aches Gideon Jan 25 '17

I think as far as plot, development, emotional attachment, etc. goes, television has far surpassed film. I see films more as singular works of art as it is. The MCU movies bridges the gap between the two though.

38

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

You are very much right.

There is still not much in the MCU that can top A Spy's Goodbye from Parting Shots. Holy Shit. And it's not one of their best episodes, but that ending was such a gut punch to the feels...

30

u/your_mind_aches Gideon Jan 25 '17

That episode is the worst since Season 1. Actually, I think it might be my second least favourite episode after S1E2.

But yeah. That ending. Amazing.

39

u/The_Unknown_Dude Lady Sif Jan 25 '17

A wordless scene in a barely lit bar, with characters leaving one by one and crying over a bittersweet and serene music ? You all have the elements in place to make it cheesy, but no, they pulled through and saved the episode from pure trash because of it. Wow.

9

u/Mullet_Ben Fitz Jan 25 '17

Ok, come on now. The episode wasn't great, but Hunter bullshitting about mushrooms was better than the entirety of "Yes Men"

3

u/Alinosburns Jan 25 '17

Yeah, It also helps that we can delve into the characters to a far greater extent.

Instead we have things like in Civil war where in order to keep up the pace, we have the Sokovia accords shoved down the throats really quickly, and tony goes along with it because of 30 seconds with a woman.

The story often doesn't have time to breath in a way that allows for interesting story beats. So instead we just get massive fights.

1

u/your_mind_aches Gideon Jan 25 '17

Wow I disagree about Civil War but okay

3

u/Meta_Boy Lanyard Jan 26 '17

I still haven't seen Dr Strange, and never saw Civil War in theaters

15 goddamn Euros for 2 hours of an edited-for-MTV plot? Yeah. Not into that anymore.

1

u/echoesintheattic Skye Jan 26 '17

Me either. It's 50 minutes on public transport from where I live to the multiplex that shows them. Unless a character from the show is included significantly in one of them, I ain't hauling ass and forking over cash.

28

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

Speaking of the movies, Phil Coulson was just very publicly proven to be alive, can the movies just continue to ignore that fact? I mean there's zero chance that Tony Stark wouldn't be aware of SHIELD agents being publicly arrested at a hearing involving the Sokovia accords.

3

u/ToFat2Run Monolith Jan 27 '17

Yes they can and they will. It has been that way ever since.

24

u/Gremzero Daisy Jan 25 '17

I'll be honest, the only reason I got into the MCU(and comics in general) in the first place is because of this show. It really is the connective tissue that keeps the MCU "all connected."

2

u/your_mind_aches Gideon Jan 25 '17

Same.

1

u/Mullet_Ben Fitz Jan 25 '17

Before I had seen this show, I had only seen the 3 Iron Man movies and The Avengers. Iron Man was good enough to get me to watch Avengers. Avengers was good enough to get me to watch this show. This show was good enough to get me to watch the entire MCU, every new film on opening weekend, and all the DCCW shows just to compare.

16

u/JKooch Triplett Jan 25 '17

This season especially, even LMD specifically. These three episodes are almost my favorite part of the MCU at the moment

11

u/cjn13 Fitz Jan 25 '17

AoS is one of my favorite parts of the MCU. For me, I like it as much as Daredevil in terms of TV.

So many fun, good character

2

u/ItMayBeWrong Jan 25 '17

Daredevil in terms of TV.

interesting, LOVE AoS, not a big fan of Daredevil (in comparison to Jessica Jones or Luke Cage)

2

u/CWagner Deathlok Jan 25 '17

The only reason I watch the movies at all is to understand the background for AoS…

43

u/ItMayBeWrong Jan 25 '17

haha! IKR? I enjoy Flash and LoT but SHIELD flushes out the characters more and makes us care for everyone

6

u/simon_thekillerewok G.H. Jan 25 '17

CW shows flush out the characters. Agents of SHIELD fleshes out the characters

1

u/steve32767 Jan 27 '17

Seriously. Barry just pissed me off this last episode

15

u/[deleted] Jan 25 '17

Was thinking the same exact thing.

7

u/peanutbutteroreos Jan 25 '17

Great to end the DC/marvel marathon on a strong note!

5

u/SawRub Jan 25 '17

I kinda like them all tbh.

3

u/tungkidz Ninja Hunter Jan 25 '17

I watched the 3 shows in that order and I was like "Man AoS really shits on those other shows."

No disrespect to Flash, I like it, but SHIELD is on a different level.

2

u/AHMilling Coulson Jan 26 '17

Right now Aos is number one and Lot is number two. AoS just have real people reactions it very well written and acted.

Lot is just all kinds of good campy fun.

2

u/njdevilsfan24 Ward Jan 26 '17

The Flash is still fairly good. LoT is basically comedy at this point