CBR News: "Jeffrey, let's start by looking a bit at the season so far as whole. With episode 10 coming up, from your perspective as someone with a lot of TV experience, are things around where you hoped them to be at this point, both creatively and in terms of audience?" Jeffrey Bell: "Creatively, yes. One of the things that's interesting for us is doing a 22-episode arc; the pace of telling that story. We have to arc something out over 22 episodes versus 10 or 12. What I think people will see in episode 10 is how things we laid out in episode 1 and episode 3 and episode 4 and episode 5 and other episodes actually all start to come together, and you see pieces come together in 10. For us, that's exciting, and I think people see, "Oh, there's been this plan," and what felt standalone is actually connected, but you can still get into it. That's been fun for us, and I think people will enjoy the episode because of some of the cards we turn over with respect to that."
Bell then goes on to discuss some of the fan reaction to the show specifically their desire for characters from the comics.
"The thing that's interesting about fan responses is, it's all over the place. There are die-hard Marvel people who wonder why Mike Peterson isn't Luke Cage. "We need more Marvel characters, it needs to be serialized." Then you've got people on the other end who want more kissing. There are a lot of different opinions, but I think in general people are responding well to the show. I can't remember the last time I had so many unsolicited people go, "Oh, you work on that show, I love that show," or, "My wife loves that show," or, "My kid loves that show," or, "My brother loves that show." I feel like there's goodwill in the world for that. So that's been cool."
"This week's episode sees the return of J. August Richards' character from the pilot, Mike Peterson, who's presumably in a very different place than the last time we saw him." "He is! J. did such a good job on our pilot, and fan reaction was terrific. We always had an idea of different ways to bring him back. It's a show where we say, "Not all heroes are super," but when we go up against people with punchy jumpy powers like some of the Centipede characters have, it made sense for us to enlist someone who might have a similar skillset so that we just don't get clobbered. Bringing him in, seeing him cleaned up, doing well, is fun. And J. really did a great job of bringing that energy to it. He also feels like this is a guy who has a second shot. The first time he met this team, they could have put a real bullet in his head, and instead they knocked him out. He's grateful for that second chance, and anxious to prove it was worth their doing. I think fans will dig that."
"Speaking of Agent May, wanted to ask about the recent reveal of certainly some type of a relationship between May and Ward, which took a lot of people by surprise. Can you give any commentary about what inspired that pairing, and can viewers look forward to learning more about their dynamic going forward?" "It happened kind of naturally, which is fun. If you can have something that's surprising and natural, you go, "Oh, that's a winner." After the Asgardian episode and Ward touching the staff and going to the rage-y dark place, and him really fighting that, hopefully when he gets to the bar at the end you can see Skye is also there for him in a very real way. She offers him a shoulder to cry on -- I don't know about the bars you hang out in, but to me that means, "Here's my shoulder to cry on." The fact that he passed on that, I think not so much because of, she's not attractive or not interesting, but he's sort of trapped in his pain and what he went through. When you go to Agent May, who is also haunted by this past, this pain -- and we got a little bit more into what some of that is in "Repairs" -- I think people sometimes get together to share their pain. "I don't have to talk, I don't have to think, I just have to be." And you understand that. We thought there was a nice shorthand with that that made sense, but was also surprising.It happened kind of naturally, which is fun. If you can have something that's surprising and natural, you go, "Oh, that's a winner." After the Asgardian episode and Ward touching the staff and going to the rage-y dark place, and him really fighting that, hopefully when he gets to the bar at the end you can see Skye is also there for him in a very real way. She offers him a shoulder to cry on -- I don't know about the bars you hang out in, but to me that means, "Here's my shoulder to cry on." The fact that he passed on that, I think not so much because of, she's not attractive or not interesting, but he's sort of trapped in his pain and what he went through. When you go to Agent May, who is also haunted by this past, this pain -- and we got a little bit more into what some of that is in "Repairs" -- I think people sometimes get together to share their pain. "I don't have to talk, I don't have to think, I just have to be." And you understand that. We thought there was a nice shorthand with that that made sense, but was also surprising."
"A common thing people seem to want from the show is more characters from the comics incorporated, and more tie-ins with the Marvel Cinematic Universe -- we've seen some of both, but going forward to the next crop of episodes, would you say viewers can expect more of that stuff? Around the same amount?" "I would say, in general, I think fans will experience the episodes as being a bit more "Marvel." I mean that on several levels. I think we're always looking to find characters either from the Marvel movie universe or the comic universe that fans would recognize. I think bringing the tension and suspense of the movies is something that we're looking to do as our characters become more confident. The other thing that seems to be happening, just based on the fact that what felt like standalone were in fact for us setting up a lot of different pieces of the puzzle, I think you're going to feel more momentum from the stories, episode to episode. Occasional cliffhangers, which I feel are more like a Marvel Comic ending than, "it's all neatly tied up in a bow." So I think on a few levels, fans will feel it's moving a bit more in the Marvel direction."
"And there will be more hints towards the Coulson mystery coming up, as well?" "Yeah. We'll be turning over cards for that in the next few. I'll be curious to hear people's responses to where we're going with that, because everybody has an opinion!"
For the full interview hit the source below.
"The Bridge" - In a shocking cliffhanger episode, Coulson takes the war back to Centipede, and this time he brings in Mike Peterson for some super-soldier support. As they get closer to the truth, startling secrets are revealed and an unexpected twist threatens the team, on "Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.," Tuesday, December 10 (8:00-9:00 p.m., ET) on the ABC Television Network. "Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." stars Clark Gregg as Agent Phil Coulson, Ming-Na Wen as Agent Melinda May, Brett Dalton as Agent Grant Ward, Chloe Bennet as Skye, Iain De Caestecker as Agent Leo Fitz and Elizabeth Henstridge as Agent Jemma Simmons. Guest starring are J. August Richards as Mike Peterson, Ajani Wrighster as Ace, Ruth Negga as Raina, Rick Malambri as Brian Hayward, Molly McCook as Laura Hayward, Cullen Douglas as Edison Po, Rico Devereaux as prison guard and Albert Marrero Jr. as trainer. "The Bridge" was written by Shalisha Francis and directed by Holly Dale.
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