Many months ago, as the ratings for Agents of SHIELD began its free fall during the midst of a very bad creative funk for the show, Clark Gregg took umbrage with some of the critics of the show who described themselves as geeks. “Those aren’t geeks. Those are losers,” Gregg said, suggesting that real fans should stick around because the show would get much better.
The good news is, it did get better. The bad news is, it took about two months after Gregg made that statement before the show really began turn around. It wasn’t until the plotline began to intersect with Captain America 2 that things finally got interesting, and based on recent ratings, it may have been too late.
In an interview with Screencrush’s Mike Ryan, however, Clark Gregg clarified the “loser” comment, essentially apologizing for speaking for all geeks and hurting some people’s feelings.
It hurt some people’s feelings and I didn’t mean to imply that people who had, as he said, all the geeks had given up on your show. I consider myself in that category. So, I didn’t like things spoken for by that guy and I got defensive and a little protective of my team. But, I know it hurt some people’s feelings when I said that and I really regret it. People can watch or not watch, it doesn’t mean they’re a loser. But, that said, I was kind of tying to speak for the nerd that I am, who grew up reading Marvel stuff and just say, look, have some patience. These are brand new characters — the only brand new Marvel characters you’re going to see; all of the other ones are 30-years-old and have had time to be refined with the comics — you’ve got brand new people putting together a team and kind of establishing these characters in a way that, trust me, to quote a title, is going to be useful once we get to the back half.
When I first read that quote, I thought you meant it as “you’re a loser because you’re going to miss out on something you might like,” not that you’re actually a loser, but maybe you did mean that …
It was a terrible attempt — and if I actually did the delivery — it’s something that we used to say, jokingly, you don’t even spell it the same way: l-o-o-s-u-h. You’re a loosuh. Maybe there’s a “z” in there. And it was just, yeah, you’re going to be losing out.
So he was joking, the joke didn’t come off in print like he’d have liked it too, and he really wants us all to watch Agents of SHIELD. Please.
I also encourage you to read the rest of the interview, where Gregg talks about the series chances of renewal, and how if the finale’s storyline will play into the overall Marvel Universe.
Source: Screencrush
