‘Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D.’: After Committing Murder, Is Fitz Going To Be A Villain For Next Season’s AoS?
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ended on a fairly shocking note last episode, with Fitz essentially murdering someone – albeit a computerized and almost artificial Agnes – inside the Framework. This was nearly as shocking to viewers as it was to Simmons. But the question now is whether this is going to be a short-term plot device for the show that’s easily resolved once Fitz is out of the Framework, or is his psyche so damaged that he will become a villain for next season?
Certainly, his pseudo-Doctor Mengele attitude about torturing inhumans and murdering anyone who gets in the way of his increasingly bizarre relationship with Aida is turning him into a fairly unsympathetic character. At the same time, it’s also making him very interesting from a storytelling point of view.
A solid outing from #AgentsofSHIELD as we get to learn more about Madame Hydra's true aims and Fitz's true nature. https://t.co/YsDTEjKtC3 pic.twitter.com/PHVsgvc9eW
— IGN (@IGN) April 12, 2017
As noted by CBR, Fitz’s decision to murder Radcliffe’s girlfriend and torture Radcliffe and Daisy – seemingly just for the fun of it – made him more menacing than any villain we’ve ever seen on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.. Somehow, even Ward’s betrayal of the team in the real world when he turned out to be a Hydra agent wasn’t quite as hard-hitting for the viewers as watching nice guy Fitz become an absolute maniac.
This change in Fitz is even more jarring, given how much of a sympathetic character he was last season when he was suffering from brain damage after sacrificing everything to save Simmons. Of course, it’s possible that the producers will decide to use that as an out by suggesting Aida took advantage of his fragile mind, but that would seem like a cheap way out of this situation.
From a dramatic point of view, it’s hard to think of anything that would be more compelling in the upcoming season than the team having to fight against and bring down a newly re-arisen Hydra led by Fitz of all people. Yes, they first all have to get back to the real world outside of the Framework, but that’s almost inevitably going to happen in the next few episodes.
Fitz, no!#AgentsofSHIELD #Fitzsimmons pic.twitter.com/yxdLkeOitP
— Harrow (@Nirrimbaker) April 12, 2017
Once it does, just what happens with Fitz? Do they send him to a psychiatrist, a re-programmer or an old-fashioned prison? Yes, it wasn’t too long ago that Hive – the alternate identity of Grant Ward – Jedi mind tricked Daisy/Quake into turning on her team, but she didn’t actually kill anyone.
Not to mention, Fitz’s closing suggestion that they didn’t really know him at all indicates that there might be deeper waters ahead when it comes to Fitz. Maybe evil Fitz has been there all along waiting to pop out with the right encouragement – Aida’s.
The awesome thing about Fitz becoming a major villain – or perhaps even the big bad – for the upcoming season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is that unlike most of the other villains they’ve had on the show, he’s not an idiot. Having a bad guy on the show who’s actually smarter than anyone at SHIELD would make a nice change of pace.
It has to be acknowledged that villains in previous seasons, whether they were Grant Ward or someone else, weren’t that difficult to take down. They certainly weren’t that hard to predict, since Colson almost always seemed to be at least three steps ahead of them.
In fact, the only reason Grant Ward was as effective as he was against them once he came out as a Hydra agent was that he knew SHIELD procedures and SHIELD agents so well. Ward isn’t exactly the sharpest pencil in the box. Having an absolute genius like Fitz also be a megalomaniacal bad guy – and maybe the new leader of Hydra – could make the upcoming season far more interesting than anything we’ve seen so far on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D..
[Featured Image by ABC]
