General Hale

"I'll put an end to all of this. This entire S.H.I.E.L.D. chapter will be over."

- General Hale plotting to hunt down the agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

General Hale is the main antagonist of the second half of Season 5 of the ABC TV series, Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D..

She is a high-ranking officer of the U.S. Armed Forces who formulates a plot to arrest any remaining S.H.I.E.L.D. agents following the Framework simulation conducted by Holden Radcliffe. She is also the mother of Ruby Hale, who acted as her main assassin and right-hand.

She was portrayed by Catherine Dent.

Hunting S.H.I.E.L.D.
Following the death of Hale's superior Glenn Talbot, Hale decided to take action by ordering the arrest of all S.H.I.E.L.D. agents after learning that Daisy Johnson (actually a Life-Model Decoy of the real Daisy Johnson) was the one responsible for Talbot's death. Even when being told by a captive Leo Fitz about the true circumstances behind Talbot's death, Hale refuses to give up her pursuit on the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

After killing two of her subordinates for their failure, Hale confronts her daughter Ruby for missing class, and advised her to tag along with her plan to hunt down S.H.I.E.L.D.. Though Ruby agrees to do this, she questions her mother of her motives by pointing out that S.H.I.E.L.D. used to be praised as good guys until the Framework incident, to which Hale responded that her actions were due to orders by people that she needs to answer to, promising that she's only doing this for Ruby and all the other unfortunate citizens.

Locking Up Her Daughter
When the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents have resurfaced, Hale sends Ruby to spring the trap on them under a false intent on peaceful negotiation. To that end, she sends in robot soldiers to help Ruby capture them, but Ruby planned on killing them in an intent to lure Daisy to her, which resulted a backfire that allowed the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents to escape.

Confronting Ruby in her bedroom, Hale states her disappointment for what Ruby did, but Ruby defended her actions by declaring it an opportunity to find Daisy. Unperturbed by this, Hale furious locks Ruby in her bedroom and hires Carl Creel as her new right-hand. Despite Creel's suspcions over Hale's true motives, he agreed to join her to hunt down the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

Personality
Hale is considered to be very stern and no-nonsensed for a general, and is very obsessive in hunting down S.H.I.E.L.D. agents for the death of Talbot; even when being told about the true circumstances behind Talbot's death, Hale refuses to give up her pursuit, implying darker purposes that she may have in mind with the agents.

She can also be quite demanding and abusive towards her own daughter Ruby, even berating her for missing class and locking her up in her bedroom as punishment for her intentional failure to capture the S.H.I.E.L.D. agents.

Trivia

 * General Hale is currently the third main antagonist of a season to be an original character, following Jiaying (second half of Season 2), and Kasius (first half of Season 5).