There were zillions of Inhumans because of the fish oil capsules. The show spent most of the season killing them off, usually through Lash.
Why? I assume because the writers realized that a world full of Inhumans destroyed the value of Daisy. She ain’t so special when everybody is. But inside the show’s world it’s even more mysterious. If Lash’s purposes was to save Daisy why kill Inhumans who were locked in stasis and no threat? He couldn’t know Hive would arrive.
That whole long plotline baffles me. Did I miss some major clue along the way, too?
IIRC there was also some dialogue where Daisy said something like “He can’t die for my mistake!” and Coulson said something along the lines of “He’s dying for all our mistakes”. So I (life-long atheist) did also think it was maybe laying it on a bit thick there–I was halfway expecting people to start making the Sign of the Quinjet.
(And of course now Lincoln will come back to life three days later.)
It was incredibly prominent, and it was clear from the start that it was Yo-Yo’s necklace. Speculation began in the first episode since the mid-season break on how Yo-Yo’s necklace would end up in space and who would have it. The whole game in the final episode where we were following the bouncing cross was because the audience knew that whoever ended up with it was going to die. That’s why Daisy took it; that’s why Lincoln took it from Daisy - to fulfill the vision.
I think it’s more than just a MacGuffin; but more a spiritual reference than a religious one. It represents sacrifice for a greater good and how many people were willing to do so. From my (non-religious Jewish) standpoint I didn’t see how this could be an offensive metaphor, but different squids for different kids.
I had no problem with the show depicting Mac and YoYo as people of deep Christian faith. Notable, though, is the total lack of depictions of any other faith. What happened at the ending was the raising of their particular devotion to a generality for the entire team.
That sort of exercise is how Christians get away with displays of their faith on public property, in crosses and christmas trees and ten commandments plaques and the “ceremonial deism” of “In God We Trust” on coins and “Under God” in the Pledge of Allegiance. Christianity has been the majority for the entirety of the existence of America and the devotions of the majority became the default piety for the country.
We’re more religiously diverse than ever, and well past the time to eliminate Christianity and its symbolism as the default piety. Making individuals believing Christians is fine. Having others respect their faith is fine. Allowing that faith to define the beliefs of others is not at all fine. It’s pernicious.
Good thing too, because without Christianity being so prominent, who could atheists/non-religious/other religious folks openly make fun of with literally zero repercussions?
Make fun of a Jewish person and you’re anti-semetic, make fun of a Muslim and you’re perpetuating post-9/11 hate, but make fun of a Christian and it’s fine because “turn the other cheek right guys? Wink wink”.
All that being said: I didn’t get the Christian overtones moreso than I got the “self-sacrifice for your friends” overtone that’s a pretty big trope in storytelling. The cross was just the MacGuffen.
But it’s not like everyone who took it was doing so as part of volunteering to be the sacrifice, like Daisy and Sparky did (though of course any of them would have sacrificed themselves to save the world). IIRC, Fitz wound up with it just because he happened to put on the jacket that had it in the pocket. The writers gave it to him to scare us all into thinking they were going to kill him off right after he finally got together with Simmons.
When is the last time in popular entertainment you saw a non-Christian religious symbol used to show group faith, piety, spirituality, or moralism for people not of that religion? Never. It doesn’t happen. But a cross is used frequently as symbolism. What if the show ended with a close-up of a star of David or a crescent? You don’t think Christians would take down the Internet with their screams?
And while I’m asking questions: who is making fun of anything religious here?
I suspect that I didn’t pick up on the vision thing due to the fact that I watch the show online, and irregularly. ABC won’t let me watch the show online until 8 days after it airs (unlike most of the other networks, which let me watch their shows the very next day). So I go to watch the latest episode, but it won’t let me, and then I forget to check back to see if I can watch it yet, and I often end up not watching an episode for two or three weeks.
This is probably why I was also baffled by Daisy’s behavior and SHIELD’s chasing her at the end of the episode.
I thought the Christ symbolism was very heavy handed.
The act of sacrificing himself to save the others… the very prominent cross… all the talk about how this was his purpose and his destiny… the fact that he did it to defeat the one they’d repeatedly said was literally the devil (or at least the inspiration for the devil)… Coulson saying “He’s paying for all our mistakes”…
I don’t care about the religious aspect. But if they were going to recycle an incredibly unoriginal trope, they could at least have been subtle about it.
Fitz gave her his jacket at some point, with the cross still in his pocket because he hadn’t had a chance to return it to Yo-Yo.
Not a chance. You’d hear nothing about it in any meaningful fashion other than probably a Buzzfeed article about how “Christians around the world vowed boycott Marvel and Disney for Life after the newest Agents of SHIELD episode”. Which translates to, like, 6 people tweeted about it.
And no one is making fun of anything religious in SHIELD (or even in this thread for that matter), I’m just saying it’s easy to scream about overt Christian symbolism because it’s the only religion in the world that you can do that to with literally zero reprecussions
I agree with you on the first part, but I’m not sure about the second part. Can you give an example of someone screaming about overt Christian symbolism and having zero repercussions?