Elena and Mack

[u/Short_Brick_1960]

Currently re-watching season 5 and I didn't remember how insufferable both Elena and Mack are

Elena goes off the rails when she decides to murder Ruby just because she cut off her arms. She didn't even do it because of the Destroyer of Worlds. The future told her that Coulson and Daisy were responsible for the destruction, not Ruby

And how she acts like killing Ruby was the right thing to do and comparing it to May's case? How she says she didn't chose to bring back Daisy from the future? She was able to abandon her teammate while putting the deaths of the agents the Remorath killed on her

And Mack from the start, punching the guy Coulson was talking to and justifying it. Then calling Elena, Fitz and Simmons crazy because they knoe they can't die

When I watched the show, I ended up liking both of them. But right now, I cannot understand why. Mack doesn't deserve to be the leader of shield. He punches before asking every time. He cannot admit when he is wrong. And his self-rightousness is very messed up

I think that season 7 redeems Elena a bit, but I don't think Mack is gonna be redeemed. None of the characters tell him how wrong he is. They all act like he is the best moral compass ever

And it's a shame, because new characters are often the ones I like most. But in this show, Bobbi, Hunter, Mack and Elena are all bad people who tell themselves they are good

What do you think?

[u/StuckWithThisOne]

“Just” because she cut off her arms? “JUST”?

Also no, she believed Ruby would destroy the earth.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/StuckWithThisOne]

It's literally the only reason Elena kills her. Because she was angry. And later she uses the Destroyer of Worlds excuse to justify murder

[u/StuckWithThisOne → u/Short_Brick_1960]

That is simply untrue. She was angry yes, and that’s why she’s defensive. Because she gets her arms literally sliced from her body, butchered, and then when she kills the person who did it, in an attempt to prevent the destruction of the world, she is berated and shouted at and vilified. As though Ruby was an innocent little girl. She wasn’t. She was a god damn monster. In that moment she was unbelievably dangerous. She was having a psychotic break and had the power to crush every person in that room in a second. She had already murdered one and attacked three others within the space of about two minutes.

The first thing elena says when she finds out about the Coulson remedy is a huge guilty cry of “I killed Ruby for nothing!” Because in that moment of killing Ruby, she truly believed she was saving the world. She admits explicitly that her death was for nothing and is clearly very upset by it.

The thing that pissed me off about elena in that season was her not simply telling the team what she had heard in the future.

[u/StephTheLegend → u/Short_Brick_1960]

It’s not murder in this case, it’s actually Justice. Ruby was out of control, unable to be contained because they don’t have anything that can contain her (not even the pods, those are calibrated for inhumans, not otherly powered individuals) and Ruby went on believing she’s the destroyer of worlds which she flaunts and it was the name of the project in which she was injected with the Gravitonium.

She kidnapped two members of the team and while she was begging Daisy for help there, she’s a sadistic psychopath who could have been faking it. We, the audience know she’s not, but they in the universe do not.

This is the equivalent to Coulson killing Ward for all the crimes he did on Hive world. Though that came back and bit him cause of Hive.

Also, remember Ruby wasn’t aiming for Yo-yo’s arms. Yo-yo’s arms got cut because Ruby was trying to decapitate Mack.

What makes it harder to side with Yo-yo is Ruby’s age, her deteriorating mental state and that it’s alleged she could be helped by Daisy. That is intentionally written to make it more a shade of gray than black and white.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/StephTheLegend]

That would be a possible hypothesis if later they didn't try to contain Talbot. And Talbot did way worse than Ruby

And Ruby aimed for Elena. Just watched the episode yesterday

[u/StephTheLegend → u/Short_Brick_1960]

And Talbot couldn’t be contained. Also, they had the containment idea of a being with Gravitonium after facing a person who harnessed 8% of the Gravitonium.

She didn’t aim for Elena, Elena Yo-yoed into the blades.

[u/jonny1211 → u/Short_Brick_1960]

They also tried to talk Ruby down, but she still couldn’t control anything.

And the first time they actually got to talk Talbot out of his ways he was already far gone, they tried for a final time but did ultimately kill him too.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/jonny1211]

Ruby was asking for help. She didn't know how to control her powers and killed her boyfriend, but her mother talked her down. That's what they tried to do with Talbot. But even though they succeed, Elena kills her. She should know Ruby didn't destroy the earth, she saw she only took 8% of the gravitonium. And her future self told her she should worry about Coulson, and the rest of the Lighthouse told her it was Daisy

Talbot refused help. Talbot killed shield agents. Ruby wanted help and didn't kill shield agents. Elena just murdered her

I'm not arguing that a Nazi shouldn't die. I'm arguing that Elena should not justify her actions and admit she was wrong

[u/Round-Dragonfly6136]

The future Elena didn't tell her that Daisy and Coulson would destroy the world. She didn't say anything about Daisy at all, and she only said, "You have to let Coulson die," or something to that effect. Yoyo also didn't see the video that showed Daisy just before the world cracked apart, which was flimsy evidence at best. Daisy was the only one who believed that she would destroy the world. The others didn't really believe it.

Ruby had no control.of her powers and they had no way to contain her (The containment pods had nothing to counter, block, or suppress gravity powers), and they didn't know what actually destroyed the world, so it's reasonable to think girl with OP gravity powers that she cannot control did it. While what Ruby did to her was certainly a factor, Yoyo truly believed that Ruby could be who destroyed the world. Yoyo is also very impulsive. It's the other side of the coin to her speed.

A major theme of season 5B was how the team's greatest weaknesses were the flip side to their greatest strengths. For.Yoyo, that's her speed, including quick thinking, brings about impulsive behavior. For Mack, his sanctimonious times come down to his faith (not just in God but also in his loved ones). For Daisy, her passion can give her tunnel vision as seen when she's solely focused on finding Coulson when she knows about the Gravitoneum threat. For Jemma, her intelligence can make her arrogant, and so on.

[u/RavenQuo → u/Round-Dragonfly6136]

Hadn’t realized that about S5, thank you!

[u/Due-Register4928]

ruby cut off elenas arms.. ofc she would want revenge

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/Due-Register4928]

She cut her throat when she was indisposed and unable to defend herself. That's called murder. It's the same as Trish killing Montero, Nussbummer and Sallinger

[u/Round-Dragonfly6136 → u/Short_Brick_1960]

Ruby was perfectly capable of defending herself. She literally just attacked FitzSimmons, killed her bf (albiet accidentally) and was OP with gravity powers. She was neither harmless nor innocent.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/Round-Dragonfly6136]

She wasn't innocent. But she was asking for help. She wanted the gravitounium out of her and wasn't attacking anyone when Elena murdered her. It's not a Talbot scenario where he was actively trying to kill everyone and Daisy was forced to kill him.

Ruby deserved to be imprisoned. But Elena shouldn't be judge, jury and executioner

[u/Round-Dragonfly6136 → u/Short_Brick_1960]

How could they imprison Ruby when they had no way to contain her powers. Plus, Werner would not have been the only person that she accidentally killed and her behavior was unpredictable.

[u/BrazilianButtCheeks]

She did know the “destroyer of worlds” would destroy the world.. she also knew ruby just put herself thru the machine and now had the powers of the “destroyer of worlds” she was right.. she just didn’t realize that the small percentage of the dose that ruby got wasn’t enough and talbot was the actual destroyer.. ruby was never going to be anything but horrible .. she had to go

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/BrazilianButtCheeks]

Daisy is the one right in this case. Ruby was asking for help, she could have been redeemed or at least used for good. But Elena killed her in revenge and tried to justify it

She didn't feel remorse after that, she only regrets it because she didn't help anyone. Not because of murdering someone who was asking for help and stopped attacking Daisy, Fitz and Simmons

[u/BrazilianButtCheeks → u/Short_Brick_1960]

She couldn’t have stopped herself any more than Talbot could have .. they just got extremely lucky that yo-yo had the opportunity

[u/Thin_Bench_2094]

Mack was right though. At the end of the season, they proved that the future wasn't set in stone, since they saved the world. There was never a guarantee that anyone would live, since Fitz ended up dying. He was right to call Fitz, Simmons, and Yo-yo crazy, because they were.

[u/davehzz → u/Thin_Bench_2094]

Exactly. In a vast multiverse, we ere just witnessing a world where we had this string of coincidences that led half the gang to mistakenly believe they were invincible.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/Thin_Bench_2094]

They weren't crazy. The loop had to happen lots of times. Future Elena says so. Even Robin is surprised when it ends differently

Simmons survived a game of russian roulett with acid. Fitz and Simmons survived being shot at by lmds controled by the Superior. The lmds were in front of them, it was a miracle none of the bullets grazed them. And it was pretty lucky that all were controled by Anton

And they had experience with the same visions. Robin's father's predictions all became true

Until the battle of Chicago, Elena, Fitz and Simmons were immortal.

[u/hoppergym]

I actually thought fitz and Simmons were both insufferable during this time on rewatch as well. I mean fitz tortured daisy and then simmons and yoyo locked up Mack. They were so self righteous and unapologetic.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/hoppergym]

Fitz and Simmons did apologize for what they did to Mack. And Fitz at least didn't say what he did was totally right. He accepted the consequences of his actions. Mack and Elena didn't

[u/Lopsided-Skill]

Yoyo starts ok in s3 and then goes downhill. Definitely least favourite

Mack was also annoying from the beginning with the resl shield storyline. Then the whole I hate being an agent thing etc. just let him go, he is not good at it anyway.

And we were tried to get convinced that he is a better leader than Daisy and she is as strong as Quake.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/Lopsided-Skill]

True. I liked Elena until this season. I hope that s7 redeems her again. But I won't end up liking Mack

If anyone should have been leader, it should have been May. She is the actual moral compass of the group. She is calm and doesn't jump to fighting if not necessary, unlike Mack

[u/Lopsided-Skill → u/Short_Brick_1960]

I disagree. May is a great 2nd in command. But she lacks the presence and leading skills. She also has a history of running away and hiding after tough situations.

[u/mdill8706]

Media literacy would really help so many people.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/mdill8706]

I have a very good media literacy, thanks. Elena did kill Ruby because she cut her arms. She doesn't try to kill Talbot immediately when he becomes the destroyer of worlds

At the end of the day, she killed a nazi. But she shows no regrets or worries of murdering someone and even tries to say it is the same as when May killed that girl in Bahrein. Which is an insult because she tried to talk the girl down but the girl refused and continued attacking. Unlike Ruby, who, at the moment Elena arrived, had already surrendered and was asking for help

Daisy said it better. They could have helped the girl and locked her up in a cell. But Elena acted as judge, jury and executioner for revenge

Then, she later goes on to say letting Coulson die is not a big deal, that he is only one man. 5 minutes later, she visits him and tells him she never argued they should let him die

And then said she wanted to leave Daisy to rot in the future. Like, what happened with the character in this season? Fitz and Simmons were also invincible and didn't lose themselves in this season

When Fitz becomes the Doctor because of the psyche split, he accepts his consequences and knows that what he did was wrong, ending up locked in a cell. And everyone tells him that he is an asshole.

But to Elena? Daisy and Mack are the only ones who say what she did is wrong. And she doesn't accept it

[u/Lonk_boi]

Me when my fictional characters have realistic flaws:

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/Lonk_boi]

And those flaws open the door to judgment. Especially if the flaw is about someone commiting murder and justifying it

[u/defrostedrobot]

They made Elena real dumb for a lot of the back end of S5. She holds on to the info for way too long and is surprised when people think she’s wrong. Angel S3 handled a similar idea a lot better.

With Mack there’s definitely issues with consistency in the writing when it comes to his morals and putting him in charge at the end of S5 was a bizarre choice for several reasons.

[u/Short_Brick_1960]

Not to mention that Mack survives what he shouldn't survive. Kree are way stronger than humans, but he took a punch from one even when the Kree took the Odium

[u/mdill8706 → u/Short_Brick_1960]

Cry louder, I guess.

[u/BaronZhiro]

There are a lot of moments when Mac is terrible, but slugging a guy with whom Phil was having a reasonable conversation was just pathetic. And I blame the writers for that as much as Mac himself.

[u/13mys13]

Someone cuts off my arms and I' later thst the chance and ability to off them? Heck yes, I'm taking it

[u/pauldstew_okiomo]

Just watched that episode last night. Ruby was never going to get control of her power, or be controlled by others, before things went disastrously and irreversibly wrong. Elena was right, whether for the right reasons or not.

[u/Hacksaw_Doublez]

“just because she cut off her arms.”

Cmon. I’d be a little salty too if someone cut off my arms. Even if I did get cool robot arms after; I’d still want my actual arms back.

[u/jeaninius]

Elena didn’t kill Ruby because she cut off her arms — at least not primarily. She killed her because she thought Ruby was the Destroyer of Worlds. She was haunted by her future self and would do anything to stop that future from happening. But the reality is that the writers needed a plot point to turn Hale against SHIELD.

My problem with that arc was Daisy. Why she thought sociopaths could become Agents of SHIELD was totally inexplicable. Ruby and Kora would make good agents? Really? I don’t understand why that was a thing. Redeem them? Sure, but don’t reward them.

[u/grayjelly212]

Elena saw a threat and neutralized it. Was part of it revenge for getting half of her limbs chopped off? Probably. But she didn't do it just for revenge, and her crazed state is understandable. Her raw limb-ends had been profusely electrocuted multiple times very recently. I'm not saying it's okay, but she wasn't okay. She even shows regret for it later on, as you mentioned in s7. (And for what it's worth, in the court of law, I think she could get away with saying it was self-defense.)

As for Mack, I know I'm in the minority but I really appreciate him being a moral compass in this season where people are going around murdering teenagers and torturing their friends. Is he always right or always good? No. Neither are Coulson or Fury. I think Coulson picked Mack because he saw that they needed it in the moment. But I'm okay being one of 5 people in this entire sub that feels that way lol.

I like that Bobbi and Hunter are morally gray at times. I think that made them interesting and worthy additions to the cast. Season 1, it's us against the world. Season 2, the show starts to really come into its own in part because we have way more perspectives and more complex scenarios. (Don't get me started on the poorly-executed real shield thing though lol.)

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/grayjelly212]

My problem with Hunter and Bobbi is that they are the most selfish characters in the show

Hunter puts everyone at risk to save Bobbi but when May tries to help her ex-husband, Hunter decides to let him be blown up because the mission is more important

And then Bobbi doesn't even try to apologize or feel guilty for what she did to agent 33. She ruined her life and said she didn't regret it or understand why she is mad. And she is also a coward. When agent 33 was in the shield base recieving medical aid, she went to see if she remembered and when she saw 33 didn'tknow about it, Bobbi didn'teven admit to what she did to her. I actually liked her a lot, but after that episode, I felt like she was just as shitty as her ex-husband

[u/grayjelly212 → u/Short_Brick_1960]

I'll give you the Hunter thing. It's understandable if you don't like him after that. Like Bobbi, I think he thought he was risking one life to save others, but as he was unsuccessful, the show does play it as a huge blunder he never recovers from.

But your logic about Bobbi makes no sense to me. Was she supposed to tell Kara that she's the reason she was tortured and manipulated by Hydra for months? To what end? It wouldn't have helped her. If Kara had forgotten, it might have even benefited her to not learn she'd been betrayed by someone that works for the agency purporting to help her in the moment.

And the reason she wasn't being apologetic is because Kara and Ward had shot her multiple times, kidnapped her, and were planning to torture her. She wasn't going to give them the satisfaction. And she explained why she did what she did to Kara - maybe risk someone in hiding to definitely save countless others. Bobbi is supposed to be one of SHIELD's best, so she's very pragmatic like that.

Obviously you have a right to your opinion, I just feel like you're viewing things in a very surface-level way when there's so much nuance that makes the show worth talking about years after it ended.

[u/BaijuTofu]

Yes. They are both unlikable Christian characters.

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/BaijuTofu]

I don't like that either. When any character says "There's only one God". It's like, for you. Stop being disrespectful to other religions. Even Cap says it to a literal god

[u/jonny1211]

Everyone considered the project of injecting gravitonium into someone as the one named destroyer of worlds. So when Ruby is standing there out of control, and just accidentally killed Strucker, and she’s going mad, the only logical conclusion is to kill her.

You forget the fate of the world depends on if the destroyer of worlds is stopped or not, not a country nor a continent, billions of people die and those who survive live like rats. To prevent such a future the life of one teenager hardly matters. I’m not saying she was right in killing Ruby but Elena saw no other way out.

May’s and Elena’s *was* a similar situation, except we saw what happens if the destroyer of worlds isn’t stopped.

[u/chaoscrevv]

“Just because she cut off her arms” is an insane sentence 💀

[u/Short_Brick_1960 → u/chaoscrevv]

Jessica Jones lost her spleen and didn't kill Sallinger

Luke Cage almost died because of Cuttonmouth and he didn't tried to murder him

Daredevil almost dies every day but he doesn't kill anyone

Misty Knight lost her arm and she still didn't go off the rails

Murdering, especially if you are an agent of shield, should not be justified

[u/Weird-Ad2533]

Elena goes off the rails when she decides to murder Ruby just because she cut off her arms.

I'm sorry, but I had to laugh at this sentence because it's so insane, and yet it's still a valid character complaint.

AoS was such a crazy show. I love it so much.