The Pentagon quit advising on The Avengers because they found the film too unrealistic

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The Pentagon quit advising on The Avengers because they found the film too unrealistic

Too unrealistic? Which part? The portal to another universe from which evil skeleton-like creatures and flying worms emerge? A super soldier that survived being frozen in ice for 60 years? A guy that’s turned into a monster from some gamma radiation? Nope… the Pentagon, which had been advising on the Avengers script apparently quit because they were put off because it wasn’t clear who SHIELD answered to.

Moviegoers and comic fans know that S.H.I.E.L.D., led by Samuel L. Jackson’s super-spy Nick Fury, is an international peacekeeping/global surveillance/crisis response/quasi-military organization. But its relationship with the United States is murky. And that basically stopped the U.S. military, which is normally eager to cooperate with the film industry on blockbuster movies, from teaming up with the Avengers.

“We couldn’t reconcile the unreality of this international organization and our place in it,” Phil Strub, the Defense Department’s Hollywood liaison, tells Danger Room. “To whom did S.H.I.E.L.D. answer? Did we work for S.H.I.E.L.D.? We hit that roadblock and decided we couldn’t do anything” with the film.

Who cares? SHIELD is just one of those super secret shadowy organizations that answer to some group of cliched super shadowy government and/or world leaders. They’re in almost every comic book and sci-fi or action movie. But the fact that SHIELD wasn’t in some sort of clear chain of command just made the Pentagon’s brain feel all fuzzy.

Via