The Avengers will never appear on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., despite interest from the show's producers. ABC's flagship comic book TV show premiered in 2013 and gave the network its biggest series premiere in four years. However, consistent viewership decline painted a bleak picture until things turned around midway through season 1. S.H.I.E.L.D. clawed its way back and has since found its own voice that continues to resonate with its millions of fans. What's more, they continuously manage to throw curve balls at viewers - with the Inhumans and Framework story arcs, among other things - which isn't all too common for comic book TV shows nowadays.
The first season of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. was quite promising for franchise fans, especially for those who were hoping to see more of their favorite big screen characters, but what viewers got instead was a stream of narratives that remain generally unconnected to the overarching shared universe. Captain America: The Winter Soldier and Captain America: Civil War have made an immense impact on the TV series (and the MCU at large), but the only instance in which Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. played a role for an Avengers film was finding Loki's Sceptre prior to Avengers: Age of Ultron.
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Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. recently wrapped production on its 100th episode, and Screen Rant attended the series' set visit along with other press to interview the cast and crew. While discussing S.H.I.E.L.D.'s future, executive producers Jed Whedon and Maurissa Tancharoen Whedon, regretfully, said audiences shouldn't expect to see Iron Man or any other Avengers on the small screen.
Jed: I think there's definitely things that will never happen but...
Maurissa: I don't I still don't think we'll ever have Iron Man show up on the show.
Jed: Right.
Maurissa: Unfortunately
Jed: But, I think that you know, that the things that won't happen are more just are based on sort of our tastes and our wishes. It's not, you know, there's certain things that I think are off the table. Just because we're like, if we discuss them we go, nah. But no. Our entire show is based on a man coming back to life, and so from the beginning, it was very grounded. Out of the gate, it was not all heroes or super. But we've seen that that changes and we saw the framework last year that really anything goes, so it's liberating for us to storytellers to know there are no rules, but at same time we have to sort of set up rules for ourselves that the world makes sense, and it feels a piece and cohesive universe.
Aside from the Avengers appearing on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., or S.H.I.E.L.D.'s characters appearing on the big screen, one of the biggest questions people have is: Will Earth's mightiest heroes find out that Phil Coulson is alive? Simply put: no. Clark Gregg feels that the Avengers have "moved on" from Coulson, but he's touched by all the fans who continually ask about his involvement with the silver screen side of things. After all, Coulson was the connective tissue between the Avengers' solo movies during Phase 1, and his "death" was the impetus for their union.
While the Avengers may never appear on the small screen, that doesn't preclude the other heroes and characters from doing so. As audiences may remember, Lady Sif (Jaimie Alexander), Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), and Maria Hill (Cobie Smulders) have all appeared on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., but those were years ago and the series is further removed from the core MCU than ever before, so even they may never reappear on television - but fans can still hope.