Even though on ABC, we know Agent Phil Coulson is alive and well in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, as far as the film side of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is concerned, Coulson's last words were said amidst the Earth's Mightiest Heroes' first team-up in 2012's The Avengers. But thanks to the upcoming Captain Marvel being set in the mid-1990s, Clark Gregg will be returning to the big screen as Coulson. With the help of Marvel's incredible de-aging technology, this time Coulson will play a younger agent who's just starting out his career with S.H.I.E.L.D. After being introduced in the first MCU film, Iron Man, and digging deep into his character for five seasons of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, Gregg loved exploring this different era of Coulson. Here's what he said:
There was something really special about going back to the early days when he was just kind of coming up the ranks. I had to take innocence workshops and go back to when he was a little less crusty and jaded!
We're excited to see a young and chipper Agent Phil Coulson grace the screen with Captain Marvel's release. During his interview with Entertainment Weekly, Clark Gregg explained that Coulson is quite the fan of MC Hammer and attempts to channel him, much to Nick Fury's annoyance. Samuel L. Jackson will also be getting the de-aging treatment in the film, as other actors such as Michael Douglas, Robert Downey Jr. and Kurt Russell have for flashback sequences in other MCU films. However, for Gregg and Jackson, the technique will be used throughout the film, as the two S.H.I.E.L.D agents are part of the principal cast.
With Phil Coulson and Nick Fury being much younger in Captain Marvel, the film will mark a turning point for their characters who will meet each other in the film and haven't had any exposure to superheroes or aliens yet. While the superhero flick at first follows Carol Danvers in the elite military team Starforce on the Kree planet of Hala, a good amount of the film will take the hero back to her home planet, where we will meet Fury and Coulson, who are a lot more desk ridden then when we first came to know them. In Fury's case, he will be struggling with the thought that his glory days are over now that the Cold War has concluded.
Seeing Agent Phil Coulson back to the MCU after a seven-year drought from the major leagues while he has been on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D adds to the high anticipation for Captain Marvel. For fans of his television show, Coulson's resurrection has ties to the Kree, and for Carol Danvers, it's the source of her powers. So Coulson's return to the MCU film realm in this specific installment might not be so out-of-the-blue and could have some sort of larger effect on the shared universe. Captain Marvel comes to theaters on March 8, 2019.
