Agents of SHIELD Debuts Season 6 Premiere at WonderCon
SHIELD is going cosmic.
Agents of SHIELD fans at WonderCon got a Marvel-ous treat; not only was the show's Season 6 premiere date (May 10) announced, they also got an early look at the season opener, which was directed by series star Clark Gregg.
If you've already caught the Season 6 trailers that Marvel and ABC have been running since January, it's no spoiler to say that while our beloved Agent Phil Coulson is (as far as we know), truly, officially dead following the events of Season 5, Clark Gregg still shows up on camera, as well as behind it. Coulson appears as a hologram giving Mac leadership advice, but we're also introduced to a mysterious man in black who shares Coulson's face but, when challenged that he's "from SHIELD," coldly retorts, "never heard of it."
This isn't the first time SHIELD has used a familiar face for a villainous twist, but without getting into details, it's safe to say that Gregg seems to relish the chance to play a darker role, and he pulls it off with convincing menace even in his brief time on screen.
Marvel has released a sneak peek at the Anti-Coulson's debut on Twitter - check it out below:
Without giving too much away, the Season 6 premiere picks up a year after the events of Season 5, with Daisy, Simmons, Piper, and Davis on a mission in deep space to try and retrieve Fitz from his cryogenic deep freeze. Meanwhile, Mack is attempting to settle in as the new director of SHIELD and expand their ranks. The earthbound portion of the team is attempting to track a strange anomaly that keeps popping up in different parts of the world and causing "reality warps."“S.H.I.E.L.D.? Never heard of it.” Get a jaw-dropping look at @clarkgregg’s new role on Marvel’s #AgentsofSHIELD! pic.twitter.com/CMV3PCe84s — Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (@AgentsofSHIELD) March 30, 2019
But with Fitz AWOL and Simmons on the hunt for him, SHIELD is missing its two brightest minds, which means the team has no theories about what could be causing these anomalies or how to track them. May has been tasked with recruiting new agents, but as Mack notes, "we've got plenty of muscle; we need brains." You can expect to meet a new SHIELD recruit who could prove very useful in helping figure out what the heck is going on, who has a history with May and no real enthusiasm for taking part in any spy games.
Somewhere in space, Daisy and Simmons' team has been on the hunt for Fitz for months, and the strain is starting to show. Daisy has been using her powers to make an impression with the alien races they've encountered to ensure that everyone knows Quake is a threat, but that might also be drawing some unwanted attention from another hostile intergalactic force - one that should be familiar to SHIELD fans from previous seasons.
After last year's space-bound adventure, it's nice to see Agents of SHIELD venturing even deeper into the cosmic realm, just as the MCU movies are doing, and you can expect some impressive visuals (especially considering the TV budget) as Daisy's team visits an unfamiliar alien world in the premiere. And while we don't get much context for Clark Gregg's new character (except that he and his posse have a somewhat Mad Max vibe, and plenty of heavy-duty weaponry), we can't wait to see how he interacts with our team, considering he's wearing the face of their fallen leader.
While the Season 6 premiere is very much a scene-setter for the larger conflicts to come, it definitely isn't as cryptic as the Season 5 premiere was about the threats facing our heroes, establishing the stakes up front while expanding the world of the show in intriguing ways. The episode also does a great job of introducing and fleshing out a number of supporting SHIELD agents to really dig back into the team dynamic even outside of our core cast, something that the show has been doing effectively with Piper and Davis over the past few seasons. We've still got a lot of questions (and don't expect the show to venture anywhere near the fallout from Avengers: Endgame, which will have hit theaters a couple of weeks prior to the season premiere), but this marks a promising start for the new season, and a satisfying way to keep Gregg involved without cheapening Coulson's death.
Marvel's Agents of SHIELD Season 6 premieres Friday, May 10 on ABC in the US.