Agents of SHIELD: Enver Gjokaj Shares What It Was Like to Play Daniel Sousa Again

After Agent Carter was canceled back in 2016, Enver Gjokaj didn’t think he’d get the chance to play Daniel Sousa in the Marvel Cinematic Universe again. Thankfully, Gjokaj’s time starring in the series Dollhouse made him close with Agents of SHIELD showrunners, Jed Whedon and Maurissa Tancharoen, who decided to bring Sousa back to the small screen. At the beginning of the current Agents of SHIELD season, the team rescued Sousa from his death in 1955. However, Sousa needed to pretend to be dead in order to preserve the timeline, so he’s now joining the team on their time-traveling adventures. In a recent interview with Collider, Gjokaj shared what it was like stepping back into the role.

“It was a blast. When I finished with Agent Carter, I had pretty much said goodbye to the character, so this came out of nowhere and it really surprised me. I wasn’t involved in the internal Marvel discussions about this happening, so I was the last to find out and it was a real pleasant surprise. Jed and Maurissa had been talking about getting me on SHIELD for a little while, but it hadn’t really materialized, so it did come as a surprise,” Gjokaj shared.

“It wasn’t,” Gjokaj added when asked if was hard to say goodbye to Sousa for a second time. “For me, this was just a really pleasant way to get to replay a character that I’d spent so much time with. Usually, you develop a character, and that’s it. It doesn’t matter how good or bad it was, you’re never really gonna get a chance to do it again. Very rarely do you get to revisit a character that you really love to play. Usually, it happens in theater, but in this case, it was television.”

When it came to joining Agents of SHIELD so late in the game, it wasn’t too hard of a transition. “Well, what helped was that, in the script, Daniel is in the dark, so that meant that I didn’t really have to know everything that has happened over seven seasons of Agents of SHIELD. I got to inhabit that perspective from the character and really just let him take the ride, unawares. Everything that’s happening around him is pretty much a mystery. That’s where he’s coming from me, so didn’t make it that hard for me,” Gjokaj explained.

During the interview, Gjokaj also talked about how he’s not sure what happened between Sousa and Peggy Carter after Agent Carter. While some people were upset Peggy ended up with Cap and not Sousa, many minds have been changed this week when fans noticed some chemistry between Sousa and Daisy Johnson.

Agents of SHIELD airs Wednesday nights on ABC at 10 PM EST.