People can't get enough of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and thanks to a few upcoming projects from the cast and crew we're hearing more and more about the show. Joss Whedon and Clark Gregg have been speaking fairly often about the show thanks to Much Ado About Nothing press obligations. But now, we get to hear from someone else. Speaking to IGN, Ming-Na Wen stated about her character, Melinda May, "What can I say? I think what’s going to be interesting with her character is you discover her slowly. She’s a bit of a mystery, she’s a bit damaged, she doesn’t say very much. She’s slowly revealed -- which means I don’t know who she is yet! [Laughs]." In the trailer, you may recall that Agent Grant (Brett Dalton)expresses a bit of a shock at the fact that "Melinda May is just the pilot." There's definitely a bit of back history to the character. In other interviews May has been referred to as a real badass.
Continuing on about her character in relation to the tone of the show Wen added, "I think if you’re part of that level, if you’re in that level being a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, you’ve seen it all, you know it all." So does that mean Wen is a Level 7 S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent? Probably so. She continued to say about her character's mindset, "There are things that still might surprise you, but at the same time, they have gone through that route before. It’s more about the task of, how do we fix a bad situation? How do we take care of this and make it a benefit for our country? I think those are our real mindsets -- not so much “Holy... whoa! Look at what this person can do...!”, you know?" She goes on to reference the events of a previous Marvel Studios film, The Avengers, "Because they’ve seen aliens fly from a hole up in the sky. We’ve seen a semi-god, so it’s really about, how can we take care of this particular situation." Maybe something happened to Melinda May during the events of The Avengers to make her the damaged character she spoke of above? Perhaps an unfortunate run-in with a few of the Chituari?
Wen also touched on the tone of the show and confirmed that there will be humorous banter undercutting the tension, a cornerstone of all Joss Whedon productions. Wen said that Joss sometimes lets the actors discover that humor for themselves, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. And sometimes it’s just off the top of his head. And a lot of times he’ll let us find it ourselves, because he’s that secure about letting the actors discover things too." There's a bit more at IGN but its mostly just Wen denying any specific questions about her character or the show despite the inventive nature of the questioning.
Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. premieres this Fall on ABC.