Select previews of this Fall’s upcoming science fiction and fantasy shows. You can see the full schedule of shows at this link.
Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD: ABC, Returning Series (2nd Season), Premieres Tuesday September 23rd 9 PM EST
This show is back for a second season and it bring’s Xena’s Lucy Lawless onboard as a “longtime S.H.I.E.L.D. veteran” and Nick Blood as “Lance Hunter from S.T.R.I.K.E., a character that executive producer Jeffrey Bell describes as a mercenary who will join forces with the agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.” Patton Oswalt will also be returning as Agent Koenig who is apparently not as dead as he appeared to be at the end of the first season. And as we know, Coulson now leads a rogue team that is on the run but still trying to defeat the threat that Hydra brings to the world.
Last season, Agents of SHIELD debuted to monster ratings, but those quickly dropped off when viewers found that the show could not deliver the same level of spectacle as the Marvel blockbusters on the big screen (and I expect to see FOX’s Gotham experience a similar spike and quick drop-off). And I have to admit that while I loved the show early on for its excellent cast and its witty scripts, I found that the quality dropped off by mid-season and I felt like I was pretty close to hate-watching the second half of the series, even when things started to pick up at the end of the season. I’m guessing that the executives over at Marvel and ABC and Disney will have insisted on some retooling of the show and the cast additions mentioned above are likely part of that. And I plan on tuning in early to see if the second season can recapture the sense of fun we saw at the beginning of the show’s first year. But if it starts veering toward hate-watching, there are plenty of other genre options on the tube this season (just take a look at the Fall schedule).
As for the show’s chances of making it to a third season, I’d say its very iffy at this point (you can see where it came in on the Power Rankings at this link). It dropped down into the low 2’s in the 18-49 demographic based on the overnights toward the second half of its first season which had it on the verge of bubble territory. True, with the ratings declines the broadcasts networks have been experiencing in general, a 2.0 score is good enough for many shows. But Agents of SHIELD is an expensive entry, and I’m sure ABC wants higher ratings than where the show ended its last season. It’s part of the Avengers franchise, and Disney executives can likely trump the ABC brass because they own the network. But you can only bleed so much. I believe this show’s numbers will have to improve, otherwise Coulson will have to come up with a scheme to avoid one the greatest super-villain of them all: the Network Executioner.
Here is the Teaser for Season 2:
Buy Agents of SHIELD Season 1 on DVD and Blu-ray or Stream Episodes from Amazon.com:
