The Do’s And Don’ts Of A SHIELD TV Show

Cobie Smulders as Maria Hill in “Avengers.” Via MTV.

DO: Keep writing good female characters. You’ve had a few missteps in your career, Joss, but the whole ‘strong female character’ thing is something you manage to do well the majority of the time. Take advantage of the Marvel character roster or simply make up your own, but give us some kickass female agents–especially if you can’t transfer Maria Hill from the big to the small screen. But …

DON’T: Make all those female characters white. Again, with the diversity. This is not about looking for a story about race in the Avengers universe, it’s simply about looking for faces of color. This is more than achievable, and we expect it.

DO: Take advantage of every character you can get your hands on. The exciting part of this project isn’t who’s helming it. Nah, the cooler thing here is the (hopeful) access to the full catalogue of Marvel Characters the show should have. Marvel doesn’t possess the rights to some of their most well known franchise characters (Spider-Man and the X-Men, for example),  but that’s fine here. A small screen show is the perfect platform to widen the spotlight on some of their lesser known characters of all races and backgrounds. I’ll take an order of Luke Cage with a side of Daughters of the Dragon, any and all mentions of the Young Avengers crew, and all kinds of ridiculous villains like The Spot and Rocket Racer! Entertaining characters who aren’t necessarily on the fast track to their own movies but deserve a little screentime.

The sheer number of potential appearances and references alone–a nerd potpourri if you will–are enough to make me shake with (a very hesitant) glee. Yeah, it’s a S.H.I.E.L.D-focused show, but this could be the best chance Marvel fans ever have to see their favorite characters acknowledged outside of their monthly issues. Not that there aren’t downsides to that excitement …

Colleen Wing (L) and Misty Knight. Via Marvel Comics.

DON’T: Get too caught up in your own mythology. There would be no point in writing this list if I weren’t rooting for this show to succeed. The whole not-being-on-Fox thing is a really great start, but it also needs to be accessible to the average TV viewer rather than the average Joss Whedon fan.

We don’t need a show with a fast-talking script filled with references only a comic book fan will understand any more than we need another show starring Summer Glau as an emotionless, wide-eyed girl with super strength. And if he doesn’t simply rely on the tropes and characters types he’s already written more than once, maybe he won’t be so apt to repeat the mistakes he’s made in the past.

With the character descriptions up, and a strong knowledge of Whedon’s strengths and weaknesses as a writer and shaper of pop culture, I guess I just have one last piece of advice…

DON’T: Screw it up too badly. It’s tall order, but a nerd can dream.

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