Clark Gregg Talks Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 2
By Nick Tylwalk
Sadly, Clark Gregg didn’t discuss the upcoming second season of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. with us. Nope, he went to the big dogs at IGN to talk about getting promoted by Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury and what it feels like now that Phil Coulson is Director of the once-mighty but now rebuilding S.H.I.E.L.D.
More from TV
- The Expanse: Every character ranked from worst to best
- Monarch: Legacy of Monsters episodes 1 and 2 review: Aftermath
- The 9 best (and 8 worst) Arrowverse characters
- 10 things nobody wants to admit about The Walking Dead
- Harley Quinn renewed for a fifth season on Max (and it’s well-deserved)
Saying that Coulson went through a lot in the first season would be something of an understatement, given that he was brought back from the dead thanks to some alien science, had a run-in with the lost love his job won’t allow him to see, found out one of his hand-picked team members was a sleeper Hydra agent and saw the organization he dedicated his life to destroyed from within. He came through it okay, except for that creepy bit carving alien symbols on the wall at the very end of the season finale.
Still, Gregg admitted to IGN that Coulson is necessarily a man who’s been changed by what he’s experienced:
"He’s a very different Coulson than the guy who everyone knew. A lot of people who knew him in the old days say, “He’s different.” I think you would have to be different having gone through that stuff. So I think he’s reinventing himself and re-understanding himself as a person anyway, which is probably really necessary to taking in the new environment and figuring out what SHIELD ought to be in a way that it doesn’t get rotten again."
Stepping out of Coulson’s head, Gregg also supported the decision to splt Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. into two halves for Season 2, saying he thinks fans will aprreciate better than the random two-to-three-week breaks during a normal TV season. ABC will use the show’s hiatus to air the new Marvel series Agent Carter, starring Hayley Atwell as Peggy Carter and focusing on her post-World War II adventures.
Changed man or not, it’s hard to believe fans won’t rally around Director Coulson as they have in the past. Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. returns this fall, Tuesdays at 9 pm on ABC.