Virginia Woolf tells me not to be angry all the time because no one wants to listen to angry people. So this week, I’m taking a break from lamenting the sad state of television and its exclusivity and instead nerding out over Joss Whedon’s latest creation, the TV show “Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.”
Superhero films and shows have an uncanny ability to reflect the American public’s feelings about power or whatever the present paranoia happens to be.
I was an avid fan of “Heroes,” faithfully following through even after it thoroughly jumped the shark in its third season. The 2006 series, focusing on an international community of ordinary folks with superpowers, resonated with much of what was being preached to the millennial generation — who wants to be extra special when you can be “normal”? We’re all special because we all get trophies for simply existing in youth basketball!
That tired theme quickly petered out by the fourth season, and the show was canceled. Soon afterward, we were met with a deluge of superhero movies questioning whether power was inherently good or bad (see: “The Avengers,” “Iron Man 3”). And now, we have “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.,” a departure from the normative superhero narrative in that the show centers on the team hunting down the supers.
Another side note trend that deserves snaps: Lead female characters in superhero movies/TV shows have become progressively more badass. Katniss Everdeen of “The Hunger Games,” Black Widow of “The Avengers” and even Gwen Stacy of “The Amazing Spider-Man” made the summer of 2012 one of the best seasons for female roles in the superhero genre.
Given that “Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” is a Whedon show, the lead female characters are smart and kick-ass but nonetheless objectified. In the first episode, the protagonist resorts to flaunting her breasts to get an agent to open up to her, even though she has hacked into government systems multiple times and probably brilliant enough not to have to do so.
The show’s protagonist is a young hacker and conspiracy theorist named Skye, paranoid that the government is trying to “cover up” superheroes everywhere after what happened in New York City a la “Avengers.” Her rhetoric echoes the Occupy movement in some regards — in the latest episode, she fantasizes how great it is that “so many people can unite over an idea … a few hundred people can come up with 1 percent of the solution.”
And in the pilot episode, she’s constantly worried that she’ll be captured by the “men in suits” for her work as a hacker running an antigovernment website. Sound paranoid enough to be familiar? If Captain America was for World War II and the X-Men’s struggle for equality from the same period as the Civil Rights Movement, is the defining movement of our time defined by Occupy and antigovernment paranoia? God, I hope not.
But as much as the show allows Skye to project the unease that American sentiment holds for government overreach, it ultimately seems to advocate the net positivity that this shadowy, shady government entity is dealing out in “covering up” supernatural presences.
Despite Skye’s efforts to cast doubt over S.H.I.E.L.D.’s intentions and actions, the secret government department nevertheless charms viewers.
Perhaps President Obama and Congress can take a cue as to how to win over the hearts and minds of the American public — have a few very attractive people run around and save the day from alien threats to humanity while making witty quips, and voila, our faith in the necessity of intelligence agencies is restored.