The first season of the American television series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., based on the Marvel Comics organization S.H.I.E.L.D., follows Phil Coulson and his team of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents on several dangerous cases revolving around Project Centipede and Coulson's mysterious resurrection following his death in the film The Avengers (2012). The season is set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and acknowledges the continuity of the franchise's films. It was produced by ABC Studios, Marvel Television, and Mutant Enemy Productions, with Jed Whedon, Maurissa Tancharoen, and Jeffrey Bell serving as showrunners.
Clark Gregg reprises his role as Coulson from the film series and is joined by series regulars Ming-Na Wen, Brett Dalton, Chloe Bennet, Iain De Caestecker, and Elizabeth Henstridge. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was picked up for a full season by ABC in May 2013, and filming took place primarily in Los Angeles. The main recurring setting of the season is the Bus, a retrofitted Boeing C-17 Globemaster III plane that was designed by visual effects company FuseFX and created with CGI. Some episodes of the season directly crossover with the films Thor: The Dark World (2013) and Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), with the latter causing a major retooling of the season for its final six episodes. Several other actors also reprise their MCU roles in the season for guest appearances.
The season aired on ABC from September 24, 2013, to May 13, 2014, and consists of 22 episodes. Its pilot episode was watched by 12.12 million viewers, the highest ratings received by the first episode of a drama series since 2009, but ratings decreased as the season progressed. The critical reception was initially mixed, but grew more positive in the second half of the season and particularly after the crossover with The Winter Soldier. The series was renewed for a second season in May 2014.
Episodes
Cast and characters
Main Clark Gregg as Phil Coulson Ming-Na Wen as Melinda May Brett Dalton as Grant Ward Chloe Bennet as Skye Iain De Caestecker as Leo Fitz Elizabeth Henstridge as Jemma Simmons
Recurring
J. August Richards as Mike Peterson / Deathlok David Conrad as Ian Quinn Ruth Negga as Raina Saffron Burrows as Victoria Hand Bill Paxton as John Garrett / The Clairvoyant B. J. Britt as Antoine Triplett
Notable guests
Cobie Smulders as Maria Hill Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury Titus Welliver as Felix Blake Maximiliano Hernández as Jasper Sitwell Jaimie Alexander as Sif
Production
Development In August 2012, it was announced that Marvel's The Avengers (2012) director Joss Whedon would be involved in an upcoming project for ABC, set within the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). A few weeks later, ABC ordered a pilot for a show called S.H.I.E.L.D., to be written by Joss Whedon, Jed Whedon, and Maurissa Tancharoen, directed by Joss Whedon, and executive produced by Joss Whedon, Jed Whedon, Tancharoen, Jeffrey Bell, and Jeph Loeb. Jed Whedon, Tancharoen and Bell were slated to serve as the series' showrunners. Joe Quesada, Alan Fine, and Stan Lee also executive produce. In April 2013, ABC announced that the show would be titled Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and it was officially picked up to series in May. In October, ABC announced that it had ordered a full season of 22 episodes. After the ratings for the early episodes were not to the liking of ABC, Marvel's Dan Buckley went to the network to request they allow the creatives to create the show they wanted, rather than try to work with notes from the network that asked the series to appeal to their main audience demographic, "upscale women".
Writing
Writers for the season include Paul Zbyszewski, Monica Owusu-Breen, Brent Fletcher, Lauren LeFranc, Rafe Judkins, and Shalisha Francis, alongside Joss Whedon, Jed Whedon, Bell, and Tancharoen. The character arcs were laid out by the series' creative team, with Marvel's only guidelines being to work around Captain America: The Winter Soldier, which sees S.H.I.E.L.D. destroyed. Jed Whedon said on this, "if someone told you that concept, you'd think it was a great thing to have happen at the beginning of the show or the end of Season 3. To have it happen in the middle of your first season is an interesting kind of riddle". The writers worked to establish a "regular day at S.H.I.E.L.D." and the existing hierarchy, and then "to blow that up, we knew the way to best illustrate that was by putting it on a personal level with our main man Coulson". Leading up to the Winter Soldier tie-in, the writers avoided talking about Hydra except in terms of their history in the MCU in order to avoid spoiling the film. Tancharoen elaborated that "We see what it actually looks like for S.H.I.E.L.D. to crumble in Captain America 2, we see the Helicarriers literally barreling through the Triskelion, we see the massive destruction throughout the city, but the benefit of our show is we get to dive into the emotional toll of that." Therefore, it was decided at the beginning of the series that one of the main characters would be a traitor, with Jed Whedon saying "since this is an infiltration based on betrayal on a massive scale, we wanted to have it on the small scale, and have it be a really personal dagger to the heart". Executives at ABC did not believe having Grant Ward be the traitor would work, because they felt Dalton was too handsome for the audience to believe it to be real. They felt the creatives should change their choice, and were keen on Jemma Simmons being the traitor, since it would have been unexpected given she was "so sweet". After dealing with the fall of S.H.I.E.L.D., the writers were able to "put the pedal to the metal" and shift from the standalone stories preceding it to more serialized episodes. Whedon would later say this shift was where "we found our voice in the series after a rocky start". Zbyszewski added that there had been resistance early in the season from the network to have serialized episodes, over single mysteries per episode.
On whether it was Marvel's idea or the showrunner's to have Coulson promoted to Director and tasked with rebuilding S.H.I.E.L.D. at the end of the season, Jed Whedon said "They're the same. They have plans for films, and we have plans to intermingle with them, and it's the name of our show. The second to last episode is called 'Ragtag', and that's a term we've used; we wanted to create this ragtag group, but within this giant organization with billions of dollars and support all over the globe and satellite feeds on their luxurious plane. Now we have a chance to start them over and figure out what it's like to really be a secret again."
Casting
The main cast for the season includes Clark Gregg as Phil Coulson, reprising his role from the film series, Ming-Na Wen as Melinda May, Brett Dalton as Grant Ward, Chloe Bennet as Skye, Iain De Caestecker as Leo Fitz, and Elizabeth Henstridge as Jemma Simmons.
In April 2013, J. August Richards, one of the stars of the earlier Joss Whedon series Angel (1999-2004), was cast in the pilot in an unspecified role, later revealed to be Mike Peterson, the first live-action portrayal of Deathlok and a recurring character throughout the season. Nicholas Brendon, another Whedon collaborator, was also reportedly considered for Richards' role. In December, two recurring characters were set to be added to the series with the episode "T.A.H.I.T.I." They were described as "an African-American agent who specializes in combat/weapons, and a high-level S.H.I.E.L.D. agent/munitions expert who has past ties to both Coulson and Ward". In January 2014, Bill Paxton was cast as Agent John Garrett, "a rough-and-tumble former cohort of Agent Coulson with a little bit of attitude and cigar-smoking swagger", for at least four episodes of the season. Jed Whedon said that "We actually discussed Bill Paxton in the room, when we were talking about the character ... Then when he came up as an actual possibility, we couldn't believe it." The next month, B. J. Britt was cast as Agent Antoine Triplett, an associate of Garrett. Other recurring guests in the season include Saffron Burrows as Victoria Hand, David Conrad as Ian Quinn, and Ruth Negga as Raina.
In January 2013, Cobie Smulders, who played agent Maria Hill in The Avengers, said that her character may make an appearance in the show and that her commitment to How I Met Your Mother (2005-2014) would not prevent her from participating. Smulders reprised the role of Hill in the pilot, with Joss Whedon saying, "I wanted very much to have Cobie in the pilot because as much as anyone else, she S.H.I.E.L.D." Smulders returned once again in the episode "Nothing Personal". In June 2013, Samuel L. Jackson expressed interest in guest starring as S.H.I.E.L.D. director Nick Fury, and subsequently appeared in the second episode "0-8-4". Jackson makes a second appearance in the season finale. During the episode "The Well", Chris Hemsworth appears as Thor via archival footage from Thor: The Dark World (2013). Maximiliano Hernández and Jaimie Alexander also reprise their film roles, Jasper Sitwell and Sif, respectively. Titus Welliver reprises the role of Felix Blake from the Marvel One-Shots short films.
Design Storyboards Storyboards were used throughout the season, to "put the director, stunts, camera, FX and the crew on the same page", though Joss Whedon did not use them for the pilot. One of the storyboard artists, Warren Drummond, noted the process was different to that on films, because there was limited time to complete the work, and because the storyboard artists were often working with different directors for each episode. Most of the sequences storyboarded were action or science fiction sequences.
Sets The main recurring setting for the season is the Bus, a retrofitted Boeing C-17 Globemaster III, that serves as both the transportation and headquarters of the titular team. The Bus includes such features as a soundproof interrogation room, a forensics and research lab located on the lower deck, where Fitz and Simmons work, and a cargo hold directly outside the lab where the team parks its SUV and Lola (which stands for Levitating Over Land Automobile), Coulson's prized 1962 Chevrolet Corvette. When designing the Bus, production designer Gregory Melton began with the basic design and shape of a C-17, before adjusting it to serve the needs of the season. The main interior set does not have many obtrusions, allowing it to be seen completely at either end of the set; this was requested by Joss Whedon, which Melton called "a tall order" given it needed to include the command center, lounge, crew quarters and galley. Construction on the sets for the Buss interior, interrogation room, and Fitz and Simmons's lab, which first appeared in the pilot and throughout the season, began on December 6, 2012.
Between the filming of the pilot and the start of the season filming, Melton was able to modify the sets, such as new flooring and equipment to the lab and additional lighting fixtures in the command center. Melton explained that because of the quick turnaround needed for the pilot, some details had to be sacrificed until the series was picked up for the season. Coulson's office set was also constructed, first appearing in "0-8-4", which was envisioned as a crow's nest, giving it Captain Nemo vibes. The lower level of the Bus is first seen in "Repairs", which Melton designed to be "a modular area of the plane that is full of pods... [that] we can do anything with", changing based on the episode's needs.
Costumes