Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: What Really Happened to Agent Coulson?

[Warning: This story contains spoilers from Tuesday's Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Read at your own risk!]

The truth about Agent Coulson was finally revealed. Sort of. Possibly. If you choose to believe it.

During Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.'s midseason return, Agent Coulson (Clark Gregg) was subjected to a machine that would draw out the memories of his apparent time in Tahiti. But it wasn't until Raina (Ruth Negga) played on his emotions regarding his family — both of his parents are dead — and his former girlfriend — who cried for days when S.H.I.E.L.D. told her that Coulson was dead — that Coulson decided to really discover the truth behind what happened to him after dying in The Avengers.

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Well, Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) "moved heaven and earth" to save Coulson, who was not just dead for a few seconds, but several days. Coulson went through six surgeries to restore his body. "The trauma he endured was ungodly," Dr. Streiten (Ron Glass) said. Notice all these keywords he dropped in while telling Coulson the truth, leading me to believe something otherworldly was used to bring Coulson back to life.

But this is apparently Coulson — the Coulson, not some Life Model Decoy or the Vision. (Probably.) But through all those surgeries, the company man lost his will to live, so the surgery where we saw a machine working on his brain was implanting him with happy memories that would restore his will to live. However, Streiten did say, "If you only knew —" before Coulson jumped out of his car, so there is definitely more to the story than the S.H.I.E.L.D. brain trust is telling us.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: The truth about Coulson revealed!

Now the real question is: Why? Why is Agent Coulson so important that Nick Fury would order him to be literally brought back from the dead? How is he different than any of the other S.H.I.E.L.D. agents who have fallen over the years?

By the way, "Heaven & Earth" was a Thor comic miniseries, so maybe there's a godly connection there? Excuse me while I head to my local comic book store.

What did you think of the Coulson reveal? There's still something afoot, right? Hit the comments with your thoughts!

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. airs Tuesdays at 8/7c on ABC.