Board Thread:Television/@comment-1713281-20131004113215/@comment-1895174-20140515055004

But the only reason we have more unanswered questions than before, is that we've found out enough to ask those questions. It's undeniable that we've learned a lot. We haven't learned much at all. The reason we have more unanswered questions than before is because each "reveal" is incredibly vague and doesn't actually reveal anything. It's just that there's still a lot more to learn. And I think hanging that mystery over to the next season is okay, particularly because it very likely ties into the mystery about Skye's heritage. Which is why there isn't a full story, and why this doesn't work as a season finale. Of course it's a relatively sloppy way of having a twist. That's because the twist wasn't told on the show's terms, but instead the terms of the MCU as a whole. Right. That's my point. They explain everything we need to know after they drop the Hydra twist on us. Which makes it a poor twist. Like pulling the mask off the Scooby-Doo monster and it's a character who wasn't in the rest of the episode. If you've been keeping up with the MCU, there's no problem: you've done the recommended (not required) reading. If you haven't, your idea of the show's quality probably dips a little, but you still understand what's going on. Or if you haven't seen the movie in the first five days of release. Or if you just don't care enough about Captain America to watch his movies. If you haven't seen it, your idea of the show dips a little because it has a very poorly executed twist. If you have, your idea of the show dips a little because you've been reminded of how awesome this universe usually is. Well, whether or not it's filled holes in the past, it will soon. The show's going to focus on Coulson reforming SHIELD now. Which means any time SHIELD shows up in a future film (which could be Age of Ultron, with SHIELD-related characters such as Fury and Hill making appearances, but not necessarily, given their lack of a position in the new SHIELD), it's because of the events of Agents of SHIELD. Wildly speculative. Samuel L. Jackson said his role is small. Hill works for Iron Man now, she shows up because he does. Regardless, it's incredibly foolish to base an opinion on speculation, much less speculation on what happens in something that isn't this show. And you know it's not just a spin-off of The Winter Soldier. Sure, we're dealing with the aftermath, with the fall of SHIELD, but that's always been what this show is about: The aftermath of The Avengers, dealing with Extremis, literally cleaning up after Thor, and now this. The threats dealt with before and after Turn, Turn, Turn are the same: the Clairvoyant, the Centipede Project, Cybertek, the Deathlok Program. The only thing that changes is that now we know these things have been related to Hydra all along. You know that stuff isn't all on the same level. The aftermath of The Avengers was one episode. They didn't deal with Extremis, they dealt with something similar to it. They cleaned up after Thor for a couple of minutes before doing something completely unrelated to that. The aftermath of The Winter Soldier, on the other hand, was a multi-episode arc that closed out the season. The threats dealt with before and after "Turn, Turn, Turn" were not the same either. The Clairvoyant and Centipede became moot points after the Hydra reveal, as the only reason they existed in the first place was to give the characters something to do until Captain America: The Winter Soldier could come around and reveal Hydra infiltrated SHIELD.

Yes, this series undeniably became a spin-off of The Winter Soldier in its final episodes.