What Potential does Agents of SHIELD have with Season 3 and Project Caterpillar?

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I can make as many excuses as I wish, but I cannot deny that the ratings behind Agents of SHIELD have been surprisingly low in the season finale, dropping from a 1.5 with 4.45 million viewers to a surprising 1.3 with a 3.88 million audience.[1] Now, I could blame many elements as to influence its drop in ratings due to the two-hour time slot until 11 pm or that the show has no clear target audience it caters to, which makes it difficult to truly pull in an audience especially on the more female-oriented network such as ABC. Yet I do have to say that TV ratings in general have been quite down except for cable, which seems to be thriving thanks to shows such as The Walking Dead or Game of Thrones. Thought that is a topic for another day, as I personally intend to talk about something positive this time around, the potential the upcoming third season of Agents of SHIELD can offer not only for the show, but also to draw in a wider audience.

A little warning ahead of time, this article will contain spoilers for the finale of the finale for Season 2. If you haven’t had the chance to watch the episodes yet then please take this under consideration as you continue reading.

A New Season, A New Focus
The influences by the “Secret Warriors”[2], which were created by Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev, are becoming more apparent with each season and now Skye, or Daisy Johnson (Chloe Bennett), will be leading her own team of heroes in the next season even stating that unlike the Avengers they need to stay a secret. This act seems to be something they have been building up ever since the first season trying to focus more on SHIELD and exploring the aftereffects from the Winter Soldier incident. After people criticized the show for being a “superhero show” without superheroes, even though it was marketed as a show focusing on non-powered heroes in a world full of them. This sentiment is shifting with the “Caterpillars” project introduced in the last few minutes of the season finale. I have read people saying that Agents of SHIELD needs a reboot to survive long-term but I don’t believe something so drastic, I’d rather think it might require a new marketing strategy with what might be a new change of focus.

While the “It’s All Connected” tagline will most certainly remain the unofficial tagline for the Marvel Cinematic Universe we will probably move away from only marketing the regular people in a super-powered world to this new team of gifted individuals. With it being the most complained about aspect of the show it would make sense to now draw them in with the potential of seeing what secret agent versions of the Avengers would be on the smaller screen. While I believe the “Secret Warriors” are a great team name it would probably prove to draw in more people if they call them the “Secret Avengers”, which is currently a team in the comics even with Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) as part of it. The biggest issue will be if they can also satisfy the expectations of their viewers to a certain degree when they hear Secret Avengers. So, let us look at how it would work as a narrative and what characters they could put together.

From a Narrative Perspective
Now, the show is stilled called Agents of SHIELD so it would be difficult to forget about the main cast, but it seems they are trying to have the next season being them gathering these gifted individuals. With a new threat arising it could potentially be interesting to see  a race between two parties trying to get to these individuals to recruit them, something that was slightly hinted at with Grant Ward (Brett Dalton) or maybe even a new third party entering the mix, as I am still holding out for the potential return of AIM, who could be a nice trade-off to HYDRA for the coming season. Furthermore with the Civil War event growing near it would make sense to also continue the storyline of how the index works and how dangerous it is, something we had hints at with the second season. I believe by the time the mid-season rolls in, a fulfilled team should exist that can be expanded with the latter half and any following seasons, as some might complain it is building up too long. Furthermore, a team of gifted individuals will provide them an ample opportunity to bring back Dr. Franklin Hall (Ian Hart) from season 1, something that has still been looming over their heads ever since the first one ended.

From a Character Perspective
Now, with a somewhat potential storyline structure available it would make sense that the chosen characters for the team could make or break the usage of the Secret Avengers tagline. I will note that I don’t know of all characters that joined the Secret Warriors team in the comics or even the Secret Avengers besides the current one so as a basis I highly recommend the article “What Is Skye’s New Project?” by Jamie Lovett on Comicbook.com (http://comicbook.com/2015/05/12/agents-of-s-h-i-e-l-d-what-is-skyes-new-project-/). Here is an example of who I think should be a part of the team in the coming season besides who I hope joins the team Lincoln Campbell (Luke Mitchell) and of course their future leader Daisy Johnson, who hopefully will also receive her codename Quake and her famous gauntlets. I do believe though that they could also add Mockingbird (Adrianne Palicki) even if she hinted at her reaching her limits in the season finale, but she was once a part of the Marvel NOW! incarnation of the Secret Avengers. These are just a few characters I’d like to see so this can always change.

Jessica Drew aka Spider-Woman
I believe with all the Spider-Man news it would be an interesting idea to actually add Spider-Woman to the team cementing the fact that not only could they potentially spin-off to be a part of the actual Avengers team, but also that Spider-Man is indeed heading our way in the near future, especially considering Spider-Woman is actually part of the Secret Avengers in the comics. It would also be an interesting way to see her in person, as the most popular theory for the first season was that Skye would turn out to be Jessica Drew, but we all know how that eventually evolved into.

Sebastian Druid aka Druid
A character I never knew of until I read the before-mentioned article, who actually allows a potential tie-in to Doctor Strange, who is also coming out next year. Slowly easing in viewers to the usage of supernatural abilities besides only Scarlet Witch, who already was a fantastic way to introduce more mystical elements. This also gives them more potential on what type of visuals they can use with the powers of this character. It would also be interesting to follow the inner turmoil of where his actual powers originate from.

Jerry Sledge aka Stonewall
Here is a character I have a hard-time believing they can work in due to his outwards appearances, but with the introduction of his father, Carl “Crusher” Creel, it could be a great way to continue that characters story beyond the first episodes of Agents of SHIELD and his off-screen appearance in Daredevil. They already have the effect down with the character so I am sure they would be creative on how they would use it.

Robbie Baldwin aka Speedball
This is one I think might actually already be in the works due to strange tweets by Fran Kranz that hinted at his existence.[3] Him also playing a big role in the comic version of Civil War could hint at the potential his character could have in the franchise. Furthermore, it would be nice to see how the TV goes about using a speedster in comparison to Quicksilver. The Flash proved that portraying that level of speed on TV is possible so it would be a nice touch and addition to the team.

Brunnhilde aka Valkyrie
I know this is really going to be an odd choice of mine, but I believe that a bit of diversity should also come from the origins of these stories. With Asgardian Dr. Elliot Randolph already introduced we could see him return as a young Asgardian named Brunnhilde has gone lost in their world. Not only would it be a great way to tie-in to an earlier episode, but also further expand their team with a strong female character alongside Quake and Mockingbird.

Conclusion
One can always hope to see these things come together as one envision it, but as I stated I believe that building up an interesting cast of new gifted individuals as well as allowing the marketing campaign to focus on this new chapter it could make old and even new viewers return and boost the ratings. I know I have somehow combined an article regarding the marketing possibilities together with what I hope to see for the third season, but one can always dream for a synergy effect to help boost the show’s draw in the battlefield full of superhero shows.

What are your thoughts on the matter? Who do you want to see join the Project Caterpillar in the next season? Leave your thoughts below!

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