Spoiler Warning: If you’re not caught up with the third season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., I suggest you stop reading now as there will be spoilers below.
When it comes to Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., one of the show’s greatest strengths is the ability to constantly reinvent itself. In the first season, the show spent the first half of the season shaping the characters and the world they inhabited, only to destroy S.H.I.E.L.D. and the group as we’d come to know it. Brett Dalton‘s Grant Ward was revealed to be a double agent, and in the second season, we began to see a completely other side to him as he went against Coulson and his former teammates and tried to re-build Hydra. Of course, as we’re all aware – or at least you should be if you’re in this post – Ward was meant with death at the hand of Coulson (literally), only to have his corpse become inhabited by a creature known as Hive.
Going into the second half of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.‘s third season, we’ll come to see yet another side to Ward as the person he once was is overtaken by an ancient Inhuman. While talking to the folks over at TV Line, Dalton revealed that, while he’s still “relatively intact” emotionally, he does miss being able to work alongside his former team-mates.
“I’ve been splintered from the cast since I became a double agent,” Dalton notes. “And unfortunately, that has been one of the saddest things for me, because I love these guys so much and I don’t get to work with them as often as I like.”
Given the amount of changes he’s had to face when it comes to his character’s ever-changing story-line on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and the continual separation from the core group, one would expect Dalton to feel hurt. However, according to Dalton, he insists that isn’t the case.
Has Dalton ever felt hurt by the story-line-dictated segregation? “No,” he says. “I’ve gotten bumps and bruises from some of the fight scenes, but emotionally I’m still relatively intact — as much as one could hope for!”
As to what we can expect from Ward’s new direction as Hive overtakes his corpse, Dalton refers back to Will, the man Jemma (Elizabeth Henstridge) came to have a relationship with while on Maveth. Meaning, we can expect him to look like Ward, and retain his memories and thoughts, even though it’s truly Hive inside.
“As we saw when [the creature] inhabited [spaceman] Will, Ward is still going to walk and talk like a human. And he looks the same on the outside,” Dalton shares. “But the character that we fell in love with is no longer.”
Given that the last time Coulson (Clark Gregg) and company – more specifically Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) – saw Ward, he was dead, it’s sure to cause confusion for the group if they come across him. (And given this is S.H.I.E.L.D. we’re talking about, they will.) However, Coulson isn’t the only one bound to be surprised by this new incarnation of Ward. Malick (Powers Boothe) will have plenty of questions after Ward’s return from Maveth.
“What do we do now what we’ve brought this creature back? What are his real intentions? And are they in line with Malick’s? These are the exact questions that Malick has in his head, and these are questions that we are going to answer,” says Dalton. “The audience is getting to know the character just as Malick is, and just as I am in playing him. It’s a whole new chapter for Ward.”
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. will return tomorrow night on ABC at 9 PM EST. Be sure to tune in! And as always, for all things Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. be sure to follow along here.
Source: TV Line.
