Honestly Tripp's character not being developed is just shit writing but personality wise I'll take the more easy going Tripp over the "argh I'm a hard ass muscle dude" any day. What they should have done was keep Tripp and actually develop him as a character outside of "I has commando gear".
Tripp's character fit with the group better and the actor is better than Mack. Only reason why we even like Mack is because they actually wrote him a story arc. And I blame the Rule of One for the entire thing.
I agree Tripp should've been developed more. They tried with the budding romance between him and Jemma, but it wasn't particularly interesting.
While I didn't hate BJ Britt in his role, I think it's fair to say that based on his interactions with the rest of of the cast Henry Simmons was the better fit for the show. He has much more chemistry with Hunter, Fitz, Coulson, Bobbi and Skye.
Britt had similar scenes with enough of dialogue but never did more than take up space. Granted, he didn't have the benefit of a mysterious backstory to channel, but I never had that in mind when it was just Mack interacting with the crew about stuff that didn't have anything to do with the "real" SHIELD, e.g. when he was just chilling with Fitz and Hunter or helping Fitz with his work, or even when he was just straight up afraid of Skye and her powers.
Mack irrationally hating Colson was fucked up. Dude has 2 speeds chill and no chill. Very little depth.
Well he did lose a lot of friends and got it in his head Coulson was in part responsible for it, but he got over it so I don't think that's an indication of little depth. That's character development.
He has a temper, but that's a character flaw. Not bad writing.
