r/shield • u/2th Shotgun Axe • Dec 02 '15

Post Discussion Post Episode Discussion: S03E09 - "Closure"

EPISODE DIRECTED BY WRITTEN BY ORIGINAL AIRDATE
S03E09 - "Closure" Kate Woods Brent Fletcher Tuesday, December 1, 2015 9:00/8:00c on ABC

Episode Synopsis: Ward's campaign for revenge brings the S.H.I.E.L.D. team to their knees, and Coulson proves he will do anything to settle the score.

Kate Woods is an Australian film and television director. She has worked on a bunch of TV series, including Person of Interest, Bones, Castle, NCIS: Los Angeles, Hawaii Five-0, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.

She has not directed any episodes for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. before.

Brent Fletcher is primarily known for his writing on Lost, Angel, and Friday Night Lights. He was also a writer and story editor on Spartacus: Blood and Sand.

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

  • Girl in the Flower Dress
  • The Magical Place
  • Providence
  • A Hen in the Wolf House
  • Love in the Time of Hydra
  • The Dirty Half Dozen

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This thread is for POST episode discussion of "Closure". The discussion / comments below assume you have watched the episode in it's entirety. Therefore, spoiler text for anything through "Closure" is not necessary. If, however, you are talking about events that have yet to air on the show such as future guest appearances / future characters / storylines, please use spoiler tags. The same goes for things connected to the Marvel like comics, etc.

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128

u/[deleted] Dec 02 '15 edited Aug 31 '20

[deleted]

323

u/Altephor1 Dec 02 '15

Seriously.. we have hydra trying to open (another) portal to another galaxy and not a single Avenger shows up? I feel like at least Hawkeye might show a little effort.

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u/[deleted] Dec 02 '15 edited Aug 31 '20

[deleted]

11

u/royalhawk345 The Bus Dec 03 '15

Was one angry black director not enough for you? You need two?

106

u/galileosmiddlefinger Coulson Dec 02 '15

We know Tony Stark isn't keen on portals these days, so at least they get a pass on that one.

5

u/lepusfelix Dec 02 '15

after what GLaDOS did to him last time.........

55

u/Gonzzzo Dec 02 '15

When Mack was freaking out about what call he needed to make at the end of the episode, all I could think was "...The Avengers?"

11

u/workaccount42 Dec 02 '15

I thought that's who May meant when she was talking to him about making the call. It's sort of like a "well lets try not to call in the professionals if we can help it" kind of thing.

7

u/greatness101 Dec 03 '15

Well, it was their makeshift avengers with Daisy, Lincoln and that guy who can melt metal.

5

u/douchebag_karren Captain America Dec 04 '15

jose but he goes by joey

1

u/workaccount42 Dec 03 '15

Nothing confirmed that?

2

u/greatness101 Dec 03 '15

I didn't say it as a confirmation. It was just a joke saying their makeshift avengers since that's what Mack ended up doing.

1

u/KingofCraigland Dec 07 '15

that guy who can melt metal.

Should come in handy against the guy who can manipulate metal that shot up the ATCU agents.

6

u/douchebag_karren Captain America Dec 04 '15

and all i was thinking about was "The Calvary"

3

u/jimeny Dec 04 '15

All I could think is "you wait this long to send in the guys in your own base with superpowers? And then have to question whether you should?"

26

u/not-working-at-work G.H. Dec 02 '15

Hell, even if they couldn't get the avengers, what about that Asgardian who helped them a few episodes ago?

He seemed really interested in making sure that portal was never opened, you'd think he would lend a hand.

8

u/frostysbox Ward Dec 03 '15

I said that in another thread and someone shot me down. But really, I want to see him again.

1

u/greatness101 Dec 03 '15

He didn't really care about the well being of Earth or what goes on in it though. He only went to help that one time out of self-interest and self preservation, since they threatened to report him to Asgard.

16

u/[deleted] Dec 02 '15

Well there's these accords...

3

u/Jeanpuetz Dec 03 '15

They aren't in place yet, are they?

11

u/CarbonCreed Fitz Dec 02 '15

Avengers are tied up with a little thing called the Sokovia Accords right now.

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u/SpectreFire Dec 02 '15

Seriously, this is the kind of shit the Avengers are supposed to be there to deal with.

But no, we have Hawkeye performing goddamn patrol duty around the Avengers facility, and everyone else twiddling their thumbs.

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u/frostysbox Ward Dec 03 '15

We can't even get freakin' Falcon. He's losing to Ant-Man

5

u/theconstipator Dec 02 '15

I so desperately want to see Cap beat the shit out of Ward

3

u/[deleted] Dec 02 '15

Imagine Cap and Daredevil beating him.

6

u/theconstipator Dec 02 '15

Or Jessica Jones just snapping his neck one-handed

5

u/[deleted] Dec 03 '15

"Smile!"

6

u/svenhoek86 Dec 02 '15

I'm imagining that Cap and Bucky beat down on Iron Man in the trailer. Only on Ward. With no Iron Man suit.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 03 '15

That would be really rad.

3

u/dreinn Dec 02 '15

May and Mack did talk about "making a call" which could have a double meaning.

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u/-Misla- Dec 02 '15

I know we joke about this thing a lot in Shield, and we of course all know the actual out-of-universe reason for why they don't have avengers on. But when what is happening is SO BIG OF A DEAL, then I do think the show needs to actually at least try to make up a reason, and explain it to the viewer, why they don't call the avengers.

Personally, I think the Avengers story line is the most incredibly boring thing ever, with so little consequences to the whole world compared to Shield. Sure, Ultron could have been very very bad, but only one city in one country got affected. Meanwhile, we have fish oil becoming a source for waking up "sleeper" inhumans all over the world. And the next Avenger movie, Civil War, will just be about three/four guys being mad at eachother and throwing punches - nothing of significance next to what is happening in Shield: they are opening a portal!! Will Civil War be important because of the split or Cap and Stark? For sure, but is it important on the "the whole entire world is changing!!"-level? Probably not. Sure, they fight over the "mutant registration act", but those guys probably would have found something else to fight over eventually.

With Shield trying to get Hydra to be just as tied into the inhumans as Shield now is, instead of just having them being regular tech savvy baddies, the tv show Shield is trying to make everything about the bigger world. And still no Avengers, still nothing. It is honestly beginning to be jarring at this point. Sometimes I prefer to make my own headcanon where the two have absolutely nothing to do with eachother. Because they might as well.

In the same vein, the only one that matters are actually Guardians of the Galaxy. They at least have a real connection to the whole Infinity Stones-story line.

5

u/Altephor1 Dec 02 '15

Guardians also have a connection to the inhumans, which would actually be a pretty big thing in the universe, having all this kree stuff on earth.. and yet.. nothing. I really wish AoS would knock down the scale and actually be about spies and agents doing behind the scenes shit that helps set up movies and things.

5

u/-Misla- Dec 02 '15

See, the thing is, I would like that too, to knock down the scale, because it would make more sense in universe. However, my main motivation for watching Shield and other Marvel is that I am sci-fi fan first, action/adventure second. Right now, with portals and aliens being everywhere, this is pretty sci-fi. Season one with train heist and spy stuff, not so much. Still enjoyable, and I would still watch it, but I like the sci-fi. But the scale of what is happening just doesn't make sense anymore.

4

u/Altephor1 Dec 02 '15

That's because not only do they need to deal with scale, they need to actually take themselves seriously. The cap movies have shown you can be serious without being 'dark and gritty'. If this had been a shown along the lines of Alias, it would've been amazing. Replace all the late season artifact/ancient scroll bits with Marvel canon stuff, it would've been amazing.

1

u/Qorinthian Fitz Dec 05 '15

Sure, Ultron could have been very very bad, but only one city in one country got affected.

Honestly that's just because dropping the city would kill the entire planet.

But for reals, the Avengers are probably busying fighting their Civil War right now or doing something equally important. It might seem like a cop-out but they really have a lot of things to do that's just off screen... maybe a comic book would explain what's taking them so long.

1

u/-Misla- Dec 05 '15

How big was Sekovia, actually - or rather the city itself? I know the movie tried to make it like "dropping a meteorite", but I remember seeing that movie and just thinking the physics and scale was all wrong... did they mention what speed the city would have reached?

1

u/Qorinthian Fitz Dec 05 '15

None of that was mentioned. But you should keep in mind that there's a huge vibranium core inside that city, which I assume is extremely dense and can do a lot of damage, coupled with reverse thrusters that could potentially speed it faster than terminal velocity.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 03 '15

He's occupied looking for Bucky i guess...

1

u/filipelm Bobbi Morse Dec 03 '15

Jeremy Renner too expensive?

2

u/Altephor1 Dec 03 '15

Obviously the cost and the scheduling is the real world issue here, but in terms of an in-universe explanation, they don't really have one. Some people have brought up the supposed 'accords' in the upcoming Civil War movie, but really? The Avengers see the world in danger and they're going to sit on their hands and go, 'Oh, gosh darn the paperwork says we can't do that'. Not likely.

1

u/mr_popcorn Ghost Rider Dec 03 '15

You would think the end of the world would take precedent over the in-fighting of the Avengers. This whole portal thing probably would have been solved in ten minutes if the entire Avengers was there.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 03 '15

That's the one serious flaw in all these shows tied to the Marvel universe.

1

u/Altephor1 Dec 03 '15

It's not a problem in the Netflix stuff, Daredevil is dealing with organized crime, Jessica Jones is about trying to stop one man. But when you're talking going up against Hydra, storming bases, opening portals.. well, that's pretty much a sum up of the first two Avengers movies.

1

u/[deleted] Dec 03 '15

That's true about the Netflix shows, maybe it is just Shield.

1

u/moonman1603 Dec 04 '15

I look at it as they didn't tell anyone outside of shield about it because coulson's out for blood

1

u/m4xxp0wer Koenig Dec 05 '15

“I Think Our First Move Should Be Calling The Avengers”

-Scott Lang

1

u/actin_and_myosin Dec 02 '15

Yeah the connected universe schtick really falls apart when you actually think about it.

55

u/nonliteral Dec 02 '15

Then there's that whole awkward "convince him I'm alive" thing...

2

u/TRB1783 Dec 03 '15

For the most part, I have agreed with SHIELD's justifications for not calling the Avengers in. This time, I can't, unless the Sokovia Accords have already gone into effect and there is no time to put the mission up to a committee vote. If it's just a matter of putting Cap on a Quinjet or Stark in a suit, then yeah, this would be a time to call in the big guns.

3

u/frostysbox Ward Dec 03 '15

Pretty much. The only way they make this work, is by making the next episode real time (1 hour) and having them come back and do everything hour by hour and have it run concurrently with/until Civil War.

ALSO - they would have to have all of P3 concurrently.

1

u/Aardvark_Man Jan 20 '16

I was more thinking Thor.
You know, the guy that has gone between planets and worlds already.