Although the Marvel Cinematic Universe does encompass both television and film, it never seems like Marvel’s shows, such as Agents of SHIELD, are ever incorporated in the studio’s movies. While SHIELD‘s characters will, at the very least, mention whatever occurred in Marvel’s most recent blockbuster, whether it be Captain America: The Winter Solider or Avengers: Age of Ultron, the individuals in the movies never bring up the game-changing events that are happening on the series, such as the emergence of Inhumans, and Marvel fans shouldn’t expect that to change in the studio’s upcoming film, Captain America: Civil War.
In a recent article published by HitFix, Civil War co-writers Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely were asked about Agents of SHIELD‘s second season. Season 2 of the ABC series not only revealed that one of the show’s main characters, Skye, was actually Daisy Johnson, an Inhuman also known as Quake in the comics, but it also ended with the promise that more Inhumans than ever before would soon be popping up around the world. However, when HitFix reporter Donna Dickens questioned Markus and McFeely about that story development and how it could factor into Civil War, neither of them seemed to know what she was referring to.
Here’s the full exchange between the three of them:
Right before the Civil War set visit, S.H.I.E.L.D had concluded their explosive second season. The world’s oceans were contaminated with Terrigen and fish oil supplements were exposing the population. Inhumans were popping up left and right. It seemed like a big deal. But not to the writers Captain America. When I questioned if the fish oil would play any role at all in the upcoming film, both men seemed confused.
Markus admitted he was behind on the show, “I have to confess, having come here, I’ve seen no TV since I got here in April. I haven’t seen the vast majority of this season of ‘Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.’ There’s fish oil?”
McFeely was just as lost. “Is there really fish oil? What are you talking about?”
As Dickens mentions in her article, this is not an isolated incident. While Agents of SHIELD has regularly produced episodes that tie in with Marvel’s major films, what the show’s writers do is never reciprocated by Marvel’s filmmakers, and that’s a problem. As much as Marvel likes to give off the appearance that “everything is connected” and that it’s universe is one big, interconnected world, more and more the studio’s television properties feel like afterthoughts compared to its films, little brothers bullied into certain storytelling decision by their older siblings.
Marvel needs to decide soon whether or not it wants to continue making these tie-ins to the films on Agents of SHIELD, because as of right now, this structure is only hurting the show and the stories that it’s telling, and it’s not receiving any type of acknowledgement from characters within Marvel’s major movies. Maybe it would be best for the studio to permit Agents of SHIELD to tell its own separate story, like Agent Carter and the Marvel Netflix series have done, without having to worry about what Captain America, Iron Man, and the rest of the Avengers are up to. This direction could help SHIELD‘s creative keep its attention on the show’s central storylines and main characters and allow the series to become the best version of itself.
[Photo via ABC]