Tahiti: Not So Magical After All

How did Phil Coulson survive being shot in the heart by Loki in “The Avengers?”

That’s been the big question with “Agents of “S.H.I.E.L.D.” ever since it was announced that Clark Gregg would be reprising his role from the Marvel movies in the series.  Surprise resurrections are nothing new to anyone who has been reading Marvel or DC comics for an extended period of time.  After a while, it gets to be something you expect, with the success of the resurrection pending on a combination of how well-liked the character was when they were killed off and how cleverly their return is explained.  Personally, I’ve always thought that Coulson did die in “The Avengers” and his mind was transplanted into a life-model decoy.  After Tuesday’s episode, we got a big chunk of the answer to this question, and it’s not really more satisfying than my LMD theory.

(If you think spoilers follow the break, then you’d be right!)

As it turns out, Coulson did die in the movie.  Then, through means that were not explained in the episode he was brought back.  We were told by Shepherd Book Ron Glass was that these methods were dangerous, experimental and ordered by Nick Fury himself.  Also seen was a machine operating on the agent’s exposed brain while he begged to die.  It was further mentioned that the memory implants of Coulson recuperating in Tahiti were done to help him deal with the fact that he lost his will to live after the operation.  By tweaking his memory, they were able to get the character we knew and loved back up and running again.

This is all well and good, with the scenes of the “operation” coming off as appropriately disturbing and the confrontation between Gregg and Glass giving the series a high point in terms of acting.  Unfortunately the answers we got left me with some rather big questions that are almost as distracting as the big one.  First off, why Coulson?  I like the character as much as the next person, but for all intents and appearances there was nothing that special about him.  That was a big part of his appeal, seeing this normal guy interact with superheroes.  Yet it doesn’t explain why Fury would move Heaven and Earth in order to bring him back to life.  Maybe Coulson was just that good of a friend to Fury, and we all know that it’s a very bad idea to say “No” to any character played by Samuel L. Jackson.

There’s also the matter of just what kind of technology was used in order to resurrect Coulson.  It was hinted that he may have returned via magical means, which would pave the way for characters like the Scarlet Witch and Dr. Strange, to be introduced into the Marvel Movieverse.  Yet the tech we saw looked clearly science fiction in nature.  Could it be extraterrestrial in nature?  If so, we might get an answer when “Guardians of the Galaxy” debuts this August.  If not, then the sooner the show provides an explanation the better.  Otherwise the means of Coulson’s return will end up looking like a big deus ex machinal “Because we wanted to bring him back,” which isn’t satisfying at all.

Bringing Coulson back as a LMD would’ve sidestepped all this and given us a potentially interesting storyline about how the man copes with being a robot with human memories.  It would have also given us another concrete link to the comics, of which the series has sorely been lacking in so far.  I realize that the series needed to prove it could work on its own merits before bringing in the fanservice.  So I guess what I’m saying here is that as it hasn’t quite clicked yet I’m willing to give them a pass on this in order to give us something to sustain our interest.

Tuesday’s episode was a step in the right direction, though.  Coulson’s kidnapping gave the plot an urgency that hasn’t been seen in most episodes and there was one great scene in this episode too.  That was the moment when Raina decided to play “good cop” with Coulson in order to get him to go willingly under Centipede’s “dream machine” so that they could finally find out just how he returned.  As soon as she started pouring on the sweetness, I was rooting for Coulson to not give in and find some way to make her mad.  Mainly because I can’t stand characters like her who appear to succeed because the writers dictate it be so rather than through their own struggles or ingenuity.

Then, something funny happened as the scene went on.  Raina’s statements actually started making a lot of sense as she appealed to Coulson’s own desire to learn about what happened to himself.  Ruth Negga did a very good job of coming off as genuinely sympathetic towards Coulson’s plight, even if her speech was laced with insider knowledge of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the character that made it clear what her real intentions were.  Clark Gregg also did a really good job of projecting his character’s dedication to his job versus his desire to actually learn what happened to him.  After being stonewalled by S.H.I.E.L.D. in previous episodes, you could tell that he was deeply troubled by the fact that this was likely going to be his only shot at learning the truth.  When he agreed, I didn’t feel anguish at his capitulation.  I felt relieved that he was finally going to get some answers.  That Coulson didn’t give up any information regarding what he saw to Raina, well, I liked that too.

So what we had there with that scene was another well-worn trope that the series actually managed to turn around and make compelling through the writing and the acting.  “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” desperately needs more scenes like this if it’s not going to try subverting any of the conventions of its genre or bringing in more fanservice.  That being said, next week’s episode involves a mysterious storm wreaking havoc across the nation.

I’m going to keep my expectations low for that one.