I’m really impressed at how you set everyone up to get to this point, because once you realize what’s happening, you definitely see how it all ties together.

LOEB: And part of what’s so much fun is being able to go back and look at the pilot and see where Coulson says to Ward, “we haven’t scores like yours since Romanov.” Now, at the time, you probably thought “oh, that’s a really good spy.” But then if you think about what Natasha has done with her life and the number of identities she’s had and the number of people that she’s burned along the way, that may have not been the best compliment to give somebody.

BELL: Let me put this on another level: Ward had put Garrett on this plane for a reason, and so he had to come in and be accepted to this team. And so if you’d look at how he related to everyone — Coulson loves projects. Here is a guy who didn’t have people skills. So Garrett says, can you help this guy Ward round off some of the rough edges? So he comes onto the team. Coulson is now vested, because he’s got a project. Who is Ward’s greatest threat? May. What does he do? He seduces her. Who is the one unknown on the team? Skye. He becomes her S.O. How do you get everyone rally around and trust you? You jump out of a plan trying to save someone else. Now, he had a parachute. Let’s say he failed to save Simmons, he would’ve been fine. Everything he’s done has solidified how people feel about him over the course of the season.

LOEB: And what was the next thing he had to do after he saved Simmons? He had someone on the plane who was jealous of him: Fitz. And what did they do? They went on a mission together and they had a really good time together. And a bromance was started. And that took care of that.

BELL: And then even when he was with Lorelei, and she was talking about the darkness inside of him and the other qualities, she saw something that a lot of other people hadn’t seen. So we feel like we laid things out pretty well. Because you don’t want to over tip your hand, but we think people are pretty smart, and you can look back and go, “oh yeah, it was all there the whole time if I had looked.” And what’s fun now that you’ve seen 17, watch it again, or watch 16 again, and every look Ward does seems to have a double meaning.

I love that. Give me an example of something that might be a little less “obvious” than the Romanov line that could be fun for viewers to realize.

LOEB: We’ll give you one that’s a lot of fun, and that’s in “Seeds,” episode 12. Towards the very end, there’s a lovely, heartwarming moment where Skye is standing in front of the fallen S.H.I.E.L.D. agents through the decades. Watch that scene, and keep an eye on Ward.

BELL: And what she’s saying as you’re looking at him.