'Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.' Preview: Elizabeth Henstridge Reveals Secrets of the Alien Planet
This week, on Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., we get the story we’ve been waiting months for: Where did Simmons go? After several brief glimpses, we’ll get the story of all “4,722 Hours” and we spoke to Elizabeth Henstridge about tackling the episode without any of the rest of the main cast.
In the above exclusive preview clip, we see Simmons go all Survivor on some unseen tentacled beast. Trapped on the unnamed alien planet, she is forced to hunt for her food, but the food hunts back. Her triumphant “You’re dead, beeyotch!” and accompanying burp is probably the season’s high point so far.
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The tentacle looks terrible, but Henstridge says otherwise. “They cooked some sort of syrup/corn flour/milk mixture in there, so actually it tasted pretty good. It was just the not knowing what it was going to taste like that was the worst because we only had one take of that.” The worst thing she’s ever eaten in reality was a bug in Thailand. “It just exploded in your mouth,” she recounts with an audible grimace, but she imagines the tentacle probably tasted worse than that to Simmons.
Doing the rest of the episode wasn’t nearly as easy as eating alien tentacles. Shooting took place during the worst part of the summer heat wave, so every day, it was 100 plus degrees. “It was madness, honestly, but it was the best experience I’ve ever had,” Henstridge shares. The desert they used as a location used to be the bottom of a sea floor, “There were a lot of old, fossil-type stones and so, if you slipped and fell, your skin just gets lacerated. We went through it on this episode!”
As tough as it was on her, though, Henstridge gives all due credit to the crew. “I’m just acting as me and we have our cameraman carrying 60 pounds on their shoulders trying to get the shot.” Everyone got behind her, so it didn’t feel like she had to carry the show alone. “Really, it was an ensemble with all the crew. It’s never just about the acting: There’s a million people behind the scenes.”
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As demonstrated by her wildlife management/devouring shows, Simmons isn’t the same meek lab tech we met in Season 1. “In Season 2, we saw her come into her own a bit more as an individual,” says Henstridge. Clearly, she developed the toughness to make hard decisions — even though she didn’t kill Ward, it wasn’t for lack of trying during the assault on Hydra’s base — and that toughness pays off here. And even though she still relies heavily on Fitz emotionally, she proves more than equal to the task of surviving on her own. “I definitely think everything that’s happened to her up to this point has prepared her as much as possible.”
As for Henstridge herself, would she ever be interested in visiting an alien planet? “No! I’m such a scaredy-cat. I mean, I can barely get on a roller coaster. So, the thought of going to another planet is…” She trails off in distaste. “And I think I’m justified in that now!” She says that seeing The Martian — the recent Matt Damon film — cemented her opinion. “I like my creature comforts, y'know?”
In the “4,722 Hours” episode, Simmons fantasizes about all the foods she’ll eat when she gets back — which adds new context to the scene where she breaks down at a fancy dinner Fitz organizes for her. In real life, she says food is also one of the big things she’d miss. “My day is definitely centered around mealtime.” Even more than that, though, the one thing she’d miss most: “People I like. I’m quite a tactile person, so not to be able to just hug someone or hold someone’s hand. The isolation thing would probably get to me first.”
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. airs Tuesdays at 9 p.m. on ABC.
