Keeping the Hope Alive: Clark Gregg Loves The Idea of Coming Back as The Vision

When news of Joss Whedon creating a S.H.I.E.L.D. television show for ABC hit, there was a lot of reaction. There’s still a lot of reaction. I think the residual energy of it may have just reached the Curiosity Rover on Mars (she’s also disappointed that Cobie Smulders is way too busy with HIMYM to realistically join the show).

A good chunk of that reaction was from fans of Clark Gregg‘s Agent Coulson, both crying in pain because his character is presumed dead and therefore presumably cannot be in the show, and cries of hope that he will be resurrected in some fashion (possibly as the superhero The Vision, pictured above) for it. Turns out Clark Gregg had about the same reaction to the news.

He told Movies.com: “You know what, that was the moment when I went, ‘Great, they’re doing the S.H.I.E.L.D. TV show and I’m on a slab!” The actor is still uncertain as to his future with the Marvel franchise:

I don’t know if we’ll see Agent Coulson again, but I certainly do his voice in their animated series, The Ultimate Spider-Man, and you never know, there may be a flashback or something sometime. I really hit it off with those guys [at Marvel], and I’ve talked to them lately about some ways I can continue to work with them, perhaps as a writer or director.

But what about the Vision? The Vision has been a popular suggestion for Coulson’s resurrection. The character is an android, with the brain patterns of a deceased superhero encoded into his brain, giving him a “matrix” for his emotions… but basically a human soul. It sounds like Gregg would take the role, if it were offered:

You know the Vision is synthetic with a soul, sort of, and he’s an amazing character who I loved when I used to read those comics. I love the idea of Coulson as that guy, but I don’t know if that’s in the cards.

While it’s far too early for Gregg to know whether or not he’ll be involved in the next Avengers movie, it would seem that since Iron Man 3 and Thor 2 are already underway, he’d know if he was in those (or he’s keeping a very big secret). It certainly seem like if Marvel was going to bring Coulson back, it would be in the next Avengers. Joss Whedon, for example, has expressed a wish to keep The Avengers 2 as self contained as its predecessor, so that folks who don’t see the intervening solo movies can still get a grip on the characters’ development. My pet theory is that it will simply be revealed that Coulson never died in the first place, that his injuries were opportunistically used by Nick Fury (as Coulson himself indirectly suggested before falling unconscious) to manipulate the Avengers to banding together as a working team. A reveal of Fury’s willingness to manipulate those who trust him would be an excellent second movie reveal.

(Movies.com via MTV Splash Page.)