COMICS ON TV

I recently read that Agents of SHIELD is steadily losing viewers which brings to mind something I've always thought, extremes with comic book stories are not very good in television. When Batman came out in 1966 it was a lot of camp and not too much substance. That series worked because back in those days television was not a charged medium. The Superman series starring George Reeves was geared toward kids and it had been on air in the 1950's.

Superman was highly predictable and did not have much depth since it only had a 30 minute timespan in which to tell a full story. If you fast forward to the 70's you have shows like Shazam, Wonder Woman, and the ill fated Justice League, series.

All of these shows failed to get long runs out of the gate because by the 70's there were more shows chose from and comic books were not really as marketable as before. With films such as Star Wars it seemed like comic books would be doomed. Yes Superman was released in 1978 and it was a huge box office hit but beyond that it seemed like the genre did not really have a life in the small screen.

Fast forward to the early 90's and it was more of the same with failed attempts in shows such as the Flash, and Justice League. It wasn't until Smallville that there was a real success with heroes. Now we look at SHIELD and see what's wrong.

People expect all out action and special effects sometimes and SHIELD has not gone that route. SHIELD has taken to slowly telling a story that relies on depth mixed with action. A show like Smallville began to step away from the soap opera in order to bring in more comic book aspects and while that worked, it took a little bit of wind from the shows sails. As far as SHIELD goes there's a possibility that it can nail the right balance if given a chance. People should not view it as just another comic book show. Perhaps the show is lagging because it only has one so far compelling character in terms of Agent Coulson.

I hope the show stays on the air because I think it's a great show.