Posted in: ABC, Disney+, Marvel, streaming, TV | Tagged: ABC, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., marvel, mcu

So Is Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Proper MCU Canon or Not?

If you had a chance to check out Tara Bennett and Paul Terry's The Story of Marvel Studios: The Making of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, then you know it's an impressive and exhaustive look at Marvel Studios and the year-by-year, project-after-project steps it took to create the Marvel Cinematic Universe that fans know today. Unless you're a fan of ABC's Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Because to say intel on the long-running series is lacking would be an understatement. And why is that? Because even after the easter eggs, the crossover appearances (like Samuel L. Jackson's Nick Fury), and the establishment of Agent Carter as pseudo-canon, the reason why Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. wasn't included? That's because it's not proper MCU canon…

At least according to Bennett, who responded to questions about the show being MIA in the book. "We wrote the book. It does not say AoS is part of the MCU," Bennett wrote. So does this mean that the seven seasons of the Clark Gregg and Ming-Na Wen-starring series are being labeled"multiverse" and lumped into the same category as Netflix's Charlie Cox-starring Daredevil? Hard to say, and understandable since Bennett's job isn't to give out large chunks of what's in the book for free.

Bennett urges folks to read the book for themselves to truly understand all of the factors in play before reminding everyone that Bennett and Terry's job was to report on the history of Marvel Studios based on the evidence at hand and the materials presented and not create a history that isn't there. It should be noted that series creator Joss Whedon is quoted in the book as always seeing the series apart from the film world. For him, Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was "always was a separate thing- it was really separate from the movies."

"It was extraordinary. There were many, many "pinch me" moments that we experienced over the course of the four years this book took us to make. We came into this project as fans who had been excitedly awaiting each Marvel Studios film since 'Iron Man' was released back in 2008. And, beyond that, we have been film nerds since we were kids," Bennett explained about the access they had to study the history of Marvel Studios and the Marvel Cinematic Universe. "We have written official making-of books for a really eclectic range of movies and TV shows for many years now. But the access, the support, the trust, and the collaborative spirit with which Marvel Studios came to this book project was at a level that we've never experienced before. The deeper we got into the project, and what became increasingly exciting, was realizing the level of detail, and just how much they were keen to pull back the curtain and reveal to the fans exactly how the studio was formed and evolved. And, of course, how they made the Marvel Cinematic Universe across three creative phases. And the very personal stories they shared with us for this book really are grounded in the risk-taking, the stresses that come with that, the decisions that ended up requiring a lot of problem-solving, as well as the critical and commercial successes."

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