The Consultant

The Consultant is the first in a series of Marvel one-shots. It was attached to the physical media release of Thor on September 13th 2011. It is set after the events of Iron Man 2 and Thor during the events of The Incredible Hulk. The Consultant was directed by Leythum and written by Eric Pearson.

 

Phil Coulson ends up meeting Jasper Sitwell and informs him that the World Security Council wishes for Emil Blonsky, the Abomination, to be released from prison to join the Avengers Initiative. They blame the damage to New York City caused during the final battle of The Incredible Hulk as being caused by Bruce Banner as the Hulk.

In order to prevent this from happening, they decide to send Tony Stark who is currently part of the Avengers Initiative as a consultant to talk with General Thaddeus Ross to anger him enough that he would refuse to release Blonsky into their custody.

The mission is succesful with Phil Coulson meeting with Jasper Sitwell again to inform him that Ross ended up having Tony Stark removed from the bar, to which Tony Stark responded by purhasing the bar and having it demolished.

The Consultant was generally considered a lower budget one-shot, built from the budget being used up with the other two one-shots at the time; A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor's Hammer & Item 47. The one-shot as such almost entirely focuses around Phil Coulson and Jasper Sitwell talking with intersected segments of The Incredible Hulk focusing around Abominations rampage and the post-credit scene of Tony Stark approaching General Thaddeus Ross at the bar.

Item 47

Item 47 is the third in a series of Marvel One-Shots. It was attached alongside The Avengers physical media release on September 25th 2012 and is set after the Battle Of New York that occured in that film.

 Benjamin Pollack and Claire Wise, a down-on-their-luck couple, rob banks together with a discarded Chitauri gun left over from the attack on New York City in The Avengers. This draws the attention of S.H.I.E.L.D. 

Felix Blake one of the two agents assigned to the mission sends Jasper Sitwell to retrieve the weapon and "neutralize" the couple. Sitwell tracks the couple down to a motel room that gets wrecked in the subsequent confrontation, and the stolen money gets destroyed as the Chitauri gun goes haywire. 

Instead of killing the couple, Sitwell acknowledges that out of the 47 missing pieces of alien technology they have discovered, this is the only one that was working. It's revealed that Benjamin repaired it which gives Sitwell an idea. Sitwell invites them to join S.H.I.E.L.D. as a way to get back at Felix Blake. Benjamin is assigned to the R&D 'think-tank' to reverse engineer the Chitauri technology, and Claire becomes Blake's assistant, much to Blake's frustration.

This short helped result in ABC ordering a television spin-off Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and later led to the initial concept for Damage Control. It is also revealed in subsequent media that Hydra gained access to the technology thanks to the research of Benjamin Pollack which is used to arm Hydra in Avengers: Age Of Ultron.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor's Hammer

 

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor's Hammer is the second in a series of Marvel One-Shots, released on October 25th 2011 with the release of Captain America: The First Avenger on physical media. It takes place during the events of The Incredible Hulk, and in between the events of Iron Man 2 and Thor. It was directed by Leythum and written by Eric Pearson.

 

The one-shot tells the story of Phil Coulson on his way to New Mexico, stopping at a Roxxon Gas Station. Unable to decide between powdered and frosted donuts, both for 75 cents, he finds himself in the middle of a robbery. Using his quick thinking and skills as a S.H.I.E.L.D agent he proceeds to defeat the two robbers with ease, leaving to continue on his journey after deciding to buy both packs of donuts.

 

Eric Pearson the writer remarked that the action scene, while brief, resulted in 80% of the budget being used up resulting in the lower budget one-shot 'The Consultant' focusing around Jasper Sitwell and Phil Coulson talking.