If you tuned into the Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. midseason finale last week you’d know that towards the end of a very intense episode, Coulson (Clark Gregg) finally put an end to the traitorous former Agent Ward via robotic hand chest crush – but, that wasn’t the last we saw of actor Brett Dalton looking very much alive, if a little on the tired side.
Apparently, the ancient Inhuman deity (or whatever it’ll actually turn out to be) transferred its consciousness into Ward’s body just as the portal back to Earth was closing, so although the character we’ve been following since the very first season is dead, Dalton will continue on next year playing this mysterious entity.
Of course, Ward began as a good guy and then revealed his dark side towards the end of the first season, so in essence, Dalton has already got to play two very different characters, and in an interview with IGN, he discusses what it was like to add yet another aspect to this fan-favorite villain.
As an actor, I’ve more or less gotten to play a new character each season, and it’s incredibly cool and incredibly challenging and fun. But in many ways this is probably the hardest iteration of this character because we aren’t dealing with a “human being” anymore. This is Ward 2.0. This is a human being plus something else, this is a human body being occupied by a creature that’s been around for centuries. In Season 1, it was like “oh hey, by the way, you’re a spy and you have this checkered past.” This is like “oh hey, by the way, your body is being inhabited by something else.” [laughs] So that can seem like maybe a harder thing to pull off. I think we’re definitely doing it. You’ll have to tune in and watch to see just where it goes.
Dalton also hints that this new being will retain some of Ward’s consciousness, which should make for a very interesting dynamic when we return to Marvel’s Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. in the new year.
